21 October 2003 Afternoon Edition

Regional News

· Hand over indicted officers, Hague tells Serbia (Reuters)
· ANALYSIS: Will new war crime indictments seal Serb government fate? (Dpa)
· Serbia furious over fresh war crimes indictments (AFP)
· Serb generals indicted by U.N. war crimes court won't be extradited soon, (AP)
· Police minister: "I won't extradite Lukic" (Beta)

Hand over indicted officers, Hague tells Serbia

(Recasts, adds prosecutors, deputy Serb PM, analyst)

By Abigail Levene

AMSTERDAM, Oct 21 (Reuters) - The Hague tribunal told Serbia on Tuesday it had no choice but to surrender two former top soldiers, an ex-police chief and its current public security boss to answer charges of war crimes against Kosovo Albanians.
Belgrade reacted bitterly to a United Nations indictment -- publicly revealed on Monday -- of former armed forces chief of staff Nebojsa Pavkovic, former corps commander Vladimir Lazarevic, former police chief Vlastimir Djordjevic and the current head of Serbia's public security, Sreten Lukic.

Serbia, where many view the men as heroes, made clear it was in no hurry to transfer them to The Hague, where they are charged with crimes against humanity during Serbia's bid to crush separatist Kosovo Albanian guerrillas before and during NATO bombing in 1999.

But Hague officials said Serbia's obligation was clear.

``When the tension dies down and the dust settles, they will see they have no option but to proceed and apprehend these men,'' deputy prosecutor Graham Blewitt told Reuters.

Tribunal spokesman Jim Landale said: ``The authorities have an obligation to detain and transfer these four individuals in good time.... We certainly expect them to be transferred.''

``NO AGREEMENTS''
Prosecutors denied an assertion by Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Zivkovic that Belgrade and chief U.N. prosecutor Carla Del Ponte had struck an agreement that there would be ``no more indictments on the basis of chain-of-command responsibility.''

``No agreement was settled with Mrs Del Ponte,'' said the chief prosecutor's spokeswoman Florence Hartmann.

The indictment says the accused ``planned, instigated, ordered, committed or otherwise aided'' crimes including executions and the deportation of some 800,000 Albanians.

It says they were members of a ``joint criminal enterprise'' to expel Kosovo Albanians, along with top officials like former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, ex-Serbian President Milan Milutinovic and former Yugoslav Deputy Prime Minister Nikola Sainovic -- all of whom are in detention in The Hague.

The four are indicted both on the basis of command responsibility -- where a superior must answer for the conduct of his subordinates -- and individual responsibility for their alleged participation in the ``joint criminal enterprise.''
Prosecutors also denied Zivkovic's statement that he had an agreement with the United States and Del Ponte that if top Bosnian Serb fugitives Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic were handed over, other cases could be dealt with at home.
TRICKY TIMING
Serbian officials said the tribunal was ignoring political realities. Deputy Prime Minister Zarko Korac told B92 radio the government wanted to and would cooperate with The Hague, but that it also had to consider internal stability:

``The state...will consider the consequences of the possible arrest or extradition against the internal stability of the country and overall political situation in the country.''

James Lyon, Balkan expert at the International Crisis Group think tank, voiced doubt the government would be in a position to arrest figures like Lukic at the moment. ``The question is whether police would obey any order to arrest him,'' he said.
The indictments come at a bad time politically for the government, which is facing a no-confidence vote in parliament.

Serbia's reformist coalition has lost momentum since Prime Minister Zoran Djindic was assassinated in March, in what some believe was an act of revenge for the handover of Milosevic.

``It should not be forgotten that seven months ago a man was killed because he was considered to be extraditing the heros to The Hague,'' Korac said.
Prosecutors said they were determined the four be tried in The Hague, rather than in a local Serbia court. They plan to request the case be joined to the pending trial of Milutinovic, Sainovic and ex-army chief Dragoljub Ojdanic.

ANALYSIS: Will new war crime indictments seal Serb government fate?

By Boris Babic

Belgrade (dpa) - When United Nations war crime prosecutors unsealed new indictments against Belgrade's top security operatives involved in the 1999 Kosovo war, they probably sealed the fate of the tottering Serbian government, a Belgrade analyst said Tuesday.
This time International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague has indicted four army and police generals, including the current assistant interior minister and chief of Serbian police, Sreten Lukic.
The news could not have come at a worse time for Prime Minister Zoran Zivkovic as he faces an uphill battle in a no-confidence debate pending in parliament in the next days.
There is no way out for the cabinet but to stall measures against those under indictment, maybe until the next administration takes over, said Ognjen Pribicevic, an analyst with the Institute for Social Sciences.
Otherwise, the humiliation of Lukic, widely regarded as the ``best cop in the country'', and other officials considered defenders of Serbian national interests, would also become the humiliation of the government, in the face of nationalist opposition

Serbia furious over fresh war crimes indictments

By Stephen Coates

BELGRADE, Oct 21 (AFP) - Serbian leaders were furious Tuesday after the UN war crimes tribunal issued fresh indictments against four generals over atrocities in Kosovo, saying the court should not expect any arrests soon.

