Feel-good news item of the day

I cannot say whether it is the nature of events or just a morbid cast of mind, but regular readers of this site may be forgiven for having the impression that there is a heavy emphasis on scary, nasty and depressing items from the Balkans here. Not today: the news is that the coffee in Serbia is excellent. I am happy to confirm the findings.

African paprikaš

I think that Tim Judah is offering a reflection on the various dustups around Eurovision. With input from Aleksandar Tijanić?

Update: Ah, but never mind those down-island papers. Here is Zoran Radosavljević in The Scotsman.

Vitally important update: Alex Chilton at Dom Omladine on Thursday. Budite tamo gdje staje njegova štikla (baj di vej, in that link to the show announcement, which is from Yellow Cab, is anyone else taken aback by the writer's inconsistency in turning English-language spellings into the genitive case? I say "Tav Falco-a" is fine, as is "Tav Falka," but "Tav Falca" is just a mess. Or is it just me?).

Abuse and degradation

Is the problem with Donald Rumsfeld really that he wounded the pride of some ex-generals? Or is there more?

Zna se!

This week posters once more appeared in Belgrade with messages of support for genocide indictee Ratko Mladić, this time accompanied by claims that he is a "Serb." These ones were put up by the members of the cheeky neofascist group "Obraz." Danish artists Pia Bertelsen and Jan Egesborg (I may be misspelling their names, which I encountered in the rendering po Vuku) responded by adding a variety of slogans to the posters: "We know who you are talking to," "We know you have weak nerves," and "We know you are a coward."

Signs of the times?

So the French government has responded to irresistible pressure by withdrawing its proposed law permitting labor discrimination, and it looks like Romano Prodi will be forming the next Italian government. And we finished our taxes in record time and visited our friends in quaint Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where we had some of the best pizza this side of Buenos Aires. Don't let the good times get you down, ah?

Cosa ho nella testa

Since Mrs Ethnia and I have launched into our new translation hobby, nuances of meaning and ways in which they can be magnified are apparent to us more than they are usually. Which makes me wonder whether the reporter used the only way possible of rendering this. Somehow I expect the answer is yes, after all.

And now the sergeant will tell us his dream

Admit that you always thought that there were unexplored connections between Slobodan Milošević and Luis Buñuel. Edin Hajdarpašić explains why.

Communication with the public

B92 is reporting that Florence Hartmann, spokesperson for the ICTY prosecutor, has been removed from her position. No confirmation or word as to why, or on the question of who might replace her.

Update: Rumor is her role will be assumed by Anton Nikiforov, up to now a diplomatic advisor at OTP.

Nema te 100 godina bre

I am getting to the end of an insanely busy period, the beginning of which coincided with the Blogger meltdown in early March. Expect regular posting to resume in the next couple of days. Aside from travel, regular work-type work, and nonwork-type work, Mrs Ethnia and I have been working on a book translation which has to be done today. A part of that translation is the introductory poem, which was a pretty difficult piece of work. We are pretty well pleased with how it turned out (must work on emulating rhythm, however), though Mrs Ethnia is fonder of the poem itself than I am. For your pleasure, the original followed by our translation:

Momčilo Nastasijević
MISAO

1
Tišinom čudno
sve mi zasvetli, -
krilata pohodi me ona.
Nerođenih zora
zapoju mi petli;
sa dna iskon-mora
potonula, čujem, bruje zvona.

2
Raduj se,
svemu si spona,
pokoji u tebi svi žive.
I duša
tuzi što sklona,
i prazninom što
dani zasive,-
u pohode to sprema ti se ona.

3
I čudom,
u neprohod me spletu,
putanje isprave se krive;
i radosnica suza
orosi me kam.

4
I kroz golet me, u mahu,
dah zastruji aprila.
U samoći to
ne ostadoh sam:
tajno je kroz potaje moje, znam,
noga njena bila.

5
I nespokoji
u pokoj svi ožive.
Sa bezdan sa izvora
Poteku vode svete.
Blage od srca srcu
vesti polete.

6
Mreži to, i pauku,
zlosluto što je plete,
prisniva se svila.
Duši to,
svetli za let,
tajno izrastaju krila.

7
Tišinom čudno
sve mi zasvetli,-
krilata pohodi me ona.
Nerođenih zora
zapoju mi petli;
sa dna iskon-mora
potonula, čujem, bruje zvona.




Momčilo Nastasijević
THOUGHT

1
Silently, strangely
everything lights up for me,
winged she pursues me.
Of unborn dawns
roosters crow to me;
from the depths of ancient seas
sunken bells tolling I hear

2
Rejoice,
You bring together every thing
all the peace lives in you.
And the soul
inclined to sorrow,
with days graying
from emptiness,
awaits your attendance.

3
And miraculously,
though tangled where I cannot pass,
twisted paths straighten out;
and tears of joy
soften the stone

4.
And through the cliff, at once,
the breath of April streams.
In that loneliness
I did not remain alone:
Secretly through my hiding places, I know,
her foot has crossed.

5
And all my troubles
come alive in tranquility.
From abysses, from springs
holy waters course.
From heart to heart
the gentle message flies

6
To the web, and to the spider,
who weaves it with dread
dreams of silk appear.
To the soul,
lit up for flight,
wings sprout unknown.

7
Silently, strangely
everything lights up for me,
winged she pursues me.
Of unborn dawns
roosters crow to me;
from the depths of ancient seas
sunken bells tolling I hear

Hope for conspiracy theorists

If the antibiotic thing did not work out, try this: Slobodan Milošević is alive and well and living in Illinois. However, he wants to change his name to Brad Pitt.

In the event anyone should succeed in getting this page

Yes, I do know that the problems with Blogger seem to continuing. I cannot get East Ethnia to load myself, despite my powerful connections. Presumably they will be able to fix this at some point, but in the meantime I am headed off for a trip. If everything is up and running, your regular service ought to resume here on Wednesday.

While you were away

Blogger seems to have been having some difficulty, with any luck whatever problem there was has been resolved.

Today has turned out to be a bad day for conspiracy theorists. An autopsy of Slobodan Milošević did not find traces of the drug about which everybody has been speculating. On the other hand, this may turn out to be just fine for conspiracy theorists. It has also been a bad day for museum directors, who can apparently be overruled on the question of what exhibit from the general interest area of necrophilia can be placed in their institutions.

For everything else around questions of burials, memorials and museumgoing, Viktor is keeping the world posted (with illustrations!). Highlights: the death announcement from the symbolic Ćurčići in Politika, and photos.

Požarevac: The trouble with Harry

The Body of Evidence couldn't make it to Moscow. Belgrade doesn't want it, the government won't recognise it, and the military won't honor it. There is concern in the cemeteries that it may end up near the bodies of decent people. So the family has decided to bury it on their own property in Požarevac.

Reports of mourning aside, not all citizens are happy to rejoined by the dictator they removed. Have a look at the comments (219 of them and counting) on B92. There is talk of an "anti-burial" to coincide with the autoamnesty festival on Saturday (see the announcement reproduced on Viktor's Belgrade Blog). SPS is failing in its effort to organize a public viewing. The parties of the old regime are threatening to bring down the government if they do not get symbolic satisfaction, and SPO is being invited to bring down the government if they do. Expect some ugliness on Saturday as the "two Serbias" meet again.

Meanwhile, the American far right radio host Rush Limbaugh has made his own contribution to the flowering of conspiracy theories. Clinton killed him, por supuesto.

Illustration: Predrag Koraksić in Danas, 13 March.

What was Milošević taking?

The drug in question would seem to be rifampicin.

