Serious Divisions Over Serb War Crimes Emerging in Yugoslavia

13/04/2002| IslamWeb

Suicide Note Blames Reformers for the Act; * The Deed Raises Stakes For Sending Inductees to The Hague; * Hague Tribunal Seeking 33 Inductees Including Serb wartime leaders Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic; __

BELGRADE (Islamweb & News Agencies) - Analysts in Belgrade said the dramatic suicide of Veteran Serbian politician and war crimes inductee Vlajko Stojiljkovic underscored how divisive and politically explosive the war crimes issue has become in Yugoslavia. In a note he blamed Yugoslavia's reformist leaders for his act, which provoked small but vocal protests of solidarity from nationalist sympathizers.

Stojiljkovic, who shot himself in the head outside the Yugoslav parliament on Thursday, died in hospital on Saturday evening, a doctor said.

Stojiljkovic put a bullet through his head just hours after parliament passed a law under heavy U.S. financial pressure to send him and other war crimes suspects to the U.N. Hague Tribunal. He had since remained deeply unconscious and in a critical condition.

The former minister had been considered a prime candidate for an early handover to the court, where ousted Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic is on trial.

Analysts have said the deed seriously raised the stakes for bringing more fugitives to trial alive.

The law passed by parliament on Thursday, after more than a year of arguments among reformers and their allies, authorizes the handover of suspects already indicted by the Hague tribunal.

Yugoslavia's dominant republic Serbia has already handed over several suspects, including Milosevic. But it had balked at acting again without a law, fearing the political fallout.

The authorities' failure to surrender more suspects before a March 31 deadline set by the U.S. Congress triggered a freeze in U.S. financial aid and support in international lending bodies.

The U.N.-run International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia is seeking a total of 33 fugitives, the vast majority of them believed to be in Yugoslavia or Bosnia's Serb Republic.

The most wanted are Bosnian Serb wartime leaders Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, both charged with genocide.
But Stojiljkovic, former Yugoslav deputy premier Nikola Sainovic and ex-army chief of staff Dragoljub Ojdanic were widely seen as the most likely candidates for early handovers.

Indicted with Milosevic and current Serbian President Milan Milutinovic during the NATO bombing, they face charges of crimes against humanity and violations of the law and customs of war.

PHOTO CAPTION:

Former Serbian interior minister Vlajko Stojiljkovic, wanted by the U.N. war crimes tribunal, died two days after shooting himself in the head outside the Yugoslav parliament April 11, 2002. Stojiljkovic is seen attending a Serbian parliament session in Belgrade in this October 9, 2000 file photo. (Goran Tomasevic/Reuters)