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Snap Milosevic Extradition Ruled Out - International Justice - Global Policy Forum Snap Milosevic Extradition Ruled Out
BBC
June 27, 2001Some Milosevic supporters wept in Belgrade Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica has said it will be impossible to extradite Slobodan Milosevic ahead of a key donors' conference on Friday. But the Tanjung news agency says Yugoslavia's constitutional court will issue a ruling on Thursday on whether the decree which allows for the transfer of Mr Milosevic to the war crimes tribunal in The Hague is constitutional or not. Lawyers say this could allow for his immediate extradition.
Mr Milosevic, who is appealing against the decree, will appear before a Belgrade court judge at the prison where he is being held on Wednesday to hear the extradition order and indictment against him. The United States is still threatening to boycott Friday's conference - where Yugoslavia is hoping to raise $1bn in aid - unless the authorities provide more details about their plans for Mr Milosevic.
Mr Kostunica said Mr Milosevic's appeals against extradition had to be allowed to run their course, which would be impossible before Friday. However, Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic said the former president could be transferred to The Hague before the donors' conference. One of Mr Milosevic's lawyers has told the BBC he would not be surprised to find his client whisked out of Yugoslavia without the legal process being completed.
Several thousand supporters of the ousted president demonstrated in Belgrade on Tuesday evening against the extradition.
Tight Deadline
Mr Kostunica told reporters in Belgrade: "The decree cannot be carried out in 48 hours. That would be a direct violation of it."
But Mr Djindjic said: "If everything goes according to procedure... Friday would be the shortest possible deadline."
"This is the Balkans and everything is possible here," said Mr Milosevic's lawyer Toma Fila. "It is more surprising to us if something is done according to the law. "It won't surprise me one bit if I wake up in the morning and Milosevic calls me from The Hague; neither will 10 million Serbs be over-excited."
The protesters in Belgrade, some weeping, waved banners with messages saying: "Serbia won't give you away, Slobodan" and "Selling out the Serbs".
"Once a Serb is put on trial, the whole of Serbia will stand accused," Branislav Ivkovic, of Mr Milosevic's Socialist Party told the crowd.
US Reconsidering
US State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Washington welcomed "the initiation of legal proceedings against Milosevic" and was "encouraged by these positive developments as we consider participating in Friday's donors' conference".
Mr Kostunica, who rejected the idea of co-operating with The Hague when he first took power, acknowledged that US pressure had contributed to his change of heart. But Mr Kostunica again questioned the legal basis of The Hague tribunal itself, because it had not put on trial the Nato countries which bombed Yugoslavia in 1999. The way was cleared for Mr Milosevic and other war crimes suspects to be extradited when the Yugoslav Government passed a decree on Saturday.
Mr Milosevic has been held in jail since 1 April, on charges of corruption and abuse of power. He faces charges of crimes against humanity at the tribunal in The Hague. If Mr Milosevic is transferred he will be the first former head of state to be tried by a war crimes tribunal. He is accused of planning and ordering a campaign of terror, persecution and violence against the Kosovo Albanians, at the end of the 1990s.
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