Croatia Faces Mounting Pressure to Deliver War Crimes Fugitive to The Hague

07/03/2005

Croatia has only days left to hand over a key war crimes fugitive to the UN war crimes tribunal, EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn has said, warning that failure to do so will result in postponing the start of accession talks.

(The Guardian - 07/03/05; HINA - 06/03/05; AFP, BBC Monitoring - 05/03/05; Reuters, EurActiv - 04/03/05)

Fugitive General Ante Gotovina must be apprehended in the next ten days for Croatia's EU accession talks to begin on time. [File]

Time is running out for Croatia to prove it is fully co-operating with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn has said. In an interview published by the Croatian daily <I>Jutarnji List</I> on Saturday (5 March), Rehn warned that accession talks will not start on 17 March, as scheduled, unless retired General Ante Gotovina is delivered to The Hague.

"I hope [authorties] will be successful in fulfilling the goal of locating and transferring Gotovina, so that we can open negotiations in time," Rehn said. "But the time is short and they have to do everything possible in the time that is left."

Gotovina, 49, is one of the ICTY's three most-wanted indictees. He has been charged with war crimes committed by troops under his command towards the end of the 1991-1995 conflict in Croatia, including the unlawful killings of at least 150 Krajina Serbs and the expulsion of tens of thousands of others. A former French Foreign Legion member, Gotovina has also been convicted in France on charges of extortion, bank robbery and abduction.

The general has been on the run for nearly four years now. ICTY and other Western officials believe a network of supporters, including senior officials, is protecting him.

In December, EU leaders gave the go-ahead for the start of Croatia's membership talks on 17 March, but made it conditional on Gotovina's handover to the ICTY.

Croatian authorities say they have stepped up their efforts to catch the fugitive in recent weeks, while continuing to insist he is not in the country. Quoting EU diplomatic sources, Reuters reported Friday that Croatia has proposed a deal to several member states that support its bid.

"The Croats are suggesting starting talks even without the ICTY certifying they are co-operating fully," Reuters quoted an unnamed diplomat as saying. "In return, the EU would send a monitoring team to sit, presumably in the Croatian Justice Ministry, to be able to verify that the Croatian government is telling the truth when they say they couldn't do any more."

Rehn, however, and most other European officials appear to agree with chief UN war crimes prosecutor Carla del Ponte, who told the EU last month that Gotovina was within reach. Croatian authorities could have arrested him by now if they had the political will to do so, she said.

On Thursday, EU ambassadors are scheduled to discuss the status of Croatia's EU bid. Foreign ministers of EU member states are expected to make a final decision on whether the talks should go ahead as planned once they receive a new assessment by del Ponte.

In a telephone interview with the Croatian news agency HINA, del Ponte's spokeswoman suggested that the prosecutor could hardly be expected to certify that Croatia has met that condition without Gotovina in the dock. "As far as the tribunal is concerned, what has to be done as part of full co-operation has not been done yet," said Florence Hartmann.