Live coverage at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsa/n5ctrl/live/now4.ram
* AFP. 14 February 2002. Milosevic says war crimes proceedings
"political trial"; Milosevic charges West with "ocean of lies."
* AFP. 14 February 2002. Milosevic shows shock pics of Kosovo refugees
attacked by NATO; Milosevic too hopes to show videos during testimony:
laywer.
* BBC. 13 February 2002. TRANSCRIPT: MILOSEVIC ADDRESSES COURT
* AFP. 13 February 2002. Legal challenges raised by Milosevic at war
crimes trial.
* IAC SENDS SOLIDARITY DELEGATION TO OPENING OF "TRIAL" OF PRESIDENT
MILOSEVIC
* News from Jugoslav government sources
===*===
Subject: [ML-YU] Milosevic vs. ocean of NATO lies
Date: Thu, 14 Feb 2002 07:45:55 -0500
From: Barry Stoller
AFP. 14 February 2002. Milosevic says war crimes proceedings "political
trial"; Milosevic charges West with "ocean of lies."
THE HAGUE -- Slobodan Milosevic told the war crimes court at The Hague
on Thursday in his defence statement that he was the victim of a
"political trial."
As he continued his defence statement, which blamed the West for
concocting an "ocean of lies" in order to carry out the 1999 NATO war on
Yugoslavia, he said: "The whole word knows that this is a political
trial."
He said: "There is not a single element of a fair trial ... there is an
enormous apparatus on one side, a vast media structure on that same
side.
"What's on my side? I only have a public telephone booth in prison.
That's the only thing I have available to face the most terrible kind of
libel against my country, my people and me."
In a confident statement that aimed to speak to world opinion as much as
the international court trying him for genocide, Milosevic said he was
the victim of a "criminal" and "political" trial bent only on vengeance.
He compared Yugoslavia's fight against ethnic Albanian rebels in Kosovo
to the US-led campaign in Afghanistan, arguing that his nation had done
just what the United States had when faced with terrorism.
"You basically have nothing," Milosevic scoffed at the prosecutors, who
argue he is personally responsible for mass murder and crimes against
humanity in the 1990s wars in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo.
Former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic opened his defense Thursday
by showing the UN war crimes court a video discussing the 1999 massacre
of ethnic Albanians in Racak, which triggered the NATO air war on
Yugoslavia.
The video, some of it taken from German television, showed a commentator
casting doubt on whether the dozens of ethnic Albanians killed were
civilians, and an interview with an observer who said there may have
been separatist fighters of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) among them.
"An important reason for the (NATO) war was the alleged massacre in
Racak. From the begining there were doubts with respect to that
question, doubts which, with the latest research, have become ever more
clear," the commentator said.
"The name of this village is Racak. The Serbs suffered a terrible
massacre here, a massacre which led to the attack by the NATO aviation,"
the commentator said in the video.
He also showed video of the NATO air strikes that began in March 1999,
where Serbs were seen huddled in bunkers, and other commentators saying
that there had been no "humanitarian catastrophe" in Yugoslavia before
those air strikes.
In a mirror image of the meticulous portraits of atrocities spelled out
by prosecutors in the first two days of the trial, Milosevic read aloud
a list of Yugoslav hospitals and schools reduced to rubble by the NATO
bombing.
He ridiculed prosecution arguments -- more than once asking if they
could not "come up with something more intelligent" -- and defiantly
said his people had made a "heroic defence" in the face of the NATO air
campaign.
Milosevic argued that Serb forces who fought Albanian guerrillas in the
province of Kosovo had been fighting an anti-terror war just like that
led by the United States in Afghanistan.
"The Americans go to the other side of the globe to fight terrorism, in
Afghanistan as a case in point, right to the other side of the world,
and that is considered to be logical and normal," Milosevic said.
"Whereas here the struggle against terrorism in one's very own country
is considered to be a crime," he said.
Milosevic on Thursday told his war crimes trial that NATO and the West
had fabricated an "ocean of lies" to back the 1999 war on Yugoslavia.
"This is just an atom of truth in the ocean of lies and the product of
propaganda and the use of global media as a means of war against my
country," Milosevic said after presenting a nearly hour-long video on
the Kosovo war.
The video cast doubt on the January 1999 massacre of ethnic Albanian
civilians in Racak and charged that the West fabricated allegations of a
Serbian plan to ethnically cleanse the province of its Albanian
population.
"This terrible fabrication," Milosevic argued, was used to whip up
public opinion in favor of a war against Yugoslavia.
Hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians fled Kosovo to avoid NATO air
bombs in 1999, Milosevic contended.
"Now they wish to negate that fact by saying that they in fact fled from
Serb forces," he said.
"I consider the defense a heroic defense from the aggression launched by
NATO and the NATO pact," he said.
The prosecution charged in the first two days of the trial that
Milosevic was at the centre of a web of loyal local Serb leaders,
parliamentary forces and army commanders who carried out the crimes in
order to forge and ethnically pure "Greater Serbia" purged of all
non-Serbs.
"The events point towards a central personality, the existence of a
controlling human force," prosecutor Geoffrey Nice told the court
Wednesday. "It is a personality the accused seeks to say is not his, but
there is no other," he said.
Milosevic scorned the claim Thursday, saying: "He probably thinks I am
superhuman."
---
Subject: [ML-YU] Milosevic has his own photos to show
Date: Thu, 14 Feb 2002 07:28:56 -0500
From: Barry Stoller
AFP. 14 February 2002. Milosevic shows shock pics of Kosovo refugees
attacked by NATO; Milosevic too hopes to show videos during testimony:
laywer.
THE HAGUE -- Former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic on Thursday
showed photographs of burnt bodies of what he said were ethnic Albanian
refugees killed by NATO bombs during the 1999 war in Yugoslavia.
