The statements of Miroslav Filopovic on his release, show the positive side
of the revolutionary change in Yugoslavia, for the purposes of rebuilding
unity between the peoples of former Yugoslavia.
Not so good for bureacrat socialism. Best for finance capitalism. But also
better for the long term prospects of workers unity in the region without
which little can be achieved against global finance capital.
So this revolution [counter revolution in the opinion of Proyect] helps in
the long term to prepare the ground for the demise of global finance
capital. Nurturing its grave diggers as it were.
Chris Burford
London
Serbs must face up to Kosovo crimes, says freed reporter
Special report: Serbia
Jonathan Steele in Belgrade Thursday October 12, 2000
Like most first-time prisoners, Miroslav Filipovic, the courageous Serbian
journalist who was given a seven-year sentence for "revealing state
secrets" and "spreading false information", says he learned a great deal
from his time behind bars.
"I shared a cell with two or three others. The inmates were moved around
but I usually had Albanians with me. I had never had such close contact
with them before," Filipovic said in Belgrade after he was freed on Tuesday
on the instructions of the new president, Vojislav Kostunica.
His crime was to be the first Serb journalist to write directly about
atrocities in Kosovo and to try to explain how some Serb units attacked
Albanian civilians.
He was tried in a military court and held in a military prison in Nis, in
southern Serbia. Some of his Albanian fellow inmates were convicted of
membership of the Kosovo Liberation Army. Others were awaiting trial. He
believes most are innocent and ought to be freed.
"The Albanians treated me well. I made friends with several. I had written
about Kosovo and in some way was on their side," he said. They listened
together to radio reports of Slobodan Milosevic's downfall.
Exhausted but neatly dressed in a suit, ready for an interview on a Serbian
TV channel, Filipovic does not look the part of a brave investigative
reporter. Now 50, he was not trying to start a career as a young journalist
with a splash. He had not done any critical reporting before he joined the
London-based Institute for War and Peace Reporting as its correspondent in
Kraljevo, a town in southern Serbia.
"If I had known what would happen to me, I would not have written those
articles. I am not so brave," he said. "I was just in the right place at
the right time."
What he picked up, and then published, was a series of searing accounts
given after the war by several officers and men who had served in Kosovo.
One saw a three-year-old Albanian boy beheaded in front of his family.
Others witnessed the artillery shelling of defenceless villages, and forces
going in to massacre civilians.
Filipovic does not believe that collective guilt can be placed on a whole
people. The atrocities were carried out by particular units. But he does
not accept that few Serbs knew what was happening in Kosovo.
"Everyone who was in Kosovo knew, as well as their friends and families.
They talked about it. There are people who still cannot sleep properly for
thinking about what was done," he said.
Unlike most Serbs, he believes that Mr Milosevic and the other suspected
war criminals should go on trial in the Hague, not in Serbia. "They will
get a fairer trial there," he said.
Serbs have to start to face up to and discuss war crimes fully, he
believes. This is vital if good relations are to be restored with Croatia,
Bosnia, and Kosovo. "We cannot go forward otherwise."
After some rest, Filipovic plans to write a book and more articles on
atrocities. The pieces which caused the military to put him in prison this
summer appeared only on the internet.
