The death of former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic in a United Nations cell on Saturday prompted widespread dismay that the ”Butcher of the Balkans” had escaped justice.
But his allies accused the UN war-crimes tribunal in The Hague — trying him for genocide and war crimes in the Balkans conflicts of the 1990s — of being fully responsible for his death.
Milosevic, charged with war crimes and genocide for his part in the Balkans conflicts that killed more than 200 000 people, was found dead in his cell room bed in the UN war-crimes tribunal in the Dutch capital, The Hague.
Among the gravest charges, he was accused of ordering the massacre of up to 8 000 Muslims in Srebrenica in Bosnia in 1995 after it was captured by Serb forces.
Relatives of those killed in the massacre welcomed the 64-year-old former strongman’s death but regretted that he escaped sentencing.
”It is a pity that we will not see him facing justice, that we will not hear the verdict. However, it seems that God punished him already,” said the head of the Tuzla-based association of Srebrenica mothers, Hajra Catic, who lost her son and husband.
Milosevic’s family, meanwhile, blamed the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia for his death.
It bore ”full responsibility” after it refused to allow him to have medical treatment in Russia, his brother, Borislav, said in Moscow.
”Three months ago he asked to go to Moscow for treatment. This whole circus of the court in The Hague is terrible. It’s criminal,” Borislav told France-Info radio.
CNN quoted widow Mirjana Milosevic, also in Moscow, as saying: ”The Hague tribunal has killed my husband.”
The Russian foreign ministry said it regrets Milosevic was not allowed to seek treatment in Russia, saying the Russian authorities ”had guaranteed to meet all the demands” of the court.
There was anger too from some ordinary Serbs in Belgrade.
”They kept him there [in prison] for more than three years, treating him as an animal and not allowing him to be visited by the doctors who could have helped him,” Milanka Sojic (54) said.
Report
Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica for his part said his government ”will ask from The Hague tribunal a detailed report about this tragic event”.
The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia said it has launched an inquiry into Milosevic’s death, and ordered a full autopsy and a toxicological report.
Stephen Kay, the lawyer appointed by the court whom he refused to recognise, said Milosevic had told him recently he would not take his life because he had worked hard on his defence, but he was aware the heavy workload was having an impact on his health.
”Many times he was told … that he could delegate more of his work, but he was very, very determined to be at the front of the case in the court room,” Kay told the BBC.
Milosevic’s death was announced just six days after the suicide in the same prison of his former ally, 50-year-old Croatian Serb ex-leader Milan Babic, who pleaded guilty to crimes against humanity perpetrated during the 1991-1995 war in Croatia.
In the streets of Belgrade, Serbs reacted with a mixture of anger and deep suspicion. ”It is not fair that the bastard died in a dream while others died in pain,” said 43-year-old Belgrade resident Duska, who asked not to give her full name.
European powers, too, regretted that Milosevic escaped sentencing but hoped for reconciliation.
European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana said he hopes Milosevic’s death will allow Serbia to turn the page.
”I hope very much this event, the death of Milosevic, will help Serbia to look definitely to the future,” Solana said.
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said he hopes it will ”enable the people of Serbia better to come to terms with their past, which is the only way in which they can properly face their future”.
”I was always aware of the risk that he might die before the end of the case.”
‘Villain’
The Muslim chairperson of Bosnia’s tripartite presidency, Sulejman Tihic, said Milosevic’s death in his bed is ”sad news for victims, for truth and for justice”.
”He will be remembered as a villain politician responsible for the suffering of thousands of people. He was the first head of state to be charged with genocide,” said Tihic, who testified against Milosevic in 2003.
Croatian President Stipe Mesic repeated the sentiment. ”It’s a shame he didn’t live until the end of the trial so he could be given the sentence he deserved,” Mesic told the Hina news agency.
”Today God gave his verdict on justice,” said Albanian Prime Minister Sali Berisha.
”The death of the ‘Butcher of the Balkans’, who caused the greatest drama and tragedy of modern history to Bosnians, Albanians and Croats, is a relief for the families of the hundreds of thousands of victims of his cruelty,” Berisha added.
Ironically, the former Serb strongman died as EU foreign ministers were holding talks with their counterparts from five Balkan states in the Austrian city of Salzburg, taking stock of progress towards integrating them into the bloc.
One of the biggest stumbling blocks to Serbia joining the EU has been its refusal to deliver up figures such as fugitive general Ratko Mladic, who has been charged for his role in the Sarajevo siege and the Srebrenica massacre in Bosnia. — Sapa-AFP