ZAGREB, May 6 (Hina) - Croatian President Stjepan Mesic has said that there would have been no need today for the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague as far as Croatia is concerned, had the Croatian judiciary responded timely and
prosecuted concrete crimes.
ZAGREB, May 6 (Hina) - Croatian President Stjepan Mesic has said that
there would have been no need today for the UN war crimes tribunal in
The Hague as far as Croatia is concerned, had the Croatian judiciary
responded timely and prosecuted concrete crimes.#L#
"We can count war crimes on one hand and perpetrators of each of them
are known", but much was later lost in the shuffle and now we are
facing trials of some people in The Hague on the basis of their
command responsibility, President Mesic said during his visit to the
bar association in Split-Dalmatia County on Thursday evening. He went
on to say that those who allowed shuffling and covered up war crimes
"are now shedding crocodile tears" over those who are leaving for The
Hague.
Trials for concrete crimes would have much facilitated the position of
those who are now being tried in The Hague on the basis of their
command responsibility, the Croatian head of state said.
"If crimes such as the murder of the Zec family had been punished and
had the judiciary punished perpetrators, many other crimes would not
have happened and Croatia would have today been in a much more
favourable position," he said adding that the war was dirty on all
(warring) sides. Both sides set houses on fire to prevent others from
coming back. When 30 or 300 houses are burnt, these are then
incidents. But when 30,000 houses are burnt, this is then a policy,
and we were not aware of this on time, Mesic told the gathered
lawyers, judges and prosecutors.
The situation in the judiciary is important for Croatia's efforts to
be granted a status of country-candidate for European Union membership
and that's why Croatia must become a law-based country which it was
not in the previous period, the president added.
Commenting on relations with neighbouring countries, Mesic stressed
the importance of maintaining Bosnia-Herzegovina as a community of
equal peoples.
Croatia's relations with Serbia should follow the example set by
Germany and France, he said adding that one should, however, be
cautious as in Serbia power is now in hands of those who advocate the
border along Virovitica-Karlovac-Karlobag line (namely the western
border of a Greater Serbia).
The dispute with Slovenia with regard to its request to access to the
open sea would sooner or later go to the international arbitration,
and concerning the issue of debt of the Ljubljanska Bank to its
clients in Croatia, they should be equally treated as its clients in
Slovenia, Mesic said.
(Hina) ms