Headline from Serbia could just as well be from U.S.
The headline and story: "Bosnian Serb police chief turned over to UN court" First some details from the story:
Jun 21st, 2008 | BELGRADE, Serbia -- Serb authorities Saturday turned over an ex-Bosnian Serb police chief to the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal in the Netherlands.
Stojan Zupljanin was arrested in the town of Pancevo last week after nine years on the run. A Belgrade court on Friday rejected his appeal against extradition.
"Stojan upljanin was transferred today into the tribunal's custody, after evading justice for more than eight years," the court in The Hague, Netherlands, confirmed. Details of the transfer routinely are not disclosed.
Serbia has been under pressure from the European Union to turn over suspects to the international tribunal, which has charged Zupljanin with war crimes for allegedly overseeing Serb-run prison camps where thousands of Muslims and Croats were killed during the 1992-95 war in Bosnia.
The EU has stressed that all the suspects sought by the tribunal must be arrested and extradited if Belgrade wants to move closer to the 27-nation bloc." (Click here for the entire story posted on Salon.com.)
You could substitute the name Donald Rumsfeld, Cheney or Bush, for that matter, for that of the Serbian Police Chief or former President Slobodan Milosevic, it is possible the same story could play out here, based upon suspected approved torture techniques from our government and played out in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib.
The question I put to you is this, do we as citizens have the courage to consider this request if it were made of us? Would we be willing to turn over any of our citizens to be tried in the World Court at the Hague in the Netherlands? We insist other countries do, as does the EU make similar requests, as they have in this example. We must elevate our morality and sense of justice, instead of entitlement, to consider these larger questions. I would love to hear from you as to what you believe we should do faced with a similar request from other governments or the U.N. Leave a comment.
Jun 21st, 2008 | BELGRADE, Serbia -- Serb authorities Saturday turned over an ex-Bosnian Serb police chief to the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal in the Netherlands.
Stojan Zupljanin was arrested in the town of Pancevo last week after nine years on the run. A Belgrade court on Friday rejected his appeal against extradition.
"Stojan upljanin was transferred today into the tribunal's custody, after evading justice for more than eight years," the court in The Hague, Netherlands, confirmed. Details of the transfer routinely are not disclosed.
Serbia has been under pressure from the European Union to turn over suspects to the international tribunal, which has charged Zupljanin with war crimes for allegedly overseeing Serb-run prison camps where thousands of Muslims and Croats were killed during the 1992-95 war in Bosnia.
The EU has stressed that all the suspects sought by the tribunal must be arrested and extradited if Belgrade wants to move closer to the 27-nation bloc." (Click here for the entire story posted on Salon.com.)
You could substitute the name Donald Rumsfeld, Cheney or Bush, for that matter, for that of the Serbian Police Chief or former President Slobodan Milosevic, it is possible the same story could play out here, based upon suspected approved torture techniques from our government and played out in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib.
The question I put to you is this, do we as citizens have the courage to consider this request if it were made of us? Would we be willing to turn over any of our citizens to be tried in the World Court at the Hague in the Netherlands? We insist other countries do, as does the EU make similar requests, as they have in this example. We must elevate our morality and sense of justice, instead of entitlement, to consider these larger questions. I would love to hear from you as to what you believe we should do faced with a similar request from other governments or the U.N. Leave a comment.
Labels: 2nd term of Bush, Abu Ghraib, Cheney, EU, Guantanamo, Rumsfeld, Serbia, torture, War Crimes, World Court
posted by Charles Amico at 6:37 AM
3 Comments:
Charles, You sound very much like a progressive Democrat! Our local club, the Democratic Club of Claremont has wirtten a document that matches such solutions as you suggest.
Our web site is: claremontdems.org. (The dates for meetings, etc., are outdated but the information about "The Claremont Manifesto" remains current.
Carolee Monroe
Carolee, I went to your website and wondered have you all stopped what you were doing? The site looks like it hasn't been touched in 2 years. The ideas were good and the Resolutions noteworthy. Has the group dissolved?
Charles, our club is functioning but we are all volunteers, including the position of webmaster. That position is changing hands. When completed, I believe visitors to the site will be able to access our television programs, besides being updated on meetings and speakers. Dowell Myers spoke at our last luncheon - his presentation on the interdependency of immigrants and boomers packed a powerful punch: "When you (Boomer) retire, who's going to buy your house?" Also, "Cherish every student - educate them" (so they can afford to support our system.) And, the birthrates in European countries are so low they import workers. Our TV program next month will feature Terry Masl, who advocated for the homeless of Ontario's Tent City, possibly a model for other cities. Our Resolutions are one of the products, besides the "Manifesto" of our own Friday luncheon Think Tank begun by Werner Warmbrunn.
We are very active - but not always on top of computer technology.
Carolee
Post a Comment
<< Home