[ In Bosnia-Erzegovina, la classe dirigente nazionalista musulmana
("bosgnacca") prosegue l'opera iniziata dal suo leader recentemente
scomparso, Alija Izetbegovic: separatismo su base religiosa, attacchi
alla laicita' dello Stato, anti-jugoslavismo, revisionismo storico...
A Sarajevo, la proposta di rinominare la centralissima Via Maresciallo
Tito intitolandola ad Izetbegovic ha suscitato il dissenso
generalizzato della popolazione di tutte le "etnie", unanime nel
ricordare in Tito il capo dello Stato comune, indipendente, prospero e
pacifico, quello cioe' di prima della presa del potere da parte delle
leadership reazionarie... ]


http://www.iwpr.net/index.pl?archive/bcr3/bcr3_200402_482_6_eng.txt

IWPR'S BALKAN CRISIS REPORT, No. 482, February 27, 2004

STREET NAME CHANGE SPLITS BOSNIAN CAPITAL

Not all Sarajevo residents are happy about plans to rename avenue after
the late president Izetbegovic.

By Dino Bajramovic in Sarajevo

When Josip Tito's partisans freed Sarajevo from the Nazis and their
Ustasha allies in April 1945, residents marked the end of four years of
terror with celebrations in the main street.

Not long afterwards, Aleksandar Street was renamed in honour of Tito,
who went on to become president of the Socialist Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia until his death in 1980. Signs bearing his name still hang
the length and breadth of Bosnia's main thoroughfare.

But not for much longer, if supporters of Bosnia's late president Alija
Izetbegovic get their way.

Izetbegovic became Bosnia's first president as Yugoslavia broke up, and
remained head of state throughout a war which saw Sarajevo bombarded by
besieging Serb forces.

A campaign has been launched to have Tito Street renamed after the
former president, who died in October last year.

Although the city is gripped by political and economic crisis, and
residents are traumatised by mafia showdowns, brutal murders and rapes,
and corruption, the change of name for the main street has become a hot
- and politically-loaded - topic.

Sukrija, a resident of Tito Street for 40 years, says scrapping the
name would be justified - but not for the reasons that most supporters
of the campaign would endorse.

"When Tito was in power the people in this street were Muslims,
Catholics, Jews, atheists, Jehovah's Witnesses - all mixed up, in line
with Tito's politics," he recalled. "But when Izetbegovic came,
grenades landed, people moved away and my new neighbours are all
Muslims from the provinces."

"It has become a street like any other in the provinces. Just as Tito
was a world statesman, under Alija we fell behind. The name of the
street should reflect this."

The campaign for Izetbegovic Street started three months ago when
Sulejman Tihic, leader of the Bosnian Muslim-led Party of Democratic
Action, SDA, and a member of the Bosnian state's presidency, demanded
that something be done to commemorate the recently-deceased leader.

On February 5, the commission responsible for marking historical events
and figures in Sarajevo canton duly voted to propose renaming Tito
Street as Alija Izetbegovic Street at the next cantonal assembly.

The vote was not surprising, as five of the seven members of the
commission belong either to Izetbegovic's old party or to a closely
allied group, with only two from the opposition Social Democrats.

The decision seems likely to go through at the next session of the
canton assembly, scheduled symbolically for March 1, Bosnia's
independence day

But the battle is not over yet, and Bosnia's complex constitutional
arrangements, in which power is split between the Federation and
Republika Srpska, could yet sink the proposal.

A few days ago, Sahbaz Dzihanovic, deputy president of the Federation,
said a decision to rename the capital's main street could only be
passed by the state parliament, in which both entities are represented.
Under the constitution, Sarajevo is deemed to be the capital of the
whole of Bosnia, not just the Federation, he added.

As it had never previously occurred to anyone to check whether the
constitution defines which placenames can and cannot be changed,
Dzihanovic's announcement seemed likely to send experts rushing to
check the exact legal wording.

Another problem is that the momentum behind the campaign to for
Izetbegovic Street has come solely from the SDA, which is almost
totally Bosnian Muslim in composition.

Members of other groups feel far from happy about the idea.

"Changing the name of Tito Street would mean the systematic and planned
erasure of our history," complained Zenja Ljubuskic, a Muslim member of
the commission for marking historical dates in Sarajevo canton, and a
Social Democrat.

"If this were to happen, Sarajevo would lose many of the attributes of
a capital city."

There are streets and squares named after Tito far beyond his own
country - from France, Spain and Italy to India, Egypt and Libya.

Within the states that emerged from socialist Yugoslavia, Croatia -
where he was born - still remembers him with Marshal Tito Square in the
capital Zagreb. Although Croatia's post-independence president Franjo
Tudjman became a passionate anti-communist and spurned Tito's political
legacy, he never deprived him of his square.

Serbia has been less generous. Twenty-four years after his death, both
the street and the square named after him in Belgrade have changed the
names - Marshal Tito Street becoming King Milan Street.

If Tito Street has survived until now in Sarajevo, it is, ironically,
thanks to President Izetbegovic, who refused to contemplate altering it.

"I wouldn't allow the name of Tito's street to be changed because I do
not think history starts with us", Izetbegovic once said in an
interview.

A few days ago Izetbegovic's son Bakir suggested that a new title might
now be appropriate. "My father was right not to allow a name change for
Tito Street," he said, "but people are also right [now] to ask for this
change."

The latest opinion polls show that the people of Sarajevo remain
undecided over the future of their largest and most popular avenue.

As Bosnians await the decision, the youth wing of the Social Democrats
has added some humour to the debate.

The group, most of whose members were not born when Tito was alive, has
printed pocket diaries containing a message from beyond the grave from
the late Yugoslav leader - "This must be a lucky city if I am its
biggest problem."

Dino Bajramovic is a journalist in Sarajevo.

"TRIPOLI BEL SUOL D'AMORE" E "FACCETTA NERA OH BELLA ABISSINA" FUORI
CONCORSO A SANREMO


http://www.repubblica.it/speciale/2004/sanremo/programma.html


Martedì 2 marzo

Nel corso della serata, collegamento con le Forze di Pace italiane
all’estero. Si comincia con Sarajevo

Mercoledì 3 marzo

Tra gli ospiti della serata: Emanuele Filiberto di Savoia.
Secondo collegamento con le Forze di pace italiane all’estero: Kabul

Giovedì 4 marzo

Terzo collegamento con le forze di Pace italiane all’estero: Kosovo

Venerdì 5 marzo

[nessun dettaglio sui collegamenti con i soldati dell'esercito d'Italia
e d'Albania]

Sabato 6 marzo

Quinto collegamento con le Forze di pace italiane all’estero: Nassiriya

(italiano / srpskohrvatski / english)

Aggiornamenti da ICDSM-Italia e SLOBODA

1. MILOSEVIC, CHIUSA FASE ACCUSE

2. Aldo Bernardini scrive al presidente del "tribunale" dell'Aia /
A LETTER TO ICTY PRESIDENT BY PROF. ALDO BERNARDINI

3. TEMATSKA SKUPSTINA UDRUZENJA "SLOBODA"


=== DA ICDSM ITALIA RICEVIAMO E DIFFONDIAMO ===

La Sezione Italiana dell'ICDSM ringrazia tutti quelli che hanno finora
contribuito alla campagna di finanziamento per la difesa di Milosevic.
La richiesta dell'ICDSM internazionale, tuttavia, e' che tali sforzi
vengano RADDOPPIATI nel prossimo futuro, poiche' le spese sono ingenti.
Non esistono altre fonti di finanziamento: la situazione a Belgrado e'
irrespirabile, i lavoratori ... non lavorano, chi ha i soldi per
mangiare li tiene stretti e non rischia certo la galera in attivita'
politiche o di solidarieta' a favore di Milosevic, che viene presentato
dai media laggiu' esattamente come da noi, cioe' come un dittatore
criminale e ferrovecchio. I nuovi ricchi votano i partiti
filo-occidentali e di destra e non appoggiano certo Milosevic. Per di
piu', alla campagna per Milosevic l'SPS e' sostanzialmente
ESTRANEO, poiche' la leadership parlamentare di quel partito ha
scelto una linea accomodante con Kostunica ed e' in rotta di
collisione con il gruppo organizzatosi attorno a SLOBODA
(sezione belgradese dell'ICDSM).
A tutti deve essere infine chiaro che non esiste alcun "tesoro
nascosto" di Milosevic e che il nostro impegno e' insostituibile ed
indispensabile.

Per contribuire dall'Italia:

Conto Corrente Postale numero 86557006
intestato ad Adolfo Amoroso, ROMA
causale: DIFESA MILOSEVIC

Per contatti:

ICDSM - Sezione Italiana
c/o GAMADI, Via L. Da Vinci 27
00043 Ciampino (Roma)
email: icdsm-italia@...


=== 1 ===

Da: ICDSM Italia
Data: Sab 28 Feb 2004 20:15:12 Europe/Rome
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Oggetto: [icdsm-italia] MILOSEVIC, CHIUSA FASE ACCUSE


MILOSEVIC: TPI; CHIUSA FASE ACCUSE, ORA PAROLA A SLOBO /ANSA

(ANSA) - L'AJA, 25 FEB - Basta ritardi, basta udienze sospese per i
problemi di salute dell'imputato: dopo due anni dall'inizio del
processo, Carla Dal Ponte ha oggi ufficialmente chiuso la fase delle
accuse contro l'ex presidente jugoslavo, Slobodan Milosevic. Il
procuratore generale del Tribunale penale internazionale sull'ex
Jugoslavia ha accettato di rinunciare a due udienze che aveva ancora
a disposizione pur di dare un colpo di acceleratore al processo.
''La procura vuole chiudere il proprio dossier'' nella fase attuale
in cui si trova il lavoro degli avvocati dell'accusa, aveva
commentato nel primo pomeriggio la portavoce del Tpi, Florence
Hartmann. E poco dopo i giudici del Tpi hanno fatto sapere di aver
accettato la decisione: in altre parole, la fase delle imputazioni si
e' chiusa e ora - nel giro di tre mesi - la parola dovrebbe passare a
Milosevic, che non ha voluto avvocati scegliendo di difendersi da
solo. INCOGNITE. E' indubbio pero' che il processo contro l'ex uomo
forte di Belgrado si trova in un momento delicato. Sul processo
pesa un'incognita per ora difficilmente risolvibile, viste le
dimissioni presentate a sorpresa qualche giorno fa da Richard May, il
giudice britannico che presiede la Corte e che lascera' l'incarico il
31 maggio prossimo per ragioni di salute. In una situazione del
genere - e cioe' con la partenza di uno dei giudici del tribunale -
Slobo avrebbe il diritto di chiedere che il procedimento riparta da
zero. La possibilita' che l'ex presidente Jugoslavo - 62 anni,
accusato dalla Corte di genocidio, crimini di guerra e contro
l'umanita' per i conflitti nei Balcani degli anni '90 - chieda un
nuovo processo e' pero' giudicata ''improbabile'' negli ambienti del
Tribunale. STRATEGIA DIFESA. L'avvio della difesa da parte di
Milosevic e' previsto per il 19 maggio prossimo, mentre la chiusura
del processo nel 2006, quattro anni dopo la prima udienza, celebrata
il 12 febbraio del 2002. Alla Corte dell'Aja gli occhi sono
quindi puntati su quella che sara' la strategia dell'ex presidente
jugoslavo, che potrebbe chiamare in propria difesa numerosi nomi
illustri, quali Bill Clinton e il segretario generale dell'Onu, Kofi
Annan. Di certo c'e' solo che oggi si e' chiusa una tappa chiave
di un processo ormai storico, quasi da guinness dei primati.
Quello in corso all'Aja e' infatti un procedimento giudiziario con un
imputato che e' un ex capo di Stato e che si difende da solo, in cui
una quindicina di udienze sono state rinviate per ragioni di salute
dell'accusato. In aula si sono d'altra parte ascoltate contro Slobo
quasi 300 testimonianze, alcune delle quali portate da politici di
spicco quali il generale a riposo Wesley Clark - ex comandante Nato
in Kosovo -, il capo dello stato croato Stipe Mesic, l'Alto
rappresentante in Bosnia, il britannico Paddy Ashdown. (ANSA).
RIG 25/02/2004 20:56


=== 2 ===

Da: ICDSM Italia
Data: Lun 1 Mar 2004 09:39:55 Europe/Rome
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Oggetto: [icdsm-italia] Prof. Aldo Bernardini writes to ICTY President
T. Meron


[ Una lettera di Aldo Bernardini, noto docente di diritto
internazionale, al presidente del "tribunale" dell'Aia... ]


Rome, 16 th February 2004

                                                              
To:             Mr. Theodor Meron, President,
ICTY, The Hague, The Netherlands
Fax 00 3170 512 8637

Cc:             H.E. Kofi Annan,
Secretary General,
UN, New York, USA
Fax 00 1212 963 4475

  
STATEMENT BY PROF. ALDO BERNARDINI

International Law, University of Teramo (Italy)

 
Since June 2001 President Slobodan Milosevic is a political prisoner in
Scheveningen. His transfer from the Belgrade jail has been tantamount
to a kidnapping without the legal guarantees which are usual in cases
of extradition (that was in any case forbidden by Serbian and Yugoslav
Constitutions, as confirmed by Federal Constitutional Court). Money has
been paid, or rather promised, to a quisling regime. An unprecedented
treatment for a former Head of State, illegitimately indicted when he
was in office (see International Court of Justice – Case concerning the
arrest warrant of 11 April 2000 – Democratic Republic of the Congo v.
Belgium , 14 February 2002), whose only fault had been in the past his
effort to avoid Yugoslavia being blotted out by Western diplomatic
trickeries and by ethnicist secessions and later to keep together so
much as possible of former Yugoslavia. The 1992 Constitution of the
Federation of Yugoslavia bears witness to this in the articles,
strongly advocated by President Milosevic against nationalistic trends,
by which Yugoslav citizenship and equality of rights were founded on
residence instead of ethnical grounds such as in the Constitutions of
other former Yugoslav Republics.

