Word: kosovo
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Once again, June 28--the feast of St. Vitus in the Christian Orthodox calendar--had written itself into the history of the Balkans. On St. Vitus day in 1389, Serbs were defeated by the Turks at the battle of Kosovo Polje, the event that launched Serbian claims to eternal victimhood. On the same day in 1914, Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip killed Archduke Francis Ferdinand in Sarajevo, plunging Europe into World War I. And on the same day in 1989, Milosevic--speaking at Kosovo Polje--launched his career as the defender of Serbian nationalism. Twelve years later, he finds himself imprisoned...
...Balkan wars, Milosevic can expect a fair trial. This week he is expected to plead not guilty to charges ranging from crimes against humanity to violations of the laws or customs of war. Specifically, prosecutors intend to link him through the chain of command to atrocities committed in Kosovo in 1999, including the murder of more than 600 civilians by Serbian security forces. Prosecutors are also looking to expand the charges to cover other crimes, including ones committed from 1991 to 1995, during the Croatian and Bosnian wars. Though U.N. lawyers will not discuss details of the indictment...
...Milosevic was tried anywhere, it should be in Belgrade, for corruption. But U.S. and European officials consistently linked their financial aid to cooperation with the court. And over the past two months, the Interior Ministry has revealed the existence of three mass graves filled with victims of the Kosovo war. The latest, uncovered the day Milosevic was arrested, contained the bodies of nine children. For Serbs, who had been sheltered from reports of such atrocities, the news hit home. "I don't care if he stole money, and I don't care if he was abusing power," said Vojin Savic...
...testimony not to the power of international law but to the power of the U.S. The indictment that the Hague tribunal issued two years ago would be a dead letter today--and "international justice" an empty phrase--were it not for American power. It was the NATO bombing of Kosovo--overwhelmingly American--that expelled Serb forces, devastated Serbia and utterly discredited Milosevic...
Justice knocked at six in the evening last Thursday for Slobodan Milosevic. It was St. Vitus' Day, a date steeped in Serbian history, myth and eerie coincidence: on June 28, 1389, Ottoman invaders defeated the Serbs at the battle of Kosovo; 525 years later, a young Serbian nationalist assassinated Austro-Hungarian Archduke Franz Ferdinand, lighting the fuse for World War I. And it was on St. Vitus' Day, 1989, that Milosevic whipped a million Serbs into a nationalist frenzy in the speech that capped his ascent to power...