Arguing that it was NATO and not Serb forces who were responsible for
the slaughter of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo, Milosevic put on show
photographs of bodies of old men, women and children, charred bones and
body parts torn off during the attack and lying in pools of blood.
"These were mostly peasant women, villagers, killed and burned to death
as a result of a bomb," Milosevic said as he presented his defense at
the war crimes trial.
The bombing of the refugee column traveling from Djakovica to Prizen on
April 14, 1999 drew outrage from human rights groups, who also took
offense to NATO's description of the deaths as "collateral damage."
The photographs showed the bodies in fields, burnt corpses lying in
carts pulled by tractors, a head, hand or arm torn off in the attack,
Milosevic said.
The former head of state charged that NATO targeted civilians during its
air war against Yugoslavia.
"They were the priority targets of the evildoers who decided to
undertake this action," he said.
Milosevic will try to show video sequences during his defense Thursday,
to counter the shocking footage of mass graves, starving Bosnian Muslims
and deportations presented at the trial's opening by the prosecution, a
lawyer said.
"Milosevic will try to show video clips to counter the images shown
yesterday by the prosecution, but I don't know if the judges will permit
this," said Zdenko Tomanovic, a Belgrade lawyer helping Milosevic to
mount his case.
During nearly two days of opening statements by the prosecution, the
three-panel judges saw video footage of emaciated Bosnian Muslim men
behind barbed wire fences at a detention camp in northwest Bosnia in
1992.
The court also was shown film, taken by a local doctor, of ethnic
Albanians who had been killed in the Kosovo town of Izbica, as well as
deportations of Kosovars in military convoys.
---
Subject: [ML-YU] Milosevic transcript - full text
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2002 13:17:21 -0500
From: Barry Stoller
BBC. 13 February 2002. Transcript: Milosevic addresses court.
[This transcript is taken from a simultaneous translation of Mr
Milosevic's statement to the court, made in Serbian.]
Presiding Judge Richard May: You may sit or stand to address the court
whichever you prefer.
Slobodan Milosevic: Do you stop work this afternoon at four o'clock?
Judge May: We stop at four, so if you'd like to make a start now, we'll
adjourn then and you can go on tomorrow.
Slobodan Milosevic: I don't think there's any sense in me starting and
being interrupted half an hour later. I have spent two days listening to
the speeches made by the prosecution.
Judge May: Are you asking to start tomorrow morning - is that what you
want?
Slobodan Milosevic: You explained to me last time when we were here,
when we attended a status conference here, that I would have the right
to speak and as far as I was able to gather now, you are giving me that
right.
However, I consider that it would be logical for me to begin without
having to be interrupted less than half an hour hence. But I would like
to take advantage of this opportunity nonetheless.
Judge May: Very well, you can address us tomorrow. But what is it you'd
like to add?
Slobodan Milosevic: I wanted to take advantage of this opportunity
before I begin speaking and delivering my speech to say that as you know
several times here I have bought some legal aspects - I won't be
mentioning those in my speech proper but I have received no response or
answer from you.
You know full well that all international and national documents and
rules and regulations determine the fact that a court can be there to
judge only if it has been established on the basis of law and I have
broached the question of the legality of this tribunal. You did not
provide me with a response.
You delved into the question and looked into the aspects of court
authority although the competencies of the court are not the same thing
as the court's legality and I challenged the very legality of this
tribunal because it was not set up on the basis of the law.
The Security Council could not transfer the right that it does not have
to this tribunal and, therefore, this tribunal does not have the
competence to try.
I expect this tribunal, or rather you, to respond to those legal facts
and I had expected as one of the amici curia [literally "friends of the
court" and Mr Milosevic's legal representation], and suggested that you
seek the advice of the International Court of Justice, which you failed
to do.
I consider that this is a question of prime importance. It is of
principled importance, both for international law and for justice in
general and that it will have to be resolved. I think that I have
sufficiently expounded and explained the issue when I sent you a lengthy
text with all the points that set out my arguments and I also did so
orally here.
The second point that I wish to raise and wish to clarify is that at the
status conference that was held here I raised the question of my illegal
arrest and the representative of the tribunal had a part in that.
It took place in Belgrade. It violated the constitution of Serbia and
the constitution of Yugoslavia and the Federal Government tabled its
resignation because of that and criminal law suits have been the result
in Yugoslavia - they've been filed and on the other hand I do know that
every court is duty bound to deal with the habeas corpus question before
the start of trials.
You failed to take that into account nor did you schedule a hearing with
that respect and which rule you were duty bound to do based on the rules
and regulations.
Those questions are regulated by all human rights and political rights
declarations - universal ones and European, American and others - and
you as men of the law are well acquainted with that and through your own
practice as well, you have become acquainted with that because you have
been discussing the question of unlawful arrest in other cases.
So this has been a great omission on your part. You were duty bound to
call a hearing with respect to the unlawful arrest that took place ove
my person and with respect to the fact that I was brought here on the
basis of a crime having been committed. A crime which is not only
treated in the laws of my own country but it is an issue treated in the
laws of all states and is present in all international conventions and
so on and so forth.
Furthermore, I also wish to question [something] which you too did not
wish to resolve and I put forth many arguments to clear up my point. I
said that we cannot speak of a fair trial and an equitable trial here
especially an unbiased stand on the part of the prosecution.
You know that in 1990 the United Nations Congress adopted its own set of
instructions with respect to prosecution and the prosecutor. Those were
general guideline demanding that there must be n prejudice and that
there must be impartiality.
From everything that we have heard here so far, we have become more than
convinced that not only is it partial but your prosecutor has proclaimed
my sentence and judgement and the prosecution has orchestrated a media
campaign that has been waged and organised. It is a parallel trial
through the media which along with this unlawful tribunal are there to
play the role of a parallel lynch process. Which, in advance without any
insight...
Judge May: I'm going to interrupt you. What do you mean by saying that
the prosecutor has proclaimed your sentence and judgement?
