Accused Serb Won't Plead to War Crimes and Insults the U.N. Court

THE HAGUE, Netherlands - Serbian ultranationalist politician and former paramilitary commander Vojislav Seselj refused to enter a plea Wednesday to charges that he incited his followers to murder, torture and plunder during the Balkan wars.

The court allowed Seselj to delay his plea by up to 30 days after he claimed he needed clarification of terms in the indictment that he said were written in a language he did not understand.

"I'm not at all in a hurry in these proceedings," he told the U.N. war crimes tribunal after insisting that the lengthy indictment be read in its entirety, which took more than three hours.

In a numbing flat tone, a court clerk read a list of victims allegedly killed by troops under his authority in Croatia and Bosnia. Among them were the names of 255 people, mostly Croatians, who were removed from the Vukovar Hospital, executed and buried in a mass grave in 1991.

Seselj, who refused to stand during the proceedings, is a former ally of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic (news - web sites) who has been on trial for the last year.

He flew from Belgrade on Monday and surrendered to the tribunal. As the indictment was read, Seselj sat quietly in the dock, occasionally smiling.

Seselj objected to the use of Croatian terms, claiming he didn't understand them, even though the Serbian and Croatian languages are virtually identical. Serbs and Croats were the main ethnic rivals in former Yugoslavia.

"I only understand the Serbian language," Seselj claimed, in a display for nationalists at home, where the proceedings were shown on television.

Seselj, 48, who came in second in the December presidential election with nearly one-third of the vote, is accused of eight counts of crimes against humanity and six counts of violating the customs of war. The crimes allegedly occurred in the early 1990s.

German Judge Wolfgang Schomburg said he would enter a "not guilty" plea if Seselj refused to plead within 30 days.

Asked by Schomburg if he understood the indictment, Seselj replied: "I understand you would like to convict me."

The judge replied: "I have to reject the insinuation that this trial chamber is here to convict you. It is for the trial chamber to come as close as possible to the truth."

Seselj complained he had been "exposed to physical torture" by having to wear 45-pound body armor while authorities brought him to court and he ridiculed the U.N. judges.

"I'm frustrated by judges wearing funny clothes," he said. "They remind me of the inquisition by the Roman Catholic church."

Authorities say Seselj is responsible for a brutal ethnic cleansing campaign in Croatia, Bosnia and in Serbia's northern province of Vojvodina between August 1991 and September 1993.

Yugoslavia was abolished earlier this month and was replaced by Serbia and Montenegro, a loose coalition of its two remaining states.

Vojislav Seselj and Slobodan Milosevic are sacrificing themselves at the Hague for a greater good. Their performance at the Kangaroo Court just boosted their political parties popularity back home.

The Third Way leftists assume the world thinks like they do and hoped that this court would break the Serbian nationalist movement. They did not understand the Serbian/Yugoslavian/Balkan mentality.

From my readings - Yugoslavs and Eastern Europeans grew up with the threat of prison sentence a possible reality - Tudjman and Izebegovic were both Yugoslav jail birds once. When going to prison is an everyday fear you stop to fear it.

It is a price for doing "business" in the Balkans. In these countries where the Ottoman empire created hell on earth the family and then your extended family were a man's guarantee for the future, a man lives on through his family and clan (for lack of a better word-Serbs have no clans). Your individual fate does not matter as it would matter to an individualistic Westerner.

We keep reading that he UN Court will heal the wounds of the Yugoslav wars by trails. This is a Western liberal concept. It is meaningless to those people and thus a failure in this respect also.

In other words the Serbs and the Balkan people in general are not respectful of authority (a result of geography and the Ottoman occupation). The Serbs are not like authority respecting Germans or Japanese who snapped to respectful attention even when they were on trail in allied courts. The Serbs will make martyrs of the jailed and in this regard also the UN court will have failed.

PS: (with apologies to the mob comparison) Ever see the movie Casino? A scene which best describes this culture for all sides is the one where Joe Pesci's character is threatening the banker who owes him money with violence and Pesci's character "doesn't care about going to jail if he cracks the man's head open for double crossing him". Pesci's character adds "just as you are recovering from your coma, I will be getting out of jail and I get to crack your head open again".

The UN court is as useless as it is dangerous.

Oh man, this is gonna get good. This is a man who had a portrait of Ronald Reagan framed in his office.

Asked by Schomburg if he understood the indictment, Seselj replied: "I understand you would like to convict me."

The judge replied: "I have to reject the insinuation that this trial chamber is here to convict you. It is for the trial chamber to come as close as possible to the truth."

Seselj complained he had been "exposed to physical torture" by having to wear 45-pound body armor while authorities brought him to court and he ridiculed the U.N. judges.

"I'm frustrated by judges wearing funny clothes," he said. "They remind me of the inquisition by the Roman Catholic church."

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