Hand Milosevic over to The Hague: U.S.

By Sridhar Krishnaswami

WASHINGTON, MARCH 31. The Bush Administration is waiting for the air in Belgrade to clear before commenting one way or the other on the ``arrest'' of the former Yugoslavian strongman, Mr. Slobodan Milosevic. Like the rest of the western nations, the U.S. initially welcomed the reports of the arrest, but neither the White House nor the State Department has issued formal statements.

Another part of the message from Washington, especially from law- makers on Capitol Hill, is that Mr. Milosevic must be turned over to a war crimes tribunal at The Hague and not merely tried for ``corruption'' in Serbia.

``We're monitoring the situation'' was about the extent the White House would go and unnamed senior officials of the administration have been quoted as saying that if the news were true that would go a long way in making the certification that would pave the way for the badly needed funds to head the way of Belgrade.

The reports of the arrest - denounced by the Serbs as a ``shame'' and by the ethnic Albanians as a ``sham'' - comes three days before a State Department certification on whether or not Yugoslavia is making progress in pursuing indicted war criminals to warrant American assistance. Pressure is on authorities in Belgrade to turn Mr. Milosevic over to The Hague.

Without the certification, the funds flow from the U.S. comes to a halt today; but the State Department has said that no formal announcement on the subject is expected till Monday. Congress passed a law saying that non-humanitarian assistance to Yugoslavia shall stop on March 31 unless the administration certified that the country passed a number of democracy tests including cooperation with a tribunal in The Hague that wants to try Mr. Milosevic.

While officials of the Bush Administration seem to think that the arrest would be a major and an important first step that will be a critical factor in the certification process, law makers are not quite sure if this is the case. For instance, one of the law makers who was instrumental in the certification process, Senator Patrick Leahy, argued that arrest alone was not enough for continued economic assistance.

``The conditions of U.S. aid call for cooperation with the war crimes tribunal, not a trial in Serbia for corruption,'' he said adding that Mr. Milosevic along with other indicted war criminals should be turned over to The Hague. The Chairman of the House International Relations Committee, Mr. Henry Hyde, took a slightly different approach.

In the view of Mr. Hyde, the arrest would be ``an important first step towards reintegration (of Yugoslavia) into the family of civilised nations''.

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Section  : International
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