World Leaders Hail Milosevic Arrest as End of Turbulent Era

World leaders Sunday hailed the arrest of Slobodan Milosevic as the end of a violent and unstable era in Europe and hinted that they might accede to the deposed Yugoslav president’s facing justice at the hands of his own angry countrymen before he stands trial on war crimes charges.

U.S. congressional leaders and U.N. war crimes prosecutors have demanded that the government in Belgrade deliver Milosevic to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia at The Hague to face charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Congress has threatened to withhold $50 million in economic aid unless it is convinced that Belgrade is cooperating in the quest for international justice.

But diplomats who have struggled with the despair and displacement inflicted on millions by Milosevic’s proxy aggressions over the last decade seemed the most open to suggestions that his fellow Serbs must be the first to confront the atrocities committed in their name.

In Washington, President Bush welcomed the Milosevic arrest and said it represents “an important step” in ending a tragic era of brutal dictatorship. The White House statement made clear that it expects Milosevic to be delivered to the Hague tribunal, but it appeared to acknowledge that he will be prosecuted first in his homeland on corruption charges.

“We cannot and must not forget the chilling images of terrified women and children herded onto trains, emaciated prisoners interned behind barbed wire and mass graves unearthed by U.N. investigators,” the president said in urging Belgrade to eventually extradite Milosevic.

But Bush also said he recognizes the “hard job” the new government faces as it builds a democracy, and he pledged U.S. support as Yugoslavia moves down the path of political and economic reform.

Today, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell is to decide whether to certify Yugoslavia as having cooperated sufficiently with the war crimes tribunal to allow release of the $50 million in aid, a process mandated by Congress.

Carla del Ponte, the chief prosecutor for the tribunal, told Swiss Television that she thought the arrest of Milosevic will lead eventually, though not immediately, to his prosecution in The Hague.

“The chance is there, but it is true this will take time,” she said. “It will not happen today or tomorrow. But I think it will happen in a few months.”

European allies were quick to telegraph to Belgrade their support for the arrest and their intention to keep up economic and political assistance to the new leadership of President Vojislav Kostunica.

“This marks the end of Slobodan Milosevic’s political career, which has caused the region so much devastation and its people so much suffering,” Swedish Prime Minister Goran Persson, whose country holds the rotating European Union presidency, said in a statement on behalf of the alliance.

He made clear that the 15-nation EU will refrain from threatening sanctions against the fledgling democratic forces now ruling in Yugoslavia over the indictment issues.

“There will not be any ultimatum about withholding EU aid. It would not be right to expose starving and freezing people in Yugoslavia at risk by refusing aid,” he said.

German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer echoed those sentiments in praising Kostunica for his “prudent approach” in arresting the man long identified by European diplomats as the single most destabilizing figure in the Balkans.

“The German government believes that all countries must fulfill their obligations under international law for cooperation with international criminal jurisdiction. This also applies to Belgrade,” Fischer said, while suggesting that the timing of extradition is less important than having it occur “in the end.”

French President Jacques Chirac expressed relief at the detention of Milosevic, saying that “we have waited for this day for a long time.”

In Britain, Foreign Secretary Robin Cook described the arrest as “another important step toward bringing Milosevic and his cronies to book for their crimes against humanity.”

Western European countries have been providing the bulk of forces for U.N. and NATO peacekeeping missions deployed to deal with the chaotic aftermath of four wars in the former Yugoslav federation that Milosevic masterminded to stay in power despite the sweep of democracy through other former Communist states. The last, over Milosevic’s repression of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo--a province of Serbia, Yugoslavia’s dominant republic--led to more than two months of airstrikes by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1999.

Only Russia and Belarus, which supported Milosevic throughout the armed conflicts and even beyond his September electoral defeat by Kostunica, greeted his arrest with apprehension.

