FORMER JNA COMMANDER COMMENTS ON CROATIA'S SUIT BEFORE ICTY, VERDICT

BELGRADE, Jan 29 (Hina) - Momcilo Perisic, Serbian vice premier and one of the leaders of Serbia's ruling coalition, said on Monday Croatia's suit against him at the Hague war crimes tribunal and the verdict of the Zadar County Court sentencing him to 20 years in prison for crimes against civilians were "an exercise in futility." In a statement to today's issue of the Belgrade daily 'Blic', the president of the Movement for Democratic Serbia (PDS) and former Yugoslav People's Army Chief-of-Staff between 1993 and 1999 said he was "not afraid of the Hague Tribunal." In 1990 and 1991 Perisic was the commander of the Zemunik military training centre near the Croatian coastal town of Zadar. During that time Zadar came under JNA shelling, in which civilians were killed. Perisic says that "at the time Croatia was not an internationally recognised state" and adds that he therefore does not fear the Hague tribunal. "I only protected the lives and property with which I was entrusted," Perisic says adding that as a JNA officer he "lawfully defended the state about which the incumbent Croatian president Mesic publicly boasted of having broken it up." Perisic also said his political opponents, such as the leader of Serbia's radicals Vojislav Seselj, were taking him to task and saying the Hague tribunal would issue an indictment against him, as well as that the state television was conducting a campaign against him "by broadcasting reactions from Croatia regarding my appointment as a Serbian vice premier several times a day." (hina) rml