Serbian Nationalists and Karadzic

It's no surprise that Serbian nationalists believe that the Hague ICTY is incapable of providing Radovan Karadic with a fair trial. That said, the trial is going forward. One of the most recent developments concerns Karadzic's attempt to sack his court-appointed attorney. Karadzic is doing everything in his power to delay the trial, and continues to insist that he is innocent on all 11 counts of war crimes. His most infamous act was to oversee the massacre of Bosnian Muslims at Srebrenica. Karadzic continues to argue that war war was avoidable and that Alija Izetbegovic as well as foreign (German) interference was largely responsible for the outbreak of war. Also, there's no denying that the origins of the conflict are difficult to unravel. Still, this trial is not ultimately about establishing blame for the outbreak of the war. Karadzic needs to stand trial for specific war crimes.

Karadzic wants to reduce his Indictment

Karadzic is advising the ICTY, suggesting they should "cut down his indictment" in order to avoid a long, drawn-out trial that will last years. Slobodon Milosevic died after 4 years in custody, and so he was never brought to justice. The Associated Press reports that the Security Council is pressuring the ICTY to wrap-up its work as soon as possible. Meanwhile, Russia Today claims that Karadzic is seeking help from Russian officials in support of his claim that the US government offered him a deal in 1995.

Finally, a recent poll in Serbia reveals that 65% of Serbians would refuse to help international authorities bring Radko Mladic to justice. Mladic was the mastermind behind the massacre of at least 7,500 Bosnians at Srebrenica in 1995.

It's not Abuse, it's Torture

Dahlia Lithwick and Phillippe Sands of Slate argue that Susan J. Crawford's explicit use of the word "torture" this week "changes everything". Put simply, the Bush administration has long asserted that a combination of coercive techniques it approved in the wake of 9/11 are legal. Of course, that's because the administration relied on its own lawyers to redefine precisely what torture is. For example, many of the techniques that our military and CIA interrogators have used over the past 7 years mirror those of their former ideological foes, the Red Army and the KGB. Lithwick and Sands state that Crawford's acknowledgement of our activities as torture is "astounding". "She has repudiated the formalistic (and perennially shifting) definitions of torture as whatever-it-is-we-don't-do. She has admitted that there is a medical and legal definition for torture and also that we have crossed the line into it." Who is this Susan J. Crawford? None other than the former "general counsel for the Army during the Reagan administration."