Re: Filipovic released

[Chris Burford <cburford@xxxxxxxxxx>]

At 07:57 07/10/00 +0100, I wrote:
> One of the key pointers on the new Kostunica regime will be whether
> Filopovic is released. Filipovic was imprisoned for revealing evidence of
> Yugoslav military atrocities in Kosovo. An appeal has already been made.


From the BBC today:

Miroslav Filipovic was pardoned by the new Yugoslav President, Vojislav
Kostunica, on Monday but his family continued to insist that his conviction
should be overturned.

The supreme military court ruled that there had been "major violations" of
criminal procedure when Mr Filipovic was sentenced to seven years
imprisonment in July.


The case against him centred on articles written about alleged atrocities
committed by Yugoslav troops in Kosovo last year, for the website of the
London-based Institute of War and Peace Reporting (IWPR).


He thanked those who had campaigned for his release and said he hoped all
other political prisoners would be freed.

The state news agency, Tanjug, said a new trial had been ordered.


At his trial by a military court in the southern city of Nis, Mr Filipovic
denied charges of spying and "spreading false information", but the court
ruled that he had gathered confidential military information for foreign
organisations.

His reports included testimony from a Yugoslav army commander who admitted
that he watched as a soldier decapitated a three-year-old ethnic Albanian
boy in front of his family.

Another report described how tanks in the commander's unit indiscriminately
shelled a Kosovo Albanian village before paramilitary police moved in and
massacred the survivors.