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AFP (with additional material by AP). 3 October 2002. Indiscreet lawyer apologises at Milosevic trial. THE HAGUE -- A lawyer appointed by the U.N. tribunal to help protect Slobodan Milosevic's interests apologized to the court Thursday after he was quoted as saying the former Yugoslav president will be found guilty of war crimes. But Michail Wladimiroff said his ill-considered comments published earlier this month in Dutch and Bulgarian publications did not compromise his role as a "friend of the court," and he should be allowed to continue [!]. The three judges are to decide later whether to dismiss Wladimiroff, one of three veteran defense attorneys appointed last year to help ensure Milosevic gets a fair trial. Vladimiroff, who told the Haagsche Courant that if the trial were to end now Milosevic would be found guilty, told the court, under the watchful eye of Milosevic himself: "I should not have given this interview. I am responsible for the interview although I have not been quoted correctly." Thursday's proceedings focused on events in 1991 in the Croatian province of Western Slavonia and in particular the multi-ethnic town of Pakrac, where atrocities were commited by both sides, according to the anonymous witness. The witness, identified only as C037 to protect him from possible reprisals, is a moderate Serb politician from the region. He was quizzed about the treatment of Serbs taken prisoner by Croats and held in the town's police station and the basement of a department store. Shielded from the gallery by a large grey screen, "Mr C37" as Milosevic insisted on addressing him, spoke of the period from August 1991 to the start of 1992 when around 100 Serbs were held hostage. "They say they were tortured, beaten with electric wires, had electric currents passed through their bodies and were forced to cut the ears off each other and eat them," he said. "Many were beaten up and tied to radiators and some were taken away and shot." He said Serbs in the towns and villages of Western Slavonia who fled their homes had never been able to re-occupy them, as they had forfeited the right to them. Those houses that were not torched or dynamited were occupied by Croats or sold off, he said. Milosevic, who is conducting his own defence from the dock, seized on this information and reminded the court that Mesic had said that his Croatia was a law-abiding country. "Do you mean to say that in present day Croatia, where the rule of law is in force, that Serbs are not allowed to own apartments?" he asked triumphantly. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ProletarianNews http://www.utopia2000.org --------------------------- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.bacIlu 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 ==^================================================================