Prime Minister Zoran Zivkovic said the indictments announced by The Hague-based tribunal overnight were a "blow to reform in Serbia" and a "drastic violation" of an informal agreement between the court and Belgrade.

He said UN chief prosecutor Carla Del Ponte had assured late Serbian prime minister Zoran Djindjic, who was assassinated in March, that there would be no new indictments based on the principle of command responsibility.

"This is a drastic violation of an agreement which was not legally based but which should have been a (formal) agreement between two serious sides," Zivkovic told state television.

"No fast reactions in terms of arrests and extraditions should be expected from us," he said, adding the timing of the indictments four years after the end of the war was baffling.

The indictees, who include Deputy Interior Minister Sreten Lukic and former Yugoslav army chief Nebojsa Pavkovic, are accused of having taken part in "a campaign of terror and violence against Kosovo Albanians" in 1999.

The charges are similar to those levelled against former Serbian and Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic, who was extradited to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) at The Hague in 2001.

At the time of the Kosovo war Pavkovic was in command of the Yugoslav Third Army Corps and Lukic was chief of Serbian police in the southern province.

The other accused are generals Vladimir Lazarevic and Vlastimir Djordevic, at the time respectively corps commander in the Kosovo capital Pristina and head of public security at the Serbian interior ministry.

They stand accused of taking part in "a joint criminal enterprise" which sought among other things "the expulsion of a substantial portion of the Kosovo Albanian population ... to ensure continued Serbian control over the province."

An estimated 800,000 Kosovo Albanians were driven from their homes during the 1998-99 war, when guerrillas from the province's ethnic Albanian majority fought for independence from Serbia.

The four will have to answer charges amounting to crimes against humanity and war crimes, on the principle that those in command bear responsibility for atrocities committed by their troops.

The charges were signed by Del Ponte on September 22 and confirmed by a judge on October 2, but were kept secret until now.
"I can't understand that the whole of Serbia and half of Europe knew that Lukic was the head of the police forces in Kosovo in 1999, and The Hague only realises this a few days ago and issues the indictment today," said Zivkovic.

General Lazarevic said he was innocent of the crimes and demanded action from the government.

"No one led a private war or private defence of the country" in Kosovo, he told FoNet news agency, adding: "The state should solve this now."

Interior Minister Dusan Mihajlovic described Lukic as his "right hand man" and the "hero" of a crackdown against organised crime launched earlier this year.

"I have said several times that indictments based on command responsibility are completely unacceptable for me," he told the BBC's Serbian service.

"I will respect any decision made by the government, but I will not be the minister who will extradite generals Lukic and Lazarevic to The Hague."

Foreign Minister Goran Svilanovic told B92 radio that he believed the ICTY would allow the generals to be prosecuted in local courts if Serbia arrested former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic, one of the most wanted war crimes and genocide suspects who is believed to be hiding in Serbia.

Serb generals indicted by U.N. war crimes court won't be extradited soon, officials say

By DUSAN STOJANOVIC

BELGRADE, Serbia-Montenegro (AP) _ Government officials on Tuesday denounced new indictments issued against four Serbian generals by U.N. war crimes prosecutors, saying they won't be arrested or extradited to The Hague war crimes tribunal any time soon.

The tribunal in the Netherlands on Monday indicted the four generals, including Serbia's current assistant Interior minister, Sreten Lukic, for alleged atrocities against ethnic Albanians during the 1999 war in Kosovo.

The other three indictees are former Yugoslav Army Gen. Nebojsa Pavkovic; Vladimir Lazarevic, the former commander of Yugoslav Army forces in Kosovo's capital Pristina; and Vlastimir Djordjevic, the chief of police forces operating in Kosovo.

Serbian officials said the latest indictments came at a delicate time for the pro-Western government as it faces a no-confidence vote. The parliamentary vote

Police minister: "I won't extradite Lukic" (Beta)

BELGRADE -- Tuesday - Serbia's police minister last night ruled out extraditing his assistant and chief of public security, Sreten Lukic, after an indictment against him was unsealed at the United Nations war crimes tribunal in The Hague.

"I will honour every government decision, but I won't be the minister to extradite generals Lukic and Lazarevic to The Hague", Dusan Mihajlovic told Serbian state television.

The UN tribunal yesterday disclosed indictments against Lukic, who led the regular uniformed police in Kosovo during the war, former Pristina Corps commander Vladimir Lazarevic, Lukic's predecessor as public security chief Vlastimir Djordjevic and former armed forces chief of staff Nebojsa Pavkovic.

Mihajlovic last night described Lukic as his "right-hand man" in reforming the police and "the hero" of the police operation launched after the assassination of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic.