Milosevic Refuses To Work With Lawyers
THE HAGUE -- Slobodan Milosevic angrily refused to work with two court-appointed lawyers Tuesday as they called the first witness in his war crimes defense case -- an elderly Serbian nationalist who taught the ex-Yugoslav leader law and advised the wartime Serbian government.
Smilja Avramov, a former professor at Belgrade University, was questioned for several hours by Steven Kay, one of two British lawyers assigned last week against Milosevic's will to contest the 66 counts in his indictment.
Avramov, like Milosevic a vocal opponent of the U.N. tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, praised two Bosnian Serb hard-liners, Radovan Karadzic and Gen. Ratko Mladic, both indicted on genocide charges in the 1995 massacre of 7,500 Muslims near Srebrenica in eastern Bosnia.
Milosevic, who insists on representing himself, has rejected any form of cooperation with Kay or his deputy, Gillian Higgins.
Milosevic was told he could question Avramov, but he refused, saying he would not accept "crumbs" from the court.
THE MIDDLE EAST
• GAZA CITY -- Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia condemned in unusually harsh terms an Israeli airstrike that killed 14 Hamas militants, warning that the attack would invite a tough response from the group and saying retaliation would be justified.
The Israeli attack, which struck a Hamas training camp shortly after midnight, came a week after suicide bombers from the group, formally known as the Islamic Resistance Movement, blew up buses in the Israeli city of Beersheba, killing 16 people plus themselves.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said the attack was not retaliation but "part of our continuous war against terrorism."
Early Wednesday, Israeli tanks entered northern Gaza in what military sources called a limited operation.
THE AMERICAS
• PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Haitian police, backed by U.N. troops, regained control of the city of St. Marc on Tuesday, a day after rebels took over the town 60 miles north of the capital. No casualties were reported, but residents said they heard much gunfire.
Authorities ordered the national police on Monday to retake several towns held by rebel former soldiers who want to reestablish Haiti's army. Police carried out the raid with an Argentine contingent of the U.N. peacekeeping force sent to stabilize Haiti after President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was forced out in February.
Gunfights in Cite Sole killed seven people on Tuesday and six on Saturday, witnesses said.