Slobodan Milosevic: In public and the previous prosecutor at a meeting
with Albright said - they both said - that they were engaged in the same
business or job and the indictment itself was raised on the basis of the
constructions of the British intelligence service during the war against
Yugoslavia and we know full well that intelligence services only give
out selective information and details - those that they are able to rig
and not those which are not to their advantage and so on and so forth.
There are many arguments that could be raised here but at all events I
should like to indicate to you that you did not discuss these matters
nor did you make a decision of any kind. You did not call upon the
International Court of Justice as to the illegalities of the issue and
you did not schedule a hearing which you were duty bound to do on the
basis of habeas corpus and on the basis of the fact that your
representative took part in the...
Judge May: Mr Milosevic you indicated earlier that you wanted to make
your submissions tomorrow - that's apparently not the case because you
wanted to address us today.
But the matters on which you are choosing to address us are matters upon
which we have already ruled. As you would know, if you'd taken the
trouble to read our decisions. You had the right of appeal - you did not
take it.
The matters, therefore, have all been dealt with and your views about
the tribunal are now completely irrelevant as far as these proceedings
are concerned. All the matters you raised, you've argued before and we
have ruled upon and there is no need for them to be raised again in
these proceedings. We will hear the rest of your arguments and
submissions tomorrow morning.
---
Subject: [ML-YU] Legal challenges raised by Milosevic
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2002 12:42:56 -0500
From: Barry Stoller
AFP. 13 February 2002. Legal challenges raised by
Milosevic at war crimes trial.
THE HAGUE -- Herewith some of the legal challenges
raised Wednesday by
Slobodan Milosevic against the UN war crimes
tribunal, which is trying
him for genocide and crimes against humanity:
LEGALITY
Milosevic said the International Criminal Tribunal
for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), established in 1993,
had "no competence" to try him and was manifestly illegal.
In a controversial ruling on November 8 last year,
the court itself decided it was competent to hear the
case against Milosevic, who is faced with 66 charges
on three indictments covering events in Bosnia,
Croatia and Kosovo.
Commentators have noted that Milosevic signed the
1995 Dayton accords, ending the Bosnian and
Croatian wars, and that those accords implicitly
recognised the ICTY's legitimacy.
Some experts say the UN Security Council, which
established the court, had no legal right to
establish a judicial body because the UN charter
gives the council no such mandate.
IMPARTIALITY
Milosevic said the court had already decided he was
guilty, and had he not been cut off, would, presumably,
have gone into previous arguments that NATO and the
West were responsible for their own atrocities with
the killing of civilians during the 1999 bombing of
Yugoslavia.
Chief prosecutor Carla Del Ponte decided not to
open a formal investigation into the NATO
bombardments, which left scores of civilians
dead and raised accusations of political bias
against the Serbs.
Milosevic's successor, Yugoslav President Vojislav
Kostunica, said that ruling cast a "great shadow"
over the court's credibility.
ARREST
Milosevic said his arrest in Belgrade last June by
Serbian police for extradition to The Hague was
illegal and a violation of the constitutions of
Serbia and Yugoslavia.
Yugoslavia's constitutional court had ruled the
extradition was illegal.
Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic sidestepped
the court by invoking a law, ironically implemented
by Milosevic himself, giving Serbia the
right to overrule decisions by the federation if
they interfered with Serbian interests.
In the political row that ensued, Yugoslav Prime
Minister Zoran Zizic and his Montenegrin allies
in the federal government resigned in protest.
---
Subject: Newsletter FREE SLOBO ! - n° 12
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2002 23:20:28 +0100 (CET)
From: ICDSM <icdsminfonet@...>
IAC SENDS SOLIDARITY DELEGATION TO OPENING OF
"TRIAL" OF PRESIDENT MILOSEVIC
The International Criminal Tribunal for the former
Yugoslavia (ICTY) is set to open a so-called trial of
former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic on Feb.
12 at The Hague, Netherlands. The International Action
Center (IAC), based in the United States, has sent a
delegation to take part in activities showing solidarity with the
defendant and opposing the "trial" as a NATO frame up.
"With this trial," said International Action Center (IAC)
representative Bill Doares from Amsterdam, "Washington
and its NATO allies hopes to pin the guilt for the 10
years of civil war in the Balkans on the Yugoslav leader. The
goal of these big powers is to shift the blame for the war
they fomented onto the victims, the Serbian people and all
the other peoples of Yugoslavia."
The delegation will be participating in meetings and
press conferences denouncing the ICTY in Amsterdam and The
Hague on Feb. 11 and Feb. 12. They will also attend the
trial to hear President Milosevic's opening statement, which is
expected to be a political defense of his people and
their role in the war.
Speaking boldly in his own defense before an ICTY
hearing on Jan. 30, President Milosevic said this to the
officials appointed to judge him:
"With all due respect, the real judges of this trial-not
you who wear the robes-want to bet those who decided to
murder children in my country, who launched NATO's
aggression and dropped 25,000 tons of bombs in 78 days,
murdering mostly elderly people, children and women.
This is the role they would like to play, but they will not
be allowed to be the judges."
"The Yugoslav president is confident that if the people
know the truth, they will rally against the NATO court,"
said Doares. "The truth, for example, that U.S./NATO bombs
and rockets destroyed much of Yugoslav industry in Serbia,
while killing only 14 tanks in Kosovo, where war crimes
were alleged to be taking place."
---
MILOSEVIC TRIAL STARTS
BELGRADE, Feb 13 ( Beta) - The trial of former Yugoslav president
Slobodan
Milosevic for crimes against humanity in Kosovo and Croatia and genocide
and other crimes in Bosnia, began at the International Criminal Tribunal
for the Former Yugoslavia on Feb. 12
Milosevic will first be prosecuted for crimes in Kosovo. After the
prosecutor's and Milosevic's opening statements, which could last up to
three days, witnesses will be heard.
