Why Hague court wants to silence Milosevic
By John Catalinotto
The NATO-created International Criminal
Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague took
ominous new steps July 5 to restrict former Yugoslav President
Slobodan Milosevic's right to represent himself. The ICTY used
Milo sevic's real health problems as an excuse to justify
depriving him of his rights.
The following day the court ruled that his trial would
resume on July 14, but that it would assign a cardiologist to
monitor Milosevic's health in preparation for forcing him to
accept assigned counsel.
Milosevic has been imprisoned for three years in The Hague
in a place where the Nazis held resistance fighters. For two
years he cross-examined some 300 prosecution witnesses. He was
about to begin his defense case. Though he was to be restricted
to 150 days in court, the former president was prepared to
present a powerful case exposing U.S. and NATO crimes in his
country and exonerating himself and the Yugoslav people.
Milosevic told the media and the court that he would never
accept an appointed counsel and he insisted on continuing his
own defense. "This illegal court is daring to judge biological
and medical issues after they have proven incapable of judging
legal and historical issues," he said. "This court is like the
Inquisition."
Madeleine Albright, who was U.S. secretary of state during
the 1999 U.S.-NATO war against Yugoslavia, was seen in The
Hague at the ICTY building on July 5. Albright is known as "the
mother of the ICTY." Supporters of Milosevic believe her
presence is connected with the court's decision to postpone the
trial and its attempt to change the rules.
Milosevic's long-time aide, Vladimir Krsljanin, said from
Belgrade on July 5, "What we have seen at The Hague is the
worst kind of political theater and legal outrage directed at
the president.
Slobo dan Milosevic was brought to trial while he was suffering
bad health conditions. Despite our pleas and complaints and the
petitions of medical experts to the ICTY, it refused our
demands for more time for preparation and rest for President
Milosevic.
"First the court created conditions that worsened his
health, and now they are using his ill health to justify
stifling his presentation of his powerful defense case," said
Krsljanin.
Changing the rules
The ICTY opened the prosecution case in February 2002 after
a year of preparation. The well-funded and staffed court set
its own rules for the proceedings. It allowed Milosevic to
represent himself, as he insisted.
At that time, the ICTY and the media presented the Milosevic
case as "the trial of the century." That's when the prosecution
hoped to use it as a show trial to convict the Yugoslav leader
and blame him and the entire Serb people for the wars in the
Balkans.
Within the first month, however, Milosevic had so ably
handled his political and legal presentation, and had so
effectively cross-examined hostile witnesses, that many
reporters had to admit the case against the Serb leader was
weak to non-existent. Publicity on the case was damaging NATO's
justification for the war.
Throughout the two years of prosecution that ended last
February, President Milosevic was plagued by high blood
pressure and a heart ailment. Dozens of doctors pleaded for a
more humane treatment of the president. The court delayed
proceedings, but refused to release him from the harsh prison
conditions or give him the medical care of his choice.
Though prosecutors took a year to prepare their case and two
to present it, the ICTY allowed Milosevic only 90 days to
prepare his defense and was to allow only 150 days for him to
present it. Any time there is a delay for his health, the court
refuses to allow him access to any papers or books or to
interview potential witnesses at leisure. He lost 51 of the 90
days preparation when he complained of bad health.
As part of his defense case, Milosevic intended to call U.S.
President Bill Clinton, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and
other NATO leaders as witnesses so he could charge them for the
war crimes NATO committed against Yugoslavia.
He also planned to call a number of political analysts and
activists who have written, spoken and organized against U.S.
and NATO intervention in the Balkans. Some of these potential
witnesses participated in the Peoples Tribunal on Yugoslavia
organized by the International Action Center (IAC) in
1999-2000.
Faced with the embarrassment of a powerful political
exposure of NATO and U.S. leaders, the ICTY, like a schoolyard
bully who keeps getting beaten at his own game, decided to
change the rules and refuse to allow Milosevic to defend
himself.
One potential witness was Sara Flounders, a co-director of
the IAC and an editor of the IAC book, "Hidden Agenda: the
U.S.-NATO Takeover of Yugoslavia." Flounders was scheduled to
testify early. She met with Milosevic in The Hague on June
28.
Flounders told Workers World that "The attempt to remove
President Milo sevic as his own attorney is an admission of his
innocence of the war crimes charges and of U.S. and NATO guilt
in planning, executing and carrying out a 10-year war that
broke up a strong and successful Yugoslav Federation into a
half-dozen weak colonies and neo-colonies subservient to the
United States and Western Europe.
"Just as the weapons of mass destruction have never been
found in Iraq," Flounders continued, "the charge of massacres,
mass graves and genocide proved to be an utter fabrication in
Kosovo. It is essential that President Milosevic have a full
opportunity to expose NATO's war crimes, to defend Yugoslavia
and to answer these charges against his government."
IAC founder and former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark
made himself clear on the issue of Milosevic's right to defend
himself: "President Milosevic chose to 'defend himself in
person,' a fundamental human right recognized by the Inter
national Covenant on Civil and Political Rights."
Tiphaine Dickson, an attorney from Canada who is assisting
the Inter national Committee for the Defense of Slobodan
Milosevic, said, "Within the U.S., the Supreme Court has
recognized this as a right under the Sixth Amend ment to the
Constitution. To refuse to allow him this right would turn the
already illegal ICTY hearings into a star-chamber
proceeding."
Reprinted from the July 15, 2004, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyrighted
under a Creative
Commons License.
Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011
Email: ww@workers.org
Subscribe to WW by Email: wwnews-subscribe@workersworld.net
Donate to
support pro-labor, anti-war news.
Email
this article
Printable
page