Carla Del Ponte's memoir

A lot of double standard of who was to be prosecuted. Also political inteference by U.S. and British governments in the work of the ICTY. Just one example was the bombing campaign by NATO on Serbia. As it started out they went after military targets as it progressed NATO realized more the U.S. that they were not getting any where with the effort they were putting in. The returns were minuscule things were even getting worse. The Serbs had hidden their military assets to well put up dummy tanks and missile sites. NATO was getting very frustrated as time went by. In the news reports in North America the Americans said they would change their tactics. They would go after the civilian targets and that would produce civilian casualties. So that the civilians would turn against the government. Low and behold that is what NATO did mostly the U.S. with ever increasing number of civilian targets were hit and civilian deaths and casualty's increased also. That is a war crime targeting civilians deliberately. Carla Del Ponte tried to get the information from NATO country's and governments but was blocked or ignored as a person non grata. Even the evidence on the ground testifies to NATO,s frustration when the Serb forces went out of Kosovo and NATO went in. NATO reported that their bombing campaign original claims of destruction of the Serb military assets and forces were exaggerated not even 5% what they claimed originally. But NATO made sure that the unarmed Serb civilians did pay the price. I'm not a fan of Carla I think she was a very mediocre Chief Prosecutor. Not even her colleagues that worked with her had any good say about and the way she handled the job. It was Carla all the way only me and my way.

Dear Ex-Ambassador,

The stench of self-delusion and denial oozes from your words.

The Balkans remains a mess because of political decisions made by selfish leaders within the region and without. You, as the point man for the State Dept., are just as guilty as CdP for creating and sustaining that mess with inappropriate, biased and counter-productive coercive policy.

CdP blames everybody for the failure of ICTY. In turn, you blame her.

Instead of trying to pass blame round for your collective past and current policy failures, don't you think it's high time sensible and reasonable policy be introduced that can actually lead people in the region towards a better future?

Dear Mr. Montgomery,
I would love you to have this debate with John Pilger and Noam Chomsky.

I don't think you could get away with any of what you have just said. These men have a lot of information and knowledge of what went on there and you would not be able to defend these ridiculous statements you have just made.

Carla does not have a soft spot for Serbs, that was always obvious, but even that is not good enough for you. You want nothing less than hatred and propaganda from her otherwise you will attack her observations.

Interesting that he didn't really talk about the allegations of organ smuggling. The allegation that the Serbs were killed and harvested for their organs, the allegation that some in the region, like Albania, were responsible. I think that if the Serbs were accused of that, it would have made a bigger impact in this article. But of course we're dealing with Westerners who rarely regard Serbian lives to be equal to an American life, therefore stories of Serbs being sold for their livers and kidneys seems to have been unimportant.

And of course you'll never hear him talk about the war crimes the USA has committed. The fact that the Bosnian war could've ended early if not for American pressure on the Bosnians to veto a peace deal. What, is that not a war crime? They were responsible. Or how about the bombing of the TV station in Belgrade? Or the bombing of the train in which Spanish pilots were recorded being given orders to hit it. Or the use of cluster bombs in a market which killed several people in Serbia. All of these things will rarely get mentioned. And of course let's not get into the fact that the largest ethnic cleansing, KRAJINA, was supported by the USA. But of course, let's not talk about that either.

Americans were surprised by 9-11, but most Serbs were not. Most Arabs were not. Those who had the fortune of being bombed by the Americans were not surprised.

Oh, this is about Tribunal. No need to comment on that.

"the approach of her office was to assume that all the senior leaders on all sides of the conflict were guilty of war crimes"
Getting all sides to see that they have done crimes is a good start and it certainly would make reconciliation more easy. But I am less happy with the focus on the leaders. I have always considered it an error to indict Milosevic. Once you start indicting heads of state you end up with indicting the president of the US and that just doesn't work. A second problem with a focus on the leaders is that it is too abstract and that there is often too little evidence. If Milosevic had been convicted the very probable result would have been that the other parties held it up as a sign of their moral superiority while it would hardly convince a Serb (the process until now was far from convincing).

Instead I believe that the ICTY should concentrate on concrete events: Srebrenica, Foca, Omarska, but also Operations Storm and Lighting. I believe that if ICTY had immediately thrown itself upon Operation Lightning Srebrenica would have never happened. Unfortunately the US embraced the ideology of ethnic cleansing at this point and even blocked a condemnation of Operation Lighning in the Security Council.

Sometimes I do not understand why you publish articles like this one. The editor(s) should know that The International Criminal Court (ICC or ICCt) was established in 2002 as a permanent tribunal to prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, etc. The editor(s) should know that this ex-ambassador comes from the country that does not recognize this court. Dear ex-amabasador, please tell me how you can have a face and tell us the words such as this: “As the U.S. Ambassador in Croatia from 1998-2000 and in Serbia from then until 2004, one of my highest priorities - as directed by my government - was the transfer of indictees to The Hague along with supporting documentation of war crimes.”
Shame on you and your country. If you want to make any contributions, you should first joined the 106 states that are members of this court.

I found no reason at all in this article for the author's contention that Del Ponte was to blame for non-Serb war criminals going free in Kosovo, as well as Bosnia. People like Haradinaj and Naser Oric went free after the powers behind the ICTY pressed for it. Del ponte was the prosecutor trying to stick them behind bars. How was that her legacy? She didn't run the court. She was the prosecutor. the court was run by judges and the NATO countries that set it up, and if Montgomery wants to blame anyone for letting Oric and Haradinaj go free, he has to blame the USA, the UK, France, Germany, Netherlands, etc.