Milosevic was taken into detention at The Hague on June 26, last year.
The
trial has a historical importance for the victims, the peoples of the
former Yugoslavia, international law and justice.
British prosecutor Geoffrey Nice said that Milosevic had made a
considerable effort to cover his participation in crimes in Bosnia.
LIVE BROADCAST OF MILOSEVIC TRIAL, SVILANOVIC
KIEV, Feb 12 (Tanjug) - The whole trial of former Yugoslav president
Slobodan Milosevic should be broadcast live, Yugoslav Foreign Minister
Goran Svilanovic said during a visit to Kiev, Ukrainian news agency
Interfax said.
Svilanovic added that the trial should be made fully public to the
citizens
of Yugoslavia so that they can assure themselves it is fair.
He said that a television broadcast with a translation was important as
the
only way for most people in Yugoslavia to learn about all the details.
"We will follow the trial very carefully," Svilanovic said and added
that
the Milosevic trial was a political issue for Yugoslavia.
DJINDJIC SAYS OFFICIALS ACCUSED WITH MILOSEVIC MUST BE EXTRADITED
BELGRADE, Feb 13 ( Beta) - Serbian Premier Zoran Djindjic said on Feb.
12
that four former top officials, accused together with Milosevic for war
crimes in Kosovo, must be extradited to the international war crimes
tribunal.
Djindjic told Austrian journalists reporting on Austrian President
Thomas
Klestil's visit, in Belgrade that, "This does not have an alternative."
"I favor cooperation and oppose any risk to our country. Were they
honest
they would have surrendered themselves. If they have nothing to hide
then
this will be revealed," Djindjic was quoted as saying by the Austrian
APA
news service.
Commenting on the start of Slobodan Milosevic's trial, Djindjic
indicated
that the extradition of Serbian President Milan Milutinovic, Nikola
Sainovic, Vlajko Stojiljkovic and Dragoljub Ojdanic "is no problem." "We
have our laws," he said.
Djindjic said a bigger problem would be extraditing Republika Srpska
Gen.
Ratko Mladic, who is allegedly located in Serbia.
"He is not a citizen of Serbia and Serbia is in no way a country
providing
asylum for someone internationally wanted," he said.
GOVERNMENT PREPARED TO STAND BAIL FOR MILOSEVIC ASSOCIATES
BELGRADE, Feb 12 (B92) The Serbian Government would provide guarantees
for the release on bail of any close associates of Slobodan Milosevic
who
voluntarily surrender to the Hague Tribunal, Justice Minister Vladan
Batic
said today.
Batic told media that the government had resolved in November last year
to
provide guarantees for any Serbian citizens who surrendered to the
Tribunal.
This would automatically apply to Nikola Sainovic and Vlajko
Stojiljkovic,
he added.
DJELIC: POLITICAL CONDITIONS MUST STOP
LONDON, Feb 12 (Tanjug) - The office of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran
Djindjic is ready to send to The Hague another indictee, but demands an
end
to political blackmail over extradition, Serbian Finance Minister
Bozidar
Djelic has told the BBC.
In reaction to speculations that three of the four other persons
indicted
for crimes in Kosovo and Metohija could be sent to The Hague soon -
Vlajko
Stoiljkovic, Dragoljub Ojdanic and Nikola Sainovic - and that this will
directly determine United States aid for Belgrade this year, which will
be
discussed in Congress on March 31, Djelic said he did not think it was
good
constantly to pressure this government to extradite citizens.
A line must be drawn somewhere. For the sake of the future and politics
and
conscience in Serbia, it should be left to that republic to put on trial
the vast majority of those who are suspected of war crimes, he said.
Djelic said he believed this was important also for the debate which was
under way in local media and for the purpose of truth.
The Hague tribunal should respect that, Djelic said.
DEL PONTE SAYS NO COLLECTIVE RESPONSIBILITY IN INDICTMENT
THE HAGUE, Feb 12 (Tanjug) - The Hague International Criminal Tribunal
for
former Yugoslavia (ICTY) chief prosecutor Carla del Ponte said on
Tuesday
in her first speech at the opening of the trial of former Yugoslav
president Slobodan Milosevic that collective responsibility was not a
subject in the indictment and that the ICTY was not putting on trial any
nation or state.
Del Ponte said there were no personal convictions or ideology in the
background of the crimes of which Milosevic is accused, but merely
attempts
to maintain himself in power and his lust for power.
She said the prosecution was only asking that the court establish and
punish grave violations of international humanitarian laws, and that it
is
left to other experts to analyze the history of the disintegration of
the
former Yugoslavia and the fratricidal clashes that followed.
Assistant chief prosecutor Geoffrey Nice explained details in the
indictments for crimes committed in Kosovo and Metohija in 1998 and 1999
through video films of the time when Milosevic was rising to power.
Presiding Judge Richard May of Great Britain has already set the next
session for Feb 19, when the prosecution will continue presenting its
case.
MILOSEVIC TRIAL IMPORTANT BOTH FOR VICTIMS, YUGOSLAV PEOPLE
BELGRADE, Feb 12 9 (Tanjug) - Council of Europe (CE) parliamentary
assembly
president Peter Schieder assessed Tuesday that the trial of former
Yugoslav
president Slobodan Milosevic is of crucial importance for the victims of
the crimes committed during the wars in the former Yugoslavia, as well
as
for the people of FR Yugoslavia.
The CE statement, sent to Tanjug, pointed out that without justice
wounds
cannot heal, thus preventing reconciliation and lasting peace from
finally
taking root.
Schieder said that The Hague tribunal is trying individuals, not
peoples,
and that it rejects the notion of collective responsibility for the
crimes
that have been committed.
The trial is also essential for the future of international justice and
it
will have to demonstrate that an international court is able to
administer
justice in an equitable manner, regardless of the political status of
the
accused, or the nationality and the ethnic origin of the victim,
Schieder
said in the statement.