According to the Prosecution in the Hague trial, President Milosevic,
the father of such a Constitution, could – or rather, should – be the
man guilty of genocide and other crimes against mankind. After almost
three years it is clear to every unbiased person that nothing has been
proved. There is no evidence that such horrible crimes were committed
or, when committed, that President Milosevic was in any way involved
therein. The strenuous attitude of Slobodan Milosevic has been
successful in countering and rebutting all charges by Prosecution and
allegations by so-called witnesses. So much so that now it is
absolutely obvious that a political trial is going on in the Hague and
that therefore Milosevic must be declared guilty in order to acquit
NATO aggressors, whose crimes the illegal Hague Tribunal has refused
even only to skim over. This has been from the very beginning the real
task of a Tribunal which Security Council had no power to legitimately
constitute and whose financing and means of action testify to which
interests it is subservient.

But this Tribunal is passed off as being an organ, a subsidiary organ,
of United Nations. It is therefore strictly bound by all U.N. rules and
principles particularly on human rights, even by such rules that are
not binding on Member States, for ex. by General Assembly resolutions.

Generally recognised procedural rights and human rights of President
Milosevic have been violated from the very beginning. An impressive
list of such violations has been submitted by Sloboda Association of
Belgrade and I wholly subscribe to it ( Measures taken only against
Slobodan Milosevic in the Scheveningen prison and at the Hague Tribunal
in contravention of their own rules, guarantees and rights ).

I underline in particular in the last time the decision to allot him
only three months for the preparation of his defence in comparison with
three or four years given to the Prosecution and, lastly, the order for
prolongation also in afternoon hours of the last hearings to end the
Prosecution case. These are shameful decisions which infringe upon the
health conditions of President Milosevic (his life is in real danger)
and his possibility to prepare his own defence: they exclude equality
of arms between Prosecution and defence and point out the political and
persecutory character of such a barbaric trial.

During the elections campaign in Serbia, President Milosevic has been
prevented from actively participate in it. In the light of the
presumption of innocence and the abnormal feature and lengthiness of
the trial, we must pose the question whether his political rights have
been violated. Serbian people by electing him have given a beating
answer.

Among the generally recognised procedural and human rights principles
which have been completely infringed upon, I mention, in the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of 1966, article
9, par. 4 (“ Anyone who is deprived of his liberty by arrest or
detention shall be entitled to take proceedings before a court, in
order that that court may decide without delay on the lawfulness of his
detention and order his release if the detention is not lawful ”);
article 14, par. 2 (presumption of innocence); and article 25
(participation in the political life). We must not forget the Standard
Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners , approved by the Economic
and Social Council of the U.N. with res. 663 C (XXIV) of 31 July 1957
and 2076 (LXII) of 13 May 1977, particularly rule 37 (communications
and visits); the Basic Principles for the Treatment of Prisoners ,
adopted by U.N. General Assembly res. 45/111 of 14 December 1990, par.
5 (prisoners shall retain human rights and fundamental freedoms set out
in the international instruments); and the Body of Principles for the
Protection of All Persons under Any Form of Detention or Imprisonment ,
adopted by U.N. General Assembly res. 43/173 of 9 December 1988,
particularly principles 11 and 32 (review of continuance of detention
by a judicial authority), principles 15 and 19 (communication of
prisoners with the outside world and visits). It is clear that the
review of detention by a judicial authority refers to such an authority
which is independent of the Hague Tribunal; and it is also clear that
violations of rights depend also on the set of rules governing the
Hague Tribunal.

President Slobodan Milosevic must be immediately released.

The arbitrary trial must be stopped.

The illegitimate Hague Tribunal must be done away with.

Prof. Aldo Bernardini


=== 3 ===

Da: "Vladimir Krsljanin"
Data: Lun 1 Mar 2004 03:48:22 Europe/Rome
Oggetto: TEMATSKA SKUPSTINA UDRUZENJA "SLOBODA"

TEMATSKA SKUPSTINA UDRUZENJA "SLOBODA"
- KRAH HASKE OPTUZNICE


U Beogradu je 22. februara 2004. godine odrzana sednica Skupstine
Udruzenja "Sloboda" - Nacionalnog komiteta za oslobodjenje Predsednika
Slobodana Milosevica. Sednica je imala samo jednu tacku dnevnog reda:
KRAH HASKE OPTUZNICE PROTIV PREDSEDNIKA SLOBODANA MILOSEVICA.
Sednicom je predsedavao prof. dr Mirko Zurovac, predsednik Skupstine.
Uvodno izlaganje podneo je Bogoljub Bjelica, predsednik Upravnog
odbora.
U trocasovnoj raspravi ucestvovali su: akademik Mihajlo Markovic,
akademik Cedomir Popov, mr Momir Bulatovic, prof. dr Milos Aleksic,
Goran Trivan, dr Bogdan Jamedzija, mr Vladimir Krsljanin, prof. dr.
Oskar Kovac, Balsa Govedarica, Milorad Vucelic (k.g.), Branko Kitanovic
(k.g.), Dusan Cukic, mr Uros Suvakovic, dr Aleksandar Rastovic, Toma
Busetic, akademik Vladimir Jankovic i Aleksandar Misic.
Na predlog Upravnog odbora, Skupstina je jednoglasno usvojila
Zakljucke, zajedno sa izmenama i dopunama predlozenim u raspravi. Po
ovlascenju Skupstine, Upravni odbor je 24. februara usvojio redigovani
tekst Zakljucaka.
U nastavku dajemo redigovani tekst Zakljucaka Skupstine Udruzenja
"Sloboda", kojima se Udruzenje obraca domacim i medjunarodnim
institucijama i javnosti, kao i tekst uvodnog izlaganja predsednika
Upravnog odbora Bogoljuba Bjelice.


Skupstina Udruzenja "Sloboda" - Nacionalni komitet za oslobodjenje
Predsednika Slobodana Milosevica, na sednici odrzanoj dana 22. februara
2004. godine, usvojila je sledece

Z A K L J U C K E

1. Udruzenje "Sloboda" - Nacionalni komitet za oslobodjenje
Predsednika Slobodana Milosevica odaje najvece priznanje Predsedniku
Milosevicu na njegovom herojskom drzanju pred ilegalnim "tribunalom" u
Hagu i na doslednoj i principijelnoj borbi za istinu koju on tamo vodi,
braneci na najbolji nacin istinske interese nase zemlje i naroda.
Ocenjujemo da je u dosadasnjem, tuzilackom delu procesa optuznica Karle
del Ponte protiv Predsednika Slobodana Milosevica dozivela potpuni krah
i da nijedna tacka optuzbe nije dokazana. Naprotiv, dokazano je samo
suprotno - da je rec o politickoj optuznici, da je rec o ilegalnom sudu
NATO-alijanse koji pokusava da kroz sudjenje Predsedniku Milosevicu
osudi citav srpski narod za zlocine koji je sam NATO pocinio;

2. Isticuci cvrstu opredeljenost Predsednika Milosevica da se u Hagu
bori za istinu, a imajuci u vidu potrebne uslove za pripremu njegove
odbrane, kao i njegovo zdravstveno stanje, trazimo da "sudsko vece"
preinaci
svoju odluku i odmah pusti Predsednika Milosevica na slobodu, a
nastavak procesa zakaze za dve godine, kako bi se on, u istom vremenu
koje je bilo na raspolaganju i tzv. "tuzilastvu", pripremio za nastavak
procesa.
Zahtevamo od nasih vlasti da u tom smislu izdaju sve neophodne
garancije za boravak Predsednika Milosevica u nasoj zemlji, kao i da
podrze nas zahtev da "tribunal" omoguci Predsedniku Slobodanu
Milosevicu najmanje dve godine za pripremu za nastavak procesa.
Udruzenje "Sloboda" naglasava da bi odbijanje ovog naseg zahteva
znacilo prakticno onemogucavanje priprema za odbranu Predsednika
Slobodana Milosevica i nastavak drasticnog krsenja njegovih ljudskih
prava sto je, inace, postala praksa tzv. "tribunala" u Hagu;

3. Trazimo da se Predsedniku Slobodanu Milosevicu odmah omoguci
nesmetana komunikacija sa clanovima Udruzenja "Sloboda" koji aktivno
rade na njegovoj odbrani, sa njegovim drugovima i prijateljima i sa
svima koji ga iz citavog sveta podrzavaju i pomazu ucescem u pripremama
odbrane;

4. Najbolja odbrana Predsednika Milosevica u Hagu jeste podrska koju on
uziva u svom narodu i citavom slobodoljubivom svetu. Iz tog razloga
pozivamo sve gradjane nase zemlje, sve ljude kojima je stalo do istine i
pravde, sve one gradjane iz zemlje i inostranstva koji smatraju da mogu
da doprinesu pobedi istine i pravde za koju se Predsednik Milosevic
bori, da se prijave Udruzenju "Sloboda" kao potencijalni svedoci na
procesu u Hagu.
Zahvaljujemo se svima koji su i do sada aktivno pomagali odbranu
Predsednika Milosevica, saradjujuci sa nasim Udruzenjem i drugim
komitetima koji su formirani u stranim zemljama i na medjunarodnom
nivou, sa uverenjem da ce se ta saradnja i nastaviti.
Skupstina naglasava da otpor tzv. "haskom tribunalu" mora predstavljati
integrativni faktor okupljanja i ocuvanja dostojanstva srpskog naroda,
svih
onih koji su slobodari, demokrate i patriote.

5. Zahtevamo da se odmah prekine sa brutalnim politickim progonom
porodice Predsednika Milosevica.
Trazimo od nasih vlasti da se odmah prekinu svi montirani politicki
policijsko-sudski procesi koji se u zemlji vode protiv Predsednika
Milosevica, clanova njegove porodice i njegovih saradnika. Ti procesi
predstavljaju smisljen pritisak DOS-ovih vlasti na Predsednika
Milosevica, u zelji da se omete borba koja on vodi u Hagu, a sa ciljem
da se putem njegove diskreditacije pomognu nastojanja Karle del Ponte;

6. Uvereni da je rec o procesu od vitalnog interesa za sudbinu nase
zemlje i naroda, zahtevamo da novoformirana Vlada Republike Srbije
obezbedi odgovarajuca finansijska sredstva iz drzavnog budzeta za
potrebne odbrane Predsednika Slobodana Milosevica i drugih nasih
drzavljana koji se nalaze u Hagu, na isti nacin kao sto to cine i druge
bivse jugoslovenske republike ciji su gradjani zatoceni u Seveningenu.
Od nasih vlasti takodje zahtevamo da se Predsedniku Milosevicu i
njegovim saradnicima na raspolaganje stavi sva neophodna dokumentacija
za odbranu.

U Beogradu,
22. februara 2004. godine

SKUPSTINA UDRUZENJA "SLOBODA" - NACIONALNI KOMITET ZA OSLOBODJENJE
PREDSEDNIKA SLOBODANA MILOSEVICA


UVODNI REFERAT BOGOLJUBA BJELICE, PREDSEDNIKA UPRAVNOG ODBORA, NA
TEMATSKOJ SKUPSTINI UDRUZENJA «SLOBODA» ODRZANOJ 22. FEBRUARA 2004.

