Yugoslav President expresses doubts about fair Milosevic trial
( 2002-02-19 11:16 ) (7 )

Yugoslavia's president lashed out at the UN war crimes tribunal Monday, expressing doubts that Slobodan Milosevic would get a fair trial.

"So far we have seen much politics, a huge media spectacle but least of what this court should be about - trying the defendant of serious crimes," President Vojislav Kostunica said.

A longtime critic of The Hague court that he considers biased against Serbs, Kostunica singled out the prosecution, accusing it of lacking logic and correct historical facts.

"The prosecution's opening statement had little to do with law but was full of shallow misinterpretation of history," he said.

"There is certainly room to ask the question" of whether the former Yugoslav leader can get a fair trial, he said.

With Milosevic's trial in its second week, such comments by one of Yugoslavia's new leaders appear to strengthen concern that the trial of his predecessor is a trial against Serbs in general.

Milosevic is on trial on 66 counts of war crimes during the 1991-99 Balkan wars, including genocide in Bosnia. He could be sentenced to life if convicted on any count.

Last year, Kostunica opposed Milosevic's extradition to The Hague tribunal although he was part of the coalition that ousted the former president from power in the October 2000 popular uprising.

Kostunica contends that Milosevic's extradition was illegal because it violated a constitutional ban on surrendering Yugoslav nationals to foreign courts. He has since called on parliament to adopt a special law allowing extradition of Yugoslav nations to The Hague court.

"The prosecution's claim that this trial is against one person, not all Serbs, that there is no collective guilt but only individual, sounds extremely stretched," Kostunica said.