* AFP. 14 February 2002. Milosevic says war crimes proceedings
"political trial"; Milosevic charges West with "ocean of lies."
* AFP. 14 February 2002. Milosevic shows shock pics of Kosovo refugees
attacked by NATO; Milosevic too hopes to show videos during testimony:
laywer.
* BBC. 13 February 2002. TRANSCRIPT: MILOSEVIC ADDRESSES COURT
* AFP. 13 February 2002. Legal challenges raised by Milosevic at war
crimes trial.
* IAC SENDS SOLIDARITY DELEGATION TO OPENING OF "TRIAL" OF PRESIDENT
MILOSEVIC
* News from Jugoslav government sources
===*===
Subject: [ML-YU] Milosevic vs. ocean of NATO lies
Date: Thu, 14 Feb 2002 07:45:55 -0500
From: Barry Stoller
AFP. 14 February 2002. Milosevic says war crimes proceedings "political
trial"; Milosevic charges West with "ocean of lies."
THE HAGUE -- Slobodan Milosevic told the war crimes court at The Hague
on Thursday in his defence statement that he was the victim of a
"political trial."
As he continued his defence statement, which blamed the West for
concocting an "ocean of lies" in order to carry out the 1999 NATO war on
Yugoslavia, he said: "The whole word knows that this is a political
trial."
He said: "There is not a single element of a fair trial ... there is an
enormous apparatus on one side, a vast media structure on that same
side.
"What's on my side? I only have a public telephone booth in prison.
That's the only thing I have available to face the most terrible kind of
libel against my country, my people and me."
In a confident statement that aimed to speak to world opinion as much as
the international court trying him for genocide, Milosevic said he was
the victim of a "criminal" and "political" trial bent only on vengeance.
He compared Yugoslavia's fight against ethnic Albanian rebels in Kosovo
to the US-led campaign in Afghanistan, arguing that his nation had done
just what the United States had when faced with terrorism.
"You basically have nothing," Milosevic scoffed at the prosecutors, who
argue he is personally responsible for mass murder and crimes against
humanity in the 1990s wars in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo.
Former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic opened his defense Thursday
by showing the UN war crimes court a video discussing the 1999 massacre
of ethnic Albanians in Racak, which triggered the NATO air war on
Yugoslavia.
The video, some of it taken from German television, showed a commentator
casting doubt on whether the dozens of ethnic Albanians killed were
civilians, and an interview with an observer who said there may have
been separatist fighters of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) among them.
"An important reason for the (NATO) war was the alleged massacre in
Racak. From the begining there were doubts with respect to that
question, doubts which, with the latest research, have become ever more
clear," the commentator said.
"The name of this village is Racak. The Serbs suffered a terrible
massacre here, a massacre which led to the attack by the NATO aviation,"
the commentator said in the video.
He also showed video of the NATO air strikes that began in March 1999,
where Serbs were seen huddled in bunkers, and other commentators saying
that there had been no "humanitarian catastrophe" in Yugoslavia before
those air strikes.
In a mirror image of the meticulous portraits of atrocities spelled out
by prosecutors in the first two days of the trial, Milosevic read aloud
a list of Yugoslav hospitals and schools reduced to rubble by the NATO
bombing.
He ridiculed prosecution arguments -- more than once asking if they
could not "come up with something more intelligent" -- and defiantly
said his people had made a "heroic defence" in the face of the NATO air
campaign.
Milosevic argued that Serb forces who fought Albanian guerrillas in the
province of Kosovo had been fighting an anti-terror war just like that
led by the United States in Afghanistan.
"The Americans go to the other side of the globe to fight terrorism, in
Afghanistan as a case in point, right to the other side of the world,
and that is considered to be logical and normal," Milosevic said.
"Whereas here the struggle against terrorism in one's very own country
is considered to be a crime," he said.
Milosevic on Thursday told his war crimes trial that NATO and the West
had fabricated an "ocean of lies" to back the 1999 war on Yugoslavia.
"This is just an atom of truth in the ocean of lies and the product of
propaganda and the use of global media as a means of war against my
country," Milosevic said after presenting a nearly hour-long video on
the Kosovo war.
The video cast doubt on the January 1999 massacre of ethnic Albanian
civilians in Racak and charged that the West fabricated allegations of a
Serbian plan to ethnically cleanse the province of its Albanian
population.
"This terrible fabrication," Milosevic argued, was used to whip up
public opinion in favor of a war against Yugoslavia.
Hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians fled Kosovo to avoid NATO air
bombs in 1999, Milosevic contended.
"Now they wish to negate that fact by saying that they in fact fled from
Serb forces," he said.
"I consider the defense a heroic defense from the aggression launched by
NATO and the NATO pact," he said.
The prosecution charged in the first two days of the trial that
Milosevic was at the centre of a web of loyal local Serb leaders,
parliamentary forces and army commanders who carried out the crimes in
order to forge and ethnically pure "Greater Serbia" purged of all
non-Serbs.
"The events point towards a central personality, the existence of a
controlling human force," prosecutor Geoffrey Nice told the court
Wednesday. "It is a personality the accused seeks to say is not his, but
there is no other," he said.
Milosevic scorned the claim Thursday, saying: "He probably thinks I am
superhuman."
---
Subject: [ML-YU] Milosevic has his own photos to show
Date: Thu, 14 Feb 2002 07:28:56 -0500
From: Barry Stoller
AFP. 14 February 2002. Milosevic shows shock pics of Kosovo refugees
attacked by NATO; Milosevic too hopes to show videos during testimony:
laywer.
THE HAGUE -- Former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic on Thursday
showed photographs of burnt bodies of what he said were ethnic Albanian
refugees killed by NATO bombs during the 1999 war in Yugoslavia.
Arguing that it was NATO and not Serb forces who were responsible for
the slaughter of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo, Milosevic put on show
photographs of bodies of old men, women and children, charred bones and
body parts torn off during the attack and lying in pools of blood.
