Thursday August 30, 5:54 PM
Defiant Milosevic rejects UN
court and says his rights
violated
THE HAGUE, Aug 30 (AFP)
-
A defiant Slobodan Milosevic made his second
appearance before the UN
war crimes tribunal Thursday, dismissed it again as illegal and said his
conditions of detention were a "massive violation" of his rights.
The
former Yugoslav leader said he had been kept in
"total isolation" in jail in
The Hague since his
transfer from Belgrade on June 28 to face war
crimes
charges
He asked the court "why my family cannot visit me
the
same way as others have that possibility." His wife
Mira has been
allowed to visit him twice in jail.
Milosevic's court
appearance lasted about 40 minutes
during which he said he had prepared a
written
statement so that the court could not cut off his
microphone as it
had done during his first hearing.
But presiding Judge Richard May
switched off
Milosevic's microphone again Thursday just before
ending the
proceedings when Milosevic began a verbal
attack on the court, telling him
the tribunal would
not listen to any political arguments.
Milosevic
again refused to be represented before the
tribunal, arguing that the court
was illegal under international law because it was not set up by a vote of the
UN General Assembly.
So judge May said he would appoint a
representative
for him -- not as a defense counsel but to assist the
court
in future hearings.
During his first appearance on July 3,
Milosevic
refused to enter a plea and challenged the court's
legitimacy to
try him on charges of crimes against
humanity and war crimes for role in the
1998-99 Serb
crackdown on Kosovo.
Thursday's hearing, a so-called
"status conference",
was to ensure that Milosevic understood the
charges
against him as well as giving him a chance to raise
any issues
relating to the case, including his mental
and physical
condition.
Milosevic also asked Thursday why he had not been
allowed
to talk to the press to put across his view of
events.
Earlier this
week, he managed to give a sneak
telephone interview to US Fox television in
which he
hit back at the charges against him, infuriating
officials in The
Hague.
He also told the network he had never directed his
troops to
kill civilians in Kosovo. But he said they
had been under strict orders to
"eliminate terrorist
groups".
"I'm proud for everything I did in
defending my
country and my people. All my decisions are legitimate
and
legal, based on the constitution of Yugoslavia and
based on the rights to
self-defense, which belongs to
every nation in the world," he told Fox
television.
Milosevic has applied to a Dutch district court
to
challenge the legality of his arrest and detention by
the tribunal,
arguing he was kidnapped and his human
rights were
violated.
NSP Lista isprobava demokratiju u praksi
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