Balkan poison

The suicide yesterday of Slobodan Praljak at the Un-mandated International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) is a multifaceted scandal. First: how did Praljak, a former Bosnian Croat soldier found guilty of war crimes against Bosnian Muslims in 1993, smuggle poison into the courtroom? The astonishment on the face of the presiding judge as Praljak responded to his sentence by drinking a deadly draught made clear just how extraordinary the breach was – reminiscent of Goering’s death by cyanide capsule on the eve of his execution in 1946.

The wider scandal, however, is the extent to which the ICTY has failed in its original mission to mete out widely accepted justice and so sow reconciliation among the Balkans’ different ethnic and sectarian groups. The depressing truth is that, almost a quarter of a century on from the fighting which saw so many grotesque crimes committed – on all sides – much of the Balkans is as divided as ever. Not only that but nationalists have returned to power. In Serbia, convicted war criminals are lauded as heroes. Some, like Vojislav Šešelj, the ultra-nationalist and leading proponent of ethniccleansing who spent 12 years in jail, have been welcomed back to the Serb parliament. He, like many in Belgrade, views the ICTY as an instrument of the West designed to punish the Serbs unfairly.

Such complaints are particularly bitter, but Serbs are not alone. Praljak repeatedly shouted “I’m not a war criminal” before drinking his poison, and across the Balkans the refusal to accept culpability for crimes which cost several hundred thousand lives is both enduring and widespread. The region, at the heart of Europe, is not about to return to war. But it is by no means out of the woods yet.