HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK ---------------------------
BELGRADE, April 14 (AFP) - Former Yugoslav army chief of Dragoljub Ojdanic has agreed to surrender to the UN tribunal in the Hague to face charges of war crimes committed in Kosovo, the Beta news agency reported Sunday. The agency quoted Ojdanic, 60, as telling a Serbian-language newspaper published in Germany that he would go before the UN court following the adoption by Yugoslavia's parliament last week of a law setting down terms for cooperation with the tribunal. "At any moment I expect to receive a court summons from the International Criminal Tribunal in the Hague. With tranquility and dignity I will respond to the summons and go to The Hague," he was quoted as saying. "I waited for a word from people, in other words for a law on cooperation with the tribunal to be adopted," he said. "Departure to the Hague is now my legal obligation, demanded by the state and the people, as was the case when I had to defend the country from the aggression" of NATO, Ojdanic added, referring to 1999 NATO air attacks which forced Yugoslav troops from Kosovo. Ojdanic is one of about 15 former senior Yugoslav political or military officials indicted for war crimes by the UN tribunal but still at large. Former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic was turned over to the tribunal last year and is currently on trial in The Hague. Ojdanic has recently lashed out at the Yugoslav supreme military court for failing to prove or reject the accusations against him brought by the UN tribunal in May 1999. "I am not afraid of my responsibility, because I know it does not exist," the fugitive general said at the time. Earlier this month Ojdanic reportedly met at his own request with the US ambassador at large for war crimes issues, Pierre-Richard Prosper, who was in Belgrade to pressure local authorities to transfer indicted war crimes suspects. After much heated debate, the Yugoslav parliament approved on Thursday a bill on cooperation with the UN tribunal, paving the way for the first transfers of indicted suspects by the end of this month. The United States has made the surrender of war crimes suspects a key condition for unblocking badly needed development aid to Belgrade. Just hours after the law's adoption, former Serbian interior minister and a co-accused with Ojdanic, Vlajko Stojiljkovic, shot himself in the head outside the Yugoslav parliament. He died on Saturday. --------------------------- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
