Ante Gotovina seized.

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4510122.stm

Surprise surprise. Apparently the Croatian government really held up to its promise to EU and helped in his capture. Of course they'll not admit involvement since the guy is pretty much a national hero around there. This should ease up EU negotiations with Croatia quite a bit, unfortunaetly if the Milosevic trials has shown us anything it's the inefficency of Hague so we'll see if the guy is actually sentenced in my lifetime, a positive turn of events never the less and one I did not expect to happen anytime soon.

 

Yeah, good, was thinking about posting about it. Karadzic and Mladic will never get caught though.

 

Let's see about that, plenty of time yet, and time is what Karadzic & Mladic is short of...

 

Karadzic and Mladic will be a lot more difficult to get, but I believe that Croatia has set a very good example and if they get to join EU soon it will probably encourage the other Balkan governments to co operate. The relations between Serbia and EU are pretty tense now with the Kosovo negotiations so I think a lot will depend also on the outcome of those negotiations.

 

Yes for now it seems defficault, but who knows what will happen in just three years? Eventually they will get caught.

 

Expect to grow old and wither before they are caught. They will always be welcome in Russia.
Who cares about joining EU? I hope Serbia never does; and if these western twits doing the negotiations try to give "Kosovo" - something which never existed in History - independence, than, well, there will be a blood bath. I am sure they won't risk the whole situation doing so though.

 

I'm not so sure about them being welcome in Russia. I mean I can understand that some Russians such as yourself would welcome them with open arms but what's the official policy of the current Russian adminstration regarding Karadzic and Mladic? As far as I know they have condemned Srebrenica and the actions of Karadzic and Mladic, but I can't say I'm completely certain.

As for Serbia and EU, the current adminstartion of Serbia has had several negotiations with EU about joining in, the date is set at 2011. I can hardly see the point why Serbia would negotiate with EU about membership if they had no intentions of joining it? Also Croatia is about to join the EU and Bosnia is also showing increased will to join, so I think there are quite a few countries that do actually care about joining EU.

Lastly about independent Kosovo. I don't think it will happen, an autonomous Kosovo under Serbia is much more likely or a similar union as they have with Montenegro. The UN has made it clear that autonomy and independence are the only options available and Serbia should be willing to accept autonomy, the problem is that the Albanian majority of Kosovo demand independence.

The way I see it, the cooperation of the Serbian government is the only way to get these guys. They probably have false identities like Gotovina had so revealing those will be up to the Serbian government.

EDIT: Serbia Montenegro will be joining earliest at 2015 according to this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/europe/04/enlarging_europe/html/serbia_montenegro.stm

Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rhen talked about 2011 when I saw him on a local talk-show.

[ December 09, 2005, 14:30: Message edited by: Morgoroth ]

 

I'm well aware about Russias feelings towards Serbia, but then again Mladic & Karadzic isn't probably worth having around in Russia considering the consequenses.

 

What consequences? For EU it would be incredibly stupid to try to do anything against Russia. Whatever we did it would probably hurt us more than them considering that we are highly dependant upon Russian oil at the moment. The US is unlikely to do anything about it either, they do not seem very interested in getting Karadzic or Mladic. It's pretty much an European issue anyway.

Anyway I'm a bit sceptical about Russia giving them asylum, atleast not publicly. However I don't think that the Russian government would much care for searching for them or capturing them either.

 

Yes, you are not wrong, but we all know official positions don't mean much. If the Russian goverment would actually help getting either of them, it would not be good to their image.
Condemning their actions is the maximum you can expect from Putin. Of course he could disapoint me; it would not be the first time actually.

I don't think the refferendum would ever be condoned by the people, who are very proud. Plus, the EU is not willing to accept new applications since it's last expansion. Croatia might might be an exception because of Austria's pressure.

I agree with your analysis, although I think this is totally BS! Kosovo has never existed, and there was NO Republic under that name in Jugoslavia. That twit Tito was the one screwing up borders and encouraging albanian migration to the region.

Kinda, but then yet Putin did next to nothing to guarantee the rights of Russians in the Baltics, in the hand of those SS nazis; just like he abandoned Russians in the hands of asiatic despotic rulers in places like Turkmenistan, when he should be acting much tougher. So I doubt he has such bargain power on his hands right now.