Questions about Milošević's death

A bit of a controversy is brewing over the causes of the death of Slobodan Milošević. While it is far from rare, given a combination of preexisting conditions, stress, and unhealthy habits, that a person's health should fail, much is being made of the fact that Mr Milošević should have passed just at the time that his trial was (or, possibly, was not) nearing the end of oral presentations of evidence. So his death has given rise to a number of conspiracy theories. None of these are based on anything like reliable evidence, and some of them may be products of how the various conspiracy theorists think the trial was going.

The people who believe that the prosecution was well on the way to a conviction (most prominent among them, the prosecutor) have raised the possibility that the accused may have committed suicide. There are two versions of the story in the rumours: one is that he refused the medication he was given for high blood pressure, as suggested by the Russian physician with whom he consulted, Dr Leo Bokeria. Another is that he may have been (surreptitiously) taking another medication to counteract the effects of the blood pressure medication which was prescribed to him, which is being suggested (we do not know yet on the basis of what source) by the journalist Heikelina Verrijn Stuart. The center of the controversy is around an unconfirmed report from an anonymous source, claiming that an unspecified drug used to treat leprosy had been found in Mr Milošević's blood.

If the report of an unspecified drug is true, Mr Milošević's supporters have their own version of the story of how it got there. His legal counselor Zdenko Tomanović told reporters that Mr Milošević had written to Russian diplomats the day before his death, mentioning a mysterious drug and raising suspicions that his doctors may have been poisoning him. So in this version (promoted by people who believe that the prosecution's case had been going badly), he was killed by poison, presumably either to silence him or to avoid an acquittal.

Conspiracy theories are productive! So choose your version, was he poisoned, and if so by whom? Did he gamble with his health and lose? Did he commit suicide and invent a poisoning cover story? Was somebody else poisoning him? There is enough material for a soap opera to continue into several installments here, and as yet none of the reports of strange drugs having been found are confirmed.

There are clear advantages to the Milošević camp in continuing to level charges against the medical and prison staff engaged by ICTY, and of course it is entirely possible that some charges are valid and some are not. If it is the case that Mr Milošević was refusing medication, the consequences of this are entirely his own doing. If it turns out that somebody not on the medical staff was bringing him drugs, this complicates the story, but still hardly reflects well on the management of the ICTY detention facility.

Then there is the whole appalling symbolic framework: Mr Milošević built his political movement on the ideological trade in dead bodies from the past, now he has become a commodity in that trade. This discussion develops three years to the day after the death of Zoran Đinđić, who was indisputably murdered, we know by whom and for whom.

Finally, the post-Milošević era

Just some initial thoughts on the passing of Slobodan Milošević. First, it probably does not change the political situation in Serbia much. His influence had been declining since well before he left power, and as the independent activity of the groups he created indicates (for example, the murder of Zoran Đinđić a day short of three years ago, the continuing march of SRS through the institutions), very little depended on him.

The news is probably good news for Serbia, which will be hostage to one person fewer. It is also good news for SPS, which might now have the possibility (under the condition that it restructures meaningfully) to follow the example of the other parties in the region that once held a monopoly of power, and become a functional political party.

It is bad news for ICTY, for several reasons. One is that the detention facility will find it hard to escape a reputation for ineptitude. The main reason, though, is that the Tribunal will complete its activity without having completed its most important trial. The decisions which led to a frequently interrupted trial lasting years will be questioned far into the future, and will probably be used as a negative example for future tribunals.

The fact that a verdict will not be reached in the Milošević trial is bad news for everybody.

Finally, while anybody's death is a cause for regret, what is to be regretted most about Milošević is that during his life, he was able to take so many other people down with him.

Waiting for details on Milošević death

Other agencies are beginning to report the news of the death of Milošević: BBC, AP . There are no reports yet of the causes, but B92 reports that they expect a report from ICTY in about a half hour.

No details or confirmation

B92 is reporting that Slobodan Milošević has died.

The ICJ genocide trial, 3: Does the court have jurisdiction?

The outcome of the case may turn on the technical question of whether ICJ has the authority to try the charges at all. Remember that the parties to the suit (as it now stands) are two countries: Bosnia and Hercegovina is the plaintiff, and the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro is the respondent. Neither of these states existed in the form they exist now when the lawsuit was filed in 1993. Bosnia and Hercegovina in its present form, as a federal republic made up of two entities, was established by the Dayton Accords in 1995. Serbia and Montenegro came into existence with the agreement of the Constitutional Charter in 2003. The question of the authority of the court depends in large measure on whether the two presently existing states claim, or can be compelled by law to assume, successor status with the states that existed in 1993. There is a further question of whether the states that are currently parties to the suit actually represent the parties to the conflict at the time the suit was filed.

One of the strongest potential legal arguments was presented for the defence by Tibor Varady (this was a strategy that Mr Varady announced well in advance). He argued that since ICJ had declared in 2004 that it did not have jurisdiction in the suit filed by SRJ against NATO regarding the 1999 bombing campaign (SRJ charged the NATO countries with genocide, which would seem to weaken SCG advocate Stojanović's argument for a narrow application of the definition of genocide), it could not have jurisdiction in this case. What ICJ found in 2004 was that since SRJ was not a member of the United Nations at the time that it filed the suit (it was admitted to membership on 1 November 2000), it did not have standing to file a suit before ICJ. Mr Varady argues that the court should apply the same standard to all cases involving SRJ between 1992 and 2000.

There are some problems with the argument. The first is that in a separate decision in 2003, ICJ specifically excluded this argument. The second is that Article 9 of the Genocide Convention specifically names the ICJ as the venue for disputes over genocide (Why then did it decline to hear the case gainst NATO? Although formally ICJ did not rule on the merits of the case, this may have been a roundabout way of finding that it was clearly not a genocide case). It might be argued that a double standard is at work here, but if so it is a standard that argues that a state must be a party to the ICJ statute in order to initiate proceedings, but not in order to be held to the law. However, it seems as though there is enough vagueness in the rules that there may still be a window through which Mr Varady's argument might be accepted.

Then there is the question of succession: is today's state of SCG the same as the state of SRJ which was sued in 1993? Mr Stojanović argued that crimes were committed by a regime which was neither democratic nor representative, and added that it was more appropriate that individuals be tried for these crimes before ICTY and national courts than for a state to be called to respond. However, this argument runs counter to an established practice by which governments inherit the obligations of their predecessors (which is why a democratic Germany which has nothing in common with the Nazi regime continues to compensate victims of the Nazis, and a modern Turkish state finds itself repeatedly drawn into polemics over the genocide of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire).

Another question of succession has been raised obliquely by the defence, in the argument by counsel Saša Obradović. He pointed to the 24,216 victims of Serb nationality in Bosnia-Hercegovina identified by the Research and Documentation Center, and asked whether they were being represented by the plaintiff's attorneys. Mr Obradović failed to argue for the importance of this point, so I will do it for him: to the degree that he points to victims of more than one nationality, the argument calls into question whether there was a targeted "group" as required by Article 2 of the Genocide Convention, and to the degree that he points to military as well as civilian casualties in BH, the argument raises the question of whether the events can be qualified as genocide or civil war. If somebody bothers to make the argument, which is based on the multiethnicity of perpetrators and victims, it might be the strongest point that can be made against the applicability of the Genocide Convention. Though as I have argued before, this strategy amounts to denying genocide by admitting to crimes against humanity.

I am not sure that I can predict how the ICJ is likely to rule on the question of its own jurisdiction (in any case, I do not have to make a prediction -- we will find out soon enough). In a sort of enigmatic interview, presiding judge Rosalyn Higgins gave a fairly loose interpretation of how much she thinks the court is bound by precedent. My feeling is that after so many years, and given the inconsistency of the arguments offered by SCG, the judges will feel obligated to decide on the merits on the case. If so, that will mean that they cannot avoid setting a major precedent related to the legal definition of genocide.

The ICJ genocide trial, 2: Was there a policy?