"These were mostly peasant women, villagers, killed and burned to death
as a result of a bomb," Milosevic said as he presented his defense at
the war crimes trial.
The bombing of the refugee column traveling from Djakovica to Prizen on
April 14, 1999 drew outrage from human rights groups, who also took
offense to NATO's description of the deaths as "collateral damage."
The photographs showed the bodies in fields, burnt corpses lying in
carts pulled by tractors, a head, hand or arm torn off in the attack,
Milosevic said.
The former head of state charged that NATO targeted civilians during its
air war against Yugoslavia.
"They were the priority targets of the evildoers who decided to
undertake this action," he said.
Milosevic will try to show video sequences during his defense Thursday,
to counter the shocking footage of mass graves, starving Bosnian Muslims
and deportations presented at the trial's opening by the prosecution, a
lawyer said.
"Milosevic will try to show video clips to counter the images shown
yesterday by the prosecution, but I don't know if the judges will permit
this," said Zdenko Tomanovic, a Belgrade lawyer helping Milosevic to
mount his case.
During nearly two days of opening statements by the prosecution, the
three-panel judges saw video footage of emaciated Bosnian Muslim men
behind barbed wire fences at a detention camp in northwest Bosnia in
1992.
The court also was shown film, taken by a local doctor, of ethnic
Albanians who had been killed in the Kosovo town of Izbica, as well as
deportations of Kosovars in military convoys.
---
Subject: [ML-YU] Milosevic transcript - full text
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2002 13:17:21 -0500
From: Barry Stoller
BBC. 13 February 2002. Transcript: Milosevic addresses court.
[This transcript is taken from a simultaneous translation of Mr
Milosevic's statement to the court, made in Serbian.]
Presiding Judge Richard May: You may sit or stand to address the court
whichever you prefer.
Slobodan Milosevic: Do you stop work this afternoon at four o'clock?
Judge May: We stop at four, so if you'd like to make a start now, we'll
adjourn then and you can go on tomorrow.
Slobodan Milosevic: I don't think there's any sense in me starting and
being interrupted half an hour later. I have spent two days listening to
the speeches made by the prosecution.
Judge May: Are you asking to start tomorrow morning - is that what you
want?
Slobodan Milosevic: You explained to me last time when we were here,
when we attended a status conference here, that I would have the right
to speak and as far as I was able to gather now, you are giving me that
right.
However, I consider that it would be logical for me to begin without
having to be interrupted less than half an hour hence. But I would like
to take advantage of this opportunity nonetheless.
Judge May: Very well, you can address us tomorrow. But what is it you'd
like to add?
Slobodan Milosevic: I wanted to take advantage of this opportunity
before I begin speaking and delivering my speech to say that as you know
several times here I have bought some legal aspects - I won't be
mentioning those in my speech proper but I have received no response or
answer from you.
You know full well that all international and national documents and
rules and regulations determine the fact that a court can be there to
judge only if it has been established on the basis of law and I have
broached the question of the legality of this tribunal. You did not
provide me with a response.
You delved into the question and looked into the aspects of court
authority although the competencies of the court are not the same thing
as the court's legality and I challenged the very legality of this
tribunal because it was not set up on the basis of the law.
The Security Council could not transfer the right that it does not have
to this tribunal and, therefore, this tribunal does not have the
competence to try.
I expect this tribunal, or rather you, to respond to those legal facts
and I had expected as one of the amici curia [literally "friends of the
court" and Mr Milosevic's legal representation], and suggested that you
seek the advice of the International Court of Justice, which you failed
to do.
I consider that this is a question of prime importance. It is of
principled importance, both for international law and for justice in
general and that it will have to be resolved. I think that I have
sufficiently expounded and explained the issue when I sent you a lengthy
text with all the points that set out my arguments and I also did so
orally here.
The second point that I wish to raise and wish to clarify is that at the
status conference that was held here I raised the question of my illegal
arrest and the representative of the tribunal had a part in that.
It took place in Belgrade. It violated the constitution of Serbia and
the constitution of Yugoslavia and the Federal Government tabled its
resignation because of that and criminal law suits have been the result
in Yugoslavia - they've been filed and on the other hand I do know that
every court is duty bound to deal with the habeas corpus question before
the start of trials.
You failed to take that into account nor did you schedule a hearing with
that respect and which rule you were duty bound to do based on the rules
and regulations.
Those questions are regulated by all human rights and political rights
declarations - universal ones and European, American and others - and
you as men of the law are well acquainted with that and through your own
practice as well, you have become acquainted with that because you have
been discussing the question of unlawful arrest in other cases.
So this has been a great omission on your part. You were duty bound to
call a hearing with respect to the unlawful arrest that took place ove
my person and with respect to the fact that I was brought here on the
basis of a crime having been committed. A crime which is not only
treated in the laws of my own country but it is an issue treated in the
laws of all states and is present in all international conventions and
so on and so forth.
Furthermore, I also wish to question [something] which you too did not
wish to resolve and I put forth many arguments to clear up my point. I
said that we cannot speak of a fair trial and an equitable trial here
especially an unbiased stand on the part of the prosecution.
You know that in 1990 the United Nations Congress adopted its own set of
instructions with respect to prosecution and the prosecutor. Those were
general guideline demanding that there must be n prejudice and that
there must be impartiality.
From everything that we have heard here so far, we have become more than
convinced that not only is it partial but your prosecutor has proclaimed
my sentence and judgement and the prosecution has orchestrated a media
campaign that has been waged and organised. It is a parallel trial
through the media which along with this unlawful tribunal are there to
play the role of a parallel lynch process. Which, in advance without any
insight...
Judge May: I'm going to interrupt you. What do you mean by saying that
the prosecutor has proclaimed your sentence and judgement?
