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Democracy Development Fund Sends Letter to Gabriella Kirk McDonald, Judge of the Hague Tribunal
January 25, 1999



We are acquainted with your stands, which you did not succeed to present at the Conference held in Belgrade recently and, citing your statement in which you said that it would be right if the people in former Yugoslavia better understood what The Hague Tribunal was all about, we feel free to set out some points of your report:

-You say that Yugoslavia's non-cooperation with the Tribunal means "disrespect of the international law and decisions of 185 UN member-countries".

As far as we know, Yugoslavia is for respecting of the "international law" in which work it has participated itself. We are not convinced that Yugoslavia does not respect and that it rejects the decisions of 185 UN members. We are of the opinion that Yugoslavia insists on the right and decisions of all UN members, which implies also the forming of a legal, Permanent international criminal court, authorized for Yugoslavia, U.S.A. and all other UN members under the same conditions and criteria.

-You say: "I energetically deny that the Tribunal functions as a political institution", with a remark that the Tribunal is an "instrument of the international community".

We think that the Tribunal is not an instrument of the international community, but of the U.S.A. and several other countries that have used the Security Council for forming of the Tribunal which would serve their purposes.

The Tribunal, as an instrument of the international community, can be only the PERMANENT INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL TRIBUNAL, founded in Rome on July 19, 1998. That Tribunal, recognized also by Yugoslavia, would be authorized for all the Yugoslav citizens, U.S.A., etc. As you know, the U.S.A. do not want that Tribunal and are trying to prevent its forming, because they are not sure if that Tribunal would show understanding for their "way of protection of human rights" in Hiroshima, Panama, Granada, Corea, Vietnam, Iraq, Libya, Iran, Somalia, Republika Srpska, Serbia... It turned out that the interest of 120 founder-countries of the Tribunal, i.e. all the UN members is not in line with the interests of the U.S.A., Israel and five other UN member-countries. We ask you, as being the Federal Investigative Judge of the State of Texas, do you believe that the Security Council would have taken the risk of forming of your Tribunal if it had not been sure that it would that way legalize the resolutions on villification and isolation of the Serbian people?

Do you believe that the U.S.A. would participate in the financing of the Tribunal, if they were not sure about the outcome of its decisions?

You say: "We do not stigmatize the entire groups of people, we think the individuals are responsible for the crimes".

If it were really true, we would be happy. Our impression and our position point to the fact that the Serbian people has been villificated and accused by the Tribunal to be an aggressor, while only the individuals have been stigmatized among the citizens of the secessionist republics.

-You say: "Any indictment means only an accusation and the accused ones have the right to be presumed innocent".

You are informed about the cases of releasing the accused from prisons due to lack of evidence and about the cases of wounding and killing of the accused during their kidnapping and arrest. It was the reason why we demanded from the Tribunal on February 9, 1998 to answer the following questions:

1. In which way the damage is to be paid and from whom we can demand it in cases when an unjustified accusation, persecution or arrest of persons was confirmed to be carried out by the Tribunal?

2. Will the Tribunal bring charges against the persons, who as the media have reported, during the war have sent medicines of which around 60% had their time limits expired or were prohibited, while those persons have called it humanitarian aid?

3. Will the Tribunal check the authenticity of information of information that the NATO units had used projectiles filled with uranium and other chemicals during the bombing of the Serbs in Bosnia?

In the Tribunal's response. i.e. the one of Mr. Graham T. Blewitt, from March 3, 1998, it was said that the Statute and the Tribunal's Regulations did not contain regulations concerning the payment for damage in such cases. Mr. Blewitt's answer to the rest of our questions was "I am now informed".

We also asked the following question: Would the Tribunal be authorized for the officials of Vatican, U.N., NATO, U.S.A., CNN... if there was evidence that they had committed the following punishable acts listed in an article of the Tribunal's Statute: "PLANNING, INDUCING, ORDERING OR IN ANY OTHER WAY PARTICIPATING IN PLANNING, PREPARING OR COMMITTING THE CRIMES AGAINST HUMANENESS".

We believe that, by answering the aforementioned questions, you would contribute to the fulfilling of your wish for the Serbs in Serbia to "better understand what the Tribunal is".





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