There is certainly a lot to be added to the first installment, on the question of whether genocide took place, and I invite people to take up the question in the comments (for the sake of people who might be looking this up in the future, I will ask people to be sure that their comment gets posted to the topic to which it pertains). For now, I want to take up the next question, which is whether genocide, if it is shown to have occurred, was the result of policy on the part of SRJ.

In a way, the question is at least a little bit circular: the "intent" provision of the Genocide Convention is most often interpreted as meaning that there cannot be a genocide without a policy. But there are two problems that immediately come forward here:

1) Even where a policy exists, it is very rare that this policy is stated in a conventional way that allows for documentation. The documentation of the Wannsee Conference (1942), for example, while it is usually taken as evidence of the announcement by the Nazis of the "Final Solution," is in fact vague on the question of what, other than deportation, this "solution" would entail (and its report was not a published document). Even the centrality of the Wannsee Conference is disputed: Christian Gerlach, for example, argues that a recently found document is more determinative and sets an earlier date. I am not about to resolve this historians' dispute -- what I want to point out out is that the dispute indicates a problem, which is that decisions to commit genocide do not lend themselves to documentation and publicity. The Nazi case takes place in the context of a regime which was sure of its power at the time and held closely to bureaucratic form, conditions which do not apply to the states of the former Yugoslavia. Even in Rwanda, where there is plentiful evidence of intent, this evidence takes the form of media material. There are no parliamentary resolutions or (written) executive decrees. So any evidence related to the existence of a policy has to be indirect.

2) To the extent that a policy can be said to have existed, there remains the question of whose policy it was. In the strictest bureaucratic sense, Serbia and the Serb parastate in Bosnia-Hercegovina were separate entities. To further complicate the matter, many of the worst atrocities were carried out by paramilitary groups (White Eagles, Tigers, Scorpions, and other critters) which had no legal status. The core of the case presented by the BiH advocates lies in demonstrating the ways in which all of these elements were connected. These are all facts that, in the parlance, "everybody knows," but that sort of qualification does not necessarily reach the required standard of legal proof. Alain Pellet of the BiH legal team himself raised the possibility that SRJ may have been "merely" an accomplice rather than a direct participant with intent in the genocide. But he raised this possibility more or less as a null hypothesis, in the process of attempting to show that the military and police forces of RS were "totally dependent on SRJ and have to be considered as organs of SRJ." Here, too, the evidence has to be indirect: the strategy depends on showing logistical, command and financial links between SRJ institutions and perpetrators.

Demonstrating links was the central concern of BiH attorney Magda Karagianakis, who spoke of the role of the Serbian interior ministry in training, arming and commanding the RS military (VRS) and paramilitaries. One well known example was broadcast to great publicity last year: the video recording showing prisoners who had been taken by the military being executed by members of a paramiltary unit. In addition to evidence from the plaintiffs' attorneys showing that VRS was financed directly by the regime in Belgrade, there remains Slobodan Milošević's interesting complaint at the time of his initial arrest, in which he denied that he had taken money missing from the state budget for personal or party use, claiming instead:

"As for the resources spent for weapons, ammunition and other needs of the Army of Republika Srpska and of Republika Srpske Krajine, those tasks for reasons of state, as a state secret, could not be shown in the budget, which is a public document. The same applies to appropriations for the supply of security forces, and especially the special antiterrorist forces --"from needles to locomotives" -- from light weaponry and equipment to helicopters and other resources which remain in place, and which were not revealed to the public for reasons of state secrecy."

Similarly, the ongoing financial relations between the legal military and Ratko Mladić raises the issue of how close the informal contacts between institutions were, as do more recent revelations of the connections between state security and paramilitary groups. These sorts of statements and findings do not offer a high level of precision, but a lot of them cumulatively contribute to an argument that a variety of forces operated with a shared goal, and with some level of coordination.

The defence has a number of potential answers to arguments along these lines. One would be that in a war atmosphere characterised by general criminality and confusion, chains of command did not function (a similar argument is offered by Kosta Čavoški on behalf of Radovan Karadžić, but it will not help in this case -- he tries to shift blame to Milošević by way of Mladić). Another would be that the interior ministry and its forces represented rogue elements not controlled by state policy, but this argument faces the problem of finding more rogue than nonrogue elements as it develops the theory. On his first day of presentation, SCG advocate Radoslav Stojanović argued for a separation between the actions of the Milošević regime and the interests of the state and its citizens. This argument may have considerable political validity but it is not clear that it can translate to a legal argument.

My assessment would be that if ICJ finds that genocide took place, it will be hard for them not to find also that there existed a policy in which SRJ was engaged.

The ICJ genocide trial, 1: Did genocide occur?

There are several competing definitions of genocide in the academic literature. The term originates with the work of the lawyer Raphael Lemkin, who had the Nazi genocide specifically in mind when he developed the concept. He intended, however, both to account for similar historical experiences of which he was aware (the Armenian genocide, for example), and to produce a concept exhaustive enough to serve as a basis for prevention (Lemkin includes in his work sections on "cultural genocide," "religious genocide" and "moral genocide," for example). His broad definition sees genocide as directed toward:

"disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of the personal security, liberty, health, dignity, and even the lives of the individuals belonging to such groups" (R. Lemkin, "Genocide," in A.L. Hinton [ed.], Genocide: An Anthropological Reader. Oxford and Malden: Blackwell, 2002, p. 27).

One of the results of Lemkin's engagement was the passage by the United Nations of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (popularly, the "Genocide Convention") in 1948. After considerable debate, the UN General Assembly opted for a definition which would exclude the categories of "cultural," "religious" and "moral" genocide, and which concentrated on physical destruction of people instead. The UN definition also narrowed the potential categories of victims, excluding, for example, political groups. The relevant part of the definition is in Article 2:

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

The UN definition is the topic of a good deal of legitimate controversy, mostly because of what it excludes -- but it is the only legal definition that exists in international law, and so it is the one that has to be used. Large scale killings which fall outside of the definition can be treated a number of ways. Some researchers have proposed definitions like "democide" and "politicide," which might be useful analytically but are not legal terms. One legal term which may apply to serious cases outside the scope of the Genocide Convention is "crimes against humanity," which the Nuremberg Charter (1945) defined as including "murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, and other inhumane acts committed against civilian populations." The most current definition of "crimes against humanity" is in the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, where Article 7 paragraph 1 enumerates:

1. For the purpose of this Statute, "crime against humanity" means any of the following acts when committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack:

(a) Murder;
(b) Extermination;
(c) Enslavement;
(d) Deportation or forcible transfer of population;
(e) Imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of fundamental rules of international law;
(f) Torture;
(g) Rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced sterilization, or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity;
(h) Persecution against any identifiable group or collectivity on political, racial, national, ethnic, cultural, religious, gender as defined in paragraph 3, or other grounds that are universally recognized as impermissible under international law, in connection with any act referred to in this paragraph or any crime within the jurisdiction of the Court;
(i) Enforced disappearance of persons;
(j) The crime of apartheid;
(k) Other inhumane acts of a similar character intentionally causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health.

I have not included paragraphs 2 and 3, which clarify terms in paragraph 1, but you can find those yourselves by following the link. One legitimate question that might be asked could be whether the distinction between "crimes against humanity" and "genocide" is all that important, since there is considerable overlap between the two. I am inclined to think that the distinction is on the one hand symbolic, like the difference between labelling a crime "really really bad" and "really really really bad," and that on the other hand it is related to political issues, as there is a greater moral claim associated with the status of being a victim of genocide. But I have no doubt that a great number of lawyers and human rights activists will disagree with me on this point (which they are certainly welcome to do).