Postovani prijatelji,

Pre nepunih pet godina, podignuta je optuznica protiv Predsednika
Slobodana Milosevica u haskom tribunalu. Optuznica je podignuta usred
agresije na SRJ, u trenutku kada je celom svetu bilo jasno da je u
pitanju agresija, a ne «milosrdni andjeo» i kada je osuda medjunarodne
javnosti postala neizdrziva za alijansu. Glavni povod za agresiju, a
kasnije i za optuznicu, bilo je navodno streljanje civila u selu Racak.
Vec na samom pocetku sudjenja slucaj Racak je diskreditovan, a danas se
javno i zvanicno zna da se nikada nije ni dogodio i da je u pitanju
cista fabrikacija onih koji su optuznicu i pisali.
Posle Racka, omiljena tema tuzilaca i svih medija pod njihovim uticajem,
bile su stotine hiljada izbeglica koje su bezale od navodnog srpskog
terora.
Cinjenica da se sve zivo sto je moglo da se krece - sklanjalo zbog
neprekidnog bombardovanja Kosova, samo tuziocima je ostala nepoznata.
Da za egzodus optuze Srbe i Milosevica, nije im smetala ni cinjenica da
su te iste izbeglice, u cije ime oni ratuju, hapse i tuze -
bombardovali.
Slucaj Racak je u svetske medije i haski tribunal usao na velika vrata a
sada se iskrada na mala, kada je vise neupotrebljiv. Sada je
kompromitujuci i stetan za svoje kreatore pocev od terorista do
tuzilaca.
Ipak, krah optuzbe protiv Slobodana Milosevica u Hagu, nije sprecio
sponzore tribunala da i dalje ubedjuju svetsku javnost o navodnim
srpskim zlocinima.
U Rambujeu, od SRJ je zahtevano da prihvati okupaciju pod pretnjom
invazije.
Slobodan Milosevic je dobio potpunu podrsku naroda da to odbije i da ga
od invazije brani. U Hagu mu se danas sudi zato sto je Jugoslaviju
odbranio i sacuvao. U Beogradu, vlasti koje su instalirali oni koji su
Jugoslaviju i bombardovali, objasnjavale su gradjanima da je izgubio
Kosovo, to isto Kosovo koje su oni zvanicno i javno odvojili od Srbije.
Objasnjavali su da je on kriv za bombardovanje, a da su im jucerasnji
agresori danasnji prijatelji.
Sudjenje Slobodanu Milosevicu nije sudjenje njemu, to je sudjenje celom
srpskom narodu.
U Hagu se vec dve godine Srbi optuzuju za genocid, za Srebrenice i
Markale, za Rackove. U Beogradu se za potrebe tog suda otkopavaju
hladnjace. Beogradu se savetuje da odustane od tuzbe protiv svojih
agresora da bi inverzija zrtve u agresora bila kompletna. Iz Beograda
se salju Bakaliji, Karleuse i slicni, da zajedno sa predstavnicima
tuzilastva i agresorima dokazu da su Srbi koji nikad u svojoj istoriji
nisu bili agresori, genocidom sirili svoju teritoriju i etnicki je
cistili. Zahvaljujuci delu zapadne propagande i tribunalu, danas se po
svetu pisu knjige i snima sve i svasta o srpskim teroristima, ubicama i
slicno.
Za dve godine, haski tribunal je preduzeo sve moguce da dokaze svoje
optuzbe. Od laznih svedoka, preko nehumanog tretmana Slobodana
Milosevica, izlaganja njegove porodice ogromnom pritisku u zemlji i
inostranstvu, pa sve do odstupanja od sopstvenih pravila i svetu
poznatih zakona i normi u vodjenju procesa.
Kroz sudnicu haskog tribunala, za dve godine prodefilovali su agresori,
spijuni, teroristi i kriminalci - uplaseni i ucenjeni, podmiceni i
amnestirani. Da apsurd bude potpun - cak i sami radnici tuzilastva
pojavljivali su se kao svedoci.
Optuznicu su pripremale hiljade ljudi, uz pomoc raznih vlada,
obavestajnih sluzbi i marionetske vlade u Jugoslaviji, uz budzet od
blizu 200 miliona dolara godisnje.
Slobodan Milosevic se branio sam, uz pomoc dvojice saradnika i
«Slobode». Ko su i kakvi su bili saradnici i svedoci tribunala pokazao
je pred kamerama sam Predsednik Milosevic. Sastav organizacije
«Sloboda», i nacionalni i medjunarodni komiteti - javna je stvar i
poznata. U tribunalu i medju njegovim pomagacima ne postoji ni jedan
covek kao sto su oni koji pomazu i podrzavaju odbranu Slobodana
Milosevica i obratno. U ovoj dvogodisnjoj borbi Davida i Golijata,
pobedio je David.
Od dolaska na vlast pucem 5. oktobra, pa do izrucenja na Vidovdan 2001,
nova vlast je intenzivno podsticala animozitet gradjana protiv Slobodana
Milosevica i njegove politike, stalno podsecajuci na redove i nestasice,
embargo i agresiju, da bi iskoristili momenat za protivustavnu i bahatu
predaju tribunalu. Predaju tribunalu pred kojim su optuzeni Srbi, pred
kojim ce se Srbima suditi i na kome Srbi treba da budu osudjeni za
genocid nad Albancima, Hrvatima i muslimanima, a stvarni zlicinci i
agresori da budu amnestirani.
Nedopustivo je i neposteno je dozvoliti da se onim grupama gradjana
koji su bili i koji jesu protiv politike Slobodana Milosevica i dalje
kreira utisak
da je on tamo i da treba da mu se sudi zbog nestasice goriva.
Pre svega, tacno je da ni embargo ni agresiju kroz koju smo prosli
pocetkom devedesetih ne treba zaboraviti. Naprotiv, treba rascistiti ko
je za nju odgovoran. Iako relativno brzo oporavljena, nasa ekonomija je
jako stradala zbog embarga i njegovih posledica. Pitanje je zasto nam
je uveden embargo.
Ko govori o tome trebalo bi da primeti da se i tada zivelo bolje u
odnosu na zemlje koje nas okruzuju. Posle embarga se zivelo bolje nego
u svom
okruzenju. Medjutim ako se neko sa ovim i ne slaze, sto i ne mora mogao
je i moze da svoju volju izrazi na izborima, svakako neslaganje sa nekom
politikom se ne resava na sudu, pogotovo ne na haskom.
Oni koji su mislili da Slobodan Milosevic nije bio dobar predsednik ili
im
se nije dopala njegova politika, jednostavno nisu za njega glasali.
Treba da bude jasno svakom Srbinu, bez obzira da li misli da je
Slobodan Milosevic bio najbolji ili najgori predsednik na svetu, da se
u Haskom tribunalu ne sudi njemu, niti mu se sudi za male plate,
nestasicu ulja ili nezaposlenost.
Pred Haskim tribunalom se sudi Srbima.
Oni koji su krivi za Srebrenicu, koji Srbima podmecu Markale, koji su
organizovali i odobrili Oluju, koji su montirali Racak, ti isti koji su
nas
bombardovali - sude nam, sude svima - i «levima» i «desnima», i
«komunjarama» i «cetnicima», i onima koji su za Evropsku uniju i onima
koji su za cara Dusana, dakle svima. Ti tamo pokusavaju da nas
predstave kao agresore i okupatore, ubice zena i dece i siledzije, a
sebe da amnestiraju za sve sto su ucinili i jos da se prikazu kao
mirotvorci. Osetili smo na svojoj kozi kako izgleda njihov put ka miru.
Na sta taj njihov mir lici vidimo i danas na Kosovu.
Haski tribunal i sudjenje Slobodanu Milosevicu su nacionalno pitanje
srpskog naroda. Odnos prema tribunalu je odnos prema nasem sopstvenom
narodu i zemlji, prema pravdi i istini, prema istoriji, i obaveza pred
nasim potomcima, a ne glasanje za ili protiv Slobodana Milosevica.
Danas, obelezava se pobeda Slobodana Milosevica nad sudom za Srbe. Sa
ovakvom optuzbom, njemu odbrana nije ni potrebna. On je u ove dve
godine oborio sve optuzbe protiv njega i dokazao pred celim svetom sta
je Haski tribunal. Na svakom sudu kad optuznica propadne odbrana i ne
pocinje. On vise nema od cega da se brani, on u eventualnom nastavku
moze samo da optuzuje. Danas, na kraju optuzbe, postavlja se pitanje
daljeg smisla sudjenja. Pre svega, srpska vlada, bilo koja i bilo cija
srpska vlada , kao i organizacije i pojedinci treba da zahtevaju
obustavljanje sudjenja i oslobadjanje Slobodana Milosevica. Spremali su
se cetiri godine i obecavali sudjenje milenijuma, a propali su vec na
pocetku optuzbe za koju im je bilo potrebno pune dve godine. Ako za dve
godine nisu mogli da iznesu ni jednu osnovanu optuzbu sudjenje mora da
se obustavi.
Ukoliko Hag i njegovi nalogodavci ne mogu ili ne smeju da se sretnu sa
istinom, sa cinjenicama, onda treba pripremiti odbranu. U ovom slucaju
predlazem:

1. Zahtevati od drzave da da garancije za predsednika Slobodana
Milosevica da moze da se brani sa slobode,
2. Zahtevati od drzave da trazi produzenje pauze od tri meseca zbog
njegovog zdravstvenog stanja koje je kriticno i zbog pripreme odbrane i
svedoka,
3. Zahtevati da drzava finansira i omoguci pristup svim dokumentima
i
materijalima potrebnim za odbranu.

Sto se «Slobode» tice, ona bez obzira na drzavnu podrsku - izvrsice
svoje
obaveze.
Zahvaljujem mnogim gradjanima na podrsci odbrani do sada, aktivistima
kojima je jos na Vidovdan bio vidljiv nacionalni imperativ, kao i danas
-
oslobodjenje Predsednika Milosevica. To pitanje, pitanje je dostojanstva
svakog gradjanina i Srbina.
Zato je tacno da je:

SLOBODAN SLOBODAN - SLOBODNA SRBIJA

Zato ce «Sloboda» - istim teskim putem, carskim - pravim i sirokim:

DO POBEDE!

Hvala lepo.

---

SLOBODA urgently needs your donation.
Please find the detailed instructions at:
http://www.sloboda.org.yu/pomoc.htm

To join or help this struggle, visit:
http://www.sloboda.org.yu/ (Sloboda/Freedom association)
http://www.icdsm.org/ (the international committee to defend Slobodan
Milosevic)
http://www.free-slobo.de/ (German section of ICDSM)
http://www.icdsm-us.org/ (US section of ICDSM)
http://www.icdsmireland.org/ (ICDSM Ireland)
http://www.wpc-in.org/ (world peace council)
http://www.geocities.com/b_antinato/ (Balkan antiNATO center)

Dobro dosli na J U G O I N F O !

JUGOINFO
e' il bollettino sulla Jugoslavia ed i Balcani curato dal
COORDINAMENTO NAZIONALE PER LA JUGOSLAVIA - https://www.cnj.it
(vedi archivio: http://it.groups.yahoo.com/group/crj-mailinglist/)
Per contattarci: <jugocoord@...>

La nostra attivita' di informazione via internet, che continua
ininterrottamente (seppur con diverse denominazioni) dal 1997
grazie allo sforzo individuale di pochissimi volontari, puo'
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Causale: sostegno per Jugoinfo


GRAZIE / HVALA / THANKS

Ramsey Clark: Divide and Conquer. The Destruction of the Balkan
Federation by the United States and NATO

4 : Part three (final) and Conclusion

http://www.iacenter.org/yugo/divide&conquer.htm
http://www.icdsm.org/more/rclarkUN2.htm

---

PART THREE

The UN Charter Does Not Contain The Power To Create Criminal
Courts And Courts Created By It Are A Continuing Threat To Peace

XI.        The US Coerced The UN Security Council to Exceed Its
Powers and Create the First International Criminal Tribunal
Through Which The US Could Target Enemies and Change Regimes

            The Charter of the United Nations was "forged" at
Dumbarton Oaks in Washington, D.C. in August and October 1944 and
San Francisco during April to June 1945.  The United States and
each of the other four permanent members of the Security Council,
all victors in World War II, though already wary allies, were
given the power to veto Security Council resolutions, as a power
demanded by the five most powerful nations, at the risk of paralyzing
the UN.

            Not a word in the Charter implies that power is
conferred on the Security Council to create any Court.  The
structure of the Charter, the nature of the powers delegated by
it, and the incorporation into the Charter and the Charter
provisions for Amendment, of the Statute for the International Court
of Justice, its authority narrowly defined and strictly limited,
belie the delegation of any power to create any criminal court. 

            If power to create a criminal court can be tortured
from the terms of the Charter, then there is no limitation on the
power of the Security Council to do whatever it chooses.

            Above all, the immediate history of the nations
actively involved in drafting and ratifying the Charter leaves no
doubt that there would not have been a United Nations if it was
believed a criminal court in which they could be prosecuted might
be created under the Charter.  The nations that fought in World
War II and played the major roles in drafting the Charter, most surely
the US, would have rejected their own work.

            The history of the planning meetings, the preparations
and instructions of the national delegations, particularly the
five nations which were to be permanent Members of the Security
Council, the Central role of the host nations, the US, the records
of the drafting and consideration of the Charter by the delegates,
if we are to believe the public record, leave no room for doubt that
there would never have been a United Nations if the Charter had
included either expressly, or by implication, the power to create
an international court of criminal justice. 

            From the four-power Dumbarton Oaks conference in 1944
to the fifty-nation conference at San Francisco in 1945, which
ratified the Charter as drafted and imposed by the US, Britain,
China, France and Russia, there was never any suggestion that an
international criminal court could be authorized under the
Charter.  It would not have been accepted by the major powers if there
was.  Those nations were not prepared to risk subjecting their
leaders, armed services and citizens to the possibility of
prosecution by an international criminal tribunal in the aftermath
of World War II.

