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This week, the Globe and Mail asked General Lewis McKenzie (Retired) to write the obituary of American diplomat Richard Holbrooke. It was a good idea. The two men had crossed paths more than once on the global stage of the Great Game. McKenzie declined. Holbrooke had just died and the general knew that what he had to say would hardly produce the standard panegyric. When I caught up with McKenzie, he was shoveling snow after a spell away from home. I asked for an interview and to my surprise, he agreed. “I’m just going to tell you what I thought...

SARAJEVO -- Friday – Hague Tribunal Prosecutor Carla Del Ponte today confirmed that the Tribunal had been investigating former Bosnian president Alija Izetbegovic at the time of his death last week. “The investigation confirmed that Bosnian Army members also committed war crimes during the Bosnian war,” she said in Sarajevo today Del Ponte told media that it was obligatory for the Hague Tribunal to complete the investigation, as it had completed that into the role of the late Croatian president Franjo Tudjman after his death. The prosecutor added that the Bosnian justice system was not up to efficiently and impartially...

22 Oct 2003 13:35:33 GMT RPT-Bosnia war crimes probe mars Izetbegovic funeral (Refiles to fix headline) By Nedim Dervisbegovic SARAJEVO, Oct 22 (Reuters) - About 100,000 mourners gathered in the rain on Wednesday for the funeral of Bosnian wartime independence leader Alija Izetbegovic, as word of his investigation for war crimes cast a pall over the ceremony. The U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague confirmed just hours before the last tribute to Izetbegovic began in Sarajevo he had been under investigation until his death on Sunday at the age of 78 from chronic heart disease. "Izetbegovic was one of...

Former Bosnian president Alija Izetbegovic was under war crimes investigation until his death, the Hague tribunal has revealed on the day of his funeral. The inquiry will now be halted, said tribunal spokeswoman Florence Hartmann, who did not reveal exactly what crimes the wartime government head had been accused of. The statement came as an estimated 100,000 mourners gathered in the capital, Sarajevo, for Mr Izetbegovic's funeral. Mr Izetbegovic, who led the Bosnian Government during the war of the early 1990s, died in hospital at the weekend, aged 78. Dozens of countries sent representatives to the funeral. Coaches carrying thousands...

Former Bosnian President Alija Izetbegovic was under war crimes investigation until his death, the Hague tribunal has revealed on the day of his funeral. The inquiry will now be halted, said tribunal spokeswoman Florence Hartmann, who did not reveal exactly what crimes the wartime government head had been accused of. The statement came as thousands of mourners gathered in the capital, Sarajevo, for Mr Izetbegovic's funeral. Mr Izetbegovic, who led the Bosnian Government during the war of the early 1990s, died in hospital at the weekend, aged 78. Dozens of countries have sent representatives to the funeral. Coaches carrying thousands...

October 20, 2003 Alija Izetbegovic, Muslim Who Led Bosnia, Dies at 78 By DAVID BINDER Alija Izetbegovic, the former Bosnian president whose dream of a Muslim-led independent Bosnia and Herzegovina was transformed by Balkan ethnic rivalries into a protracted war, died Sunday in Sarajevo. He was 78 years old. The cause of death was heart disease complicated by injuries he suffered in a fall at home, The Associated Press said. In a sense, he became the father of a republic that was the first Bosnian state since a short-lived medieval kingdom. But it was a profoundly divided country whose very...

Former Bosnian President Izetbegovic Dies Former Bosnian President Alija Izetbegovic Dies of Complications After Fall at Age 78 The Associated Press SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina Oct. 19 — Alija Izetbegovic, who led Bosnia's Muslims during the 1992-95 war for independence then became one of the multiethnic republic's first postwar presidents, died Sunday, a hospital official said. He was 78. Izetbegovic died of complications that developed after he was hospitalized for injuries sustained from a fall in his home, said Dr. Ismet Gavrankapetanovic, the head of Sarajevo's Kosevo clinic. "The former president of Bosnian-Herzegovina died in the Kosevo hospital today," Gavrankapetanovic was quoted...

Clinton Opens Massacre Memorial in BosniaALEXANDAR S. DRAGICEVICAssociated Press A Bosnian Muslim woman weeps as she squats next to the grave of her relative in the foggy morning during a memorial ceremony for 107 identified victims of the Srebrenica massacre in July 1995. AMEL EMRIC, Associated Press. SREBRENICA, Bosnia-Herzegovina - Former President Clinton called for ethnic and religious tolerance Saturday as he joined survivors of Europe's worst massacre since World War II in opening a memorial center for the victims.Srebrenica, 50 miles northeast of Sarajevo, had been declared a "safe zone" by the United Nations when it was overrun...