All of this may seem like a huge digression, but it comes down to this: no reasonable person denies that a lot of murdering was carried out in Bosnia-Hercegovina, and that a majority of the victims were from one ethnic group. What is in dispute is whether this can be legally defined as genocide, or as something else.

The debate is going to turn in large measure on interpretations of legal terms. In particular, it will turn on the question of whether there was an "intent to destroy" a group, and on how big a "part" has to be to meet the standard of "in whole or in part." The requirement of "intent" means that the plaintiffs have to show that destruction was a matter of policy, while the defendants will argue that destruction was a consequence of a particularly nasty war. Numbers or scale may not be so important: the first criminal conviction to be handed down by an international tribunal on charges of genocide (in 1998) was against a Rwandan mayor, Jean-Paul Akayesu. Convictions against national officials came later. The precedent would seem to suggest that destruction on a national or international scale, as occurred in the Nazi genocide, is not necessary in order for a finding of genocide to be made.

For an idea of why this matters, it might be useful to recall a famous example of evasion: this exchange took place between journalist Alan Elsner and State Department spokeswoman Christine Shelly during the Rwandan genocide on 10 June 1994:

Q How would you describe the events taking place in Rwanda?

MS. SHELLY: Based on the evidence we have seen from observations on the ground, we have every reason to believe that acts of genocide have occurred in Rwanda.

Q What's the difference between "acts of genocide" and "genocide?"

MS. SHELLY: As you know, there is a legal definition of this. There has been a lot of discussion about how the definition applies under the definition of "genocide" contained in the 1948 convention. If you're looking at that for your determination about genocide, clearly, not all of the killings that have taken place in Rwanda are killings to which you might apply that label.

Some of the difficulties over actually arriving at a definition of "genocide" and formulations on genocide are the reasons why -- particularly, in late May, the U.N. Human Rights Commission, with the very strong support by the United States, appointed a Special Rapporteur for Rwanda, specifically to compile the information on possible violations of human rights and on acts which constitute breaches of international humanitarian law and crimes against humanity, including acts of genocide.

His preliminary report, which is due later this month, will provide the additional information about the human rights violations -- the types, and presumably how they might be characterized -- and that is something that we have to wait for.

As to the distinctions between the words, we're trying to call. What we have seen so far, as best as we can, and based, again, on the evidence, we have every reason to believe that acts of genocide have occurred.

Q How many acts of genocide does it take to make genocide?

MS. SHELLY: Alan, that's just not a question that I'm in a position to answer.

Q Well, is it true that you have specific guidance not to use the word "genocide" in isolation but always to preface it with these words "acts of"?

MS. SHELLY: I have guidance which I try to use as best as I can. There are formulations that we are using that we are trying to be consistent of our use of. I don't have an absolute categorical prescription against something, but I have the definitions. I have phraseology which has been carefully examined and arrived at as best as we can apply to exactly the situation and the actions which have taken place.

Thomas Franck of the BiH legal team has put the argument that the events amount to genocide in terms of a thesis that the type and scale of crimes, as well as the similarity of several events to one another, are evidence that what occurred was not a set of isolated incidents but a part of a strategic plan (for which there exists indirect evidence -- more on this in the following post). It is not yet clear how SCG representatives will argue against the applicability of the Genocide Convention. So far they are off to a weak start, arguing that the numbers and descriptions in the complaint by BiH are exaggerated. If they want to confront the arguments presented by the plaintiffs so far, they will have to present a position on the questions of organization and intent.

The ICJ genocide trial: Introductory notes

There would seem to be two issues that really matter in the dispute between Bosnia-Hercegovina and Serbia and Montenegro which is currently being heard by the International Court of Justice (ICJ). These are:

1) Did genocide occur in Bosnia-Hercegovina?, and
2) If there was genocide, was it a result of policy on the part of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SRJ)?

Then there is a third question which, while it is of interest primarily to lawyers of a certain type, may determine the outcome of the proceedings, which is:

3) Does the court have the authority to try the case?

Then there is a question which is not a legal one at all, but might be the one that is most interesting to people following the case, which is:

4) What would be the political consequences of a guilty verdict?

I doubt very much that I can give definitive answers to any of these four questions, but I think I can try to give a picture of some of the issues that will have to be considered along the way to an answer. First, an observation -- the issues at stake are at bottom political issues, and judicial institutions do not necessarily provide the best forum for political issues to be resolved. However, when there is a lack of will on the part of political institutions, this may be the only forum available. In that context, I feel confident in making a prediction: no matter what the outcome, very few people will be satisfied.

Having said that, let me see whether I can shed any light on the questions, one by one. I will be posting short essays related to each of the questions in a series of four posts. A word of caution: although I do own a briefcase, I am not a lawyer. Merely a talented amateur, like Emma Peel.

While I was away

For anyone who makes the mistake of getting their news from this site, here are a few of the interesting things that happened while I was away.

There was talk that Jasmila Žbanić's award-winning film Grbavica, about violence against women during the war in Bosnia-Hercegovina, would not be shown or well received in Serbia. In fact, it was shown to a capacity audience in Sava Centar, who kicked out the far-right provocateurs and gave the director and cast a hearty ovation. Whether the film would get a similar reception in Banja Luka remains open to question, since distributors refuse to bring it there.

The convicted war criminal Milan Babić committed suicide in prison. No sane person will miss him, but his death presents problems for the prosecution in cases where his testimony would have been useful, and raises problems once again for the prison management in Scheveningen, which has failed to secure the people for whom it has responsibility before. The departure of Ali Farka Toure, in contrast, is a loss for lovers of beauty everywhere.

A court in Niš acquitted bishop Pahomije (Tomislav Gačić), who is guilty, on charges of sexual abuse of children. Prosecutors promise to bring the case to a higher court.

There was far better religious news in Bujanovac, where the local Orthodox eparchate and the local Islamic community are joining forces to, in the words of muftija Nedžmedin Saćipi, "be a true bridge between Serbia and Kosovo. The lessons we have learned obligate the Serbs, Albanians and Roma of this place to be in the service of peace, to be a model of cooperation for people of good will."

There are several other ongoing stories, including the ICJ case between Bosnia-Herecegovina and Serbia, on which I will have some comment. I'll also share some impressions of lovely Tbilisi, where I got the hat that Azra is wearing to school today.

The Earth is getting younger, and my clothing smaller

Came across this job announcement today at the Chronicle of Higher Education, from Mr Falwell's school:

Biology: Liberty University invites applications for: Faculty member with Ph.D. and compatibility with a young-earth creationist philosophy. Teaching expertise in Microbiology and supervision of undergraduate research expected. Experience in molecular genetics helpful. Send letter of interest, resume, and statement of personal Christian faith commitment to [contact info omitted].

They require the same compatibility for their position in physiology but not, interestingly enough, for their position in chemistry. I do not know whether "a young-earth creationist philosophy" is compatible with what has been called "intelligent design." But I have been looking for a forum from which to promote my theory: "Italian design," which argues that people look fantastic, but are engineered in such a way that they require constant and intensive maintenance.

Mind the gap

My travels are going to have me for a few days on what the online terminology calls a "blog hiatus" and what I call "not writing many posts." In the event that this leaves you with a burning desire for interesting reading (or if you had one to begin with), have a look at the wonderful journal published by the sociology students at the University of Zagreb, Diskrepancija. The current issue has original articles on a number of current themes, a new translation of an essay by Laclau and Mouffe, a special section critically reviewing Jeffrey Alexander's cultural theory, and reviews. There is an archive of past issues, a section in English for those who prefer it, and a photo section. For more news on sociology in Zagreb, including football match announcements, check their blog.

Burek in the wilderness

Not much posting these days, as I am just back from a visit to scenic Colgate University (yes, apparently there is a connection to the toothpaste), and am off tomorrow for a visit to lovely Georgia, which Colgate's Nancy Ries assures me is indeed the birthplace of wine.

