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| Affiliation | Socialist Party of Serbia |
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| Name | Slobodan Milošević |
| Address |
Požarevac, , Serbia |
| Email | None |
| Website | None |
| Born |
August 20, 1941
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| Died | March 11, 2006
(64 years)
|
| Contributor | The Oncoming Storm |
| Last Modifed | Juan Croniqueur
Sep 18, 2023 11:56am |
| Tags |
Imprisoned -
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| Info | Milošević was Montenegrin by origin born in Požarevac, Serbia. He began his professional life as a banker, working for the Beogradska Banka (Belgrade Bank), at times even residing in New York as their official representative abroad.
He then emerged in April 1987 as the leading force in Serbian politics. His political positions have sometimes been termed as nationalism, despite the fact that his ideology was strongly marked by socialism and other leftist viewpoints. His critics have said that his remarks in Kosovo in 1987 "nobody must beat you" - which he was heard to make whilst amid pressing crowds saying they were suffering police brutality - were nationalistic, others that, as a political representative, he was reassuring them he didn't take lightly any violation of their human rights.
After he was elected president of the Belgrade City Committee of the League of Communists, Milošević publicly opposed nationalism, prevented the publishing of a book of the works of Slobodan Jovanović, an distinguished Serbian philosopher, law professor and politician from the first half of the century. Milošević also advocated retaining Marxism as a school subject, and publicly lambasted Belgrade youth for their low turnout at the Communist manifestation Day of the Youth, saying they desecrated the character and work of Tito.
His mentor and godfather Ivan Stambolić was the party leader in the Serbian section of the ruling League of Communists of Yugoslavia. In September 1987, Stambolić became the President of Serbia and supported Milošević in the elections for the new leader, to the dismay of the other leaders in the party. Stambolić spent three days advocating Milošević's election and finally managed to secure him a tight victory, the tightest ever in the history of Serbian Communist Party internal elections.
Contrary to the liberal reforms of Communism in the Soviet Union at the time, Milošević quickly took a hard line against liberalism in the party and proceeded to use such a policy to eliminate his political adversaries.
Milošević's rise to power coincided with the growth of nationalism in all the former Yugoslavian republics following the collapse of communist governments throughout eastern Europe. Notably, Slovenians elected a nationalist government under Milan Kučan, and the Croatians did the same with Franjo Tuđman. The main Bosnian politicians were also nationally oriented, only those in Macedonia didn't support any overt national agendas.
The socialist Yugoslavia was at the time governed by an eight-member Presidency where four members were inclined to support Slobodan Milošević's ideas (such as the proclamation of a state of emergency), while four were inclined to oppose it. As the critical decisions would all end in a stalemate, the head of state was rather dysfunctional. Milošević exerted considerable influence over Yugoslav generals such as the Chief of Staff Veljko Kadijević and tried to use the army presence to pressure the other four Presidency members into compliance, but ultimately failed.
In June 1991, Slovenia and Croatia seceded from the federation, followed by the republics of Macedonia (September 1991) and Bosnia and Herzegovina (March 1992). The presence of large Serb minorities in Croatia (580,000) and Bosnia (1.6 million) led to wars in each, in which Serbs demanded the same right of self-determination given to their Croat and Muslim neighbours and demanded that their sections of Bosnia and Croatia remain in Yugoslavia.
On 4 February 1997 Milošević recognized the opposition victories in the November 1996 elections, having contested the results for 11 weeks. However, his image was badly damaged, and despite a substantial rise in popularity after the NATO bombing in 1999, this led to his eventual downfall.
Constitutionally limited to two terms as Serbian president, on July 23, 1997 Milošević assumed the presidency of the Yugoslav Federation (currently Serbia and Montenegro). Armed actions by Albanian separatist groups and Serbian police and military counter-action in Serbia's previously autonomous (and 90% Albanian) province of Kosovo culminated in escalating warfare in 1998, NATO air strikes against Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in March-June 1999, and Serbia's subsequent military withdrawal from the province. During the Kosovo War he was indicted on 27 May 1999 for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Kosovo, and he is currently (2005) standing trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia.
The Yugoslav constitution called for a 2 round election with all but the 2 leading candidates eliminated for the second round. Official results put Kostunica ahead of Milošević but at under 50%. Opinion polls suggested that supporters of most of the minor candidates would go to Milošević as would numbers of people who abstained in the first round but would oppose an opposition supported by the NATO powers. Milošević's rejection of claims of a first-round opposition victory in new elections for the Federal presidency in September 2000 led to mass demonstrations in Belgrade on October 5 and the collapse of the regime's authority. Opposition-list leader Vojislav Koštunica took office as Yugoslav president on October 6. Ironically, Milošević lost his grip on power by losing in elections which he scheduled prematurely (before the end of his mandate) and that he did not even need to win in order to retain power which was centered in the parliaments which his party and its associates controlled.
Arrested on 1 April 2001 on charges of abuse of power and corruption, Milošević was handed over by the Serbian government on 28 June to the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. Kostunica opposed the transfer.
Following Milošević's transfer, the original charges of war crimes in Kosovo were upgraded by adding charges of genocide in Bosnia and war crimes in Croatia. On 30 January 2002 Milošević accused the war crimes tribunal of an "evil and hostile attack" against him. The trial began at The Hague on 12 February 2002 with Milošević defending himself though refusing to recognize the court's jurisdiction.
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