A Game of Robes

Sometime last week, a letter by a Danish judge at the "International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia" (ICTY, aka the Hague Inquisition) was leaked to the media. In the letter, Frederik Harhoff complained about heavy-handed American influence at the Tribunal, and went on to suggest that American and Israeli (?!) officials were trying to influence certain trials so as to protect themselves from future prosecution.

That the ICTY has been little more than a tool of the Empire has been obvious for years. Harhoff's letter and wikileaked cables only confirm it. The Inquisition indicts, tries and convicts - or releases - only those the Empire has fingered. Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic were charged with war crimes when Washington wanted them cut out of the peace talks in 1995. Slobodan Milosevic was charged at the point when NATO's air war had stalled and needed a legitimacy boost. Proceedings against Vojislav Seselj have dragged on for a decade now, on spurious charges of "hate speech", because removing him from Serbian politics served the needs of Empire's puppet government.

And while the trials of any and all Serb officials sought to criminalize the Serbs' existence (let alone the cause and conduct of the war), the trial of Croatian generals released on appeal was a farce. Admittedly, not a very competent one - the Tribunal could have tried to legitimize both itself and the Croatian narrative of the war without playing fast and loose with the doctrine of "joint criminal enterprise" - but one gets the impression the ICTY is a sinecure for second-rate jurists in the same way the "peace missions" in Bosnia and occupied Kosovo have provided jobs for otherwise unemployable Eurocrats and Washington backbenchers. (Exceptions such as Prisca Nyambe of Zambia only prove the rule.)

Not surprisingly, it was Harhoff's conspiracy theory about the U.S. and Israel that attracted the most media attention. Few actually dare question the Imperial narrative of the Yugoslav Wars that the ICTY has helped establish. According to the Danish jurist, the acquittals of Croatian generals and Serbian security chiefs were supposed to weaken the doctrine of command responsibility, because it could land U.S. and Israeli leaders in hot water somewhere down the line.

Erm, no.

The conviction and release of the Croatian generals was a simple ICTY farce, one seen before in the case of Naser Oric and later Ramush Haradinaj. The indictment and conviction are supposed to create the impression the ICTY is a real, impartial, legitimate court of law - which is then followed by a release on appeal. Of actual law and justice, there is nary a trace.

Furthermore, as a fellow blogger pointed out, the ICTY has a habit of prosecuting only the alleged crimes against the designated victim groups. Hence, Serbs and (Bosnian) Croats get the (ICTY-written) book thrown at them for killing (Bosnian) Muslims, the few KLA are punished only for killing fellow Albanians, while no one ever gets punished for killing Serbs.

As for the recently acquitted Serbs, both Gen. Perisic and security chief Stanisic (and presumably his underling, Simatovic) actually worked for the CIA. Perisic had been an asset since 1997, and was caught red-handed in 2002; during his trial, Stanisic had confessed to working with the CIA since 1992. And since at this point Washington is convinced that Serbia has been conquered and irreversibly broken, releasing used-up assets instead of throwing them under the proverbial bus was probably judged to serve imperial purposes better.

What has any of this to do with American or Israeli officials covering their behinds? Nothing. Precisely. Neither the ICTY, nor its more permanent successor, the ICC, have any jurisdiction over Americans - the Empire has made sure it remains above the law, even as it uses it as a truncheon to break any resistance to its designs. The Imperial establishment not only doesn't fear prosecution, the thought of ever being taken to account for their deeds - abroad or at home - hardly ever crosses their minds. I've said as much in an interview for RT's Truth Seeker, airing tonight.

Israel similarly refused to submit to ICC jurisdiction - and moreover, has zero interaction with the ICTY.  So why did Harhoff mention it at all? Perhaps, as one Russian commentator noted (link in Serbian), because Harhoff's "leak" was a deliberate ploy in an internal Inquisition conflict: though in the past the leadership of the Tribunal rotated between America and the EU, the Empire now seeks to re-appoint Theodor Meron (American and Jewish) out of turn, in order to retain control. If this is true, it explains Harhoff's seemingly baffling conspiracy theory: dragging Israel into the mix is aimed at discrediting Meron personally. Sounds like something Littlefinger would do.

Aren't you glad that the Hague Inquisition is such an altruistic, professional, law-abiding and justice-seeking institution, completely devoid of the taint of politics?