Mr Slobodan Milosevic has said he will call Mr Bill Clinton and Mr Tony Blair, along with other present and former western leaders, to testify at his trial for war crimes, writes Denis Staunton
On the second day of his opening statement at a United Nations tribunal in The Hague, Mr Milosevic repeated his claim that NATO was guilty of war crimes in its bombing campaign of Serbia in 1999.
He showed pictures of charred bodies and dismembered corpses which he said were civilians targeted by NATO bombs. And he alleged that Mr Clinton had deliberately targeted the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade in an attack the US has claimed was a mistake.
"It is quite clear that Clinton wanted to go down in history as the first man to bomb Chinese territory by bombing the Chinese embassy. This was no accident," he said.
Mr Milosevic singled out Germany as the main culprit in the Balkan wars of the 1990s, claiming that its decision to recognise Croatia and Bosnia had precipitated the ethnic conflict and accusing German intelligence officers of helping Kosovo Albanian rebels. He said he would call the German Chancellor, Mr Gerhard Schröder, his predecessor, Dr Helmut Kohl, and the former foreign minister, Mr Klaus Kinkel, to testify in the trial.
"I'm asking what kind of tribunal this is if you refuse to try people for these crimes by the leaders and armies of NATO countries," he said.
Mr Milosevic, who is conducting his own defence, is entitled to call any witness he chooses. But it is for the court's three judges to decide who should be subpoenaed.
In his opening address, which is expected to conclude on Monday, the former Yugoslav leader has ignored many of the 66 charges against him and focused on blaming NATO for the mass exodus from Kosovo in 1999. Showing photographs of an old woman who was killed by a NATO bomb while ploughing a field, he accused NATO of the widespread use of lethal but inaccurate cluster bombs.
"This is an example of bestiality, targeting people in this way," he said.
Mr Milosevic said that Serbian forces had intercepted radio communication between the NATO's command centre and pilots in Kosovo in May 1999.
He said the pilots had spotted a convoy and reported that it was composed of civilian tractors but the response was: "Carry out your orders."
He claimed that hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians who fled Kosovo in 1999 were driven out, not by Serbs but by the Kosovo Liberation Army. Mr Milosovic alleged that an "illusion of exodus was created" to justify a NATO campaign against Serbia.
"There were hundreds of cameras waiting at the borders to show the alleged Serb misdeeds," he said.
The presiding judge, Mr Richard May, has allowed the former Yugoslav leader 90 minutes to complete his opening statement on Monday. Mr Milosevic is charged with genocide and breaching the laws and customs of war. If convicted, he could face life in prison.
Meanwhile, the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair, declined to comment in Rome yesterday on a call by Mr Milosevic for western leaders to testify at his war crimes trial in The Hague.
