Yugoslavs agree to hasten vote on a law on extradiging war crimes suspects

Saturday, April 6th 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (AP) _ Threatened with a cutoff of millions in U.S. aid , hard-liners in the Yugoslav leadership agreed in principle early Saturday to adopt a law that would allow extradition of war crimes suspects to the U.N. tribunal the Netherlands.

The Speaker of the Yugoslav parliament, Dragoljub Micunovic, said after the late-night meeting that rival factions _ those opposing and those advocating it _ ``agreed in principle on the law on cooperation with the (U.N.) Hague Tribunal.''

Micunovic said a final draft of the legislation would be written over the wekend and voted on in Parliament as early as Tueslday. Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica and other nationalists insisted the law was necessary for the government to comply with the extradition requests.

Pierre-Richard Prosper, U.S. ambassador-at-large for war crimes, held a series of meetings here on Friday to stress that Yugoslavia could lose tens of millions of dollars in badly needed U.S. aid and American support in major monetary organizations, such as the World Bank, if the men indicted for atrocities in the recent Balkan wars remain at large.

The U.S. Congress gave Yugoslav authorities until March 31 to cooperate. Because the deadline has passed, no U.S. aid checks can be written for struggling Yugoslavia until Secretary of State Colin Powell certifies its compliance.

In Yugoslavia, made up of Serbia and much smaller Montenegro, Kostunica, the president and other nationalists regard the tribunal as anti-Serb and illegal. But pro-Western officials close to Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic are eager to avoid the U.S. sanctions and said the suspects should be extradited regardless of domestic regulations.

Prosper said he believed ``the law is not necessary for cooperation with the tribunal. However, if local authorities believe they need the law and if the law can be passed in a short time, and if followed by concrete action, then this is something that will be looked at favorably.''

Micunovic said he hoped the nationalist Socialist People's Party from Montenegro, whose consent is necessary for the proposed federal law, realizes that ``we don't have plenty of time.''

Prosper warned that ``the time is running out'' and that U.S. ``will have to consider seriously withdrawing our support and preventing some (other aid) coming through as well,''

The Montenegrin officials declined comment after the late night meeting in Kostunica's office in Belgrade.

Former president Milosevic was extradited by Djindjic's government last June and now stands trial before the U.N. court.

Among the 15 remaining suspects, four are his close aides, indicted along with him for atrocities in the Kosovo war: former army commander Dragoljub Ojdanic; Milan Milutinovic, the current Serbian president; Nikola Sainovic, Milosevic's top security adviser; and Vlajko Stojiljkovic, a former Serbian interior minister.

Also believed to be hiding in Serbia is Gen. Ratko Mladic, the wartime military leader of the Bosnian Serbs, indicted on a charge of genocide in 1995 along with former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, who is believed hiding in Bosnia.