(2 of 3)
No one has ever been able to prove Stanisic's involvement in these terror campaigns. Nevertheless, he is regarded as perhaps the most damning link between Milosevic and the crimes committed by Serb paramilitary figures in Croatia and Bosnia. One of the most notorious of these is Zeljko ("Arkan") Raznatovic. During Stanisic's rise to the head of Belgrade's security operations in the 1980s, Arkan worked as an agent in the capital, flashing his Interior Ministry identity card or other evidence of his employment when he had run-ins with the police. When the war started, Arkan and his men were identified by numerous witnesses at the ethnic cleansings of several towns in Bosnia and Croatia. In 1992 they engineered the ethnic cleansing of Bijeljina and participated in killing and looting in Zvornik. As late as 1995 they were involved in expelling Muslims from Sanski Most. They were also spotted driving around the country in black Jeep Wagoneers with license plates issued from Serbia's Interior Ministry. "War is war," says a Stanisic defender, "so maybe they stole the vehicles. He simply doesn't have any deal with Arkan."
Friends of Stanisic deny that his ministry had anything to do with these atrocities. Foreign diplomats and independent Serbian journalists, however, say otherwise. Most believe that Stanisic's position as head of Serbian security means he had knowledge of these ethnic cleansings. And this, they say, makes him the one man who can finger Milosevic for war crimes. Moreover, his de facto control over the Interior Ministry's Public Security police places him in charge of the force that acts as Milosevic's praetorian guard. While this makes him the keystone to Milosevic's power, it also means that it would be difficult, if not suicidal, for anyone, including the President, to challenge Stanisic's position. "If [Milosevic] tried to do that," says a friend of Stanisic's, "it would mean that he went crazy."
Despite his brutal reputation, Stanisic is said to be advising Milosevic to make concessions to the enraged civilians who have been filling the streets of Belgrade for the past nine weeks. (The demonstrators are protesting Milosevic's decision to cancel the results of last November's nationwide municipal elections, in which Serbia's opposition parties won a number of cities at the expense of the President's ruling coalition.) Those who know Stanisic say he believes the protesters should be granted their victories because he is convinced that the opposition's coalition, which inlcudes several contentious factions, is inherently unstable. Once in power, the protesters' unity could evaporate and their fight against Milosevic dissolve into internecine bickering. Stanisic is also loath to approve a widespread crackdown on the demonstrators because he knows this would provoke an international outcry. Allowing the protests to become a Balkan Tiananmen Square would ruin Serbia's chances for attracting desperately needed foreign investment.