'Why we put Milosevic away'
The deputy Prime Minister of the former Yugoslavia spoke today of his country’s bold decision to send Slobodan Milosevic to face justice.
Miroljub Labus was speaking during an international donor conference in Brussels which is expected to pledge nearly £1bn later today towards the cost of rebuilding the war-ravaged nation.
Mr Labus declared: ‘‘We promised the clear cut-off with the past. We are on the way.’’
Urging 45 countries including the 15 EU member states, America, Russia, and Japan to give generously, the deputy Prime Minister said: ‘‘We want to share the burden of costs with the international community. We want an efficient partnership, and for the donors this will be an investment in the future of Yugoslavia and the stability of the region.’’
He added: ‘‘Investing in the future is definitely a much better option than bearing the costs of conceivable future instabilities and havoc.’’
Mr Labus said his country was back on the ‘‘fast track’’ to Europe, determined to implement its international obligations: ‘‘The chapter of conflicts in the territory of former Yugoslavia is closed and the conditions for future co-operation are created. We are fully back in the international community politically, diplomatically and financially.’’
He said the fact that the donor conference coincidentally came only hours after Mr Milosevic was put behind bars in the Hague made it a meeting with extra symbolic value.
But in practical terms it was just the beginning of the process of rehabilitation.
Today, he said, he expected no extra financial backing to be generated simply because of Mr Milosevic’s incarceration: ‘‘I hope we will meet the target’’.
One of the first firm pledges came from the European Commission, committing a total of £320 million in grants and loans cash from the EU budget in addition to any individual donations from the 15 member states.
Britain’s contribution was expected to be pledged later today, at the end of talks about the scope and scale of a ‘‘recovery and transition programme’’ for the former Yugoslavia lasting until the end of 2004.
Heading the six-strong UK delegation was Simon Ray, head of the Central Eastern Europe Department at the Department for International Development.
Like the hundreds of others from national governments and international agencies attending the conference, Mr Ray went to the donor table with a flexible financial mandate which will be delivered only after the formalities of assessing needs and securing the necessary guarantees over the use of funding have been completed.
The cash target of nearly £1 billion is the sum required for the rest of this year: the total figure for the next three to four years is put at close to £3 billion pounds.
