| Updated
March 31, 1999, 11:21 a.m. ET
War crimes tribunal indicts Serb paramilitary leader "Arkan"
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The Yugoslav war crimes tribunal said today it has indicted a notorious Serb paramilitary leader for Bosnian war-era atrocities, an announcement seen as an attempt to stop him from deploying units to Kosovo. Zeljko Raznatovic, also known as Arkan, was indicted in September 1997 but it was kept under wraps to try and facilitate his arrest, said Louise Arbour, the U.N. court's chief prosecutor. She refused to disclose the exact charges against him. The publication of Arkan's indictment was interpreted as a maneuver aimed at preventing him from deploying his "Tigers" paramilitary unit in Kosovo, where Serbs are trying to drive out ethnic Albanians. "In light of recent reports of his alleged involvement in Kosovo, I have decided to make public the existence of an indictment against Zeljko Raznatovic, also known as Arkan," Arbour said. Publicizing the indictment will "put on notice those who might be inclined to retain his services or to obey his orders that they too will be tainted by their association with an indicted war criminal," she said. Sayings emerging from Kosovo, the tribunal's U.S. president also warned Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic that he could be held accountable for atrocities by Serb forces in Kosovo. "I would also remind President Milosevic ... that just eight months ago, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda convicted the former Prime Minister of Rwanda of genocide," Gabrielle Kirk McDonald wrote in a statement. "In so doing, the court affirmed that governments have a responsibility to ensure that their citizens live in peace and security. The resulting trust and authority that governments enjoy applies equally, if not more so, to heads of state." NATO today welcomed the indictment. This serves as "a warning to all the other ... little Arkans" that they will suffer the same "fate as their mentor," NATO spokesman Jamie Shea said in Brussels, Belgium. Warrants for Raznatovic's arrest will be sent to the Yugoslav Embassy, Arbour said, although Yugoslavia repeatedly has refused to arrest suspects indicted by the tribunal. Arkan has insisted that neither he nor his Tigers have fought in the Kosovo conflict, which erupted a year ago. But Arkan's Tigers have been accused of involvement in atrocities during the wars in Bosnia and Croatia in the early 1990s, and human rights groups have long called for his indictment. Arbour said she would not reveal the nature of the charges against Arkan until he is arrested. Arkan is the 59th suspect to have been publicly indicted by the U.N. court, which has 26 suspects in custody in The Hague. Arbour also urged Western governments to hand over evidence of atrocities in Kosovo and said her investigations "are progressing through means I am not prepared to make public." Ethnic Albanian refugees flooding out of Kosovo in recent days have arrived in neighboring countries with reports of mass killings and forced expulsions by Serb forces, with entire villages being burned and cities cleared of ethnic Albanians. With international monitors gone and virtually all foreign journalists kicked out of Kosovo, the reported atrocities are impossible to verify. — Mike Corder |
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