[Comment] Karadzic's arrest is a significant rule of law victory
PETER SAIN LEY BERRY
25.07.2008 @ 11:59 CET
EUOBSERVER / COMMENT - A story from the Bosnian war: and no prizes for guessing from which side it is told.
Three soldiers meet at a crossroads near Sarajevo. One is Croat, one Serb, the third is a Bosniac Muslim. All are priming their guns when a frog pops out of the bushes and begins to speak. He turns to the Croat.
"The European Union is itself a triumph of the rule of law over the rule of war" (Photo: wikipedia)
"I shall give you a wish," he says. "Tell me what you really want?"
"See that Serb," replies the Croat. "I want him dead!"
"Do you?" says the frog. He then turns to the Serb. "And what is your wish?"
The Serb answers. "See that Croat? I want him dead, too!"
And so the frog turns to the Bosniac and asks him his wish.
"Are you going to grant the other guys their wishes?" queries the Bosniac. The frog nods.
"In that case I'll have a cup of coffee."
Of course, if we substitute beer for coffee the story could be told in any one of three ways. Over the centuries these Balkan peoples have at one time or another, or in one place or another, all been victims and have all been victors, too. The tendency today is to view the Serbs as the bad guys. That is not unreasonable. It was, after all, the dream of a greater Serbia that precipitated the first world war and under leaders like Milosevic and Karadzic Serbia has undoubtedly been responsible for many atrocities.
But in the second world war Serbia was an ally, whereas Croatia and Bosnia became part of the Axis. Serbian communities in Croatia and Bosnia and indeed in Serbia itself suffered greatly at the hands of those who embraced the fascist cause.
That of course does not mitigate, still less excuse, the extent of the horrors overseen by men like Radovan Karadzic, the leader of the Bosnian Serbs and long indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, who was arrested on a Belgrade bus this week. Or excuse the actions of the equally indicted military leader Radko Mladic, alleged architect of the Sbrenica massacre, or the Croatian Serb leader Goran Hadzic, who have both yet to be caught.
All wars are dirty
It is surely right that they should answer the grave charges laid against them. My point is that we should not pretend that all the villains were Serb or all the victims Bosnian. All wars are dirty, whether by accident, design, carelessness or latent human bestiality. That is why they are best avoided.
To some extent this may explain the deep anger felt in many Serb communities at Karadzic's arrest. The outrage in the Republika Srpska's Assembly in Banja Luka was so great that it had to be suspended. For many, Karadzic and Mladic are not war criminals but heroes without whom Republika Srpska - and the Bosnian Serb community's ethnic identity - would no longer exist.
It is a sign of the febrile social stability of the Bosnian republic. This should be a danger signal, to be watched closely as the Western Balkans and Bosnia itself edge slowly closer to European Union membership.
Nonetheless, Serbia's new pro-European government has shown itself serious in its European intentions by handing over the man with the ‘Karl Marx' beard, although I hear since his arrest he has shaved it off. Presumably this is to opt back into his former role as President of the Bosnian Serbs, the better to defend himself before the courts and perhaps more importantly before Serb public opinion.
Karadzic was medically qualified. The doctor title of the alias he adopted - Dr Dabic - was real enough. By all accounts the medical and spiritual healing activities he undertook while on the run were well received. Which leads me to wonder whether Karadzic, in the Dabic practice rooms, ever encountered his own victims, as it were, and if so what he then thought about them.
Supposing him to be convicted in the Hague he might indeed consider reverting to the Dabic persona; there is no doubt much spiritual healing required in a prison. And I suppose it might even count as a mild species of atonement.
Now, Mr Cvetkovic's Serbian government has only to find Mladic and the way could be open to a fast track EU candidacy, a point that has been made repeatedly in the last few days.
But I believe that the Karadzic arrest has a far wider significance than that. Surely the real point is what it says about the rule of law: the message it sends about the accountability of leaders to the international community and the ever-weakening protection of their own domestic security.
While I don't believe that Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe or Burma's senior general, Than Shwe, or the already indicted leader of the Sudan, Mohammed Al-Bashir, slept any less soundly in their beds after learning of Karadzic's arrest - it must have given them at least pause for thought. They, and other dictators, know that their safety depends largely on the whim of Russia and China.
The United States has stood out against the International Criminal Court - but its position is softening. Both presidential candidates have undertaken to co-operate with the court and it seems now only a matter of time, regardless of the outcome of the election, before the US will become a state party to the treaty setting up the court.
When the court was established - and it has grown out of the Yugoslav tribunal - nobody could be sure how it would operate, whom it would pursue. Slowly its credibility has grown. Europe has played a major part in this. The Karadzic arrest, though Yugoslav in context, will strengthen the hand of those who want to see the Court's reach extended.
The European Union is itself a triumph of the rule of law over the rule of war. It is one of Europe's principal legacies to the rest of the world. Increasingly world leaders will be mindful that impunity for crimes against humanity belongs to the past. At some point the Court will come tapping on their shoulder. No necessarily with a gun but with handcuffs and shackles.
Karadzic's arrest is a significant milestone along this road and as such it is not a bad note on which to depart for a summer break. This column will, God willing, resume on 5 September. Meanwhile I shall wish you all ‘bonnes vacances.'
The author is an independent commentator on European affairs