High point of the visit to Colgate: a dinner with students catered with pite from Amy's of Utica, NY. Amy is Amira Dizdarević, who with husband Dževsad provided sirnica, krompiruša, burek and ćevapi to a group of people who wanted them very much indeed. Nobody seems to import Sarajevsko pivo that far, though.

Photo: Amira Dizdarević in her shop

Datum mobile

There are many interesting items in today's Danas. The mystery over whether Ratko Mladić has been arrested already, is in the process of being arrested, is about to be arrested, or is practicing variations of the alchemy of producing the voluntarity of a surrender has got to the point that -- the "deadline" is shifting again, this time apparently to 5 April. April, like all of the months that have passed to date, will also come and go. Continuing to match the speed of the Serbian government is ICTY. When the Milošević trial began in (yes!) February 2002, one of the questions raised was whether a conviction for genocide in that trial might have an influence over the suit pending before the International Court of Justice in which the government of Bosnia-Hercegovina charged the government of the federal Republic of Yugoslavia (which existed at the time) for genocide. Only now is it clear how big the assumption behind the question was: that a verdict would be given in one trial before one was due in the other. Arguments before ICJ begin tomorrow, and arguments before ICTY may end at some point in the future. In the meantime, a pro-indictee demonstration hosted by SRS in Belgrade is being described by BBC as a "mass pro-Mladić rally." I say bringing at most 10,000 people to Belgrade (because they aren't from there) is a sign that SRS has access to fewer buses than SPS used to have.

Headline of the day

"Trust us on Mladic," says Serbia
today.reuters.com

Version tracking for fugitives, cont'd

Or was he arrested yesterday in Romania by British SAS forces? That is what Pincom is reporting, anyway.

As the Mladić bubble deflates

For Danas, Ratko Femić gathers up a set of responses to yesterday's conflicting and apparently inaccurate reports of the arrest or impending arrest of Ratko Mladić. An unidentified "source close to the Serbian government" believes that the government "tried something but did not succeed." Another anonymous "source from the security structures" believes that Mladić will be arrested soon, but that this will not be announced for some time "because discussions will have to be carried out then with the indictee." The same source (I think) also suggests that Mladić would have to be offered a large sum of gotovina, though why he would be paid off after being arrested seems a bit unclear.

Civil defence specialist Zoran Dragišić believes that the government is attempting to find a way to make Mladić's arrest "appear to be a voluntary surrender," and thinks that the "media noise" of yesterday was a part of this strategy. Military analyst Aleksandar Radić suggests a wider strategy to "send a variety of disinformation to the public" as a means of "applying psychological pressure," but Radić also does not exclude the possibility that the psychological action might not be directed toward the indictee, but toward testing the response of public opinion.

Nobody, of course, is persuaded by the denials coming from the government and from the ICTY prosecutors: these seem to be regarded either as signals that the opposite of what is being said is true, or as parts of a strategy to direct attention away from ongoing activities. And although nobody can say with any certainty how many people thought that Mladić had in fact been arrested when the news came out, one thing is clear: there were no protests, no support rallies, no rushed telegrams, and no campaigns to mobilise feelings of wounded innocence. The practitioners of violence who controlled the media persuaded themselves well that they have popular support. They do not.

Update: Oh, why not inflate the bubble a little again. The not-as-amusing-as-Kurir tabloid Glas javnosti is speculating that (take your pick) Mladić was either 1) already arrested on Cer, and authorities have not yet figured out how to get him to Scheveningen, 2) already arrested in Belgrade, several hours ahead of the point at which he had agreed to surrender, and that authorities are trying to persuade him to publicly fake a voluntary surrender, or 3) already arrested on Cer, sent to Belgrade, packed off to Tuzla, and delivered to the Hague. Vladeta Janković commented to the (unidentified, hm) journalist for Glas, "What are you thinking?" The article does not help to answer Mr Janković's question much.

Jugonostalgija

Index has a nice reminder from the earlier career of the newscaster Goran Milić, from when he hosted the evening news on the briefly active Yutel network. The recollection:

Radi se o isječku iz Yutelovih vijesti emitiranih 1991. godine, kad je Jugoslavija bila pred raspadom. Snimka prikazuje Milića kako književnim srpskim jezikom čita vijest o reakcijama iz svijeta na događanja u SFRJ.

Milićeve riječi praćene su grafikama uz pripadajuće naslove, od kojih jedan eksplicite kaže: "EEZ izražava zabrinutost zbog sranja u Jugoslaviji".

"Pardon, ovo je štamparska greška, treba da piše "stanja u Jugoslaviji". Mada, moram da kažem da ovo što je napisano nije baš sasvim pogrešno. Izvinjavamo se a vi sami prosudite da li je bilo namerno." - objašnjava Milić na kraju ove zabavne video snimke.

The article contains a link to the video of the broadcast (WMV, 38 seconds).

Nobody knows the Ratko they haven't seen

Ratko Mladić may have been arrested in Belgrade. Or he may not have been. Or maybe there is an action to arrest him going on in Bosnia, perhaps near Tuzla. Or perhaps not. Maybe we will know something by the end of the day. Or maybe we will not.

Update: For a not particularly representative sample of responses to the news (which may be false) that the suspect was raspamećen, it's always fun to follow the comments on B92.

Update: Still no reliable signs that the report is true. In the meantime, however, Mirko Marjanović died.

Another update: Nezavisne novine is reporting that the recent stories are untrue, but that PM Koštunica has issued a warrant for Mladić's arrest. Is the implication that there was no legal basis for his arrest up until now?

Morning update: Still nothing solid. The government and ICTY are either denying everything or saying nothing, media are tending to converge around the story that he has been "located but not arrested" on Cer, and Toma Nikolić chose the moment to remind everyone that he is a necrophiliac.

Dealing with the past, contd.

The BBC is reporting that Mittal Steel, the world's largest steelmaker, is abandoning plans to set up a memorial at the Omarska mine it recently bought, after the plans met with opposition from locals.

Omarska, a concentration camp during the 1992-95 war in Bosnia, was the site of some of the most horrific crimes committed by the Bosnian Serbs in their drive to "cleanse" the territories they had occupied of non-Serbs.

Mittal only agreed to erect the memorial after robust lobbying from activists of all ethnic backgrounds. It has evidently concluded that the goodwill of locals is more important than what people across Bosnia (or indeed abroad) might think.

Unfortunately, the attitude of people in Omarska is fairly typical for the mindset that still prevails in Republika Srpska. A vox pop on last night's main evening news on Bosnian TV included someone from Banja Luka who qualified the topic of Grbavica, a Bosnian movie on wartime rape that just won the Golden Bear at the Berlin film festival, as "tendentious." (Yes, the topic, not the specific treatment it gets in the movie. Even mentioning it is tendentious, apparently.)

Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli

The site Boing Boing labels itself a directory of wonderful things, and this is a wonderful thing: Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli relaxing a bit with their instruments while the rest of the musicians play cards, then the whole band plays "J'Attenndrai." 'Tis a QuickTime file, size 12 MB. Visit WFMU for more musical delights.

Qualification

I am not really quite sure what to make of this news item. Apparently the examination for job candidates at the Croatian Ministry of Foreign Affairs includes, among its 300 questions, items asking people what sort of sexual practices they prefer. This may simply be an effort to avoid potential scandals in advance, or there may be a more elaborate plan. No indication is given as to what kinds of sexual preferences best qualify a person for the job, but it would seem that the best qualification for diplomats would be to incline toward compromising positions.

