| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Captured U.S. soldiers face Serb military trial
April 2, 1999
BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (CNN) -- Three U.S. soldiers captured by Serb forces are expected to face a military trial Friday despite warnings from NATO and Washington such action would breach the Geneva Conventions on prisoners. Yugoslavia's Tanjug news agency said the trial would be held in Pristina, the capital of Kosovo. It did not say what charges they faced. The soldiers were captured while on what NATO says was a routine patrol on the Macedonian side of the Yugoslav- Macedonia border. News of their capture came Thursday when Serb television broadcast pictures of the men, who appeared bloodied and bruised but otherwise in good health. The newscast said the soldiers were on the Yugoslav side of the border and had resisted arrest. British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook called their capture a "snatch" operation by Yugoslav forces. NATO leaders expressed concern about the safety of the three. "We've seen their pictures, and we don't like it. We don't like the way they are treated. We have a long memory about these kinds of things," said NATO's supreme allied commander, Gen. Wesley Clark. He said NATO will hold Serbian authorities accountable for the soldiers' treatment and is investigating where the soldiers were captured. The men reported coming under fire shortly before going missing. U.S. President Bill Clinton on Thursday repeated NATO's position and said the United States, too, will hold Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic responsible for the safety of the three American soldiers. "President Milosevic should make no mistake," Clinton said. "We will hold him and his government responsible for their safety and for their well-being." The Pentagon said the captive U.S. soldiers were prisoners in a military conflict and therefore should be covered by the protections of the Geneva Convention. Edgar Buckley of the British Defense Ministry expressed deep concern over reports that Milosevic was preparing to overthrow the government of Montenegro. Buckley said there was every reason to believe that Milosevic would replace the elected government with one of his own. Air Marshall Sir John Day, deputy chief of the British Defense Staff, said manned NATO air attacks on Thursday night into Friday morning had been disrupted by bad weather but that weapons effective in all weather continued to be used. He said Milosevic was running critically short of fuel in some areas. "This will further inhibit the ability of his forces to attack the Kosvar Albanians,"" Day said. Day said forecasts of improved weather for the coming days in the Balkans should strike fear in the hearts and minds of Serb forces. The Pentagon said the fate of the captured soldiers had not stopped planned bombing runs; Pentagon spokesman Ken Bacon said bad weather had more effect. "We did attack a Yugoslav army unit in central Kosovo that's been involved in some of the ethnic cleansing activities," Bacon said. "We also attacked a major ammunition dump in Kosovo." Bacon also announced that 13 additional F-117A stealth fighters will soon leave Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico, and fly to Italy to participate in NATO's Operation Allied Force. One is to replace the warplane downed last week. "That will bring our total of stealth fighters up to 24 in the theater, and our total number of aircraft up to about 220," Bacon said.
He also said A-10s -- awkward-looking planes dubbed "wart hogs" and "tank killers" -- were being flown but did not know if they had fired weapons yet. At the Aviano air base in Italy -- the main staging post for NATO airstrikes on Serb forces -- hopes grew that a fine morning Friday would allow a stepped up air campaign in what will be the tenth day of attacks. Bad weather has forced several missions to be aborted in recent days. And in the Black Sea port of Sevastopol on Friday a Russian navy spy ship set sail for the Adriatic where it is expected to adopt a monitoring role. The ship is expected to reach its destination in three or four days.
Meanwhile, the senior U.S. envoy who had spearheaded efforts to get Milosevic to sign onto a Kosovo peace deal said Thursday the Yugoslav president was "a formidable adversary" who chose bombings over diplomacy. Richard Holbrooke, appearing on CNN's "Larry King Live," said NATO made the right choice by implementing Operation Allied Force after months of intense negotiations fell through. "This tragedy in Kosovo has been a noble undertaking," Holbrooke said. "Many foreigners, many Americans have said to me, 'Why is the United States bothering?' The answer is because we could make a difference and tried to make a difference." Over the years, Holbrooke has traveled to Belgrade on more than 30 occasions for diplomatic talks with the Yugoslav leadership. He met with Milosevic in 11th-hour negotiations last week on the Rambouillet peace proposal, but he failed to get the Yugoslav leader to sign on -- even after he made clear NATO would begin its bombing campaign. "Diplomacy has been set aside ... because given a clear choice, the Yugoslav leadership chose a course knowing that it would go on to this situation," he said. Asked what it was like to deal head-on with Milosevic, the envoy said, "He's always been tough to deal with. He's a formidable adversary, and negotiating with him is not a lot of fun. I've done it for a long time." "We have achieved things in that process many times, most notably peace in Bosnia with no Americans injured or wounded." Holbrooke also urged Yugoslav authorities to abide by international laws set forth in the Geneva Conventions, a series of international treaties signed in Switzerland between 1864 and 1949. Asked on "Larry King Live" if Yugoslav authorities should release the three as a gesture of goodwill, Holbrooke said, "I think that's a good idea, Larry. I know that your program is watched carefully in Belgrade, probably the most watched program available to the leadership in Belgrade, and I hope they hear your suggestion and respond positively to it."
NATO, the U.S. and Yugoslavia have also come under pressure from Christian leaders urging the resumption of peace talks as their congregations begin Easter observances. Eight U.S. Catholic cardinals, in joint letters to U.S. President Clinton and Yugoslav President Milosevic, urged a cessation of hostilities, while the head of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops outlined steps to end "the unfolding human tragedy in the Balkans." At the same time, five Serbian Orthodox bishops who preside over the North American branch of the Serbian Orthodox Church called on Clinton and other NATO leaders to stop aerial bombing in Yugoslavia during the Easter season. The Western Christian church will observe Good Friday and Easter Sunday on April 4. The Orthodox church, to which most Serbs belong, celebrates Easter a week later. NATO leaders have opposed the idea of calling off military operations in observance of Easter, saying it would provide Milosevic too great an opportunity to commit unchecked violence. A representative of Pope John Paul II traveled to Yugoslavia Thursday to personally deliver a papal plea for peace to Milosevic.
NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana said NATO remains committed to stopping Milosevic's "criminal war machine" in Kosovo. "It is the right thing to do, and it is our duty to do whatever we can to stop the killings in Kosovo," he said during a NATO news conference in Brussels. "After one week of NATO air operations, I am confident that we are having an impact on Belgrade's war machine," he added. Clark said that in the past eight days of strikes, NATO significantly damaged Yugoslavia's military air defense systems, command and control centers, and field forces arrayed against ethnic Albanians. He referred to the targets as "instruments of oppression." He said NATO attacks on Serb military targets will continue unabated, "step by step, day by day, with precision and a great deal of attention to avoid civilian casualties." And reports continued to emerge from Kosovo of Serb forces stepping up their campaign to drive ethnic Albanians from Kosovo. The Kosovo capital of Pristina was said to have been virtually abandoned, and the U.N. estimates 170,000 have fled since airstrikes began.
RELATED STORIES: Captured U.S. soldiers face military court in Yugoslavia RELATED SITES: Extensive list of Kosovo-related sites
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Back to the top |
© 2001 Cable News Network. All Rights Reserved. Terms under which this service is provided to you. Read our privacy guidelines. |