Slobodan Milosevic, the Serb nationalist who presided over a decade of disastrous wars in the Balkans, was Friday facing the prospect of a life behind bars following his dramatic extradition to the UN war crimes tribunal.
Milosevic arrived by helicopter at the UN tribunal's prison in The Hague at 1:20 am Friday (2320 GMT Thursday), tribunal spokesman Christian Chartier told AFP.
Milosevic was flown to The Hague only hours after a dramatic twist in which Yugoslavia's top court froze his planned extradition, only to be overruled by a Serbian government anxious to obtain desperately needed economic aid at an international donors' conference being held Friday.
He is expected to be brought before the court in the next few days to formally hear the charges against him of crimes against humanity, stemming from atrocities by his troops against the ethnic Albanian majority in Serbia's Kosovo province.
He will become the first head of state to face trial by an international court. He faces a maximum sentence of life in prison.
His handover leaves his former protégé Radovan Karadzic, the war-time Bosnian Serb president, and the former Bosnian Serb military chief Ratko Mladic as the most wanted of the 25 named suspects indicted by The Hague tribunal who are still at large.
Twelve others are the subjects of secret indictments and have not been identified.
The transfer of Milosevic brought 4,000 angry supporters onto the streets of Belgrade, incensed his Socialist party, and split the top echelons of Yugoslav politics, as clear differences emerged between President Vojislav Kostunica, who was made aware of the handover only after the event, and Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic, whose cabinet ordered it.
The United States had made Milosevic's handover to the UN court a condition of continued support, and political leaders around the world hailed the surprise move as a step forward for Yugoslavia and the end of a long struggle to bring the former Yugoslav strongman to justice.
US President George W. Bush called the transfer "an unequivocal message to those persons who brought such tragedy and brutality to the Balkans that they will be held accountable for their crimes."
Milosevic, a 59-year-old hardline Serb nationalist who presided over a decade of bloody conflict as the Yugoslav federation collapsed, stands accused of crimes against humanity, including murders, deportations, persecutions and violating the conventions of war, during the 1998-1999 Serb crackdown on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo.
Officials at the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) have said he would also likely be indicted for crimes against humanity committed in Bosnia -- scene of the most murderous conflict in Europe since World War II -- and possibly Croatia.
Milosevic had been in a Belgrade prison since April 1, when he was arrested facing domestic charges of corruption during his decade in rule.
Evidence of atrocities by his troops in Kosovo has continued to build, with the recent discovery of mass graves dating from when Milosevic sent soldiers to crack down on ethnic Albanian rebels, sparking massacres and a mass exodus of refugees -- images which are burned on the collective memory of his 12 years in power.
He was ousted during a popular uprising in October after he attempted to overturn presidential elections in which he was beaten by Kostunica, a moderate nationalist.
Milosevic was placed in the custody of officials from the ICTY in Belgrade Thursday afternoon and flown to a NATO air base in Tuzla, in neighboring Bosnia.
There, he was put on a NATO Orion-type plane bound for The Hague.
The former president was then helicoptered to the prison after his arrival at Valkenberg airbase, about 10 kilometres (six miles) outside The Hague, and kept out of sight of awaiting journalists.
News of his handover came after a day in which Yugoslavia's Constitutional Court threw a wrench in the works by freezing a five-day-old government decree enabling the transfer of Milosevic to The Hague.
Djindjic said the government saw the decision as "invalid".
The court had said the decree adopted Saturday was unconstitutional and that it needed a further two weeks to consider whether the transfer was legal.
The court ruling, issued by four judges appointed by the Milosevic government, appeared to grant the former president a temporary reprieve.
On hearing news of the court ruling, the government, which had been keen to show good faith ahead of the crucial donors' conference in Brussels on Friday, called an emergency meeting to consider action.
"The court's decision endangers the survival of the country," Djindjic said later.
The Serbian government decided to "carry out its obligations towards The Hague, and the decision went into effect immediately after the cabinet session," Djindjic said.
Djindjic insisted that the "future of Serbia would be jeopardized if the cooperation with the ICTY was postponed until an uncertain future time."
Friday's donors' conference is viewed as a crucial step on Yugoslavia's long road back to normality after a decade of war, sanctions, international isolation and economic ruin under the Milosevic regime.
Washington only confirmed its participation in the meeting after Belgrade issued on June 23 its decree allowing Milosevic's extradition.
At Friday's conference, the some 35 donor nations will be called upon to pledge 1.25 billion dollars for the coming year.
Leaders worldwide hailed the transfer of Milosevic to The Hague and said it should bring new aid to the Yugoslav people.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair called the move "a thoroughly good thing," while French President Jacques Chirac said it was "great progress for the universal conscience."
NATO Secretary General George Robertson hailed the Belgrade authorities for "their wise and courageous decision."
But not everyone was happy: the Tanjug news agency quoted a source in Kostunica's office as saying the president had "found out about the event through the media."
Ivica Dacic, a top official of Milosevic's Socialist Party (SPS) said the handover was a "direct violation of the constitution."
Dragan Koprivica, spokesman of the Socialist People's party from Montenegro (SNP) -- a key ally of Serbia's ruling DOS coalition at federal level -- warned the handover would "break the coalition which would bring the survival of Yugoslavia into question."
"We are seriously concerned over the future of the joint state and I am afraid that this decision could be the end of its existance," Koprivica said, quoted by Tanjug -- THE HAGUE (AFP)
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