Dear Ex-Ambassador,

The stench of self-delusion and denial oozes from your words.

The Balkans remains a mess because of political decisions made by selfish leaders within the region and without. You, as the point man for the State Dept., are just as guilty as CdP for creating and sustaining that mess with inappropriate, biased and counter-productive coercive policy.

CdP blames everybody for the failure of ICTY. In turn, you blame her.

Instead of trying to pass blame round for your collective past and current policy failures, don't you think it's high time sensible and reasonable policy be introduced that can actually lead people in the region towards a better future?

Oh, this is about Tribunal. No need to comment on that.

A lot of double standard of who was to be prosecuted. Also political inteference by U.S. and British governments in the work of the ICTY. Just one example was the bombing campaign by NATO on Serbia. As it started out they went after military targets as it progressed NATO realized more the U.S. that they were not getting any where with the effort they were putting in. The returns were minuscule things were even getting worse. The Serbs had hidden their military assets to well put up dummy tanks and missile sites. NATO was getting very frustrated as time went by. In the news reports in North America the Americans said they would change their tactics. They would go after the civilian targets and that would produce civilian casualties. So that the civilians would turn against the government. Low and behold that is what NATO did mostly the U.S. with ever increasing number of civilian targets were hit and civilian deaths and casualty's increased also. That is a war crime targeting civilians deliberately. Carla Del Ponte tried to get the information from NATO country's and governments but was blocked or ignored as a person non grata. Even the evidence on the ground testifies to NATO,s frustration when the Serb forces went out of Kosovo and NATO went in. NATO reported that their bombing campaign original claims of destruction of the Serb military assets and forces were exaggerated not even 5% what they claimed originally. But NATO made sure that the unarmed Serb civilians did pay the price. I'm not a fan of Carla I think she was a very mediocre Chief Prosecutor. Not even her colleagues that worked with her had any good say about and the way she handled the job. It was Carla all the way only me and my way.

Dear Mr. Montgomery,
I would love you to have this debate with John Pilger and Noam Chomsky.

I don't think you could get away with any of what you have just said. These men have a lot of information and knowledge of what went on there and you would not be able to defend these ridiculous statements you have just made.

Carla does not have a soft spot for Serbs, that was always obvious, but even that is not good enough for you. You want nothing less than hatred and propaganda from her otherwise you will attack her observations.

Interesting that he didn't really talk about the allegations of organ smuggling. The allegation that the Serbs were killed and harvested for their organs, the allegation that some in the region, like Albania, were responsible. I think that if the Serbs were accused of that, it would have made a bigger impact in this article. But of course we're dealing with Westerners who rarely regard Serbian lives to be equal to an American life, therefore stories of Serbs being sold for their livers and kidneys seems to have been unimportant.

And of course you'll never hear him talk about the war crimes the USA has committed. The fact that the Bosnian war could've ended early if not for American pressure on the Bosnians to veto a peace deal. What, is that not a war crime? They were responsible. Or how about the bombing of the TV station in Belgrade? Or the bombing of the train in which Spanish pilots were recorded being given orders to hit it. Or the use of cluster bombs in a market which killed several people in Serbia. All of these things will rarely get mentioned. And of course let's not get into the fact that the largest ethnic cleansing, KRAJINA, was supported by the USA. But of course, let's not talk about that either.

Americans were surprised by 9-11, but most Serbs were not. Most Arabs were not. Those who had the fortune of being bombed by the Americans were not surprised.

"the approach of her office was to assume that all the senior leaders on all sides of the conflict were guilty of war crimes"
Getting all sides to see that they have done crimes is a good start and it certainly would make reconciliation more easy. But I am less happy with the focus on the leaders. I have always considered it an error to indict Milosevic. Once you start indicting heads of state you end up with indicting the president of the US and that just doesn't work. A second problem with a focus on the leaders is that it is too abstract and that there is often too little evidence. If Milosevic had been convicted the very probable result would have been that the other parties held it up as a sign of their moral superiority while it would hardly convince a Serb (the process until now was far from convincing).

Instead I believe that the ICTY should concentrate on concrete events: Srebrenica, Foca, Omarska, but also Operations Storm and Lighting. I believe that if ICTY had immediately thrown itself upon Operation Lightning Srebrenica would have never happened. Unfortunately the US embraced the ideology of ethnic cleansing at this point and even blocked a condemnation of Operation Lighning in the Security Council.

Sometimes I do not understand why you publish articles like this one. The editor(s) should know that The International Criminal Court (ICC or ICCt) was established in 2002 as a permanent tribunal to prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, etc. The editor(s) should know that this ex-ambassador comes from the country that does not recognize this court. Dear ex-amabasador, please tell me how you can have a face and tell us the words such as this: “As the U.S. Ambassador in Croatia from 1998-2000 and in Serbia from then until 2004, one of my highest priorities - as directed by my government - was the transfer of indictees to The Hague along with supporting documentation of war crimes.”
Shame on you and your country. If you want to make any contributions, you should first joined the 106 states that are members of this court.

I found no reason at all in this article for the author's contention that Del Ponte was to blame for non-Serb war criminals going free in Kosovo, as well as Bosnia. People like Haradinaj and Naser Oric went free after the powers behind the ICTY pressed for it. Del ponte was the prosecutor trying to stick them behind bars. How was that her legacy? She didn't run the court. She was the prosecutor. the court was run by judges and the NATO countries that set it up, and if Montgomery wants to blame anyone for letting Oric and Haradinaj go free, he has to blame the USA, the UK, France, Germany, Netherlands, etc.