Nemesis catching up?

By Vaiju Naravane

PARIS, JUNE 29. In a country where people lay great store by symbols and omens despite over 40 years of socialist rule, the date of Mr. Milosevic's arrest assumes significant proportions.

It was on June 28, 1389 on the battlefield of Kosovo Polje that the Slavs suffered their greatest defeat at the hands of the Ottoman Turks. The Muslim invaders were there to stay and ruled the region for the next 500 years. The Slavs never recovered from that defeat and look upon it even today as a humiliating defeat.

On June 28, 1989, on that very same battlefield, Mr. Slobodan Milosevic who had recently taken over as the leader of Yugoslavia's all powerful Socialist party pronounced a historic speech before a 100,000 strong crowd of Kosovo Slavs. Faced with Slavs complaining of Albanian domination, he assured them, ``You will never be beaten again.'' Those words set into motion his ambitious plan for Serbian nationalism, of carving out a Greater Serbia from Serb-dominated regions of Croatia and Bosnia Hercegovina. Soon Kosovo's autonomy was abolished and it was summarily attached to Serbia as just another Serbian province. The rest is history. Four bloody Balkan wars, thousands dead, injured or homeless.

On June 28, 2001 Mr. Slobodan Milosevic was handed to the International Criminal Tribunal to be tried for crimes against humanity. Just irony of fate or nemesis finally catching up with him?

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Section  : International
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