Now that the Democratic Opposition of Serbia (DOS) has won an indisputable victory at the parliamentary elections in Serbia and more than two thirds of the seats in parliament, the reign of Slobodan Milosevic and his party has definitely come to an end. Serbia, on the other hand, is at the beginning of a new era: reintegration into the international community, and very late transition into a market economy, lagging years behind other countries from the former Eastern bloc.
The rotten state of the Serbian economy is depressing but there are trends in Serbian politics that are even more worrying. Three months after the so-called “October revolution,” there has not been a single indictment against the key people of Milosevic’s regime. Milosevic himself is free as a bird, and wished us all a happy new year while he was voting in the December elections. Some leaders of DOS are now beginning to speak publicly about the need to bring Milosevic to trial, but it is still unclear whether he will be sent to Hague or tried in Belgrade with the help of the Hague Tribunal.
Vojislav Seselj, who used to boast of being a commander of paramilitary units in Croatia, is now a member of federal parliament. The Party of Serbian Unity (SSJ), founded by mafioso and war criminal Arkan, has won 14 seats or approximately six per cent of the popular vote. Apparently, the level of conscience in Serbian society is even more rotten than its economy. A Polish journalist recently wrote that the Serbs got away too easy, and learned nothing from their dreadful experience. He is quite right – the Serbs are showing no willingness to face responsibility for their recent past.
As monstrous as it had been, Milosevic’s regime had absolute support from a considerable part of the population all these years. Serbs largely stood behind him when he incited wars in Croatia and Bosnia, when his people sieged, shelled and starved Sarajevo, and when he attempted genocide against the ethnic Albanians in Kosovo. Even if they were not fully supportive, most Serbs were silent accomplices of Milosevic’s regime. If Milosevic had succeeded in killing enough Kosovo Albanians and expelling the rest from the Serbian “sacred land,” there’s no doubt he would have earned the title of national hero for eternity. Today, Serbs behave as if none of the above mentioned had happened, as if they slept through those years and are now innocently waking up. They refuse to become aware of the crimes committed in their name and take their own share of responsibility for them. Serbian media are big on NATO’s usage of depleted uranium – which is a very legitimate issue to investigate – but they are silent on our own crimes in all the wars since 1991. And it is not likely to expect President Vojislav Kostunica to insist on this issue, since he was the loudest opponent of NATO intervention in Yugoslavia last year, and chose to close his eyes before the atrocities of the Serbian army, police and paramilitary units taking place in Kosovo at the same time.
The diagnosis is obvious: Serbia needs moral catharsis before it plunges itself into other reforms, or else it is bound to face collective moral degeneration with unforeseeable consequences.
Jelica Vesic is a native Serbian currently studying journalism at the American University in Bulgaria. Her column appears weekly and she can be contacted at jdv970@cj.augb.bg.
The rotten state of the Serbian economy is depressing but there are trends in Serbian politics that are even more worrying. Three months after the so-called “October revolution,” there has not been a single indictment against the key people of Milosevic’s regime. Milosevic himself is free as a bird, and wished us all a happy new year while he was voting in the December elections. Some leaders of DOS are now beginning to speak publicly about the need to bring Milosevic to trial, but it is still unclear whether he will be sent to Hague or tried in Belgrade with the help of the Hague Tribunal.
Vojislav Seselj, who used to boast of being a commander of paramilitary units in Croatia, is now a member of federal parliament. The Party of Serbian Unity (SSJ), founded by mafioso and war criminal Arkan, has won 14 seats or approximately six per cent of the popular vote. Apparently, the level of conscience in Serbian society is even more rotten than its economy. A Polish journalist recently wrote that the Serbs got away too easy, and learned nothing from their dreadful experience. He is quite right – the Serbs are showing no willingness to face responsibility for their recent past.
As monstrous as it had been, Milosevic’s regime had absolute support from a considerable part of the population all these years. Serbs largely stood behind him when he incited wars in Croatia and Bosnia, when his people sieged, shelled and starved Sarajevo, and when he attempted genocide against the ethnic Albanians in Kosovo. Even if they were not fully supportive, most Serbs were silent accomplices of Milosevic’s regime. If Milosevic had succeeded in killing enough Kosovo Albanians and expelling the rest from the Serbian “sacred land,” there’s no doubt he would have earned the title of national hero for eternity. Today, Serbs behave as if none of the above mentioned had happened, as if they slept through those years and are now innocently waking up. They refuse to become aware of the crimes committed in their name and take their own share of responsibility for them. Serbian media are big on NATO’s usage of depleted uranium – which is a very legitimate issue to investigate – but they are silent on our own crimes in all the wars since 1991. And it is not likely to expect President Vojislav Kostunica to insist on this issue, since he was the loudest opponent of NATO intervention in Yugoslavia last year, and chose to close his eyes before the atrocities of the Serbian army, police and paramilitary units taking place in Kosovo at the same time.
The diagnosis is obvious: Serbia needs moral catharsis before it plunges itself into other reforms, or else it is bound to face collective moral degeneration with unforeseeable consequences.
Jelica Vesic is a native Serbian currently studying journalism at the American University in Bulgaria. Her column appears weekly and she can be contacted at jdv970@cj.augb.bg.