Turbofolk, jobs and dreams

Among the features at the Zagreb Dox Festival of Documentary Film will be Posao snova (The job of your dreams), a documentary on the folk music industry (turbo, sevdah, novokomp) by Danijela Majstorović. The film focuses on the experience of women in the industry, as the director explains:

"Relations of power, domination and patriarchal ideology can be seen best in the Bosnian entertainment industry. Entertainment and pop culture represent a microcosm of the society, especially now, since so many people identify with people from the small screen. Although I am very critical of folk culture myself [...] my film offers a bit of a different reading of the entertainment scene. «Posao snova» has multilevelled messages and it is not simply a critique of entertainment, but a finding about the situation in which a majority of women find themselves in contemporary Bosnia and Hercegovina, but also in Serbia, and maybe in a more subtle way in Croatia."

The film does cover the manipulative aspects of the industry, the objectification, the dominating "managers," and so on. But it does not stop there: with the participation of Lepa Brena, Hanka Paldum and other luminaries, the film also discusses the expressive and liberatory potential of commercial entertainment. Or as Brena puts it, "they could all think of me as meat, but that meat had some brains!" Prepare for the first film treatment that takes on the phenomenon in a way that respects its complexity at the Tuškanac cinema in Zagreb, at 5 PM on 25 February.

Meanwhile in the Bahamas

If you like awards competitions, the voting has begun for the Satin Pajama Awards at A Fistful of Euros. I've enjoyed using their list of nominated weblogs to discover some interesting new sites that I had not known about before. This site has been nominated in two categories: best weblog (not getting that one, I know) and best Southeast European weblog (who knows). Win or lose, it is an honor to be in the company of the SEE competitors: Argumente (business and strategy from Romania), Illyrian Gazette (not just showbusiness ethnopolitics, but also occasional hot Slovenian action), the newest incarnation of Draxblog (the SEE blog institution, plus film reviews), and Csikszereda musings (with a bit about Miercurea Ciuc, at no extra cost). But go and have a look at the nominees in every category, there is a lot of good reading around, for every taste from the technical to the personal.

Ko ne voli Bagasoru....

Đurđevdan nije, a ipak nismo gadovi.

Not the only one who shakes his head

So: on Friday, the Šešelj-in-waiting Tomislav Nikolić declared that if Kosovo were to be granted independence, Serbia should declare it to be "occupied territory," and should seek to recover it "by any means possible." But that is not all he declared. He also claimed that he had made an agreement with prime minister Vojislav Koštunica to just that effect in the event that a decision on independence were to come down. This would of course go beyond a case of Mr Nikolić saying publicly the sort of thing one expects him by now to say publicly, and spill over into Mr Koštunica owning up to what one expects that he thinks privately. So naturally, Mr Koštunica issued a swift denial, right? Wrong, actually. By Sunday night, neither he nor any government representative had given any confirmation or denial. The closest anybody came was Slobodan Antonić, an intellectual supporter of Mr Koštunica, who told Danas that "Vojislav Koštunica, as is well known, has the custom of nodding his head and occasionally saying yes, which his interlocutors interpret as agreement, but afterward find out that that was not really the case." So we are happy to have been able to clear that one up.

PS: While Mr Koštunica may be as enigmatic as the Buddha, he is not as long-suffering as Jesus Christ. That role belongs -- of course! -- to Silvio Berlusconi.

Who lets these folks near implements that could affect the lives of other people?

Just because everybody else is ridiculing the bumbling Dark Lord Cheney for failing to distinguish an elderly gentleman from a small and tasty bird doesn't mean that I have to join in. Doesn't mean I have to avoid joining in either.

Update: Ignore the news reports that describe Mr Cheney as an avid and dedicated hunter. Thanks to Pharyngula, we find that what he prefers is "an increasingly popular and deplorable form of hunting, in which birds are pen-reared and released to be shot in large numbers by patrons. The ethics of these hunts are called into question by rank-and-file sportsmen, who hunt animals in their native habitat and do not shoot confined or pen-raised animals that cannot escape." This is not hunting at all. As Harry Hutton points out with regard to another pseudosport, "You could create a similar afternoon’s amusement by poking a caged rat for a couple of hours, then blowing its head off with a pistol."

Shoes over California?

As Diego Gambetta points out, stories of foiled terror plots are often difficult to take seriously because the means involved do not always seem to add up to a plausible threat. Taking down the Brooklyn Bridge with a blowtorch? Technically improbable mass poisoning schemes? On the other hand, it also does not seem so likely that a small group of men with box cutting knives could have managed what they did, and they did. But the story offered yesterday by US president George Bush, who "said that in early 2002 the United States and its allies disrupted a plot to use bombs hidden in shoes to breach the cockpit door of an airplane and fly it into the tallest building in Los Angeles," seems odd at best. The bomb-in-a-shoe threat was tried once and failed for reasons that were fairly predictable -- it might be more persuasive than radio receivers in a rock (24 hour rock radio!). But even accepting the whole shoe proposition, as a matter of planning bombs would make a poor hijacking instrument. The perpetrators would be just as likely to destroy the plane as to take control of it. Then there is the matter that if there was a threat in Los Angeles, somebody appears to have neglected to tell the city government about it. In a restrained comment, LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa "told the Associated Press news agency he had not been forewarned about the president's revelations," and said, "I'm amazed that the president would make this [announcement] on national TV and not inform us of these details through the appropriate channels," he said. John McKay points out the striking resemblance between the plot Mr Bush described and another one which failed in 1995.

Formally, there is another matter: Mr Bush made his remarks in the context of a widening controversy over his illegal program to practice surveillance over people's private communications. But there is no indication that this secret program provided useful intelligence regarding this or any other plot. As Mr Bush himself noted, "It took the combined efforts of several countries to break up this plot." Which suggests that compulsive secrecy and deliberate self-isolation continue to be poor strategies.

Update: The more I think about it, the less clear it is to me whether the quotation from the LA mayor refers to the threat itself, or to the president's decision to make information about it public.

Enthusiasm!

For all those not yet convinced that "Serbian music is great!" Thanks to Illyrian Gazette for linking

All over the world of entertainment

Comeback efforts that nobody wanted are not limited to the remix/reissue of the ouevre of Leo Sayer, but also include the return of the very diplomatic Vibbi, about whom if there is anything to be said he will &(*%$#@^ well say it himself. Before the plague of reappearance strikes people you want to see again in the wrong way, you may want to consider signing the petition by the "Odbor za očuvanje dostojanstva profesora Baltazara."

Image courtesy of Društvo hrvatskih filmskih redatelja.

The secret

There are two reasons that there was no posting over the weekend. One was that the Blogger service was misbehaving, so it was not possible to post anything. Whatever the problem was, it seems to be working fine now. The other was that I was doing some experimenting with bread making. Commercial yeast is a fine and useful thing, but I have found that using just that with bread sometimes gives it an overpowering flavor, and the crust and texture are not as good as the stuff you get from the really good bakeries. What the good bakeries do, of course, is get their yeast from the air, which is easy for them because they have big warm rooms with lots of dough rising. But that is what gives the bread its nice complex flavor, which should not be the least bit chemical. It would probably be possible to cut out using commercial yeast altogether if, say, we had a steambath in our apartment and I had unlimited amounts of time to devote to baking. But I've combined a few recipes to come up with a technique that uses a little instead of a lot of commercial yeast, only takes more time in the sense that you have to remember to spend two minutes setting it up the night before, and produces a loaf of bread that rivals just about anything you can buy. Here is how it looks after a couple of tries:

THE NIGHT BEFORE
Put about half a cup of warmish water and half a teaspoon of yeast in a bowl, stir it until the yeast dissolves, then mix in just over a cup of flour. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, poke little holes in the plastic wrap, and leave it overnight. In the morning the mixture will have grown, and will be soft and insubstantial, like an initial thought.

