Milosevic"s Death
Former Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic was found dead last Saturday in his cell at the Hague-based International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. The -year-old had been on trial there since February 2002.
Born in provincial Pozarevac in 1941, he was the second son of a priest and a school teacher. Both of his parents died when he was still a young . The young Milosevic was "untypical", says Slavolub Djukic, his unofficial biographer. He was "not interested in sports, avoided excursions (短途旅行) and used to come to school dressed in the old-fashioned way—white shirt and tie." One of his old friends said, he could "imagine him as a station- or punctilious (一丝不苟) civil servant."
Indeed that is exactly what he might have become, had he not married Mira. She was widely believed to be his driving force.
At university and beyond he did well. He worked for various firms and was a communist party member. By 1986 he was head of Serbia"s Central Committee. But still he had not yet really been noticed.
It was Kosovo that gave him his chance. An autonomous province of Serbia, Kosovo was home to an Albanian majority and a Serbian minority. In , he was sent there to calm fears of Serbians who felt they were discriminated against. But instead he played the nationalist card and became their champion. In so doing, he changed into a ruthless (无情的) and determined man. At home with Mira he plotted the downfall of his political enemies. Conspiring (密谋) with the director of Serbian T. V., he mounted a modern media campaign which aimed to get him the most power in the country.
He was elected Serbian president in 1990. In 1997, he became president of Yugoslavia. The rest of the story is well-known: his nationalist card caused Yugoslavia"s other ethnic groups to fight for their own rights, power and lands. Yugoslavia broke up when four of the six republics declared independence in 1991. War started and lasted for years and millions died. Then Western countries intervened. N.A.T.O. bombed Yugoslavia, and he ually stepped down as state leader in 2000.
Soon after this, Serbia"s new government, led by Zoran Djindjic, arrested him and sent him to face justice at the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal in the Hague. Milosevic"s DeathWhy was Milosevic sent to Kosovo in