XPost: alt.religion.christian.east-orthodox, soc.rights.human, alt.politics.religion
ICTY Exonerates Slobodan Milosevic for War Crimes
BELGRADE – The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former
Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague has determined that the late Serbian
president Slobodan Milosevic was not responsible for war crimes
committed during the 1992-95 Bosnian war.
In a stunning ruling, the trial chamber that convicted former
Bosnian-Serb president Radovan Karadzic of war crimes and sentenced
him to 40 years in prison, unanimously concluded that Slobodan
Milosevic was not part of a “joint criminal enterprise” to victimize Muslims and Croats during the Bosnian war.
The March 24th Karadzic judgment states that “the Chamber is not
satisfied that there was sufficient evidence presented in this case to
find that Slobodan Milosevic agreed with the common plan” to
permanently remove Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats from Bosnian
Serb claimed territory.
The Karadzic trial chamber found that “the relationship between
Milosevic and the Accused had deteriorated beginning in 1992; by 1994,
they no longer agreed on a course of action to be taken. Furthermore,
beginning as early as March 1992, there was apparent discord between
the Accused and Milosevic in meetings with international
representatives, during which Milosevic and other Serbian leaders
openly criticised Bosnian Serb leaders of committing ‘crimes against humanity’ and ‘ethnic cleansing’ and the war for their own purposes.”
The judges noted that Slobodan Milosevic and Radovan Karadzic both
favored the preservation of Yugoslavia and that Milosevic was
initially supportive, but that their views diverged over time. The
judgment states that “from 1990 and into mid-1991, the political
objective of the Accused and the Bosnian Serb leadership was to
preserve Yugoslavia and to prevent the separation or independence of
BiH, which would result in a separation of Bosnian Serbs from Serbia;
the Chamber notes that Slobodan Milosevic endorsed this objective and
spoke against the independence of BiH.”
The Chamber found that “the declaration of sovereignty by the SRBiH
Assembly in the absence of the Bosnian Serb delegates on 15 October
1991, escalated the situation,” but that Milosevic was not on board
with the establishment of Republika Srpska in response. The judgment
says that “Slobodan Milosevic was attempting to take a more cautious approach”
The judgment states that in intercepted communications with Radovan
Karadzic, “Milosevic questioned whether it was wise to use ‘an
illegitimate act in response to another illegitimate act’ and
questioned the legality of forming a Bosnian Serb Assembly.”
The judges also found that “Slobodan Milosevic expressed his
reservations about how a Bosnian Serb Assembly could exclude the
Muslims who were ‘for Yugoslavia’.”
The judgment notes that in meetings with Serb and Bosnian Serb
officials “Slobodan Milosevic stated that ‘[a]ll members of other
nations and ethnicities must be protected’ and that ‘[t]he national interest of the Serbs is not discrimination’.”
Also that “Milosevic further declared that crime needed to be fought decisively.”
The trial chamber notes that “In private meetings, Milosevic was
extremely angry at the Bosnian Serb leadership for rejecting the
Vance-Owen Plan and he cursed the Accused.” They also found that
“Milosevic tried to reason with the Bosnian Serbs saying that he
understood their concerns, but that it was most important to end the
war.”
The judgment states that “Milosevic also questioned whether the world
would accept that the Bosnian Serbs who represented only one third of
the population of BiH would get more than 50% of the territory and he encouraged a political agreement.”
At a meeting of the Supreme Defense Council the judgment says that
“Milosevic told the Bosnian Serb leadership that they were not
entitled to have more than half the territory in BiH, stating that:
‘there is no way that more than that could belong to us! Because, we represent one third of the population. […] We are not entitled to in
excess of half of the territory – you must not snatch away something
that belongs to someone else! […] How can you imagine two thirds of
the population being crammed into 30% of the territory, while 50% is
too little for you?! Is it humane, is it fair?!’”
In other meetings with Serb and Bosnian Serb officials, the judgment
notes that Milosevic “declared that the war must end and that the
Bosnian Serbs’ biggest mistake was to want a complete defeat of the
Bosnian Muslims.”
Because of the rift between Milosevic and the Bosnian-Serbs, the
judges note that “the FRY reduced its support for the RS and
encouraged the Bosnian Serbs to accept peace proposals.”
