[Nettime-bold] Re: Progress of Milosevic trial

["Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>]

US media tends to picture Milosevic trial as a Hollywood courtroom 
drama simply by inertia: they picture any trial like that. Milosevic's 
trial is as interesting as Collin Fergusson's trial was (Fergusson is 
the guy who shot half a dozen people on LIRR New York city's 
commuter railroad and then proceeded to defend himself without a 
lawyer in the court - very similar personality).

B92 had a traditionally anti-Milosevic stance, but it indeed did not 
insist on it during the NATO bombing of Belgrade. This is 
understandable given the circumstances. Milosevic shut them 
down briefly anyway as a treacherous station. Whether should we 
call that a black page in their history, or not, depends on whether 
we are realistic or not.

On NPR's Sylvia Poggioli report about Milosevic's trial, I think she 
was right to note that "testimony from 'the inner circle'" shall be 
necessary to convict Milosevic. Frank Tiggelaar reminds us here 
that such testimony was neither asked nor provided during the 
Nuerenberg war crimes trials. Those two trial experiences are, 
however, vastly different.

First, Hitler was never on trial, because he killed himself. Second, 
Nazis kept written records of everything, because they believed 
they'd be victorious, and they themselves believed that they were 
doing a service to humanity. In contrast, Milosevic's regime was 
well aware of possibility to lose and of the fact that their actions 
might not be looked upon amicably by an objective outside 
observer. Therefore, they functioned as an organized crime group, 
and as U.S. juristic experience shows, never was a boss of an 
organized crime group succesfully convicted without a testimony of 
his 'inner circle'.

Third, while common sense points to Milosevic's guilt, as it did to 
the guilt of Nuerenberg defendants, common sense is not enough 
for conviction. Fifty years ago the world was more ready to believe 
the common sense. Today, there is a relentless emphasis on 
evidence. And, fourth, evidence was easier to obtain in occupied 
Germany, fully under the control of the allies who also run the 
Nuerenberg tribunal, than it is in Serbia, governed by often 
obstructive and uncooperative Milosevic's successors.

As the discussion, that we had at Raccoon Space on June 27 with 
Thommas Keenan of Justwatch, Fred Abrahams (who testified 
against Milosevic on June 3 and June 4), Mandy Jacobson (director 
of Calling The Ghosts) and Mark Landsman (director of Letters 
>From Peje), showed, obtaining evidence that establish clear 
connection between the enormous existing list of atrocities and 
Milosevic's role as a supreme commander (capo di tutti capi) of 
Yugoslav/Serbian forces under arms is pivotal. It is true that The 
Hague understands this, and the tribunal prosecutors are with 
mixed success trying to nudge Serbian secret police into co-
operating and providing that type of evidence. But, it is also true 
that ICTY is often disorganized, over-bureaucratized, and slow to 
change, react and adapt, which gives certain unfair, albeit -
hopefully - just temporary, advantage to Milosevic.

ivo


Date sent:      	Mon, 1 Jul 2002 10:08:37 -0400
Send reply to:  	Thomas Keenan <keenan@bard.edu>
From:           	Thomas Keenan <keenan@bard.edu>
Subject:        	Re: Progress of Milosevic trial
To:             	JUSTWATCH-L@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU

Date: Mon, 01 Jul 2002 06:24:21 +0200
From: Frank Tiggelaar <frankti@xs4all.nl>
Reply-To: webmaster@domovina.net

Tom, why is it that US media tend to picture the Milosevic trial as a
Hollywood courtroom drama, with a script based on inaccurate facts?

In the past week it was decided that

a - the prosecution has six more weeks to finish the Kosova case in the
court (July 2nd-26th, August 26th-Sept 6th);

b - the prosecution may apply for an extra week in court in September;

c - the prosecution has four extra weeks during the recess to prepare
for the Aug-Sept Kosova sessions.

So far there have been 67 trial-days, and there will be some 30 more, i.e.
a third of the prosecutor's time in court is yet to come.  After seeing
all the public sessions in the Milosevic trial so far, I would say the
prosecution is well on the way to proving beyond a reasonable doubt that
Milosevic was aware of what went on in Kosova and that he was responsible
for most of the evil that happened there.

NPR's Sylvia Poggioli seems to forget that none of the defendants in the
Nuremburg trials were convicted with the help of testimony from 'the
inner circle' - why would this have to be the case in the Milosevic trial?

I'm also unaware of an anti-Milosevic stance in B92's reporting during
NATO's war with Serbia.  I would say that episode was a black page in
their history, a view shared by my Serbian friends in Amsterdam.

Frank

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