Coalition Fireworks

However, those firecrackers (coming not just from the Radicals) have become so numerous of late that despite all the pyrotechnics the achievements of the new government in the past hundred days are barely visible, and the question of whether there will be another hundred days at all is becoming more and more significant.

As far as the pyrotechnics are concerned, the situation at present is the following: on the day in which this edition of VREME shows up at the stands, a session of the municipal parliament is scheduled in which Seselj’s Radicals will launch another explosive contraption (firecracker) which they hope is sufficiently strong to overthrow the Mayor. In Draskovic’s SPO on the day of this parliamentary session a bomb is being only half detonated, while Djindjic is being told that because of the falling apart of Coalition Zajedno he no longer has SPO’s confidence, but for now they will stop any further detonation. In politics a threat sometimes has a greater effect than the carrying out of that threat, which is why SPO will probably wait a little longer to see how all of this will affect Djindjic, and whether he will finally desist from expanding the Coalition. Or, they will fully detonate their bomb.

The president of the municipal government, Spasoje Krunic, was the first to mention the replacing of Djindjic, objecting to the fact that Djindjic is not doing his job at all, but only doing things to promote himself. The day after, Vuk Draskovic stated that impeachment was neither mentioned, nor is of any significance, raising the whole question to a moral level by asking Djindjic to resign if he continues to ignore the Coalition’s agreements.

Milorad Vucelic entered the whole affair with a newspaper interview in which he stated that he is friends with the Mayor of Belgrade, and that he "will not shoot at Djindjic", which could be interpreted as a message from the Socialists that they are not yet ready to completely join the opposition’s campaign of slander and mudslinging in the Municipal Parliament. In any case, they believe that the new municipal government will come apart on its own, and will not last much longer.

Djindjic himself is convinced that he will survive the next session of the Municipal Parliament, even though he certainly understood the message he received from SPO recently, as well as the message he received from the shores of the Danube where Bogoljub Karic, Vojislav Seselj, and Vuk and Danica Draskovic recently met over coffee, taking pictures. As the Mayor of Belgrade he received a warning, perhaps the last, "before changing duties". Trying to appear completely calm, Djindjic stated that he will soon submit a report on the first hundred days of government in Belgrade, announcing measures for the near future and indirectly telling his coalition partner in SPO that anyone attempting to remove him from the position of Mayor of Belgrade with the help of Seselj would be making an unwise political investment. "This report will clearly show that we managed to do ten times more in the past three months than the previous government managed to do in two years", stated Djindjic. President of Municipal Government Spasoje Krunic also does not think that the past three months were unsuccessful, even though in answer to the same question he mentions the difficult obstructions put up by the previous government. Even if Djindjic’s story about exceptional successes is half true, the slightly cynical question remains: what could have happened had the members of Coalition Zajedno really cooperated in the Municipal Parliament instead of accusing each other of uncooperativeness.

Three months after the whistles stopped, the Coalition has reached a point where it looks more like "a wellspring of conflicts" where there is no more water. Draskovic stopped communicating with Djindjic and Vesna Pesic, supposedly waiting for an apology before deciding what to do next. Vesna Pesic and Kostunica are bringing to a close the drafting of a document on the minimal conditions for elections, which Draskovic refuses to even look at. At the same time, the leader of the Democrats is insisting on formulating a strategy for the elections and is testing the willingness of others outside the Coalition to join them, which the other side makes fun of as a mere banding together of the Coalition with a few dramatic actors and ballet dancers. Everything appears fairly shaky and could last, according to certain opinions, until Madeleine Albright shows up in Belgrade. Before that, no one wants to be the first to bite the bullet (which everyone it seems will soon bite), and to be accused of having taken the first steps in destroying a project in which many hopes have rested since last winter for the possibility of democratic changes here.