The Tribunal’s determination that Slobodan Milosevic was not part of a
joint criminal enterprise, and that on the contrary he “condemned
ethnic cleansing” is of tremendous significance because he got blamed
for all of the bloodshed in Bosnia, and harsh economic sanctions were
imposed on Serbia as a result. Wrongfully accusing Milosevic ranks
right up there with invading Iraq only to find that there weren’t any
weapons of mass destruction after all.
Slobodan Milosevic was vilified by the entire western press corps and
virtually every politician in every NATO country. They called him “the Butcher of the Balkans.” They compared him to Hitler and accused him
of genocide. They demonized him and made him out to be a bloodthirsty
monster, and they used that false image to justify not only economic
sanctions against Serbia, but also the 1999 NATO bombing of Serbia and
the Kosovo war.
Slobodan Milosevic had to spend the last five years of his life in
prison defending himself and Serbia from bogus war crimes allegations
over a war that they now admit he was trying to stop. The most serious
charges that Milosevic faced, including the charge of genocide, were
all in relation to Bosnia. Now, ten years after his death, ICTY admits
that he wasn’t guilty after all.
The ICTY did nothing to publicize the fact that they had cleared
Milosevic of involvement in the joint criminal enterprise. They
quietly buried that finding 1,303 pages into the 2,590 page Karadzic
verdict knowing full well that most people would probably never bother
to read it.
The presiding judge in the Radovan Karadzic trial, O-Gon Kwon of South
Korea, was also one of the judges in the Slobodan Milosevic trial. Milosevic’s exoneration by the Karadzic trial chamber may be an
indication of how the Milosevic chamber would have eventually ruled,
at least on the Bosnia charges, if Milosevic had lived to see the
conclusion of his own trial.
It’s worth recalling that Slobodan Milosevic died under a very
suspicious set of circumstances. He died of a heart attack just two
weeks after the Tribunal denied his request to undergo heart surgery
in Russia. He was found dead in his cell less than 72 hours after his
attorney delivered a letter to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs
in which he said that he feared he was being poisoned.
The Tribunal’s official report on the inquiry into his death confirmed
that, “Rifampicin had been found in a blood sample taken from Mr.
Milosevic on 12 January 2006.” And that “Mr. Milosevic was not told of
the results until 3 March 2006 because of the difficult legal position
in which Dr. Falke (the Tribunal’s chief medical officer) found
himself by virtue of the Dutch legal provisions concerning medical confidentiality.”
The presence of Rifamicin (a non-prescribed drug) in Milosevic’s blood
would have counteracted the high blood pressure medication he was
taking and increased his risk of the heart attack that ultimately did
kill him. The Tribunal’s admission that they knew about the Rifampicin
for months, but didn’t tell Milosevic the results of his own blood
test until just days before his death because of “Dutch legal
provisions concerning medical confidentiality” is an incredibly lame
and disingenuous excuse. There is no provision of Dutch law that
prohibits a doctor from telling the patient the results of his own
blood test — that would be idiotic. On the contrary, concealing such information from the patient could be seen as malpractice.
This all gives rise to well-founded suspicion that powerful
geopolitical interests would rather Milosevic die before the end of
his trial than see him acquitted and have their vicious lies exposed.
U.S. State Department cables leaked to Wikileaks confirm that The
Tribunal did discuss Milosevic’s medical condition and his medical
records with U.S. Embassy personnel in The Hague without his
consent.They clearly didn’t care about medical confidentiality laws
when they were blabbing about his medical records to the American
embassy.
It’s an unsatisfying outcome that Milosevic has been quietly
vindicated for the most serious crimes that he was accused of some ten
years after his death. At a minimum financial compensation should now
be paid to his widow and his children, and reparations should be paid
to Serbia by the western governments who sought to punish Serbia in
order to hold Milosevic “accountable” for crimes that their own
Tribunal now admits he wasn’t responsible for, and was in fact trying
to stop.
http://tinyurl.com/jf7kkdl
Comment:
This report is dated 24 July 2016.
I am posting it on 28 July 2016
A Google search has failed to reveal any of the "mainsteam" media
reporting this event.
This can mean one of two things:
1. The InSerbia site is bogus, and the report is false.
or
2. The "mainstream" media are suppressing this news.
Does anyone know which it is?
--
A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing on usenet and in e-mail?
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)