Artukovic Verdict

The conviction Wednesday of Andrija Artukovic for war crimes committed in Yugoslavia more than 40 years ago is one of the rare instances in which justice delayed is not justice denied.

There is no question about his responsibility in the torture and killing of thousands of Jews, Serbians, Gypsies and other prisoners when he served as interior minister of the puppet state of Croatia created by the Nazis during the German occupation of Yugoslavia. There also is no question that it would have been better to have permitted his extradition when it was first requested in the 1950s, but the United States’ preoccupation with Communism and its new hold on Eastern Europe blinded officials to the responsibility to international justice.

Nothing will now be served by sending this aged man to a firing squad. But much will be served by the message communicated by his conviction to all the tyrants of the world: They shall be held responsible.