RFE/RL NEWSLINE Vol. 4, No. 209, Part II, 27 October 2000
KOSTUNICA SAYS CBS TOOK REMARKS ON SERBIAN WAR CRIMES 'OUT OFCopyright (c) 2000. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free
CONTEXT.' The office of Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica
issued a statement on 26 October in which it said that the
U.S. CBS television network recently took his remarks on
Serbian war crimes "out of context" (see "RFE/RL Newsline,"
24 October 2000). His statements to the "60 Minutes II" news
program were widely hailed as the first admission by a
Serbian leader of guilt for atrocities committed by Serbian
forces during the conflicts launched by former President
Slobodan Milosevic. The statement from Kostunica's office
said that CBS had taped some 100 minutes of an interview with
him. Of that, the broadcaster used "only a few minutes...and
even that was taken completely out of context." Without
elaborating, the statement claimed that the excerpt used by
CBS contained "a series of untruths and words which President
Kostunica did not use. [In view of the wide publicity the CBS
program has received in the media, it] could have inflicted
much political damage on the president and the forces leading
the democratization in Yugoslavia." PMCBS SAYS YUGOSLAV LEADER BACKTRACKING. AP reported from
Belgrade that unnamed Yugoslav officials refused to elaborate
on the statement and that Kostunica's chief of staff "was
unavailable" for comment. CBS News correspondent Scott
Pelley, who conducted the interview with the president, told
the news agency on 26 October that the broadcast was
"absolutely fair." Pelley added that he recognizes that
Kostunica "is trying to stabilize a government with enemies
conspiring all around him. When he took the courageous steps
to be frank in our interview, I think he knew that telling
the truth was going to cause trouble for him." Kostunica
nonetheless "was very evasive, particularly on the question
[of whether he will arrest Milosevic]. We had to go back to
him again and again and again to get a straight answer,"
Pelley noted. PM
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