Srdacno, i Best Wishes,
DJGB Popadich
Feb., 18, 2003
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IHT- February
16, 2004.
Misha Glenny
Arming the
radicals
LONDON Carla Del Ponte,
chief prosecutor of the Yugoslav War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague, announced
last week that Belgrade had become a safe haven for fugitives. Even Radovan
Karadzic, the former Bosnian Serb leader indicted by the Tribunal, has now found
refuge in the Serbian capital, she said. Del Ponte offered no evidence for her
dramatic claim except to say that it came from a confidential source.
.
The statement comes at a delicate time in Serbian politics as leaders
of the so-called "democratic bloc" make a last-ditch attempt to form a minority
government that would save the country from new elections. New elections could
well further bolster Serbia's hard-line nationalists, the Radicals, already the
biggest party in Parliament and committed to territorial expansion.
.
The
government in Belgrade is exasperated by Del Ponte's latest statement. Since
assuming power from the former dictator, Slobodan Milosevic, in October 2000
after a popular uprising, the Democratic Party-led government has handed over
several key indictees - including Milosevic himself.
.
Every time Del
Ponte makes such claims, the government warns that this strengthens the
resurgent Radicals, whose notorious leader, Vojislav Seselj, awaits trial in The
Hague. The Radicals' rise in popularity is chiefly the result of the lack of
visible economic progress.
.
But Del Ponte's actions reinforce another
popular belief, that Serbia has been singled out for punitive treatment by the
international community, a fear that the Radicals use to make considerable
political capital.
.
A Western intelligence officer voiced a second
concern to me when he described how hunting Karadzic is "like hunting a stag."
"We have got close to him several times only for the whole operation to be
ruined because Del Ponte starts jumping up and down and shouting 'I can see him!
I can see him!' before we can strike."
.
Del Ponte has frequently pointed
out that she does not interfere in politics, because her role is exclusively
judicial. This is fair enough. But for her not to recognize that her often
unsubstantiated public claims have an enormous political impact throughout the
former Yugoslavia is naïve to the point of irresponsibility.
.
The
question she should be asking herself is this: Does my public statement about
Karadzic advance my goal of seeing him in The Hague? Or will it prove a valuable
fillip to the Radicals in their quest to enter government in Belgrade? If the
latter is more likely than the former - and I would aver that it most definitely
is - then both the region and the international community potentially has a very
big problem on its hands.
.
The current political uncertainty in Serbia
takes place as the United Nations is desperately trying to keep afloat talks
that will eventually seek a solution to the thorny issue of Kosovo's final
constitutional status - whether it will become independent or remain in some
respect part of Serbia.
.
If the political mood in Belgrade darkens or if
the Radicals enter the government, then the United Nations and the international
community can kiss any progress in Kosovo goodbye.
.
This is not a
prospect that the UN administration or the NATO-led KFOR troops there especially
relish because the Albanians of Kosovo are becoming extremely frustrated with
the lack of progress and, in the absence of a Serbian overlord, focus their
unhappiness on the international regime in the province.
.
A shift to the
right in Serbia would also place a significant burden on the country's already
tortured negotiations with the European Union over its path to modernization and
European integration. One thing that nobody needs at the moment is a wounded,
unstable Serbia and an angry, impatient Kosovo. Mixed together, these two
elements would form a highly volatile compound.
.
There is no doubt that
democratic and reform-minded politicians in Serbia can help themselves and their
country immensely by cutting out the unseemly squabbling that has characterized
their lamentable attempts to form a government over the past six weeks.
.
But this is also a time when everybody in the international community
should be engaging in a positive and encouraging manner with Belgrade in order
to ensure Serbia's continuing commitment to reform and democracy, and its
long-term cooperation with institutions like the War Crimes Tribunal.
.
Britain and the United States have in the past expressed their concerns
in private to Del Ponte and her employers at the United Nations about her public
appearances. Washington and London have also been the toughest in their
insistence that Serbia, Croatia and other former Yugoslav countries hand over
their indicted war criminals. Now there are signs that other officials in the
European Union are also growing worried about the impact of Del Ponte on
regional stability.
.
This is not a call on the chief prosecutor to
resign, nor do I question the important work of the tribunal. But it is an
urgent appeal for Del Ponte to take a hard look at her working style and its
impact on southeastern Europe.
.
The writer's most recent book is "The
Balkans: Nationalism, War and the Great Powers, 1804-1999." He is director of
SEE Change 2004, which promotes regional cooperation in the Balkans.
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Comment:
Surprise, Surprise!
Surprise, Surprise! The book royalties are over and it
looks ‘The Balkan: etc.,’ is a sale’s item no more. Sadly redundant,
overstretched, confused, wordy, boring above all, it is a little wonder if it
gets a serious reader at all; unless would be an angry Arbalist care to keep it
up, dust free on the shelf.
In the past we had a pleasure of enduring the
typically British sermons. The one in a long lineup is Captain Leake’s report of
1806; Seton-Watson culture laments of 1911; MG venomous diatribes of 1914, to
Blair’s WMD torments of the present, chance to kill legally still stands: the
favourite pastimes in islands’ political psyche, top to bottom.
This week of February 16, a charitable Herald has
opened the door, and Misha coughs through again. He does not cry
monster-crow-army, but a zealous tribunal losing its jest. Laughable a bit even
so the institution is in a need of some fresh infuse, from whom but from
Misha?
To begin, Misha does not suggest the Tribunal stop the
game that Keystone Police Force so playfully mastered for a century. At the end
of a rolling chain he wants to see ‘this and that’ only, hanged for good. To
this, an OS and his fellowship ought to stay aside, as the WMD swagger is not
over yet.
If a biology course might be of some help, Misha is
not slow to count that in. Nothing personal, re the Prosecutors or the whole of
Tribunal retirement, he would like to see them go. This or the other way the
clock is ticking for both, and before the bell’s toll he seems ready for another
long shot. Perhaps, ... perhaps!
To the Arbalists Misha has seemingly attached himself
by the force of Byronic nostalgia. Did he get it? Where Via Egnatia and the dry
bone arts flow, no questions asked? Then, if these ‘extremely frustrated’
Arbalists, if they fell short of the mark: a hundred more churches, graveyards,
homes, people of old, ... to vandalize, play arson, pillage, bulldozing,
bombing, and homicide; would it be Misha, the one to give himself up as
collateral, in the name of the British Naval Supremacy?
We, numb and dumb, unable to deliver a hundred new
churches on a short notice, regrettably we must default. In such a case we owe a
big and humble, ... So Sorry! Via ... Ignominia! -- to the Tribunals and
Reformists, Internationalists and Occultists, and to Misha
Glenny.
DJGB Popadich
Feb., 18, 2004.
