Word: djindjic
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...midweek, Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic gave U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell the assurances the American was seeking. Djindjic kept his word, despite a decision by a court, packed with Milosevic supporters, to overturn the order that would send him into exile. Vojislav Kostunica, Milosevic's successor as President of Yugoslavia, considered the handover "both illegal and unconstitutional," and the Prime Minister of the Yugoslav Federation, a comparatively powerless figure, resigned. But a majority of the ruling coalition supported sending Milosevic to the Hague, and Kostunica backed away from a threat to break up the government. Milosevic will face...
...Djindjic had one last ace to play. After the court handed down its ruling, Djindjic summoned his cabinet and informed them he was about to lance Milosevic with one of the strongman's own knives: a measure, devised by Milosevic during the early days of the former Yugoslavia's dissolution, that allows Serbia's cabinet to ignore any federal law it doesn't like. Without telling anyone, including Kostunica, the cabinet effectively refused to comply with the high court's ruling. Within three hours Milosevic was on his way to the Hague. The transfer blindsided Kostunica, the modest constitutional lawyer...
...judges had been Milosevic appointees, and had voted to annul last year's election result precipitating the insurrection that drove him from office - to challenge the validity of last weekend's government decree facilitating the strongman's extradition. But when the Federal court said no, Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic - Kostunica's arch-rival and an enthusiastic advocate of a Hague trial for Milosevic - convened an emergency cabinet meeting. Less than five hours later, the man who had presided over a series of bloody tribal wars and his country's demise into an impoverished kleptocracy, was simply gone, unlikely ever...
...Kostunica's prevarication had been partly based on his hope of winning over residual Milosevic supporters for his eventual election showdown with Djindjic. But by the time a little black van drove inconspicuously away from the Central Prison bearing the former strongman to face his accusers, the number of Serbs opposed to that outcome was surprisingly small. Their decision to extradite may have been driven by an overriding concern with their country's desperate financial plight, but Belgrade's post-Milosevic leadership has done a remarkable job over the past year in swaying Serbian public opinion solidly behind his extradition...
...entourage - as well as several other notable assassinations which occurred during the panicky last months of the regime. Milosevic's role in those killings has long been suspected but never confirmed. If convicted on those more serious charges Milosevic and others could face the death penalty, though Djindjic last week said that in the ex-President's case he thought execution unlikely...