            The manner in which the Nuremberg Tribunal was created
is further evidence of an intention to deny power to the UN to
create courts.  The US, France, Great Britain and the USSR,
permanent members of the UN Security Council and pre eminent in
drafting its Charter, starting immediately after the UN Charter
was adopted in San Francisco, initiated, drafted and promulgated the
Charter of the International Military Tribunal (Nuremberg Charter)
at London between late June 1945 and August 8, 1945, when it was
signed. 

            The Nuremberg Charter referred to the declaration by
the UN of an "intention that War Criminals shall be brought to
justice" and it provided that: "Any Government of the United
Nations may adhere to this Agreement by notice given through the
diplomatic channel to the Government of the United Kingdom."  But
the Nuremberg Charter claimed no relationship to the UN and makes
no reference to the UN International Court of Justice.  The UN was
excluded from even an advisory role and participation in the creation
and work of the Nuremberg Tribunal.  The Tribunal was created
completely independent of the UN.

            The UN was completely ignored and it made no protest. 
The permanent members of the Security Council and other members of
the UN opposed any power in the UN to create a permanent criminal
tribunal, or the creation of such a tribunal under UN authority,
or otherwise.

            The US was fully aware that there is no delegation of
power capable of legal restraint on the Security Council within
the UN system.  Judicial review by the International Court of
Justice of the legality under the UN Charter of acts by UN organs
was rejected during the drafting of the Charter.  At the San
Francisco conference "the proposal to confer the point of preliminary
determination [of each organ's competence] upon the International
Court of Justice was rejected.  The view was preferred that each
organ would interpret its own competence."  See, The Development
of International Law Through the Political Organs of the United
Nations, Rosalyn Higgins, (1963).  Ms. Higgins later served as a
Judge of the ICJ.

            John Foster Dulles, Secretary of State in the
Eisenhower Administration, in his memoir, War or Peace, published
in 1950, expressed the US view concerning legal limitations on
Security Council power.  "The Security Council is not a body that
merely enforces agreed law.  It is a law unto itself...  No
principles of law are laid down to guide it, it can decide in
accordance with what it thinks is expedient."  The veto power
provided the US significant protection from UN action it opposed. 
Its ultimate protection was withdrawal, which after US rejection
of the League of Nations has remained a threat.

            The Security Council knew there were only two ways to
create a criminal court under existing international law, by
treaty, or amendment to the Charter of the UN. 

            The General Assembly, which initiated among other
invaluable contributions to world peace, the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights, authorized studies for the creation of an
International Criminal Court Pursuant to Article 13 of the
Charter.  It assigned the task to its International Law Commission,
which worked on the project for years.  The contemplation has always
been that such a court would be created by multinational treaty,
or amendment to the UN Charter.

            Later the General Assembly authorized planning and
drafting of a treaty to create a permanent International Criminal
Court by the International Law Commission.  See James Crawford,
The ILC Adopts A Draft Statute for an International Criminal
Court, 89 Am.J.Int'l.L. 404 (1995).  After years of effort, in June
1998, 120 nations agreed on a treaty to create such a court.  The
United States and six other countries rejected the treaty.

XII.       The US Coerced Creation Of The International Criminal
Tribunal For Former Yugoslavia to Change Regimes, Weaken Balkan States
and Demonize Serbian Leadership

            After flagrantly violating the UN Charter by
unilaterally planning the dismemberment of the Socialist Federal
Republic of Yugoslavia and imposing unilateral economic sanctions
against Yugoslavia while providing internal support for secessionist
movements within Yugoslavia, the US coerced the Security Council to
violate the UN Charter by exceeding powers granted to it by the
Peoples of the United Nations to create the International Criminal
Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia on February 22, 1993.

            The US Ambassador to the UN, Madeleine Albright, was
the official responsible for achieving the creation of both the
International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in 1993
and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in late 1994
and early 1995.  "The United States was at the forefront in
creating both tribunals and continues to be their leading source of
political financial, personnel, logistical and information-sharing
support."  International Judicial Intervention, David Scheffer,
Foreign Policy, Spring 1996.  Mr. Scheffer who was an assistant to
Ambassador Albright was later Legal Advisor in the US Department
of State on international criminal tribunals.

            The ICTY was intended by the US as a weapon to destroy
the leadership of Yugoslavia by demonization, marginalization and
incapacitation. The ICTY provided an ideal mechanism for regime
change without the appearance of US intervention or coercion,
removing selected leaders, creating the opportunity for new leadership
supportive of the US while branding the old regime as genocidal war
criminals under the appearance of objective, judicious,
international condemnation.  It is the most effective form of
regime change, successful political intervention, selective
prosecution, and demonization in the name of international justice
through the United Nations.

            Three key players in the US foreign policy concerning
Yugoslavia and in the role of the ICTY, Richard Holbrooke, Richard
Goldstone and Madeleine Albright, in recent memoirs have declared
their support for military threats, war, bombing and coercion by
threats of prosecution by the ICTY to coerce foreign leaders and
change regimes.

            Richard Holbrooke, a career US diplomat who had served
as US Ambassador to Germany, and Assistant Secretary of State
acted as chief US negotiator during the Bosnian conflict and
through the Dayton Accords.  Holbrooke supported a major military
role for NATO and the use of bombing to force Yugoslavia agreement
to US demands.  Brian Urquhart, in a review of Holbrooke's book
"To End A War" wrote "UN Secretary-General Boutros-Ghali bears the
full brunt of Holbrooke's contempt, especially for his early opposition
to NATO bombing.  Nearer home, he has little patience with the
commander of NATO's Southern Forces, Admiral Leighton Smith, who
opposed the bombing that Holbrooke believed to be indispensable to
the start of a serious negotiating process." Time Magazine, May
18, 1998. 

            When the cease fire in Bosnia was approaching before
the Dayton negotiation, Holbrooke, "...urged Tudjman to do as much
as possible militarily 'in the next week or so'" to gain last
minute advantage and inflict further injury on the Bosnia Serbs."
To End a War, p. 191.  Holbrooke believed in the use of violence
to force agreement.

            In his book, Holbrooke wrote
"When it was established by the United Nations Security
Council in 1993, the Tribunal was widely viewed as little more
than a public relations device.  It got off to a slow start
despite the appointment of a forceful and eloquent jurist,
Richard Goldstone of South Africa, as its chief.  Credit for pumping
up its role in those early days went to Madeleine Albright and
John Shattuck, who fought for its status and funding.  Other
nations, especially its Dutch hosts and the Germans, also gave
it substantial support." Id pp. 189-190.  

            Later he recognized political utility in such a
Tribunal.
"During our negotiations, the tribunal emerged as a valuable
instrument of policy that allowed us, for example, to bar
Karadzic and all other indicted war criminals from public
office." Id. p. 90.

Holbrooke found it advantageous that President Karadzic could be
excluded from peace negotiations.  Muslim and Croatian leaders had
open access and direct input.  In contrast, President Milosevic
remained in charge of negotiations for Serbia to end the NATO
bombing in 1999 after his indictment by the ICTY.

            President Izetbegovic is quoted as saying to Holbrooke
"If you can get Karadzic out of power... I can work with
Krajisnik," Karadzics' heir apparent. Id. p. 342.   He, too, saw
the ICTY as a tool to be used to gain political advantage and
remove opposition leaders.

            Holbrooke felt the vast display of US military power
at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base would intimidate the Bosnia
participants and strengthen the US hand in the negotiations.  In
furtherance of regime change, he told President Clinton after the
21-day negotiation of the Dayton agreement that "... the arrest of
Karadzic and Mladic was the most critical issue that was not
resolved..." Id. p 315.

            The Dayton accords removed Karadzic from office
immediately and, as demanded by Holbrooke, Karadzic was barred
from "public activities," "I cited a number of examples,
especially his appearances on television and the use of posters
bearing his likeness, that could constitute violations." Id. p.
343.

            While appreciating the power policy makers gained from
ICTY indictments and their threat, Holbrooke resented actions by
the ICTY that interfered with his activities, or policy goals.  He
was
"confronted by an unexpected problem: the local police had
arrested two senior Bosnian Serb officers, General Djordje
Djukic and Colonel Aleksa Krsmanovic, as they entered Sarajevo
in a civilian car.   The Bosnians claimed the two men were war
criminals..." 

The arrest had violated "free movement" agreements made at
Dayton.  President Milosevic demanded their release.  The Bosinian
Serbs threatened further participation in the Accord. Holbrooke
continued,
"we would normally have insisted that the Muslims release them
immediately.  But Justice Goldstone complicated matters
considerably; from the International War Crimes Tribunal in
the Hague, he issued a warrant for the two men--even though
they had not been indicted." Id.

Holbrooke did not intercede to defend the Dayton Accord.  The two
men were held for several months at the Hague before the Charges
were dropped for lack of evidence.           

            The real objective of US policy is reflected in
Holbrooke's description of President Clinton's unplanned stop at a
US military "staging area in Taszar, Hungary," forced by bad
weather en route to the US military base in Tuzla, Bosnia after
Dayton.  The President, Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of
Hungary hurried to meet President Clinton.  Holbrooke wrote
"The presence of six thousand American troops on Hungarian
soil only four years after the end of the Cold War--and forty
years after the 1956 Soviet invasion--was in itself a
remarkable symbol of the transformation of Europe.  The Hungarians
had one message for President Clinton: that they were ready for
NATO membership and that the staging area at Taszar was part
of that goal.  'Stay as long as you like,' they said.  'Turn
this into a permanent NATO installation--and let us join the
West.'" Id. p. 326.

            For his part Richard Goldstone, the first Chief
Prosecutor to take charge of the office with ICTY, in his memoir,
For Humanity, Reflections of a War Crimes Investigator,
acknowledged the central role played by the US in creating the
Tribunal "Madeleine Albright, ... had played the leading role in
having the tribunal established.  Her continued support for the work of
the Yugoslavia tribunal, and later the Rwanda tribunal, was
crucial to their success.  She appointed one of her senior
advisors, David Scheffer, to take special responsibility for
moving the work of the tribunal forward." Id. p. 78.

            On Goldstone's first day at The Hague, he found
"twenty-three Americans working in the office.  They included
lawyers, computer technicians, and police investigators, all of
whom had been assigned to the tribunal by the US government, at no
cost to the United Nations.   He claimed the United States had provided
assistance only in an attempt to "jump-start the Office of the
Prosecutor and so make up for the slowness and inefficiencies at
the United Nations headquarters in New York." Id. p. 82.  He
complained of the "well-documented inefficiencies of the UN" and
used funds from private sources to pay expenses of his work as
Chief Prosecutor. Id. p. 80‑81.

            Judge Goldstone reported that much time during his
last months in office in 1996 was spent pushing for the arrest of
Karadzic and Mladic to no avail.  In 1998 he participated with
Theodor Meron, a US citizen who was his advisory at The Hague and
is now President of the ICTY, in an organization campaigning for
the same arrests. 

            Judge Goldstone cited, as the few leaders who
advocated the use of force to accomplish the arrest, Klaus Kinkel,
the German Foreign Minister, Robin Cook when he became British
Foreign Minister and Madeleine Albright. Id. p. 117.  Even without
arrests, Judge Goldstone called investigations and indictments of
individuals, including Karadzic and Mladic, "achievements, because,
though not convicted, they were marginalized." Id. p. 126.  He praised
the US and NATO for bombing Yugoslavia, calling it an historic
watershed, even "in apparent breach of the Charter of the UN." Id.
pp. 136-137.

            The singular role of the US in support for all the UN
created ad hoc criminal tribunals, as the dismemberment of
Yugoslavia, support for the RPF government of Rwanda and the
arrests of selected leadership in the nations targeted for
discriminatory prosecution demonstrates the political use it makes of
such Courts.  As recently as September 2003, Theodor Meron,
President of the ICTY called for the arrests of Karadzic and
Mladic--a questionable role for a person who must presume their
innocence and impartially judge the charges against them, a role
usually left to the Prosecutor and governments.

            In her memoir, published in September 2003, Madam
Secretary, Madeleine Albright writes proudly that the
International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, the
first international war crimes tribunal "of its kind" since World
War II, was created in her first year as US Ambassador to the UN. 
Describing the difficulties that faced the tribunal she proclaims
"...the Clinton administration, the leading financial
contributor, didn't waver. We shared our technical expertise,
while our volunteers helped interview witnesses and refugees. 
We made cooperation with the tribunal a top issue in all our
bilateral relationships with governments both in and outside
the region.  I was proud of the role my office played." 

Noting that more than four dozen suspects have been tried by 2003,
she concluded "...the tribunal would eventually land the biggest
fish of all."  She was referring to Slobodan Milosevic.

            Describing her frantic efforts to secure approval for
a NATO assault on Yugoslavia in 1999, she recalls a conversation
with Igor Ivanov, Prime Minister of the Russian Federation during
an intermission in a performance of La Traviata at the Bolshoi
Theater.  By then Secretary of State, Albright told Ivanov "The
Europeans are worried about your reaction if NATO tries to act without
going to the Security Council..." Id. at p. 396.  Ivanov responded
"'Russia will never agree to air strikes against the Serbs,' he
began.  'That would be totally unacceptable.  NATO has no right to
attack a sovereign state.'" Id. at p. 397.

            As the NATO bombing continued into April, Secretary
Albright rejected a pause in the attacks "as a sign of weakness". 
She considered "declaring Milosevic's removal from power an
explicit war aim."  Referring to the British, she recalled "We
agreed among ourselves that Kosovo would have to become an
international protectorate after the war, with Yugoslavia sovereignty
retained in name only." Id. p. 411.

            To secure approval for a NATO attack, the State
Department
"...put together a long-term reconstruction plan for the
entire Balkans region. ... This initiative would foster
cooperation among countries throughout the region, and, by
promising aid to Belgrade only if a change in government
occurred, create an additional incentive to dump Milosevic." Id.
pp. 411-412.

            The long-term reconstruction plan has not begun, but
Slobodan Milosevic is on trial at The Hague.

            Working on Russia, Albright writes
"I began an almost continuous dialogue with Ivanov, telling
him that I hoped our differences over Kosovo would not
jeopardize cooperation on other matters.  He said there was no
avoiding it. 'Russia cannot,' he said, 'sit around and watch
NATO destroy a sovereign nation.'" Id. p. 413.

            On May 7, US B-2 bombers hit the Chinese Embassy
killing three Chinese in the Embassy and injuring twenty. 
Albright writes "our pilots had thought (it) was a Yugoslav
weapons acquisition agency." Id. p. 417.

            Twenty days later,
"the war crimes tribunal announced the indictment of
Milosevic, Milutinovic, (President of Serbia) and three other
Serb leaders for crimes against humanity.  There were those
who were nervous about Milosevic's indictment, feeling that it
would mean we couldn't negotiate with him.  I was not in that
camp.  I was gratified by the indictments..." Id. p. 419.

A week later, Albright states,
            "On June 3 peace terms were agreed upon.  NATO
would occupy Kosovo.  On June 9, Yugoslav military forces
started withdraws from Kosovo, the following day NATO
suspended air strikes.  Secretary Albright awaiting the news
in Europe was elated.  "Walking down the streets in Cologne, I
received a round of applause.  During the G8 meeting, Foreign Minister
Fischer had said, 'Well, if it was Madeleine's war, it is now
Madeleine's victory.' ... 'After dinner President Clinton
called and his opening line was, 'So you're a happy girl.'  He
was certainly a happy boy.  He told me about a column he had
just read by John Keegan in which the British historian had
written, 'There are certain dates in the history of warfare
that mark real turning points...Now there is a new turning point to fix
on the calendar: June 3, 1999, when the capitulation of
President Milosevic proved that a war can be won by airpower
alone.'" Id. p. 421.

            President Clinton's pleasure with John Keegan’s column
proclaiming President Milosevic's "capitulation" "proved that a
war can be won by air power alone" reveals a greater interest in
military power than in history.  The US was forced to go back to
the United Nations, whose authority it had flouted, to secure
approval of the terms for ending its aggression.  Resolution 1244
(1999) adopted by the Security Council on June 10, 1999, ended the
bombing of Yugoslavia.  While speaking of substantial autonomy for the
people of Kosovo, a status Yugoslavia had previously recognized,
the resolution provided that Kosovo shall remain "within the
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia" (Para 10).  It further demanded
that the "KLA and other armed Kosovo Albanian groups end
immediately all offensive actions and comply with the requirements
for demilitarization laid down by the head of the international
security presence in consultation with the Special Representative of
the Secretary General." (Para. 15) Air power did enormous criminal
damage.  It did not win a war.  The failure of the peace that
followed is a failure of the US and of KFOR, which was authorized
by Resolution 1244, to fulfill the UN Mandate.

            Secretary Albright concedes in her memoir
"Well before the war in Kosovo, I gained administration
support for a policy of trying to replace Milosevic.  For two
years we moved both behind the scenes and in public toward
that end.  With colleague Joschka Fischer and others, I urged
Serb opposition leaders to build a real political organization
and focus on pushing Milosevic out. ... In public remarks I
said repeatedly that the United States wanted Milosevic 'out of power,
out of Serbia, and in the custody of the war crimes tribunal.'"
Id. p. 500.

            In late July 1999 she visited Kosovo for the first
time. In Pristina she spoke to
"an enormous crowd gathered in the city's central square. The
crowd, swollen by returned refugees, was dressed in a mixture
of Albanian national costumes and Chicago Bulls jerseys. ... I
said, 'We must support the war crimes tribunal, because those
indicted for ethnic cleansing and murder should be held
accountable, and Slobodan Milosevic must answer for his crimes.' 
The crowd yelled even louder." Id. p. 425.

            After her speech in Pristina, Secretary Albright drove
to the
"Serb Orthodox monastery of Gracanica, the mood was fearful
and bitter.  I was visiting the monastery to meet with Bishop
Artemije Radosavljevic and other local Serb religious
leaders.  The bishop had strongly opposed the NATO bombing."
            "When I had met the bishop in Washington before
the war, he had warned that a military confrontation would be
a disaster.  Now he showed me pictures of destroyed churches,
recounted attacks that had been made on Serbs, and expressed
his fear that all Serbs might have to leave Kosovo.  I told
him that outcome was the opposite of what I wanted; NATO peacekeepers
and the UN would do everything possible to help his people feel
secure.  The bishop said that if Serbs were driven out,
Milosevic would be proven right.  I agreed." Id. p. 426.

            Now four years later violence flares out frequently
and more than 250,000 Serbs have been driven out of Kosovo.

            By Secretary Albright's acknowledged test, Milosevic
was right.

            NATO attacks in Bosnia and against Yugoslavia were the
first in NATO history.  Its victims were defenseless against its
air power.  Neither NATO nor its individual members have repaired
the vast destruction they inflicted.  Two NATO members had bombed
Belgrade and other Yugoslavia cities before: Germany in 1941 and
the US in 1945.

            The ease and confidence with which principals involved
in the war of aggression against Yugoslavia and prosecutions of
the ICTY, including Albright, Holbrooke and Goldstone, speak in
the most derogatory terms of Slobodan Milosevic and other Serb
leaders can only be understood in the light of years of demonization
by the Western media of Yugoslavia, its leaders and for the past
fifteen years, of Milosevic and Serbia with special vehemence.  As
a single additional illustration, Holbrooke describes how a
waitress at a restaurant in the Wright-Patterson air base during
the negotiations at Dayton in 1995 was charmed by President
Milosevic, adding that she was unaware she was talking to "one of the
most reviled people in the world."  That revulsion was a creation of
the Western media.  It makes attacks on the victims of its
demonization politically profitable.

            The media overwhelmingly supports US militarism,
military expenditures and both US economic and military
interventions.  In war and peace it glorifies US military actions
conditioning the public to accept and seek the use of US military
power to advance US economic and political policies.  The media
and the Pentagon tell much the same story in wartime and peace time. 
They serve the same master, the American plutocracy.  They rarely
question the legality, or morality of US military actions, nearly
always justify and celebrate US military operations and demean the
victims, both soldiers and civilians, so often defenseless against
US high-technology warfare.  Foreign military casualties are
overstated during combat, civilian casualties are understated and
both are ignored thereafter.  The US media has made no effort to report
civilian casualties in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, or Iraq and does
not publish those who do.

            The Western media is owned and financed by
concentrations of great wealth.  Its principal income is from
sales to major corporations of advertising for their products. 
The western media is overwhelming responsible for demonizing
individual leaders, organizations, governments, ethnic groups, even
religions, largely as a worldwide chorus for US government
propaganda.  Such wealth overwhelmingly supports militarism,
exploitation of foreign resources and labor, foreign investment
and trade advantages and protection of its foreign assets because
it profits from all of these.  The media informs, omits and misinforms
public opinion creating a climate in which war and war crimes by
the US will be supported or ignored and demonization of its
enemies accepted.  The public accepts the message, which appeals
to its emotions using fear, hatred, nationalist pride,
indifference and a sense of powerlessness.

            Peace will be difficult to achieve until the media
seeks to provide the public with a range of facts, opinions and
perspectives sufficient to make informed judgments. 

Recent wars of aggression against Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq
might have been successfully resisted by the people within the
aggressor nations and by world opinion if the media served the
public need for knowledge.  What is past will be prologue unless
access to needed information becomes available to all who seek it.

            The failure of the ICTY to even investigate US and
NATO crimes against peace, war crimes and their violations of the
UN and NATO Charters, which eroded of UN authority and challenged
its capacity to keep peace, painfully exposes the unilateral use
of the ICTY to prosecute those who resisted the dismemberment of
Yugoslavia and demonize them for posterity. 

            The Tribunal accusations, focused on Serbs, is
psychologically more devastating then bombs which are only brute
force.  The Court can destroy the honor of a whole people.  To
employ the Court unilaterally, to assure impunity for power,
corrupts justice and forces inequality in prosecutions by the
Tribunal.  Equality is the mother of justice.  Its absence breeds
the revolutionary impulse, hatred and war.  Other criminal courts
created by the Security Council confirm the political motivation
of the US and its use of them to enforce its policies.

            The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR)
was created to be a fig leaf for the failure of the UN and
powerful countries to prevent the tragic political violence of
1994.  The unauthorized Security Council statute limited ICTY
jurisdiction to events in a single year 1994, after thirty-four years
of aggression against Rwanda by Rwandan exiles who supported the
Belgian Colonial government and in later years by the RPF, which
was founded in Washington, D.C. and supported by the US.  By
restricting jurisdiction to 1994, the US prevented investigations
for crimes against peace and war crimes by the RPF, which
conducted major invasions from Uganda in 1990 and 1993.  The French
government stopped the invasion in 1993 after major incursions which
provided enclaves for RPF forces within Rwanda, including a
negotiated deployment in Kigali itself of greater than battalion
strength. 

            The Tribunal has ignored the key causative factor in
the violence: who shot down the plane carrying the Presidents of
Rwanda and Burundi on April 6, 1994?  It has ignored the slaughter
of the Catholic Archbishop with ten other bishops and other
Catholic leaders by RPF soldiers at Gitarama in late April 1994.

            The restriction of ICTR jurisdiction to the geographic
limits of Rwanda excluded the slaughters of hundreds of thousands
of Rwandans who fled and were pursued by RPF violence in
neighboring Zaire, now again the Democratic Republic of Congo. 
The consequence was violence across Congo to Kinshasa with untold
hundreds of thousands killed and the RPF briefly in Kinshasa and
controlling vast parts of Congo, exploiting diamonds and other
resources with impunity and US support. 

            War rages today in Burundi and Rwanda itself is a time
bomb, waiting to explode with more than 100,000 uncharged
prisoners, most held for more than nine years under cruel, inhuman
and degrading conditions.  During the 1990s, the US established
hegemony, with Tutsi leadership, from Uganda, through Rwanda and
Burundi and briefly in most of Congo. 

            If the ICTR had been granted jurisdiction over persons
in adjacent nations who provided bases, arms, training, sanctuary
and soldiers to invade Rwanda, the Tutsi leadership of Uganda,
including its US supported President Museveni, might have been
indicted. President Kagame of Rwanda served for years in Museveni's
forces as he fought to rule Uganda and become his intelligence chief.

            In contrast, the Security Council criminal court
created for Sierra Leone was given jurisdiction to indict
President Taylor of neighboring Liberia, a long time target of US
plans for regime change.  The court indicted Taylor who is now
exiled in Nigeria. Such are the powers of selection in ad hoc Tribunals.

            Faustin Twagiramungn, chosen to be interim Prime
Minister of the Broad Based Transitional Government of Rwanda
under the UN sponsored Arusha Accords in 1993 and Prime Minister
of the RPF government in the immediate aftermath of its surge to
power from July 1994 to October 1995, testified before the ICTR
that he believes more Hutus were killed than Tutsis in a "political
struggle" in 1994 and not in what the ICTR has labeled an ethnic
genocide of Hutus killing Tutsis.  See Transcript, Trial of
Prosecutor v. Ntakirutimana, February 4, 2001, pp. 143 to 168.

            The Gersony Report sponsored by the UNHCR, described
RPF attacks and the slaughter of tens of thousands of Hutus during
a brief period in the summer of 1994 in only two prefectures.  To
date the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda has failed to
indict a single Tutsi more than eight years after its creation.

            The removal in September, 2003 of Chief Prosecutor
Carla del Ponte for the ICTR at the insistent of the RPF
government of Rwanda, because she threatened to make token
indictments of Tutsis to create the appearance of even handedness
reveals the power one nation targeted by an international tribunal
depended on its assistance for witnesses, documents and access to
sites has over such a tribunal and the continuing domination of
the US over the ad hoc UN criminal tribunal it brought into being
and the impunity favored powers and leaders of the US enjoy in
those courts.

            The criminal tribunal authorized for Sierra Leone with
its jurisdiction defined to permit indictment before it threaten
President Charles Taylor of Liberia who was elected with a large
majority in the presence of international monitors, was planned by
the US as a means of marginalizing and destroying leadership
hostile to US dominion in Sierra Leone and regime change in Liberia. 
The US had sought to remove Charles Taylor for years  at terrible
cost in life.  It succeeded in violation of Liberia's institutions
and the legal term of office to which Taylor was elected after
President Bush's arrogant public demand "Taylor must step down" in
the face of continuing rebel violence supported by the US
stiffened resistance to foreign demanded reforms across Africa. 
The US has had a dominant relationship with Liberia since the 1820s. 
Liberia's capital is named for US President Monroe of Doctrine
fame.  Its second city and major port, Buchanan, is named for the
last US President to serve before the US Civil War ended its
slavery.  Despite this close history and consequent high
obligation, the Bush Administration never provided the least
protection for Liberians crowded into the capital from all the
countries in the county and under attack by rebels, mostly
foreign.  Nor will the Bush Administration talk of "rebuilding
Liberia."  It never has.  To their credit, several African nations
sent peacekeepers and the UN provided a significant policing
capacity in October 2003.

            The long struggle to create a UN-supported criminal
tribunal for Cambodia was fueled by the US desire to remove the
Prime Minister and other officials who served in the government of
Kampuchea during and after the Vietnam war.

            The ad hoc criminal tribunals created by the Security
Council corrupt international law, create hatred and division that
lead to war and are incapable by their very nature and purpose of
achieving equal justice under law.  They are selective,
discriminatory and by their creation call for conviction of targeted
persons and groups.

            The Nuremberg Tribunal created by the victors of World
War II separated from the UN, taught the international community
which seeks peace under the rule of international law that in the
future all nations and their leaders must be equally accountable
for violations of international laws.  The US Chief Prosecutor at
Nuremberg, US Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson, proclaimed
with memorable passion the importance of this principle and applying it
to his own country.   Speaking to the American Society of
International Law on April 13, 1945, the day after president
Franklin Roosevelt died with World War II still raging Justice
Jackson also emphasized that while victors had always acted as
they chose toward defeated people, if the choice was for trials in
a court of law for alleged crimes "
... all experience teaches that there are certain things you
cannot do under the guise of judicial trial.  Courts try
cases, but cases also try courts.
You must put no man on trial before anything that is called
court...under the forms of judicial proceedings if you are not
willing to see him freed if not proven guilty..." 

The Anatomy of the Nuremberg Trials, Telford Tayor, Little, Brown
and Co. 1992 at p. 45.

            Following the Nuremberg trials, the UN and the
international community approved the Geneva Conventions and a host
of other treaties, covenants and principles to prevent war and
protect rights.  They are based on the principles that no nation,
however powerful, can be above the law.

            To restore integrity to its own Charter and honor to
its Members, the UN and the Security Council should abolish all
the existing international tribunals it has created and pledge
never to create another. 

            Efforts by the US, or others to create new ad hoc
criminal tribunals, or to be seize and try persons for alleged
criminal acts committed outside the US, will undermine the
authority and effectiveness of the ICC and because they are an
exercise of power in violation of international law, make the world
a more lawless place, more prone to war.

            The harm done by continuing their unauthorized
activity far exceeds any fear that the future of international law
might be impaired, or "criminals might go free."  The accused and
convicted are sufficiently identified.

            The positive steps that must be taken are to protect
and strengthen the International Criminal Court, reform its
mandate and reform defects and deficiencies by the UN Charter that
imperil its performance.

XIII.      The Bush Administration Intends to Pursue Unilateral
Policies Manifested by Its Wars of Aggression Against Yugoslavia,
Afghanistan and Iraq the Creation of Targeted Ad Hoc Criminal
Tribunals, and Its Destructive Acts Against International
Institutions, Treaties and Law.  The US Can Be Deterred Only By United
Commitment of Members of the United Nations to Its Mandate.

     The unilateralist policies of the US threaten the UN and
world peace.  Ad hoc UN created criminal tribunals are part of the
US unilateral approach.  Beyond the long list of unilateral US
military interventions and threats and the several ad hoc UN
criminal tribunals, the US is debilitating the UN and dismantling the
web of international laws and treaties on which the UN must depend
to prevent war.

            While President Bush will challenge the UN to outlaw
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction as he did once again
in his address to the General Assembly on September 23, 2003, he
ignores the near US monopoly of the technology, development and
possession of WMDs and the sophisticated rocketry and other
technology to deliver them anywhere in the world.  Realizing that
megaton nuclear bombs are too brutish, dumb and dangerous even for
their sender, President Bush is now pressing hard for the
development of tactical nuclear weapons that can destroy a
selected suburb or a battalion at a time.

            The US military budget exceeds that of the next
fifteen largest in the world combined and exceeds the gross
national product of most Members of the UN by a multiple.  The US
sells nearly half of all conventional arms sold in international
traffic, which contribute to the deaths of hundreds of thousands
and the impoverishment of hundreds of millions annually.

            Many members of the UN who have watched the brutal US
assaults on Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, or even Grenada, Libya,
Panama, or Sudan realize they have a choice.  They must develop
weapons of mass destruction sufficient to deter the US, or be
prepared to surrender independent action on any issue the US
seriously demands.  The US wars of aggression and their threat spawn
proliferation of WMDs as they create hatred and new capacities for
terrorist violence.

            The US is unilaterally undermining the fragile and
inadequate treaty framework designed to prevent nuclear war.  In
the Non Proliferation Treaty, the then six nuclear powers agreed
to plan and act to dismantle their nuclear weapons in return for
the agreement of the non nuclear powers to not develop or obtain
nuclear weapons.  The US has unilaterally proliferated ever since.  The
US is unilaterally abandoning the ABM and Test Ban treaties,
endangering the entire world.  It seeks a monopoly of military
power for mass destruction. 

            The US has rejected treaties banning land mines
regulating small arms, which kill thousands every year claiming
the Second Amendment to the US Constitution prohibits such a
treaty.  It has even opposed prohibition of the use of children in
war.  Its unilateral policies and coercive power in international
finance, trade, health and environmental protection threaten
everyone.
        The most pervasive unilateralism of the Bush
Administration is its refusal to respect the rights of
others.  Mexico's gift to the UN, standing outside the
entrance to the General Assembly, bears the words of its Zapotec
Indian President Benito Juarez who knew that "A respect for the
rights of others is peace."

            These unilateral polices place the US above
international law, or control, as do the unilateral ad hoc
criminal tribunals that target leaders and peoples chosen by the
US.

            President Bush has made clear his intention to
continue his unilateral militarization.  Continuing threats
against Cuba, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Syria, and hostile acts
and interference in the affairs of many nations, confirm his policy.

            The US wants other nations to help pay for its crimes
against Iraq with troops and funds, to "stabilize" and "rebuild" a
nation on which the US inflicted tens of thousands of deaths and
tens of billion in damage with bombs in 1991, debilitated with a
decade of Security Council approved genocidal sanctions taking
more than a million lives, then attacked again despite UN
opposition in March 2003 killing at least 30,000 people.  It will
force privatization, turning vital facilities and services over to
foreign interests.  It will control oil.  It will give rich
contracts to favored corporate friends. 

            The US will not pay to rebuild nations it destroys, or
damages.  Ask any victims of the past fifty years.  For all its
wealth, US non-military foreign aid is the lowest per capita of
any developed country.  Over a period of twelve years without a
casualty the US caused hundreds more deaths by random rocket and
air assaults.  Deaths included Leila al Attar, an internationally
famous artist and Director of Baghdad Museum of Modern Art in her
home and two employees of the Al Rashid Hotel in an attempt to
assassinate Saddam Hussein in 1993.  Even a UN helicopter and its
seventeen passengers fell victim to US fighter jets in the illegal
US imposed no fly zone over Iraq.

            If there is to be peace and justice, the US owes tens
of billions of dollars to the people of Iraq and must pay to
rebuild the country.  A payment to Iraq of 10% of the US military
budget for the next decade would take the money from the offending
source and provide a means for Iraq to rebuild.  Nothing can
compensate for the lives lost.  US firms must be barred from profiting
for the crimes of their government.

            Actions by the US against the International Criminal
Court reveals its determination not to be held accountable for its
acts, and to destroy the court which it fears.  The US coerced the
Security Council into creating ad hoc Tribunals.  It provided
funds and personnel.  Then it threatened nations with sanctions
and other harm to coerce agreements to arrest and surrender persons
within their borders charged by the ad hoc Tribunals. This is its
chosen means: selective prosecution.

            The US, while clearly opposing an International
Criminal Court that could claim jurisdiction over it, took a major
role in drafting the treaty for the ICC.  It insisted on
provisions and amendments that weakened and impaired the
effectiveness of the tribunal as the price of its participation. 

            The ICC would face an extremely difficult challenge
even if it had a perfect charter and full support.  President
Clinton signed the treaty late in his administration, but
cautioned the US Senate not to ratify it, as is required to bind
the US.  President Bush then withdrew the Presidential approval and
has attacked the ICC at every turn.

            The US attempted unilaterally to coerce many nations
from adopting the ICC treaty, seeking to prevent its
ratification.  Since ratification, the US has coerced nations from
the Philippines to Colombia as recently as September 18, 2003, to
agree not to surrender US citizens to the ICC.  This is a clear
act of obstruction of justice, a criminal offense in the domestic laws
of nations. 

            In a bold act of coercion, on June 30, 2002, US
Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Ambassador John D.
Negroponte, announced that without a Security Council resolution
establishing immunity for personnel contributed to Security
Council-authorized peacekeeping missions, the United States would
veto the resolution to renew the UN peacekeeping mission in
Bosnia-Herzegovina.  Ambassador Negroponte argued that, having
accepted the risks of "exposing people to dangerous and difficult
situations in the service of promoting peace and stability, we
will not ask them to accept the additional risk of politicized
prosecutions before a court whose jurisdiction over our people, the
Government of the United States does not accept." 

            On July 12, 2002, after intense negotiations, the
Security Council, by a unanimous vote, adopted Resolution 1422,
which provides that for one year from July 1, 2002, the ICC will
not begin, or proceed with, an investigation or prosecution for
acts committed within the year against officials, or personnel of UN
peacekeeping operations contributed to such operations by states
not party to the Rome Statute.  Resolution 1422 further states an
intention to renew its term for additional one-year periods as
long as necessary.  The King can do no wrong.  Should the US have
such impunity?  And if there is a risk of "politicized
prosecution" should anyone be subjected to the jurisdiction of such a
court?  Yet surely an independent, impartial and competent
International Criminal Court with worldwide jurisdiction is
essential to peace in these times.

XIV.     The Indictment of the President of the Federal Republic
of Yugoslavia, Slobodan Milosevic, Was A Politically Determined
Discriminatory Prosecution

            There is not a more extreme case of discriminatory
political prosecution by the ICTY than the indictment of Slobodan
Milosevic.  He was President of the Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia, the highest official of the Balkan federation.    He
is an Orthodox Christian Serb.  The Muslim President of Bosnia Alija
Izetbegovic, and the Roman Catholic President of Croatia Franjo
Tudjman, both now deceased, were not indicted by the ICTY.  By any
measure each of them is more politically extreme than Milosevic,
but he alone represented the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.  For
the NATO powers, Yugoslavia’s dismemberment had to be justified. 
Milosevic was a former President of the Serbian Republic of
Yugoslavia and Serbs were the largest part of the Yugoslav
population and had the strongest commitment to the federation.

            Within Bosnia, which in the Dayton Accords was divided
into three parts, Muslim, Croatian and Serbian living in Srpska,
among the political leadership only the Serb, Radovan Karadzic,
President of Republika Srpska, who had strongly supported the
Federal Republic, and his successor, Biljana Plavsic, were indicted.

            Richard Goldstone, who began service as the Chief
Prosecutor for the ICTY on August 15, 1994 opened an investigation
of President Milosevic within two months.  When he left the office
in late 1996 he had not obtained any evidence justifying the
indictment of President Milosevic.  He wrote in his memoir
published in 2001,
"...to indict Milosevic it was necessary to establish before a
criminal tribunal that he was a party to the crimes committed
by the Bosnian Serb Army. Had there been such evidence he
would have been indicted.  I frequently assured the public
that no person ever pressed me to refrain from indicting
Milosevic or anyone else."

Goldstone was aware when he wrote this that President Milosevic
had been indicted later in 1999.

            Goldstone was replaced by Canadian jurist Louise
Arbour, who continued the investigation.  And still there was no
indictment of President Milosevic for two and a half years.  An
indictment could not be justified in light of the facts.

            Though a passionate believer in the necessity and
desirability of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia if there is to
be peace in the Balkans, President Milosevic recognized that peace
was the end to be sought; federation was a means to that end and
not a reason for war.  As even Holbrooke concedes, President
Milosevic negotiated for a peaceful resolution.  In the wake of
secession, President Milosevic presided over the formation of the
new Federal Republic of Yugoslavia on April 28, 1992, comprised of
only Serbia and Montenegro.  Civil War had not yet broken out. 
The new Constitution recognized the withdrawal of four Republics
from the federation.  The Constitution affirmatively declared the
new Republic had no territorial ambitions against its former Republics:
Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia and Bosnia.  Serbia and Montenegro
accepted secession and renounced force, which would necessarily
diminish the possibility of a large Balkan federation in the near
future.

            The new Constitution was adopted quickly.  The
European Union, urged by Germany, had recognized Bosnia and
Herzegovina on April 6, 1992.  It chose the 51st anniversary of
the first dismemberment of Yugoslavia by Germany, Italy, Hungary
and Bulgaria to destroy the achievement of federation among South Slavs
won by the Balkan victors in World War II.  President Milosevic
did not intend to risk a repetition of the Balkan tragedy of 1941
to 1945.

            Though Bosnia had seceded from Yugoslavia, President
Milosevic used his influence with Bosnian Serbs to persuade them
to accept the UN sponsored Vance-Owen settlement which they signed
in Athens, only to see it fail from US opposition. All other
international peace initiatives met the same strongest support by
President Milosevic.

            President Milosevic then became the negotiator at
Dayton for the Bosnian Serb leadership, which was barred from
participation, the indictment of President Karadzic by the ICTY
being the justification.  Once again President Milosevic was the
key person in securing a peace agreement even though it reinforced
the dismemberment of the successful Socialist Federal Republic he
cherished.

            Serbia and Montenegro under President Milosevic's
leadership did not expel anyone, or "ethnically cleanse" any
Croats, Slovenes, Bosnians, or Macedonians during the difficult
years 1992-1999.  On the contrary, the new Republic accepted
70,000 Muslim refugees from Bosnia who sought safety in Serbia. 
Even before the immigration of 70,000 Muslims from Bosnia, Serbia
had a larger Muslim population than Bosnia.  Muslims in Serbia were
never attacked, except by NATO bombs, and then only as part of the
general population.

            President Milosevic's successful efforts to maintain
the peace despite the cost to federation, stands in sharp contrast
to the acts of President Tudjman in Croatia, Izetbegovic in Bosnia
and Serb and Croat Bosnians who used military force to purge
others from territory they would govern.

            Perhaps most revealing of the pure political nature of
the ICTY indictment of President Milosevic is the fact that when
indictment was announced in late May 1999 it was not for acts
during the preceding seven years in Croatia, or Bosnia which had
been under investigation for years.  He was first indicted shortly
after April 22, 1999 when NATO bombed his home in the suburbs of
Belgrade in an assassination attempt. 

            The indictment was for alleged Serb military activity
in Kosovo earlier in 1999.  Kosovo was under heavy NATO
bombardment at the time which continued into June.  Only after the
bombing ceased was it possible for NATO to occupy and for the ICTY
to enter Kosovo to investigate. 

            President Milosevic was indicted during the midst of
the US/NATO aerial and missile attacks throughout Serbia, which
were most intensive in Kosovo, in order to justify the US and NATO
criminal assault against Serbia and to obscure the thousands of
deaths it inflicted from the air.  Included among the many
notorious assaults causing deaths was the bombing of the Chinese
Embassy in New Belgrade which had created an international uproar
shortly before the indictment.  It was a case of demonization and
persecution by a presumptively neutral UN Tribunal proceeding
first with the indictment, then later with an investigation of the
alleged crime.

            Months later Slobodan Milosevic was indicted for
alleged crimes years earlier in Croatia and Bosnia.

            The US and NATO maintained control of the ICTY just as
they did over the peace negotiations and bombing in Bosnia and
Serbia.  The Chief Prosecutor, President of the Tribunal and
President of the Trial Chamber that indicted President Milosevic
were all from NATO countries and the US was the dominant force creating
and guiding both NATO and the ICTY.

XV.       The Sheer Magnitude And Scope Of The Trial Is Not
Capable of, or Appropriate For Judicial Resolution The And Pace Of
the Trial of Slobodan Milosevic Threatens His Health and Right To
Due Process of Law

            President Milosevic, with the Socialist Federal
Republic of Yugoslavia and all its people, are victims of the
dismemberment of Yugoslavia and the violence it entailed, the
devastation by US and NATO wars of aggression and finally of
regime change from foreign intervention.  He was surrendered to the
ICTY in violation of the Constitution and laws of Yugoslavia in
2001.

            His trial began in February 2002.  President Milosevic
chose to "defend himself in person," a fundamental human right
recognized by the International Covenant on Civil and Political
Rights.  Part III, Article 14(3)(d).  As of October 1, 2003, the
prosecution had presented its case over a period of twenty months.

            There has never been a trial like it in history. 
Nuremberg with twenty-one individual defendants and charges
relating to all the horror of World War II excepting the Pacific
conflict, was completed in eleven months.  Beginning in November
1945, the prosecution finished its presentation on March 4, 1946. 
The defense then proceeded and the final judgment was announced on
October 1, 1946.

            Unlike criminal prosecutions, which are based on the
responsibility of the accused for his individual conduct, the ICTY
prosecutor, lacking evidence of criminal acts of President
Milosevic, has put the history of the conflict in evidence, first
Kosovo, which was chronologically last, then Croatia and Bosnia. 
The Prosecution may or may not finish its presentation during 2003.

            To date the prosecution has produced some 500,000
pages of documents and 5,000 videocassettes.  There have been
approximately 250 days of hearings with over 200 prosecution
witnesses testifying.  The transcript of the testimony runs more
than 30,000 pages.

            Overwhelmingly the evidence involves events in which
President Milosevic was not present and played no role.  He has
nevertheless vigorously cross-examined the witnesses in defense of
the truth and for history.  While it is awkward, if not
impossible, and dangerous for a judiciary to attempt, write, or find
the facts of history in a legal proceeding, President Milosevic,
standing alone for the defense, has fought for the facts and to
keep the trial record true to the history it purports to
determine.  Historians tend to believe history cannot be
professionally written for a century after the times it describes,
when passions cool, the dust settles and events have been examined
from many perspectives.  Many agree with Voltaire that history is
fiction agreed upon.  The ICTY seeks to write a history dictated
by the US and NATO, not by the facts.  The entire procedure is
alien to truth and justice.

            The spectacle of a lone man defending history and
truth to exhaustion against the power of the UN court created to
bury Yugoslavia signals "unfair" and "untrue".

            The Herculean task, combined with the conditions of
the prison in which he is confined, which was used as a Nazi
prison during the occupation of the Netherlands in the 1940s, have
drained his energy and stamina and endanger his health.  The very
fact that the accused is confined in a former Nazi prison
symbolizes how little power has learned from the past.

            The Tribunal has the duty to protect President
Milosevic's health.  The death penalty is not an option.  It also
has a duty to respect his right to represent himself and not
impair his health to do so.  It <br/><br/>(Message over 64 KB, truncated)

http://auth.unimondo.org/cfdocs/obportal/
index.cfm?fuseaction=news.notizia&NewsID=2828


Scandalo OGM in Croazia

Un laboratorio pubblico scopre in commercio alimenti geneticamente
modificati. Il Ministero della Sanità minimizza, ma il Centro Comune di
Ricerca di Ispra, in Italia, conferma. Insorgono le associazioni dei
consumatori. Cosa si mangia in Croazia?

(23/02/2004) Da Osijek, scrive Drago Hedl

“Negozi pieni di alimenti modificati geneticamente”, “I Croati
comprano olio di soia geneticamente modificata”, “Carne anche in paté
vegetariani”, “Organismi geneticamente modificati (OGM) in un prodotto
alimentare su due”, “La gente ha il diritto di sapere che cosa mangia”:
sono solo alcuni dei titoli che dominano in questi giorni le prime
pagine dei giornali croati. La Croazia è sotto choc per un nuovo
scandalo scoppiato quando il Laboratorio per la Diagnosi Molecolare di
Osijek, che fa parte del Dipartimento della Sanità Pubblica, ha
pubblicato i risultati delle analisi di 33 prodotti alimentari, scelti
a caso nei negozi della città. E’ emerso infatti che 14 dei prodotti
presi in considerazione contenevano ingredienti geneticamente
modificati in quantità superiori all’1%. Nessuno di quei prodotti
indicava nella etichetta che conteneva componenti modificate
geneticamente.

“E’ la prima volta che qualcuno in Croazia dimostra la presenza di
OGM in prodotti alimentari che, secondo la etichetta, non dovrebbero
averne - osserva il dottor Josip Milas, direttore dell’Ufficio della
Sanità Pubblica di Osijek. Definirei “spaventosa” questa nostra
scoperta, non solo per quanto riguarda gli OGM, ma anche più in
generale per il fatto che i produttori non si curano di quanto è
scritto sui propri prodotti. Abbiamo infatti trovato manzo e maiale nel
paté di pollo, e c’erano diversi tipi di carne nel paté vegetariano.”

La scoperta choc fatta dai laboratori di Osijek ha posto la questione
di cosa mangiano realmente i Croati, e di quanto si possa essere certi
che un prodotto contenga davvero quello che indica l’etichetta. Come è
possibile che i prodotti di soia (salse, latte di soia, salame di pollo
con ingredienti di soia), vari paté vegetariani, fiocchi di granturco,
olio o mais in scatola contengano ingredienti modificati geneticamente
che non sono menzionati nella etichetta del prodotto?

La Croazia non dispone ancora di una regolamentazione che obblighi i
produttori ad apporre una etichetta speciale sui cibi che contengano
OGM, ma l’Ufficio della Sanità Pubblica della Croazia dichiara di
accogliere la pratica europea secondo la quale gli alimenti non
dovrebbero contenere una quantità superiore all’1% di ingredienti
geneticamente modificati, e questo dovrebbe essere riportato
chiaramente su tutti i prodotti di questo tipo. In base alla Normativa
Alimentare, tuttavia, il produttore deve indicare esattamente tutte le
componenti del prodotto, e la inosservanza di tali disposizioni prevede
multe dalle 100.000 alle 500.000 kune (da 12.500 a 65.000 euri circa).

Il Ministro della Sanità, Andrija Hebrang, ha cercato di sminuire la
portata dei risultati dei laboratori di Osijek per cercare di calmare
il panico causato dalle analisi: “Su dodici prodotti dello stesso tipo
di quelli presi in esame ad Osijek, abbiamo trovato che solo uno
conteneva una percentuale superiore all’1% di OGM. L’indagine è stata
condotta dal Laboratorio Centrale di Zagabria.” Il Ministro della
Sanità croato ha mostrato profonda irritazione nei confronti del
direttore dell’Ufficio di Sanità Pubblico di Osijek, dichiarando che i
risultati erano stati pubblicati troppo presto, e che tutto doveva
essere controllato una seconda volta da un laboratorio di qualche Paese
della UE certificato per condurre tali analisi.

“Non siamo degli incoscienti e crediamo che la gente debba sapere se
il cibo che mangia contiene OGM. Abbiamo controllato tutti i risultati
tre volte, e abbiamo poi inviato tutti i prodotti al Centro Comune di
Ricerca di Ispra, in Italia. I risultati sono stati identici ai nostri.
Il nostro laboratorio è nuovo, fornito delle attrezzature più moderne,
e i nostri esperti sono stati formati al Centro Europeo per la ricerca
degli OGM di Ispra - ha replicato il direttore dell’Ufficio di Osijek.”

I consumatori sono sdegnati per il fatto che nessuno voglia rivelare
i nomi dei produttori che hanno omesso la indicazione sulla presenza di
OGM nei propri prodotti: “Perché i nomi dei produttori che ingannano i
consumatori non vengono rivelati? Chiediamo che i nomi siano resi
pubblici, si tratta di una negazione del diritto fondamentali del
consumatore di sapere cosa c’è nel cibo che acquista - ha dichiarato
Mira Brumercek-Lukacevic, presidente della Associazione per la Tutela
dei Consumatori di Osijek.

La organizzazione non governativa “Libertà di movimento –
Associazione Verde di Osijek” ha fatto le stesse richieste: “Chiediamo
urgentemente la divulgazione dei nominativi relativi a prodotti,
fabbricanti, importatori e punti vendita che commercializzano prodotti
geneticamente modificati senza indicazione. Chiediamo che il caso sia
portato di fronte alla pubblica accusa e che i responsabili siano
puniti secondo le leggi.” I Verdi si sono appellati ai consumatori
invitando alla cautela nell’acquisto dei prodotti, e chiedendo di
riferire i casi di prodotti che non contenevano quanto indicato nella
etichetta.

