Milosevic Buries His Hatchet Man
As the Yugoslav President grudgingly reduces his troops in
Kosovo, Slobodan Milosevic is taking it out at home on foes and
friends alike, closing a radio station and five newspapers and
purging Belgrade University of professors. But in a big surprise
last week, he sacked his ruthless spymaster, Jovica Stanisic,
whose loyalists fear he may be blamed by Milosevic for the
"ethnic cleansing" of much of Bosnia. That explains why, after
the ouster, Stanisic said Milosevic bore primary responsibility
for the work of the secret police. Why did Milosevic dump a man
who may finger him for war crimes? Internal reasons: Milosevic's
wife, the retrograde communist Mira Markovic, and his fascist
vice premier, Vojislav Seselj, had it in for Stanisic. Yet with
Serbs increasingly unhappy with Milosevic, the Butcher of the
Balkans may rue the day he let his hatchet man go.