Perhaps simple math is more responsible for everything which is presently happening than the vanities of the opposition leaders which are often cited. Djindjic, who it seems is using his pocket calculator the most, was probably the first to figure out that if the last federal elections of November 3 are taken into account (and they are more significant than the local elections of November 17), Coalition Zajedno has about a million votes less than the Socialists for a final victory. Add to that at least two million DEM’s for any sort of elections campaign. Because of this Djindjic was the first to begin raising questions of the necessity for expanding the Coalition. The same figures must have been taken note of in SPO (first of all by the mathematician Milan Bozic), even though the official stance of this party is that the present makeup of the Coalition is sufficient for a victory at the elections. Because of the absence of DEM’s for the campaign, Bogoljub Karic and Milan Panic entered the picture.

Several months before the federal elections, the opposition scene in Serbia had suddenly begun to appear as a complex labyrinth in which no clear path can be discerned. Insiders claim that all except those in official positions have backup plans, because everyone is lacking something, be it potential voters, money or image. The public was certainly most interested in what was said over coffee in Hotel Jugoslavia in Zemun (Seselj has still not changed its name to "Greater Serbia") by the conjugal Draskovic couple, Seselj, and Bogoljub Karic. Despite the excuses regarding the accidental meeting from (as they say) "well informed sources", it also came to light that Djindjic was a frequent topic over coffee. The godfathers Draskovic and Seselj appear willing to come closer together once again, as it seems to them both that this is a combination which could yield a sufficient number of votes, especially if Bogoljub Karic were to join them. The offer to join would also be extended to DSS and Vojislav Kostunica. The final assignment of duties would be decided upon later, but what could be heard is that Seselj would be willing to put down his guns against the West. In return for that Karic would "arrange" through his contacts an image improvement trip for Seselj so that the latter could differentiate himself at least a little from Zhirinovski and Le Pen. Admittedly, Bogoljub Karic was considering this because his newly formed Social Democrat Party is having a hard time coming to terms with the Radicals. It is an open question how Western businesses would look upon any ties with the leader of the Radicals. Seselj began his "image improvement" with a trip to Bratislava this week.

Even before this Sunday coffee in Hotel Jugoslavia, the story of Djindjic’s backstage quest for new Coalition partners had begun. In that story even a "deal" with the Socialists was mentioned. The SPO (Serbian Renewal Movement) is constantly pointing to this, and a similar possibility is indirectly suggested by the President of New Democracy, Dusan Mihajlovic, who is mentioning some kind of "greater coalition" these days. At the annual Democratic Party's convention, Djindjic received yet another vote of confidence, while Dr. Miroljub Labus urged that the Democratic Party immediately cease all forms of cooperation with the Socialists. Members of this party were trying to explain what Labus was referring to (supposedly to the participation in TV debates), even though the explanation remains fairly certain, especially as slightly different interpretations were heard at a well attended social gathering of Democrats.

Regardless of how reliable all these stories from "well informed sources" are, it appears that the cards are once again being seriously dealt. Who knows for what time? Here no one gets up from the table after a loss, grabbing instead for the pack of cards every time; then everything begins once again. As far as the elections conditions are concerned, everyone seems to be forgetting that the same pack of cards is always on the table — that is to say the pack that the Socialists marked right from the start. Without a new pack of cards, all new dealing is pointless.

Nenad Lj. Stefanovic

Kos Is Coming Full Circle (5)

End of a Dangerous Game

How Captain Dopudja set free the former chiefs of KOS (Yugoslav State Security), and what he wrote in his report

The fixing of a court case is no simple matter even when top lawyers are fixing the game for harmless people, let alone when amateurs and the inept are trying to indict experienced hands from a powerful and distinguished secret service. In the criminal case against the chiefs of intelligence of JNA (Yugoslav National Army) — Generals Aleksandar Vasiljevic and Simeon Tumanov, and Colonel Slobodan Rakocevic — and other officers and secret associates, it could be said that what was at stake was an ad hoc political process, quickly slapped together and made to order for those at the top. When the political imperative of chopping heads of chiefs in JNA and KOS ceased in 1993, Slobodan Milosevic held a speech in Batajnica in front of airmen, saying at the time in an off-hand fashion that there were many affairs of that nature which sullied the reputation of the Army, and many things to that effect...

