Del Ponte dismisses report of chat with Mladic

By Alexandra Hudson and Beti Bilandzic

AMSTERDAM/BELGRADE (Reuters) – A report that top Bosnian
Serb war crimes fugitive Ratko Mladic had told U.N. prosecutor
Carla del Ponte by phone he would surrender soon is “total
lunacy,” her spokesman said on Friday.

The report in the Bosnian weekly Slobodna Bosna was one of
many in a wave of speculation about Serbia’s moves to bring
Mladic to justice and fulfil a key condition to join the
European mainstream after the wars of the 1990s.

It quoted a source it said was close to Serb Prime Minister
Vojislav Kostunica as saying the premier called Mladic on March
29 when his guest Del Ponte asked how he could be sure of
delivering the former general to the Hague war crimes court
within weeks.

The report said Kostunica put Mladic on speakerphone so Del
Ponte could hear him in person promising to surrender and
asking for medical treatment. The five-minute conversation also
covered Mladic’s preferences over arrangements of a surrender,
it said.

“This is total lunacy. It is absolutely not true,” said Del
Ponte’s spokesman Anton Nikiforov. Legally, it was impossible
for Del Ponte to discuss such matters with an accused, he
added.

Mladic is twice indicted for genocide in the 1995
Srebrenica massacre of 8,000 Muslims and the 43-month siege of
Sarajevo, which killed more than 10,000 civilians. His handover
is crucial to Serbia’s bid to eventually join the European
Union.

Del Ponte says he is hiding in Serbia, protected by
hardliners. Belgrade denies knowing his whereabouts or being in
contact, but Kostunica has promised repeatedly in recent weeks
he will soon meet EU demands for Mladic to be handed over.

After a positive report from Del Ponte, the EU decided last
week to go ahead with talks on closer ties rather than suspend
them. Nikiforov said on Thursday Kostunica had persuaded Del
Ponte that Mladic would be handed over to the court this month.

In a sign that Belgrade was trying harder to show progress,
deputies in the slow-moving parliament of Serbia-Montenegro
adopted a law on Friday to freeze the assets of fugitives from
The Hague, having delayed the vote repeatedly since June 2005.

NO “BAG OVER THE HEAD”

The prospect of a new deadline has sparked a new wave of
rumours in the Serbian press, which periodically quotes
anonymous sources as saying Mladic is either considering
surrender, or ready to die to avoid arrest.

The latest press suggestion was that Mladic might be handed
over on Catholic Good Friday, but not during Serb Orthodox
Easter a week later, so as not to upset Serb nationalists who
idolize him.

Serbia’s high-selling daily Blic on Friday quoted a source
close to the Hague tribunal as saying that despite all attempts
at negotiations, Mladic had not decided to hand himself in.

But the Serb government would be careful not to humiliate
him by sending him to The Hague “secretly, at night, by
helicopter, with a bag over his head,” the source added.

Newspapers also gave extensive coverage to accusations by
members of Mladic’s family in Serbia, including his son and
four male relatives, that they had been harassed by police.

The description of events in different media ranged from
“brutal beatings” to “overnight detention” and “friendly chat.”
Mladic’s son Darko said that “regardless of what the police do,
they will not get any results.”

Serbia’s Interior Ministry has refused to comment.