PROFESSOR MARKOVIC CONTINUES HIS EXAMINATION IN CHIEF
www.slobodan-milosevic.org - January 18, 2005

Written by: Andy Wilcoxson

Professor Markovic continued his testimony at the trial of Slobodan Milosevic in The Hague on Tuesday. Markovic served as a judge on the Constitutional Court of the SFRY. He is a law professor. He has written over 250 scholarly papers, and 8 textbooks regarding constitutional matters. He also took part in drafting numerous constitutions. In total Dr. Markovic has a career in constitutional law that spans more than 40 years.

In his testimony today, Professor Markovic said that a law had been drafted which would have regulated secession from Yugoslavia in accordance with the rights of the constituent peoples to self-determination.

The law would have provided a mechanism through which the constituent peoples could decide, through a referendum, if they wished to remain in Yugoslavia, or if they wished to step-down from Yugoslavia and form an independent state.

The law would have regulated the terms of secession, including the delineation of borders and the equitable division of state debts and assets. This law could have avoided armed conflict, saved numerous lives and prevented property damage.

Unfortunately, the law was too little too late. Croatia and Slovenia had already opted for war by establishing paramilitary units and announcing their secession from Yugoslavia without regard to the constitution. In connection with this issue, it was observed that the ZNG, which had been established by the Croatian government, was deemed an illegal paramilitary organization by the Constitutional Court of Yugoslavia.

According to the testimony of Professor Markovic, the illegality of the secession of the republics boiled down to Article 5 of the SFRY constitution, which prohibited altering the federal or republican borders without the consent of all of the republics and autonomous provinces.

Professor Markovic’s testimony briefly dealt with the work of the Badinter Commission, which ignored the findings of the Yugoslav Constitutional court, and determined on behalf of the International Community that Yugoslavia was in a state of dissolution rather than a state against which illegal secession was being carried out.

Markovic dealt with the question of the borders of the former Yugoslav republics. He said that these were administrative borders, which were arbitrarily drawn. He pointed out that Yugoslavia was not a confederation of the republics, but a federation made up of its constituent peoples. He pointed out that Yugoslavia existed before the republics, which were not established until the 2^nd session of AVNOJ.

Professor Markovic was part of the Constitutional commission that drafted amendments to the Serbian Constitution in 1989. Out of 41 amendments, only 5 dealt with the status of the autonomous provinces. The amendments were made in order to bring the Serbian constitution in-line with the Federal Constitution, which had also been recently amended.

As far as the provinces were concerned the amendments were intended to allow the equal application of the law throughout the Republic of Serbia. The status of Kosovo and Vojovodina as autonomous provinces of Serbia was not abolished. Article 4 of the SFRY constitution gave Kosovo and Vojovodina their autonomous status, and this was not effected by the amendments to the Serbian constitution.

The Constitutional Court of Yugoslavia reviewed all of the amendments to the Serbian constitution and did not find that any amendments that dealt with the provinces were unconstitutional. In addition the Federal Assembly of the SFRY passed a resolution approving the amendments. Furthermore, as was demonstrated by the testimony of Vukasin Jokanovic, the provinces themselves approved the amendments.

Professor Markovic made an interesting observation regarding Kosovo’s autonomy. He pointed out that Kosovo and Vojovodina were autonomies of territories, not autonomies of any ethnic group. Therefore, it is not right to link the issue of Kosovo’s status to the status of the Albanian national minority. We are talking about autonomy of a territory, not about some type of ethnic-based autonomy for Albanians.

Professor Markovic dealt with a so-called “constitutional declaration” put forward by the Kosovo-Albanians when declared Kosovo to be a republic independent from Serbia. He testified that the Constitutional Court of the SFRY ruled this declaration to be null and void, because it was unconstitutional. He gave evidence relating to the reasoning of the court in his testimony; basically the declaration was annulled because Kosovo had already been defined by the constitution as an autonomous province of Serbia, and this could not be challenged unless the Yugoslav and Serbian constitutions were changed first.

Professor Markovic was the head of a delegation of the Serbian government, which attempted to negotiate a peaceful solution with the leading parties of the Kosovo-Albanians in 1998. According to Markovic, only one meeting was ever held, and it was not particularly productive. Every other attempt to meet with the leading Kosovo-Albanian representatives was unsuccessful. According to Markovic’s diary, the Government delegation made 15 attempts to enter negotiations, and was rebuffed each time by the leading Kosovo-Albanian parties.

Markovic explained that the delegation of the Serbian Government was multiethnic because all ethnic groups wished to be included, and it was the Serbian Government’s conviction that all ethnic groups in Kosovo were equal.

Markovic will continue his examination-in-chief tomorrow when he is expected to testify about the negotiations at Rambouillet, which he attended as the head of the Serbian government’s delegation.
 

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