Free Republic

What Is Samantha Power Thinking?The charismatic Obama adviser believes that stopping "genocide" is the United States' top foreign-policy priority. On March 18, President Obama explained his decision to mobilize the United States military for international intervention in Libya. “Left unchecked,” he said, “we have every reason to believe that Qaddafi would commit atrocities against his people. Many thousands could die. A humanitarian crisis would ensue. The entire region could be destabilized, endangering many of our allies and partners.” (As if it hasn’t been already?) That last sentence was a Realpolitik, national-interest justification for the U.S. intervention. But it rang hollow....

Former Bosnian Serb general Ratko Mladic is expected to stay in hospital for a second day of tests after being taken ill during his war crimes trial on Thursday, his lawyer said. Mladic, 70, is accused of genocide over the siege of the Bosnian capital Sarajevo and the 1995 killing of 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica, Europe's worst massacre since World War Two. He was rushed to hospital on Thursday morning after he was taken ill in court. He asked the judge for a break, and then slumped with his head in his hands early on the fourth...

Ratko Mladic, wanted for genocide during the Bosnian war in the 1990s, has been arrested in Serbia. Serbian President Boris Tadic said the process to extradite the former Bosnian Serb army chief to the war crimes tribunal in The Hague was under way. Gen Mladic is accused over the massacre of at least 7,500 Bosnian Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica in 1995. He was the most prominent Bosnian war crimes suspect at large since the arrest of Radovan Karadzic in 2008. The detention, the Serbian leader said, closed one chapter in Serbian history, bringing the country and the...

Is the indictment by the Hague Tribunal of Ratko Mladic on war crimes charges based on “justice” or “vindictive triumph”, revenge and retribution? Is he indicted because he prevented NATO expansion and US penetration into Southeastern Europe? Is his greatest crime opposition to the US and NATO and the EU? One person’s war criminal is another person’s hero. On June 30, 2006, the ICTY convicted the senior Bosnian Muslim military commander of Srebrenica of committing war crimes against Bosnian Serb civilians because forces under his control tortured and murdered unarmed Bosnian Serb civilians in Srebrenica. Oric was a convicted war...

Sarajevo — One of the most sought-after war-crimes fugitives in the world appeared close to capture last night as Serbian government sources said that former general Ratko Mladic has been found and was negotiating his surrender after a decade in hiding. Rumours abounded yesterday that the ex-commander of Serbian armed forces had been arrested in either Bosnia or Serbia. He is said to be responsible for such atrocities in the Bosnian civil war of the 1990s as the slaughter of more than 7,000 men and boys in the United Nations safe haven of Srebrenica........"

Getting Serious by Igor Jovanovic 6 February 2006 The EU could block a key agreement with Belgrade if war-crimes fugitive Ratko Mladic is not arrested. BELGRADE, Serbia and Montenegro | Serbia’s path to the EU is currently blocked by a single individual: retired General Ratko Mladic, an indicted war criminal. Mladic’s arrest has become an urgent matter for the Belgrade government since European officials have made it clear that a Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA) would not be concluded unless Serbia fully cooperates with the Hague tribunal, which means handing over the wartime commander of the Bosnian Serb army. The...

A senior U.S. diplomat said Friday the capture of key Balkans war crimes figure Ratko Mladic may be near. Undersecretary of State Nicolas Burns, just back from talks in the Balkans, told reporters it is only a matter of time before the former Bosnian-Serb military chief is captured. Ratko Mladic, who faces charges in the killing of thousands of Bosnian Muslims in the Balkans conflict, has eluded pursuers for nearly a decade. But Mr. Burns says he returned from talks in Belgrade on Thursday with a very strong impression that the Serbian leadership is now determined to find the former...

He once declared that he was God, and ordered his Serb artillery to “scorch the brains” of Bosnian Muslims in Sarajevo. General Ratko Mladic kept a goat he called Madeleine Albright, and until a few years ago, openly dined at fancy Belgrade restaurants or watched soccer matches. Now, Serbian authorities say the noose is tightening around the wartime Bosnian Serb army commander, a top UN war crimes fugitive, who’s been eluding capture for nearly a decade on charges he helped mastermind Europe’s worst massacre of civilians since the Second World War. Although Serbian police today denied reports that Mladic’s exact...

NO other organisation is regarded with such respect as the United Nations. This is perhaps natural, for the UN embodies some of humanity's noblest dreams. But, as the current scandal surrounding the UN's administration of the Iraq oil-for-food program demonstrates, and as the world remembers the Rwanda genocide that began 10 years ago, respect for the UN should be viewed as something of a superstition, with Secretary-General Kofi Annan as its false prophet. Not since Dag Hammarskjold has a UN leader been as acclaimed as Annan. Up to a point, this is understandable. Annan usually maintains an unruffled, dignified demeanour....