Slobodan Milosevic: In public and the previous prosecutor at a meeting
with Albright said - they both said - that they were engaged in the same
business or job and the indictment itself was raised on the basis of the
constructions of the British intelligence service during the war against
Yugoslavia and we know full well that intelligence services only give
out selective information and details - those that they are able to rig
and not those which are not to their advantage and so on and so forth.
There are many arguments that could be raised here but at all events I
should like to indicate to you that you did not discuss these matters
nor did you make a decision of any kind. You did not call upon the
International Court of Justice as to the illegalities of the issue and
you did not schedule a hearing which you were duty bound to do on the
basis of habeas corpus and on the basis of the fact that your
representative took part in the...
Judge May: Mr Milosevic you indicated earlier that you wanted to make
your submissions tomorrow - that's apparently not the case because you
wanted to address us today.
But the matters on which you are choosing to address us are matters upon
which we have already ruled. As you would know, if you'd taken the
trouble to read our decisions. You had the right of appeal - you did not
take it.
The matters, therefore, have all been dealt with and your views about
the tribunal are now completely irrelevant as far as these proceedings
are concerned. All the matters you raised, you've argued before and we
have ruled upon and there is no need for them to be raised again in
these proceedings. We will hear the rest of your arguments and
submissions tomorrow morning.
---
Subject: [ML-YU] Legal challenges raised by Milosevic
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2002 12:42:56 -0500
From: Barry Stoller
AFP. 13 February 2002. Legal challenges raised by
Milosevic at war crimes trial.
THE HAGUE -- Herewith some of the legal challenges
raised Wednesday by
Slobodan Milosevic against the UN war crimes
tribunal, which is trying
him for genocide and crimes against humanity:
LEGALITY
Milosevic said the International Criminal Tribunal
for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), established in 1993,
had "no competence" to try him and was manifestly illegal.
In a controversial ruling on November 8 last year,
the court itself decided it was competent to hear the
case against Milosevic, who is faced with 66 charges
on three indictments covering events in Bosnia,
Croatia and Kosovo.
Commentators have noted that Milosevic signed the
1995 Dayton accords, ending the Bosnian and
Croatian wars, and that those accords implicitly
recognised the ICTY's legitimacy.
Some experts say the UN Security Council, which
established the court, had no legal right to
establish a judicial body because the UN charter
gives the council no such mandate.
IMPARTIALITY
Milosevic said the court had already decided he was
guilty, and had he not been cut off, would, presumably,
have gone into previous arguments that NATO and the
West were responsible for their own atrocities with
the killing of civilians during the 1999 bombing of
Yugoslavia.
Chief prosecutor Carla Del Ponte decided not to
open a formal investigation into the NATO
bombardments, which left scores of civilians
dead and raised accusations of political bias
against the Serbs.
Milosevic's successor, Yugoslav President Vojislav
Kostunica, said that ruling cast a "great shadow"
over the court's credibility.
ARREST
Milosevic said his arrest in Belgrade last June by
Serbian police for extradition to The Hague was
illegal and a violation of the constitutions of
Serbia and Yugoslavia.
Yugoslavia's constitutional court had ruled the
extradition was illegal.
Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic sidestepped
the court by invoking a law, ironically implemented
by Milosevic himself, giving Serbia the
right to overrule decisions by the federation if
they interfered with Serbian interests.
In the political row that ensued, Yugoslav Prime
Minister Zoran Zizic and his Montenegrin allies
in the federal government resigned in protest.
---
Subject: Newsletter FREE SLOBO ! - n° 12
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2002 23:20:28 +0100 (CET)
From: ICDSM <icdsminfonet@...>
IAC SENDS SOLIDARITY DELEGATION TO OPENING OF
"TRIAL" OF PRESIDENT MILOSEVIC
The International Criminal Tribunal for the former
Yugoslavia (ICTY) is set to open a so-called trial of
former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic on Feb.
12 at The Hague, Netherlands. The International Action
Center (IAC), based in the United States, has sent a
delegation to take part in activities showing solidarity with the
defendant and opposing the "trial" as a NATO frame up.
"With this trial," said International Action Center (IAC)
representative Bill Doares from Amsterdam, "Washington
and its NATO allies hopes to pin the guilt for the 10
years of civil war in the Balkans on the Yugoslav leader. The
goal of these big powers is to shift the blame for the war
they fomented onto the victims, the Serbian people and all
the other peoples of Yugoslavia."
The delegation will be participating in meetings and
press conferences denouncing the ICTY in Amsterdam and The
Hague on Feb. 11 and Feb. 12. They will also attend the
trial to hear President Milosevic's opening statement, which is
expected to be a political defense of his people and
their role in the war.
Speaking boldly in his own defense before an ICTY
hearing on Jan. 30, President Milosevic said this to the
officials appointed to judge him:
"With all due respect, the real judges of this trial-not
you who wear the robes-want to bet those who decided to
murder children in my country, who launched NATO's
aggression and dropped 25,000 tons of bombs in 78 days,
murdering mostly elderly people, children and women.
This is the role they would like to play, but they will not
be allowed to be the judges."
"The Yugoslav president is confident that if the people
know the truth, they will rally against the NATO court,"
said Doares. "The truth, for example, that U.S./NATO bombs
and rockets destroyed much of Yugoslav industry in Serbia,
while killing only 14 tanks in Kosovo, where war crimes
were alleged to be taking place."
---
MILOSEVIC TRIAL STARTS
BELGRADE, Feb 13 ( Beta) - The trial of former Yugoslav president
Slobodan
Milosevic for crimes against humanity in Kosovo and Croatia and genocide
and other crimes in Bosnia, began at the International Criminal Tribunal
for the Former Yugoslavia on Feb. 12
Milosevic will first be prosecuted for crimes in Kosovo. After the
prosecutor's and Milosevic's opening statements, which could last up to
three days, witnesses will be heard.
