Daily View: Looking ahead to Mladic's trial
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Commentators discuss the arrest ofÌýofÌýformer head of the Bosnian Serb army Ratko Mladic. He has been on the run for 16 years as he faces genocide charges over the 1992-95 Bosnian war
Author the similarities between Ratko Mladic and Colonel Gaddafi:
"General Ratko Mladic, like Muammer Gaddafi, was once our friend, to be courted and flattered...
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"For Pale in the 1990s, read Tripoli in the 21st century. The Libyan capital was for years the centre of the useful idiots tour of the Middle East, where Col Gaddafi and his son Saif were lauded by left-wing politicians and intellectuals, as the centre of a new civic dawning.
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"But if Gen Mladic and the Gaddafis likely share a destination in the dock on charges of crimes against humanity, there the similarity between Bosnia and Libya ends."
accusations that Serbia's President Boris Tadic has been hiding General Mladic, arguing instead that he, more than anyone, wanted Mladic captured:
"For many years, Mr. Tadic has regarded the arrest of all remaining indictees of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, including Mr. Mladic, as his top political priority. He knew full well that until that happened, Serbia's aspiration to join the European Union would be blocked. Mr. Tadic has always recognized that European integration is vital for his country's future prosperity and for the harmony of the entire Balkan region.
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"But this simple political calculation is secondary to Mr. Tadic's primary motivation, which is moral above all else."
that courts try cases, but cases also try courts . He gives some advice on how the trial should be conducted:
"Such high-profile cases test the fairness of the court's proceedings, as is happening now with Karadzic's trial. Mladic cannot be convicted on the basis of newspaper headlines.
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"The tribunal would also do well, when Mladic is handed over to it, to narrow its focus and cut its list of charges and witnesses. It must proceed justly and expeditiously. But the sheer length of its proceedings makes it more likely that defendants will die in its custody, just as Slobodan Milosevic did. That would be a denial of justice, especially for the families of the victims.
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"The trial of Ratko Mladic will probably be the tribunal's final Balkans case and will determine its reputation as well as his fate. It must deliver a fair trial, not a show trial, and one that does not stretch out to the crack of doom."
if the tribunal will do more harm than good:
"Mladic's chances in the dock appear bleak. They will rest on his assertion that he knew nothing of the genocide his men unleashed on Srebrenica.
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"A bigger question, perhaps, is what effect this last, greatest, Hague tribunal trial will have. Will it finally close old wounds or cause them to spring violently open?"
what the future may now bring for the region:
"Europe now has to prove its sincerity and move Serbia's application to the European Union forward.
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"We hope the arrest will also facilitate reconciliation among Bosnia's ethnic factions. There is plenty of blame. But the Bosnian Serb leadership in particular needs to abandon its fantasies about dismantling the multiethnic Bosnian state. It has few friends left in Belgrade and none anywhere else."