“Milosevic’s surrender will play into the hands of the U.S., which would like to see him in The Hague and thus legalize the spring of 1999 and justify NATO’s aggression against Yugoslavia,” Russia’s parliamentary chairman for international affairs, Dmitri Rogozin, told the Interfax news agency.

Belarussian President Alexander G. Lukashenko described Milosevic’s arrest as “scandalous, abnormal and undemocratic.”

In the Balkans, leaders whose peoples were tormented by Milosevic’s campaigns of political brinkmanship and “ethnic cleansing” celebrated the news of his detention.

Slovenian President Milan Kucan, whose republic in June 1991 was the first to declare independence from Yugoslavia, noted that the people of Serbia need to come to grips with the brutality they inflicted on others before their fallen leader is handed over to the tribunal.

“The arrest is an announcement that a man who is among those who initiated long-term evil in the Balkans will have to take responsibility for his actions,” Kucan said.

He expressed confidence that Kostunica’s government represents “a clear alternative to the concept of Greater Serbia” pursued by Milosevic and will be strengthened by bringing his predecessor to justice for the crimes committed against his own people.

“I believe legal proceedings before Serbian courts and the Hague tribunal will show that war crimes and systematic abuses of human individual and collective rights cannot remain unpunished,” Kucan said.

Bosnian Foreign Minister Zlatko Lagumdzija said his country, which suffered more than 200,000 dead and 2 million displaced during more than three years of siege by the Serb-led Yugoslav army, also praised the arrest of a man whose deeds “shocked the region for a decade.”

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Times staff writers Robyn Dixon in Moscow and Robin Wright in Washington contributed to this report.

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Milosevic’s Rise and Fall

Riding a wave of Serbian nationalism, Slobodan Milosevic during 13 years in power involved his people in Balkan wars and left them economically devastated.

1941: Born in Pozarevac in eastern Serbia.

1959: Joins the Communist Party.

1964: Graduates from Belgrade Law School, pursues a career both in the Communist Party and as a manager in a trade company.

1987: Becomes the head of the Communist Party branch for Serbia, a republic of the Yugoslav federation.

1989: Gains popularity by pledging to protect Serbs living in Kosovo, who often claim mistreatment by the ethnic Albanian majority there. Becomes president of Serbia and abolishes autonomy for Kosovo and Vojvodina, the two special provinces of Serbia, to suppress separatist movements.

1990: As the Iron Curtain falls, renames the Communists as Socialists.

1991: Sends army troops to crack down on Serbs in Belgrade, the Serbian and Yugoslav capital, who are protesting his policies. Two Yugoslav republics declare independence, triggering clashes between pro-independence forces and the Milosevic-dominated federal army. A brief war in Slovenia is followed by a much worse, six-month conflict in Croatia.

1992: War erupts in a third republic, Bosnia-Herzegovina. Milosevic arms and supports Bosnian Serbs fighting for territory against the republic’s Muslims and Croats. The United Nations imposes sanctions against Serbia and Montenegro, the smaller republic in the rump Yugoslavia, for instigating the war in Bosnia.

1994: Milosevic stops supporting Bosnian Serbs.

1995: Negotiates a final peace deal for Bosnia after Europe’s bloodiest conflict since World War II. More than 250,000 people were killed.

1996: His party loses municipal elections in Serbia’s key cities. Annuls results, triggering months of protests.

1997: Acknowledges municipal election defeats, but switches to the post of Yugoslav president.

1998: Cracks down on armed separatists in Kosovo, triggering international outrage.

1999: North Atlantic Treaty Organization launches airstrikes to halt continued “ethnic cleansing” in Kosovo. After 78 days of bombing, Milosevic gives in, allowing deployment of a NATO-led peacekeeping force in the separatist province.

2000: Milosevic changes Yugoslavia’s constitution to create a loophole in order to stay in power as president. Loses Sept. 22 presidential election, tries to cling to power but is ousted Oct. 5.

2001: Lives under police surveillance. Officers arrest him April 1 on criminal charges.

Source: Associated Press