Milosevic was taken into detention at The Hague on June 26, last year.
The
trial has a historical importance for the victims, the peoples of the
former Yugoslavia, international law and justice.
British prosecutor Geoffrey Nice said that Milosevic had made a
considerable effort to cover his participation in crimes in Bosnia.
LIVE BROADCAST OF MILOSEVIC TRIAL, SVILANOVIC
KIEV, Feb 12 (Tanjug) - The whole trial of former Yugoslav president
Slobodan Milosevic should be broadcast live, Yugoslav Foreign Minister
Goran Svilanovic said during a visit to Kiev, Ukrainian news agency
Interfax said.
Svilanovic added that the trial should be made fully public to the
citizens
of Yugoslavia so that they can assure themselves it is fair.
He said that a television broadcast with a translation was important as
the
only way for most people in Yugoslavia to learn about all the details.
"We will follow the trial very carefully," Svilanovic said and added
that
the Milosevic trial was a political issue for Yugoslavia.
DJINDJIC SAYS OFFICIALS ACCUSED WITH MILOSEVIC MUST BE EXTRADITED
BELGRADE, Feb 13 ( Beta) - Serbian Premier Zoran Djindjic said on Feb.
12
that four former top officials, accused together with Milosevic for war
crimes in Kosovo, must be extradited to the international war crimes
tribunal.
Djindjic told Austrian journalists reporting on Austrian President
Thomas
Klestil's visit, in Belgrade that, "This does not have an alternative."
"I favor cooperation and oppose any risk to our country. Were they
honest
they would have surrendered themselves. If they have nothing to hide
then
this will be revealed," Djindjic was quoted as saying by the Austrian
APA
news service.
Commenting on the start of Slobodan Milosevic's trial, Djindjic
indicated
that the extradition of Serbian President Milan Milutinovic, Nikola
Sainovic, Vlajko Stojiljkovic and Dragoljub Ojdanic "is no problem." "We
have our laws," he said.
Djindjic said a bigger problem would be extraditing Republika Srpska
Gen.
Ratko Mladic, who is allegedly located in Serbia.
"He is not a citizen of Serbia and Serbia is in no way a country
providing
asylum for someone internationally wanted," he said.
GOVERNMENT PREPARED TO STAND BAIL FOR MILOSEVIC ASSOCIATES
BELGRADE, Feb 12 (B92) The Serbian Government would provide guarantees
for the release on bail of any close associates of Slobodan Milosevic
who
voluntarily surrender to the Hague Tribunal, Justice Minister Vladan
Batic
said today.
Batic told media that the government had resolved in November last year
to
provide guarantees for any Serbian citizens who surrendered to the
Tribunal.
This would automatically apply to Nikola Sainovic and Vlajko
Stojiljkovic,
he added.
DJELIC: POLITICAL CONDITIONS MUST STOP
LONDON, Feb 12 (Tanjug) - The office of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran
Djindjic is ready to send to The Hague another indictee, but demands an
end
to political blackmail over extradition, Serbian Finance Minister
Bozidar
Djelic has told the BBC.
In reaction to speculations that three of the four other persons
indicted
for crimes in Kosovo and Metohija could be sent to The Hague soon -
Vlajko
Stoiljkovic, Dragoljub Ojdanic and Nikola Sainovic - and that this will
directly determine United States aid for Belgrade this year, which will
be
discussed in Congress on March 31, Djelic said he did not think it was
good
constantly to pressure this government to extradite citizens.
A line must be drawn somewhere. For the sake of the future and politics
and
conscience in Serbia, it should be left to that republic to put on trial
the vast majority of those who are suspected of war crimes, he said.
Djelic said he believed this was important also for the debate which was
under way in local media and for the purpose of truth.
The Hague tribunal should respect that, Djelic said.
DEL PONTE SAYS NO COLLECTIVE RESPONSIBILITY IN INDICTMENT
THE HAGUE, Feb 12 (Tanjug) - The Hague International Criminal Tribunal
for
former Yugoslavia (ICTY) chief prosecutor Carla del Ponte said on
Tuesday
in her first speech at the opening of the trial of former Yugoslav
president Slobodan Milosevic that collective responsibility was not a
subject in the indictment and that the ICTY was not putting on trial any
nation or state.
Del Ponte said there were no personal convictions or ideology in the
background of the crimes of which Milosevic is accused, but merely
attempts
to maintain himself in power and his lust for power.
She said the prosecution was only asking that the court establish and
punish grave violations of international humanitarian laws, and that it
is
left to other experts to analyze the history of the disintegration of
the
former Yugoslavia and the fratricidal clashes that followed.
Assistant chief prosecutor Geoffrey Nice explained details in the
indictments for crimes committed in Kosovo and Metohija in 1998 and 1999
through video films of the time when Milosevic was rising to power.
Presiding Judge Richard May of Great Britain has already set the next
session for Feb 19, when the prosecution will continue presenting its
case.
MILOSEVIC TRIAL IMPORTANT BOTH FOR VICTIMS, YUGOSLAV PEOPLE
BELGRADE, Feb 12 9 (Tanjug) - Council of Europe (CE) parliamentary
assembly
president Peter Schieder assessed Tuesday that the trial of former
Yugoslav
president Slobodan Milosevic is of crucial importance for the victims of
the crimes committed during the wars in the former Yugoslavia, as well
as
for the people of FR Yugoslavia.
The CE statement, sent to Tanjug, pointed out that without justice
wounds
cannot heal, thus preventing reconciliation and lasting peace from
finally
taking root.
Schieder said that The Hague tribunal is trying individuals, not
peoples,
and that it rejects the notion of collective responsibility for the
crimes
that have been committed.
The trial is also essential for the future of international justice and
it
will have to demonstrate that an international court is able to
administer
justice in an equitable manner, regardless of the political status of
the
accused, or the nationality and the ethnic origin of the victim,
Schieder
said in the statement.