At that moment Genl. Vasiljevic was already spared from the first degree Court Marshal sentence, the charges against Gen. Tumanov had been dropped, and the case against other charged officers and secret associates proved that the "biggest spy affair", announced a year earlier by Dr. Branko Kosit, lacked any substance. The Chief Court Marshal eventually freed almost everyone involved, dealing out minimal sentences to a very few, only to save face. The principal charges of terrorism, of releasing of military secrets, and of undermining of military authority and national defense were all dropped.

We said that the fixing of a case is a difficult business; the panic exhibited by the "fixers" during this entire criminal case — right up to the sentencing — is perfect proof of that. Gen. Nedeljko Boskovic and his commanders did not refrain from serious criminal acts, such as the illegal stripping of rights of many detained in a private prison in Zemun, or the releasing of military and official secrets to the "patriotic" press during the campaign. When the case entered the hearing phase people were detained for months "so as not to influence the witnesses", while the witnesses were not heard, creating conditions of indefinite incarceration. In the case of Lieut. Col. Ivan Sabolovic, only two witnesses were heard in the first 106 days of his detainment, while in the case of Radenko Radojicic, in the first 90 days of his detainment not a single investigative measure was taken, nor a single witness heard. In the case of Gen. Vasiljevic, in order for the three month period of incarceration to be prolonged, for 21 days hearing was denied to the two remaining witnesses. Witnesses were all available to the Court Marshal during that time, some of them having even been illegally arrested on the territories of other states (RS and RSK) and taken to Belgrade for "further questioning".

Patience was lost when it was most needed, as Generals Domazetovic and Boskovic were retired a week following the release of Gen. Vasiljevic, and before their regular retirement term in JNA. Domazetovic was refusing to step down and to leave his office; Boskovic was asking for a prolongation of active duty for himself and Domazetovic up to the end of the year; Branko Kostic unsuccessfully intervened with Slobodan Milosevic to obstruct Boskovic’s retirement. In this way the tandem of Boskovic-Kostic fell apart in the wake of "the biggest spy affair in post-war Yugoslavia"...

However, the real, hidden purpose had been achieved. During that year of fixing, rigging, arrests, mistreatment and molestation of a group of thirty officers and associates of the JNA Security Service, the regime managed to have the army "reduced" to politically harmless proportions, and managed to marginalize the military State Security Service.

The recent pardon of seven member of the "Labrador" Ring in Croatia, based on the Croatian Law of Pardon, raises several questions. Namely, some individuals fared equally in both states. As one former "Labrador" member says: "Whoever cooperated in the rigging of affairs ‘Opera’ and ‘Labrador’, and consented to serve as witness, fared well both here and in Croatia. Whoever refused cooperation and stuck to the truth fared badly both here and in Croatia".

The Law of State Security guarantees equal access to pension, social and accommodation funds for all associates of state services who suffer through no fault of their own; in other words, a guarantee of being taken care of once released. That is the legal obligation. Is there a moral obligation toward those who honestly and loyally served the former sovereign and internationally accepted SFR of Yugoslavia? Toward those who at one time were destroyed, compromised and sacrificed in a short political power game in which, as the saying goes, the baby was thrown out with the bath water? The new state SR of Yugoslavia claims that it continues from where SFR of Yugoslavia left off, from the state which those people served. Will this state finally decide to take these people under its wing and help them out? Dozens of them are suffering under refugee status, without documents, without income, without status or citizenship.

Will the outcome of the criminal case against retired Gen. Nedeljko Boskovic affect such a decision? The case is proceeding: President Milosevic accepted two letters from Gen. Boskovic, but it appears that he referred the case to the legal authorities of JNA. It seems everyone would rather forget about the whole matter...

How good is that for the state and the army?