THE NEXT DAY
Add about 3 cups of flour, a cup and a half of water, another teaspoon of yeast, and two teaspoons of salt, and mix the whole glop together gently with a spoon. When it assumes some sort of form, put the contents of the bowl on a board and knead it. The kneading will be difficult because the dough is wet and sticky, but try to avoid the temptation to add more flour than you need to keep the dough off your hands. The high proportion of water to flour is what will make the crust good later. Then pour some olive oil in a big bowl, flup the dough around in it a little, and cover it again with the plastic wrap with holes in it. Let it rise until you are astounded at how much it has risen (at least 2 hours, maybe 3). Then shape it into your favorite shape loaf and put the loaf on a thin board that has been covered with a generous amount of corn flour (to keep the loaf from sticking to the board). Let it rise again for at least a half hour, longer if you can, and in the meantime put a "pizza stone" in the oven and let it heat up to 500 of those illogical Farenheit degrees. Sprinkle the top of the loaf with whatever you like to see on the tops of loaves, if you are into that sort of thing. Ploop the loaf from the board onto the stone and bake it for about 30 minutes. Take it out, let it cool, and amaze everybody.

There are people who say that the crust can be even better if you let the loaf rise in the refrigerator for 10 to 12 hours, but these must be people who never leave home, or who have all kinds of unexplainable space in their refrigerators.

So this is freedom

By the time prosecutors brought charges against the Karić brothers (for tax evasion, as it turns out), all four of them had left the country. The general assumption is that they are in Russia. The lawyer representing Bogoljub Karić, Zdenko Tomanović, says that his client will not return to the country to face the charges because, as B92 reports, he would prefer "to defend himself in freedom." He gave no suggestion as to how his client would defend himself as a fugitive, or why absentia is a synonym for freedom. His statement has interesting implications for another defendant Mr Tomanović is representing, who would also like to visit Russia.

On hinting at sadness, and being worldly and wounded

Christopher Solomon paid a visit to Sarajevo. He squinted in distant wonder at people's war stories. He remembered the names of some old ski champions. He chatted with some journalists. He did a little shopping and snacking. He went skiing. He found turbo-folk catchy. He wanted us to know that he can adjectify the name of Samuel Beckett. He wrote a feature for the New York Times about it.

All in a day's work.

Update: Mat wasn't impressed by the piece. But (I think) Quod was.

Cuisinia Slovenia

I have just been told by a highly-placed and well-informed source (my sister) that this month's Gourmet magazine has a feature on the delights (nay, glories) of Slovenia. They don't make their articles available online, though, so my report on it will have to wait until I get a chance to visit a store. Has anyone had a look?

Ma nemoj!

The army, you say? Next thing you know, someone might say that the people responsible were higher-ranking than a retired "colonel" in an "army" that never existed except as a bureaucratic ruse to cover for what the army was doing.

Our relations to the world: under construction

This is the page that greets visitors to the "Bosnia and the world" section of the Bosnian foreign ministry's homepage: it's under construction, and a cute little Bosnian construction worker is working very hard to bring this to you uskoro. (In case the screen shot is too small: it's some dude warming his hands against a fire.)

Who's got a secret?

The petition for release pending trial by the former "VRS" colonel Jovo Đogo, arrested on suspicion of assisting in the harboring of the fugitive Ratko Mladić, has been denied, according to his lawyer. This neither surprising nor particularly interesting. Much more interesting is the last sentence of B92's article about the fact, according to which "the court in the meantime declared the case to be a state secret." Clearly it is not a secret that Mr Đogo has been arrested, and the nature of the charges against him is also not secret. Nor is his relationship with official institutions secret, and neither are the relationships of other people believed to be accomplices the operation secret (they are active military officers). So what would the motivation be for declaring a state secret? Here are some possibilities:

1. The interests and reputation of the state are involved (i.e., the operation involves individuals and institutions working on the basis of something other than individual initiative)
2. The ongoing operations of the state are involved (i.e., as has been recognised by some but denied elsewhere, there is continuing contact between state institutions and the fugitive)
3. The past operations of the state are involved (i.e., the collusion between representatives of state institutions and the fugitive dates back some time, and may involve current officials)
4. Investigations by state institutions are involved (i.e., currently active prosecutions and investigations may make use of information which the defendant is expected to provide)

The list is not exhaustive, of course. For now, it would have to be guess which motivation explains the most.

Njega i Rusa 200 miliona

I've yet to see this reported anywhere else, but Index.hr is reporting that ICTY has agreed to ship off Slobodan Milošević for "medical treatment" to Russia, and that Mr Milošević has agreed for his trial to continue (and verdict be delivered?) in his absence. More information would be needed to tell whether Index's "well informed sources" are correct, but even if they are, the news leaves several questions unanswered. In particular, it leaves open the question of who would be representing the side of the accused, which is in the process of presenting the defence. If the job is done by attorneys (which ones?) it would be reasonable to expect a major change in defence strategy, in which case the result might be more rather than less delay. Another detail of the report is that Milošević would await his verdict, and likely also serve whatever sentence he may receive, in a luxurious suburban villa. Delightfully tendentious line from the report: "Representatives of the Tribunal are not exactly thrilled with this development of events, but they are aware that the trial of Milošević, with the evidence that has been gathered by Carla del Ponte, has reached a dead end and that the sentence which he could receive on the basis of it would not in any way approach the level of his guilt." Does that come from a well informed source, as well?

Diplomatic passports

Police are not saying how many blank diplomatic passports were stolen by thieves who raided a warehouse belonging to the Serbia-Montenegro ministry of foreign affairs, reports Danas.

One for all you vertebrate biology types

Every once in a while one runs across a news item like this one about an apartment building in Šabac where the residents were left without telephones, electricity and heat because rats ate through the cables. A little gross, yes, and I know there is nothing special about Šabac here because rats are at home pretty much anywhere (but most of all, I think, in the NYC subways). But my question is: electrical cables? They will really eat metal? Wouldn't they be shocked? Your animalistic analyses, please.

Update: Andras found this answer from a "nuisance wildlife control company" in Orlando, Florida. It's illustrated, high "blecchhhh" factor.

A bit more about "Captain Dragan"

Mildly interesting: an Australian court has refused to grant bail for Dragan Vasiljković, and it looks fairly likely that he will be extradited to Croatia. More interesting: a short biography, describing the meteoric rise and soufflesque fall of Mr Vasiljković, with a dose of reserve about the charges against him, by Miloš Vasić in Vreme.

Prosecution abandons charges against Orhan Pamuk

The justice ministry refused to support (but also declined to oppose) the move to charge the celebrated writer Orhan Pamuk with a violation of Article 301 of the Turkish penal code, according to which it is illegal to insult the republic, parliament or any organs of state, or something called "Turkishness." The justice ministry's decision relieves the country of a source of embarassment, but also removes the most prominent object of prosecution from public attention, making it easier to continue to proceed against less well-known people charged with the same offence. Ironically, the prosecution was meant to punish Mr Pamuk for telling a Swiss magazine last year, "One million Armenians and 30,000 Kurds were killed in these lands, and nobody but me dares talk about it." Among other effects of the publicity surrounding the harassment of a major literary figure, more people than him are talking about it.

Coming: Extradition request for "Captain Dragan"

In an interview with Biljana Bašić for the daily Vjesnik, Croatian justice minister Vesna Škare-Ozbolt predicted that a request for the extradition of Dragan Vasiljković would be sent to Australia by Friday, which would be well within the 45-day period within which Australian law requires such requests to be made. The request will have to be accompanied by evidence that there is reason to make charges against Mr Vasiljković, as well as by assurances that he would not face a death penalty in the country to which extradition is requested. The charges against him so far are based on events in June and July 1991, and February 1993, for destruction of civilian objects, theft, and forced expulsion of civilians in Glina and in Gornji and Donji Viduševac, and for abuse of prisoners in Knin and Bruška. These are the charges developed by local prosecutors in Šibenik, but Ms Škare-Ozbolt leaves open in the interview the possibility that an eventual prosecution may move to another jurisdiction.

