He is baaaaack
dailynews.yahoo.com
Milosevic Strikes Back with Defiant Speech
By Julijana Mojsilovic
BELGRADE (Reuters) - Slobodan Milosevic (news -
web sites) made a defiant return to the political center
stage on Saturday, denouncing the mass uprising which
forced him from power as a coup and branding his
opponents thieves.
The former Yugoslav president, blamed by the West for
four Balkan wars in the last decade, delivered the attack at a special congress
of his Socialist Party to prepare for Serbian parliamentary elections due on
December 23.
``Everybody in this hall knows what kind of violence and lawlessness has
taken place since the coup on October 5,'' Milosevic, wearing a dark suit,
pale shirt and red tie, told the congress on the outskirts of Belgrade.
Milosevic, 59, was referring to a wave of popular takeovers at state
companies and institutions after his overthrow. His opponents say some quick
changes were necessary to remove the authoritarian leader's corrupt cronies
from key positions.
After he admitted defeat to Vojislav Kostunica (news - web sites), Milosevic
-- who is also president of the Socialist party -- first disappeared from public
view completely. But his return to prominence on Saturday appeared
assiduously prepared.
First, reports leaked out that he had begun to attend party meetings again.
Then he was shown on state television twice in the week leading up to the
congress rallying senior Socialist officials at meetings and calling for unity.
Senior Socialists have declared him the only candidate for the post of party
leader, although some delegates refused to rule out the possibility that one or
more challengers could emerge during the one-day congress.
No Sign Of Bowing Out
Both Milosevic's words and his demeanor gave no indication that he plans to
withdraw from political life, as demanded by Western governments and
opponents at home who want to try him for war crimes or abuses of power.
He strode calmly up to the main doors of Belgrade's Sava Centre conference
hall to enter the congress, protected by a phalanx of dark-suited security
guards and applauded by a few dozen supporters. He ignored reporters'
questions.
In his speech, he accused the party's opponents of trying to rewrite the
history of last year's NATO (news - web sites) bombing of Yugoslavia.
``The situation is absurd. Those who defended the country and were in the
country during the war are declared as enemies now,'' television showed
Milosevic telling the congress, which was closed to most media organizations.
``Those who fled the country, supported the bombing and cooperated with
the aggressors are now appearing in the role of patriots and saviors of the
country,'' he added. ``Thieves are calling honest people thieves.''
Milosevic and his Socialists, successors to the League of Communists which
ran the old Yugoslavia for more than four decades after World War Two,
suffered stinging defeats in September's Yugoslav parliamentary and
presidential polls.
The unfamiliar feeling of defeat has plunged the Socialists into crisis and
several top officials have quit the party.
But Milosevic said most of the blame for the downfall of the old ruling
coalition lay in a failure to show unity, particularly by the ultra-nationalist
Radical party.
Some Socialists hope to profit from discontent with Yugoslavia's new rulers
as the country makes the painful transition from state-run to market economy.
But opinion polls, though not always reliable guides in the Balkans, give the
Socialists little chance. |
