Amazing what people in desperate situations will do. Read on.
Milosevic Surrenders to Yugoslav Police
By KATARINA KRATOVAC
The Associated Press
BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (April 1) - Former President Slobodan Milosevic,
architect of a decade of Balkan wars, was whisked away to prison Sunday after
a 26-hour armed standoff with police who arrested him to face corruption
charges stemming from his ruinous rule.
Milosevic surrendered after late-night negotiations between the government
and his Socialist Party. Local television showed footage of the car carrying
Milosevic entering Belgrade's Central Prison and the iron gates closing
behind it.
Most Belgrade newspapers ran special morning editions Sunday. ''It's
Finished, Milosevic is Arrested!'' read the splash headline in Ekspres
Politika.
Milosevic's arrest followed U.S. threats to suspend $50 million in economic
aid if President Vojislav Kostunica's government did not show willingness by
midnight Saturday to cooperate with the U.N. war crimes tribunal in The
Hague, Netherlands.
The U.N. tribunal indicted Milosevic in connection with atrocities committed
during his harsh crackdown on ethnic Albanians. Welcoming the arrest Sunday,
tribunal spokesman Jim Landale said Yugoslavia has a ''binding obligation''
to turn him over.
Kostunica has refused to extradite Milosevic to The Hague, insisting he
should be tried at home for corruption and other alleged crimes. However,
Yugoslav authorities clearly hope that Milosevic's arrest, regardless of the
charges, will lead to U.S. certification that the new democratic government
has met conditions for the aid.
Police official Miodrag Vukovic said the charges against Milosevic include
abuse of power and corruption that cost the state close to $100 million, and
that Milosevic would face a maximum five-year prison term if convicted.
Masked police had tried to raid the sprawling villa and seize Milosevic
before dawn Saturday but were repulsed by guards firing automatic weapons.
During the day, hundreds of his supporters blocked the villa's gates,
chanting ''Slobo! Slobo!''
Milosevic told police he would rather die than surrender, and Serbian
Interior Minister Dusan Mihajlovic said that at one point the former
president, brandishing a pistol, threatened to kill himself, his wife and
daughter. Branislav Ivkovic, a close aide to Milosevic, said in the end he
surrendered voluntarily ''to include himself in the legal process.''
Mihajlovic said Milosevic's 32-year-old daughter, Marija, fired four or five
pistol shots moments before her father was taken away. A police official, who
spoke on condition of anonymity, said she was apparently aiming at a
government negotiator. There were no injuries.
The scene Sunday morning at the Milosevic residence reflected some of the
mayhem of the previous hours. Police investigating the site walked over
shattered glass. Grass trampled by Milosevic supporters was littered with
soda cans, bottles and crumpled paper.
Milosevic's wife and daughter remained inside, said police officials.
Under Yugoslav law, Milosevic will be interrogated by an investigative judge,
who determines whether the evidence merits a trial. The judge can either
dismiss the charges, release the defendant pending trial or jail him pending
completion of an investigation.
Milosevic's lawyer, Toma Fila, said, ''certain agreements were reached,'' but
added he saw ''no chance'' of bail for his client.
Although Milosevic is in ''superb mental condition,'' questioning of the
former president had been postponed to later in the day because he was
''exhausted,'' said Fila.
Describing Milosevic as a ''reasonable man, who did not want any more Serb
blood to be spilled,'' Fila blamed authorities for provoking the violence
that preceded the arrest by sending riot police to storm the residence rather
than negotiators.
Members of his party managed to persuade Milosevic to turn himself in after
negotiators noted that the arrest had nothing to do with The Hague indictment.
Mihajlovic also insisted the arrest was not a prelude to extradition, ''but
to hand him over to an investigative judge under domestic laws.'' Many Serbs
consider The Hague tribunal a political instrument of American foreign policy.
Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic said the U.S. deadline was not a factor.
Since his ouster from power last fall, Milosevic has lived under police
surveillance in the tile-roof villa built for former communist dictator Josip
Broz Tito. It is said to contain secret underground passages, and underground
vaults containing jewelry - gifts to Tito during his rule.
Milosevic gained power during the waning years of communist rule in Europe.
In 1991, he triggered the bloody breakup of the former Yugoslavia, sending
his army into losing wars against the pro-independence republics of Slovenia,
Croatia and Bosnia.
His brutal attempts to put down an ethnic Albanian rebellion in Serbia's
province of Kosovo led to NATO airstrikes that pushed his forces out of the
province in 1999.
When Milosevic refused to accept electoral defeat, opposition supporters
rioted. He conceded defeat Oct. 6, but remained politically active.
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