Ai consumatori, però, tali raccomandazioni sono di scarsa utilità. Il
direttore della ditta “Zagreb Oil”, Anto Bojic, ha dichiarato che la
Croazia ha venduto olio prodotto con soia geneticamente modificata per
anni: “L’anno scorso abbiamo preso alcune confezioni di olio importato
che recava la scritta “No OGM” dagli scaffali di diversi negozi croati.
I risultati delle analisi condotte nei nostri moderni laboratori,
confermati dalla Università per le Scienze Alimentari e le
Biotecnologie di Zagabria, hanno dimostrato che l’olio era
effettivamente fatto di soia. Indagini ulteriori hanno tuttavia
mostrato che non era stato prodotto nella Repubblica Ceca, come
dichiarato dalla etichetta, ma in Germania, con soia proveniente dagli
Stati Uniti. Da anni tutta la soia degli Stati Uniti contiene OGM - ha
affermato il direttore della Zagreb Oil.

Prove ulteriori sul fatto che nei negozi croati c’è veramente di
tutto sono state fornite l’anno scorso da una indagine dell’Istituto
Veterinario della Croazia, che ha rilevato tracce significative di
antibiotici in 14 campioni di latte e 4 di carne presi in esame, così
come anche nei campioni di miele. Calamari importati contenevano invece
tracce di un pericoloso metallo, il cadmio.

Malgrado la Croazia abbia una Associazione per la Difesa dei
Consumatori e vengano condotte diverse ispezioni sugli alimentari, il
crescente numero di organizzazioni non governative che si batte per un
ambiente salutare e per il diritto ad una vita più sana resta impotente
di fronte alla forte lobby degli importatori e dei produttori, che è
disposta a violare la legge pur di realizzare profitti maggiori. Mentre
il movimento Greenpeace, in Europa, è riuscito ad obbligare i
fabbricanti di alimentari ad indicare chiaramente quali prodotti
contengano OGM, una cosa simile in Croazia appare ancora lontana nel
tempo.


Vedi anche:

- Croazia: import alimentare alle stelle
http://auth.unimondo.org/cfdocs/obportal/
index.cfm?fuseaction=news.view1&NewsID=2800

Altri nostri articoli sugli OGM nel sud est Europa:

- Ancora OGM in Albania
http://auth.unimondo.org/cfdocs/obportal/
index.cfm?fuseaction=news.view1&NewsID=2811

- Albania: aiuti geneticamente modificati
http://auth.unimondo.org/cfdocs/obportal/
index.cfm?fuseaction=news.view1&NewsID=2571

- La Serbia e la soia transgenica
http://auth.unimondo.org/cfdocs/obportal/
index.cfm?fuseaction=news.view1&NewsID=1368

- Croazia: Organismi Geneticamente Modificati? No grazie
http://auth.unimondo.org/cfdocs/obportal/
index.cfm?fuseaction=news.view1&NewsID=463


» Fonte: da Osijek, Drago Hedl
© Osservatorio sui Balcani

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Kosovo : rompre cinq ans de silence

On ne parle plus beaucoup du Kosovo depuis quelques années. Pourtant, en
1999, cette province d'ex-Yougoslavie avait occupé les premières pages
des journaux et fait les grands titres des journaux télévisés. Il
s'agissait de nous préparer à l'intervention de l'OTAN, puis de relater
les 78 jours de bombardements sur la Serbie et le Monténégro, suivis de
l'entrée victorieuse des troupes occidentales sur le territoire kosovar.
Depuis, le sujet est quasiment devenu tabou dans nos médias. Pourtant,
de
nombreux pays occidentaux, dont la Belgique, continuent à y déployer des
troupes. Alors, pourquoi après ce battage médiatique intensif a-t-il
succédé
ce pesant silence ?

On se souvient que nos responsables politiques, suivis comme un seul
homme par l'immense majorité des médias, nous avaient assuré que les
bombardements étaient indispensables pour éviter une « catastrophe
humanitaire », protéger les droits humains, établir la démocratie et
instaurer une société multiethnique au Kosovo. Ces nobles idéaux
devaient
justifier la violation flagrante du droit international et les quelques
milliers de « victimes collatérales » provoquées par les bombes de
l'alliance atlantique.Cinq ans plus tard, les informations qui nous
parviennent du Kosovo ne sont guère réjouissantes. La province - gérée
par une administration de l'ONU et occupée par près de 20.000 soldats
commandés par l'OTAN - connaît un taux de chômage dépassant les 70 % et
est devenue une plaque tournante des trafics en tout genre, en
particulier de l'héroïne et des êtres humains. Mais, surtout, le Kosovo
sous occupation occidentale a été « purifié » de toutes ces minorités.
Sous les yeux des soldats occidentaux, la plupart des Serbes, des Roms,
des Slaves musulmans ont été expulsés par les extrémistes albanais qui
se
sont emparés du pouvoir après le retrait forcé de l'armée yougoslave.
Des
milliers d'entre eux ont été assassinés après la cessation des combats
ou
sont portés disparus. Plus d'une centaine d'églises et de monastères
orthodoxes, dont certains bâtis il y a plus de sept siècles, ont été
totalement détruits. Les quelques dizaines milliers de non-Albanais qui
y
vivent encore ont dû se replier dans des enclaves protégées, plutôt mal
que bien, par les troupes de l'OTAN et leur liberté de mouvement est
strictement limitée.

Bref, au lieu du paradis multiethnique promis, les Occidentaux ont
favorisé le développement d'une société dominée la discrimination
raciale. Si le régime d'apartheid sud-africain a disparu dans les
oubliettes de l'histoire, un régime semblable a émergé en plein coeur de
l'Europe. C'est pour se rendre compte de visu du sort fait aux minorités
du Kosovo et leur exprimer notre solidarité que le Comité de
surveillance
OTAN propose d'organiser cet été une visite de 10 à 15 jours. Si vous
êtes intéressé à participer à ce voyage ou à sa préparation, ou si vous
voulez simplement vous informer sur ce problème occulté par les médias,
nous nous réunirons le 16 mars à Ixelles . Après un bref exposé
informatif sur la situation au Kosovo et la projection du film « Les
damnés du Kosovo » (de M. Collon et V. Stojilkovic, durée : 40'), nous
discuterons de la possibilité de concrétiser ce voyage et examinerons
les
modalités pratiques de son organisation. Si vous êtes dans
l'impossibilité de participer à cette rencontre, n'hésitez pas à nous
faire part de votre intérêt en nous écrivant à l'adresse info@...
ou en téléphonant au 0474 46 97 08.

La réunion se tiendra le mardi 16 mars à 20 heures au Centre culturel
latino-américain Subterra, 33 rue de Dublin à 1050 Bruxelles

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Anti-imperialiste mailing list
Anti-imperialiste@...
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Un libro da buttare nel secchio della spazzatura:

“L’unificazione impossibile”
di Alessandro Vitale
Alfredo Guida editore, 2000, 7.75€

Riportiamo di seguito la recensione di Babsi Jones,
dal sito http://www.exju.org/ :


[ex-libris] tutta colpa del principe lazar e del centralismo democratico


ho nel folder “arretrati” un po’ di recensioni che non si meritano più
di mezza paginetta ciascuna, sicché mi lancio, ne posto una e me le
levo di torno. li liquido così, questi libri accatastati nel corso del
2003, nei prossimi giorni, a mo’ di rubrica. vado con la prima.

“l’unificazione impossibile” di alessandro vitale (alfredo guida
editore, 2000, 7.75€) l’ho letto districandomi fra la grande misura di
note, quasi tutte inservibili, alcune francamente ai limiti
dell’autoreferenziale, che sono seminate fra i paragrafi e non
germogliano in niente d’interessante. quelle riservate agli studi che
l’autore stesso ha dedicato alla civiltà slava-ortodossa sembrano
appelli alla sua autorità accademica in mancanza di meglio. più note
che saggio, e dire che il saggio è breve: 94 pagine compresa
introduzione. il sottotitolo ammonitore è “una lettura diversa del
collasso jugoslavo”, e quell’aggettivo si becca pure il diritto ad un
corsivo. in effetti, le teorie di vitale – che vertono più sul kosovo
che sull’intera questione jugoslava - giocano a rimpiattino fra la
logica antiserba sofriana e quella interventista diessina e alcune
soffuse allucinazioni post-leghiste (va detto che il saggista,
ricercatore alla statale di milano, è un accolito del defunto miglio),
e questa inoculazione qualcosa di diverso potrebbe anche produrlo.
potrebbe, ma non lo fa. se riuscite a superare indenni la scelta di
trascrivere i nomi slavi con la tristemente diffusa grafia che io
chiamo “dello sfracello grafico” (miloshevich, nachertanje, garashanin:
perché tanto odio fonetico?), vi imbatterete nell’analisi di vitale che
è tesa a spiegarci ancora una volta come la condotta dei serbi, “entità
clanica che ha sempre vissuto fra difensivismo irredentista ed
espansionismo autoritario” (sic) sia l’unica responsabile del collasso
jugoslavo (sebbene l’autore si affretti a negare “la pretesa di offrire
un’interpretazione monocausale”, che è quello che de facto riesce a
fare con orgogliosa convinzione). si comincia con il comune refrain di
terra-e-sangue, stavolta impreziosito da alcune osservazioni in merito
all’eredità filosofica bizantina, che sono l’unico spunto discretamente
acuto del libretto, almeno per l’originalità: non saprei dire su due
piedi se è proprio la politeìa celeste il nocciolo della questione
serba, ma almeno l’inciso analitico che offre vitale da pagina 33 a
pagina 38 non sembra scopiazzato a destra e a manca dai dodicimila
saggi antiserbi che sono stati stampati dal ‘91 ad oggi da tutte le
case editrici da andorra allo zaire. tutto il resto è condensabile in
una parafrasi adatta ad un bambino di sei anni: c’erano una volta i
cattivi serbi, erano già malvagi e maniaci dal medioevo, nel 1918 erano
già belve prevaricatrici; a causa del giogo del “modello totalitario
comunista” di tito (sic) si sono imbestialiti ancor di più. è seguita
catastrofe e disgrazia, perché la jugoslavia era una robaccia
artificiale. l’annotazione ricreativa è che l’autore fa continuo
riferimento ad una ‘guerra imperiale’ che avrebbe scardinato la
jugoslavia, ma intende, ahimè, quella “della politica imperiale
grandeserba”, dissimulata, a suo dire, sotto il nome di jugoslavismo.
seguono le solite indagini su: memorandum, mito del popolo celeste,
samo sloga srbina spasava, paranoia dell’assedio i tako dalje.
l’abituale chiosa sulla ‘falsificata leggenda’ del giogo dell’impero
ottomano è (come altrove) puntellata dalla presunta libertarietà del
sistema del millet [1] (“sotto la dominazione ottomana le diverse etnie
convivevano armoniosamente”, bingo!), e seguita da una gioiosa manfrina
che ci illustra come in realtà in bosnia il recupero dell’identità
musulmana sia stato “meramente difensivo” e comunque sempre “teso alla
convivenza plurireligiosa e multinazionale”, mentre la volontà
egemonica albanese sarebbe “pretestuosa”, tant’è che – afferma l’autore
– “gli albanesi kosovari auspicano da sempre spazi aperti fra
macedonia, kosovo e albania”. in pratica: il solito pamphlettino sui
serbi fanatici e delittuosi, con chiusura di scuola bossiana in base
alla quale, oltre alla lampante responsabilità serba, peccatrice fu
anche l’europa che, incapace d’un federalismo redentore sul perfetto
modello svizzero, non seppe prevenire. sottotitolo alternativo: “tutta
colpa del principe lazar e del centralismo democratico”. non posso che
definire fantascientifica la nota numero 31 in cui si sostiene che
l’efferatezza dello stato ustascia croato sarebbe quasi solamente la
“radicale reazione all’esasperato unificazionismo serbo”. 


[1] questa è forse la teoria di stampo antiserbo più abusata, che vuole
dipingere i serbi come “paranoici assillati da un ipotetico giogo
ottomano”, sostenendo che non vi fu alcuna “notte nera”. già in
“geopolitique de la serbie-montenegro” di catherine lutard (in italiano
“serbia”, ed. il mulino, 9€) l’autrice scrive che il mito del giogo
musulmano venne creato artificiosamente in epoche successive, e che in
realtà non si può parlare di quattro secoli di occupazione ("notte
nera"), ma solo di pacifica convivenza. ignorando questioni non di poco
conto storico (i giannizzeri, i ripetuti e sanguinosi scontri armati,
le vessazioni tributarie, le ripetute migrazioni a cui le popolazioni
non musulmane furono costrette, per non menzionare l’isolamento
culturale tipico di una società teologica islamica, che tenne i balcani
per 400 anni di fatto fuori dall’europa; in tim judah si legge:
“villages were burned, thousands were sent into slavery. on 17 october
1813 alone, 1800 serbian women and children were sold as slaves"), i
sostenitori di questa presunta pax ottomana si appellano al millet [il
diritto giuridico islamico che riconosceva gli zimmi (ebrei e
cristiani) liberi di professare liberamente la propria fede religiosa,
pur obbligandoli a pagare tasse speciali, compresa quella “del sangue”
(la devchirme, ossia il rapimento istituzionale dei giovani maschi da
arruolare forzatamente nel corpo dei giannizzeri)] come ‘inconfutabile
prova’ delle loro ipotesi.


inviato da: babsi jones il 25/02/04 | 03:17 | profilo