THE HAGUE: Former NATO commander and would-be US presidential hopeful Gen Wesley Clark will give evidence to Mr Slobodan Milosevic's war crimes trial next month behind closed doors.
In a legal first the man hoping to win the Democratic presidential nomination for 2004 will give evidence in a courtroom closed to the press on December 15th.
Some 48 hours later, the tapes of the evidence will be shown - and then only after they have been vetted by two US government officials.
The officials will have the power to cut some or all of the testimony if they consider it endangers national security, although the judges will have the last word.
Gen Clark was closely involved in negotiations with Mr Milosevic over the ending of the Bosnian war in 1995. And he met with Mr Milosevic again four years later to threaten, and then conduct, a NATO air war against Serbia in response to human rights violations in Kosovo.
Tribunal spokesman Mr Jim Landale confirmed that this was the first time any such arrangement has been made, but denied that the US was being given special treatment.
"There will be no access for the public," said Mr Landale. "The representatives of the US government will be in court during the giving of testimony."
The arrangement was suggested by prosecutors to avoid a legal impasse: Washington, like any other UN member-state, has the right to refuse to allow its officials to be questioned by prosecutors in The Hague.
The US is thought to have refused to allow its official to testify in open court and give intelligence information away.
It is also possible that Mr Milosevic could use his cross-examination to reveal sensitive information.
So far Mr Milosevic's two-year trial has avoided the issue, with high-profile figures like Britain's Mr Paddy Ashdown, High Representative in Bosnia, and Lord David Owen, former EU negotiator, agreeing to testify voluntarily. So also has Croatia's President Stipe Mesic.
There are fears among some war crimes officials that should a major power, such as the US, refuse to send its personnel to the court, smaller Balkan nations could follow suit.
Gen Clark took a leading role in advocating a tough response to attacks on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo in 1998.
He is likely to be asked to give details of operations against the Albanians and Albanian guerrillas by Serbian units in the 1998-99 Kosovo war.
The nationalist Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) will emerge as the biggest party in a weekend election but may not muster enough seats to defeat the ruling coalition, opinion poll results suggested yesterday.