Just as Novak Djokovic showed off the best of Serbia with his Wimbledon win yesterday, so today the world saw the worst - war crimes suspect Ratko Mladic at The Hague.
Just as soon as Novak Djokovic showed the world the best Serbia has to offer, the engraving barely cold on his Wimbledon trophy, so the world witnessed the very worst: Bosnian Serb war crimes suspect Ratko Mladic back at the War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague, defiant, unrepentant, disruptive, unapologetic.
Today Mladic was removed from his hearing after quarrelling with the judge, the court entering a plea of not guilty on his behalf. He faces a total of 11 counts of genocide of Bosniaks and Bosnian Croats in Bosnia-Hercegovina and Srebrenica; persecutions; extermination and murder; deportation and inhumane acts; terror and unlawful attacks; and the taking of UN hostages.
He is charged in connection with the Srebrenica massacre – Europe’s single worst atrocity since World War Two – in which 7,500 Muslims were massacred, and is also charged over the 44-month siege of Sarajevo from May 1992 – in which 10,000 people died.
So, how easy will it be for new Serbia to consign Mladic, Slobodan Milosevic and Radovan Karadzic to the past? And what does the future hold for the Serbia of Djokovic and president Boris Tadic?
The arrest and prosecution of Mladic, and the determination of Tadic to face down the ultra-nationalists who protested his capture, will do much to accelerate Serbia’s rehabilitaion, removing one of the key barriers to accession to the European Union; Djokovic’s advance to the summit of the tennis world rankings, and his imperious dethroning of Rafael Nadal at Wimbledon the icing on the cake.
Certainly, the unreconstructed elements are still there, from the pro-Milosevic graffiti scrawled on walls in central Belgrade and the selling of Mladic t-shirts at Belgrade’s main train station, to the subtle distrust of foreigners – or at least those who obviously look like foreigners.
Yet in Tadic and Djokovic – the man every Serbian boy wants to be, and every Serbian girl wants to be with, whose visage adorns billboard after advert after magazine cover – the future is brighter for Serbia than perhaps it’s ever been, even more than after the fall of Milosevic a decade ago.
As Misha Glenny wrote in The Guardian recently:
“It was fitting that Serbia’s president, Boris Tadić, himself announced the arrest of Ratko Mladić in Belgrade. Nobody has put in a greater effort to run down the indicted war crimes suspect than Tadić… What Boris Tadić has done with Mladić is to take a huge step towards the moral rehabilitation of Serbs and Serbia whose reputation was so catastrophically compromised by the wars of the 1990s.
“He deserves our support and respect.”
Though one can never forget the horrors of Milosevic, Mladic and Karadzic, nor should, Serbia now is a much changed place, its leaders looking outwards, to the future, to Europe, to the world, where its favoured son now sits atop.
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60 Responses to “Two faces of Republika Srbija: the hopeful future, the shameful past”
Shamik Das
Dear Rod P,
It is obvious which country I am writing about – Serbia, aka Republika Srbija – and not, I repeat not, Republika Srpska – about which confusion appears to have been sown.
I utterly refute your comment that this is done in bad taste, is in any way spiteful or connects Novak to genocide. How can it be any of those things? This is an article in praise of Novak, Tadic and modern Serbia.
Regards,
Shamik
SlashedUK
RT @leftfootfwd: Two faces of Republika Srbija: the hopeful future, the shameful past: http://bit.ly/lVj1rh – @ShamikDas reports #NewsClub
Carol Wain
RT @leftfootfwd: Two faces of Republika Srbija: the hopeful future, the shameful past: http://bit.ly/lVj1rh – @ShamikDas reports #NewsClub
Darko Petrovic
As a Serbian reader I must agree with Rod P. You How can it be? Well, it is very distasteful and unfair towards the Serb people that you are attempting to state that the Djokovic win has been just as viewed and important as some incident at The Hague. It is a shame that the American media is constantly referring to Serbia’s dark days in an attempt to overshadow any of its great successes over the past few years, especially since Novak has made two remarkable achievements in just a couple of days. Again, this comes as no surprise since the US media is not exactly free from bias. By doing this, and continually vilifying us Serbs, it is no wonder that the Serbian people still have bitter sentimen towards the United States. I am a pro Tadic supporter, which means I am also a pro Serb reformist, and wish nothing more than for my Serbia to become a modern nation. This is just a dream now, but we will continue to reform, improve our image and battle this kind of negative media attention which attempt to cover all of the wonderful things that Serbs have done in history (e.g. huge efforts in World Wars) with one specific event (Srebrenica).
Zivela Srbija! Well done Djokovic.
Regards,
Darko Petrovic
Noleisthebest
you are an idiot..it’s sad how people don understand that propaganda is being spread everyday across the world ..therefore you dont understand that everything you think you know is incorrect or simply made up..you dont know of the events that took place before srebrnica where serbian people died [because american and some other media didnt mention it or there hasnt been a fucking movie about it] and you dont know that the numbers which you wrote are almost completely made up..you dont know this because you’ve never experienced it and so you believe everything you hear or see..so why the fuck dont you talk about americas shameful past , heck , why dont you talk about americas shameful present..america threw a nuclear bomb on japan and killed over a million innocent people ..but hey no problem ..they bombarded belgrade along with nato and also killed a bunch of civilians but THATS not important..what they are doing in irac,lybia and elsewhere – also not important..by the way tadic is a moron and people in serbia mosly hate him because he is a liar and a thief..