Update, 25 January: The Australian reports that Dragan Vasiljković's lawyer, George Draca (who is representing him together with Richard Thomas and Bradley Slowgrove), has announced a plan to challenge the arrest as "arbitrary detention" and demand his release. No details on what Mr Draca plans to argue is arbitrary about the detention.

Studentska posla

Just an ever-so-brief note to the people who are kind enough to read here: you may have noticed that posting has been less frequent, and that is because the semester has begun. I am East Ethnia by night, and by day a mild-mannered professor of sociology at the fetching Clark University. This semester is the "heavy" semester (three classes instead of two), so a lot of time goes to teaching and related activity. I am trying to eliminate the use of paper as much as possible, and make as much activity as I can electronic. You are welcome to follow that bit of cyborg academia at The Iron Cage, should you care to.

Amusing photo courtesy of Srbovanje.

Breaking news

Dragan Vasiljković arrested in Sydney. More news as it happens.

Annoying little brother would like someone else to be watching you

Horrors! There may be people in the field of education with perspectives different from the ones held by the people currently in power! At one institution, students have the ability to make a little pocket change by ratting them out. This is the service promised by UCLAprofs.com, which invites students:

"Do you have a professor who just can’t stop talking about President Bush, about Howard Dean, about the war in Iraq, about MoveOn.org, about the Republican Party, about the Democratic Party, or any other ideological issue that has nothing to do with the class subject matter? It doesn't matter whether this is a past class, or your ongoing class this winter quarter.

If you can help UCLAProfs.com collect information about abusive, one-sided, or off-topic classroom behavior, we’ll pay you for your work."

Their price list ranges from $100 for surveillance and recording, $50 for technically unaided surveillance, and $10 for hearsay. The material goes to support the essayistic impulses of the group's president (and only member), one Andrew Jones, who would like to be a major-league right-wing provocateur and thinker once he learns to assemble a sentence. His previous achievements include a public stunt to sell cookies to people at different prices according to their ethnicity, presumably to show that there is no such thing as discrimination. Isn't that clever?

Živeli!

In the spirit of the photo of the day from Dnevnik, I offer you my recipe for stuffed onions in the style of the world onion prestonica, which is not Walla Walla (as I was raised to believe) but Makó.

For the osnovica:

• 8 onions, medium size
• A cup or so of bread crumbs, from good bread, preferably homemade
• A handful or so of parsley, chopped up
• 3-4 teaspoons of oil
• 1 egg

For the sauce:

• 3 teaspoons of butter
• 4 tablespoons of flour
• About a teacup or so of milk
• Half that much cream
• The yolk of an unfortunate egg
• Grated cheese

• Pepper and salt, naturally

1. Soak the breadcrumbs and squeeze them.
2. Cut the tops off the onions so that they can be used afterward like little pot lids. Scoop out the insides of the onions with a spoon and chop the whole mess up.
3. Saute the chopped onion innards until they are soft and brownish. Mix it up in a bowl with the breadcrumbs, parsley, an egg, and a bit of salt, and stuff the hollow onions with it.
4. Arrange the onions in a baking pan with a bit of oil in the bottom, cover them with their tops, add an inch or so of water, and bake the whole thing until the onions are soft.
5. Do up a nice little bechamel with the butter, flour, milk, cream, and pepper, them stir in the egg yolk when it is done. You have done this a thousand times, no need to tell you how.
6. Take the onions out of the oven. pour the bechamel over them, sprinkle on the cheese and put it back. Take it out when it is done.
7. Serve with a nice, sort of sharpish white wine, and you will not regret it.

Epic poetry: Limerick for Ratko Mladić

About town for a tenth of a veka
Then in barracks ga penzija čeka
They searched hard (or they didn't)
The far right says they shidn't
Not in Russia? Well then, Crna Rijeka

Disciplina sve je veća!

There is a lot of nice stuff to download from the site of the legendary Disciplina kičme (or if you prefer, Disciplin a Kitschme). Including clips from several versions of the song that has been repeating in my head since it was released: Političari virusi - čekaju me u zasedi - svako jutro svako veče - su mi u kompjuteru. Addictive. I was reminded of them again by this interview with Koja at the delightful kulturpunkt.hr.

Fulsome prison blues

When he was director of RTS, Dragoljub Milanović used the inside information to which he had access to save himself and his high-ranking staff from the bombing of the RTS headquarters (which was indeed, since you asked, an illegal attack -- see Arts. 48-51 -- against a civilian target), while sacrificing the lives of sixteen of his lower-ranking employees. Now the families of those sixteen victims are complaining that while serving his sentence for his responsibility in their deaths, Mr Milanović has access to some extraordinary privileges, including weekends off and vacation time. They blame justice minister Zoran Stojković. Perhaps Mr Stojković has forgotten who is no longer in power. Or maybe it only seems that way.

Beyond

In the United States, today is a holiday dedicated to the memory of Martin Luther King, Jr. So it is not all a bad day to pay a visit to Stanford's MLK papers project and have another look at his 1967 address "Beyond Vietnam," among the other resources the good folks in Palo Alto have prepared.

The ethical predicament that isn't

Over at the Post, Howard Kurtz finds himself in a "murky maze" that makes it hard to see "the right course of action." Here's his problem:

Should major newspapers and networks have agreed to suppress the news that Christian Science Monitor stringer Jill Carroll had been kidnapped in Iraq? The impulse is understandable, given the Monitor's plea that publicity might endanger negotiations to win her freedom. But since when are journalists in the business of sitting on news? And would they have imposed a 48-hour blackout for a non-journalist?

The first part seems rather easy to me. There's two goods the editor has to weigh up against one another: the right of readers to be informed of important news and the obligation of the paper not to endanger anyone through their coverage. Where's the conundrum? Does Kurtz really think amusing the liberal middle classes over their Sunday breakfast is a higher good than potentially protecting the life of a fellow reporter -- or indeed any fellow human being?

And that answers the second part of Kurtz' predicament.

Chain of command

ICTY has already changed its indictment against Jovica Stanišić and Franko Simatović -- Srebrenica is in, and Ovčara is out. Now there may be pressure for Serbia's prosecutor for war crimes to change its indictments against the "Scorpions." Insajder is promising the details in tomorrow's broadcast, but here is a tidbit from today's announcement of what will come tomorrow:

"According to Insajder's information, the 'Scorpions' were transferred to Bosnia at the beginning of the summer of 1995 by order of Jovica Stanišić and Franko Simatović. The goal of transferring the unit was to create the impression that something was being prepared near Sarajevo, so that Bosnian forces would move away from their positions around Srebrenica. This was agreed at a meeting in Dalj between Stanišić, Goran Hadžić, and Milan Milovanović Mrgud, who was one of the originators of the 'Scorpions.' However, the indictment by the special prosecutor for war crimes only includes those individuals who were seen on the video recording [of the execution of prisoners in 1995]. The people who ordered the crime to committed are not included."

Taking this sort of information into account would be a major step for the special prosecutor, which already had a major success in December with the conviction of some of the perpetrators of the Ovčara massacre. At the time prosecutors promised that the conviction of perpetrators was the beginning of their work on war crimes cases, not the end. How far a domestic prosecutor can carry an investigation is a good sign of how well domestic courts will be able to do the work that ICTY has not done.

New issue of Hidden Europe

The issue is actually dated 3 January, but it is new to me. The January 2006 issue of Hidden Europe has articles on the cultures of Sardegna, on the suburbs of Bratislava, on the search for the perfect dumpling, and several other burning questions. Sure to interest readers of this site.