Power not principle

Bosnia Genocide: Lt-Gen(retd)Javed Nasir is accused of breaking the arms embargo and supplying arms to Bosnian Muslims

So, yet again, a member of the dreaded and all-powerful ISI has been caught breaking international law. Obviously, justice must be served and Lt-Gen. (retd) Javed Nasir should be dragged out of his home and handed over to The Hague. Then the sun will shine once more and then we can link hands and sing Kumbaya as we rejoice at another blow against the deep state.

But hang on a minute. Exactly what has he been accused of? Well, to recap, he has been accused of breaking the Bosnia arms embargo and supplying arms to the besieged Bosnian Muslims who, according to the dominant narrative of the times, must of course be bloodthirsty terrorists waging a war against freedom, mom and apple pie. Except that they weren’t. They were the victims, outgunned and massacred by a Serb militia which was being provided weapons and men by the Serbian government which, in turn, was being supported by their Slavic cousins, the Russians. Meanwhile, the Croatians could smuggle in arms through their coastline; embargo be damned.

This is the same embargo that Bill Clinton, as a presidential candidate, vowed to oppose. Once he was president of course, he changed his mind saying that to do so would “convert a complex ethnic war into an American responsibility”. When Congress voted to lift the embargo, he vetoed it. At the same time, according to Congressional documents made available by the Federation of American Scientists, he “secretly let it be known in Iran that the United States would not oppose huge, illegal arms shipments to the Bosnian Moslems”. I’m still waiting for The Hague to summon him.

And who put the embargo in effect in the first place? Why, the UN of course — which also was kind enough to place peacekeepers on the ground in Bosnia. The blue helmets did an exemplary job of protecting the Bosnian civilians in various places such as, shall we say, Srebrenica. If your ancient history is a little rusty, that’s a small town that was singled out for ‘cleansing’ by none other than Serb commander and indicted war criminal Ratko Mladic. In 1995, four years into the embargo, there were tens of thousands of civilians sheltering in the town. They thought they were safe because, after all, the UN had declared it a ‘safe area’ and valiant Dutch peacekeepers were on hand to protect the innocent. The Dutch peacekeepers did a great job too, with their commander meeting Mladic for drinks on July 12 1995. A day later, the Dutch handed over 5,000 Bosnian Muslim refugees to the Serbs in exchange for 14 peacekeepers that the Serbs had been holding. Then, the first killings began. When the guns finally fell silent, an estimated 8,000 civilians had been murdered. For a little perspective, that’s about three times as many as those who died in the 9/11 attacks. Srebinica is now a part of Serbia. Mission accomplished, Mr Mladic.

All this happened while the UN and the West were falling over themselves trying to avoid calling the killings what they were: genocide. There’s a reason for that. Thanks to laws put in place after the holocaust, genocide is an international crime, and would require action being taken to prevent it.

For the record, I must mention that if there’s one western leader who did try to do the right thing, it was Margaret Thatcher — the Iron Lady herself. From the outset she demanded that Bosnia be armed and the embargo lifted.

As for Mladic himself, a man who has more blood on his hands than Osama bin Laden, as late as 2009, he was partying in Serbian army barracks and going on ski vacations. Not a bad life for someone who was the object of an international UN-mandated manhunt. The charges against Javed Nasir, by the way, are in part based on Mladic’s testimony. I personally think he should get a medal but yes, If Mr Nasir did in fact break the embargo, he was in violation of international law. But if he is to stand trial, so should Mr Clinton, the entire Russian high command and countless others. But let’s face it, this is not about law or principle; it’s about power. They have it, we don’t.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 22^nd,  2011.