Yugoslavia

CINCINNATI - Their brief ritual seemed straight from a James Bond novel. The American, speaking first, would say in Latin, "Vincit qui se vincit." (He conquers who conquers himself.) The European man, code-named Dynamo, would reply, "Verbum pat sapienti." (A word is enough for a wise man.) Then they would match halves of a torn playing card, the nine of diamonds. While this scene may have been common during the Cold War, Dynamo was no common spy. Documents unsealed in a case recently settled in Cincinnati federal court reveal that the man called Dynamo was paid to spy for the U.S. government - even though intelligence reports showed that he was considered a Nazi war criminal in Yugoslavia.

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia -- Croatia's Western-leaning government found itself confronting collapse and potential civil unrest yesterday after it decided to send two of its citizens to the international war crimes tribunal in The Hague. The government, Croatia's first in 10 years not dominated by nationalists, made the decision after coming under mounting pressure since Slobodan Milosevic, the former Yugoslav president, was transferred to the tribunal June 28. President Stipe Mesic backed the government decision in a statement yesterday and called on Croats to "maintain peace and dignity."

THE HAGUE, Netherlands - Slobodan Milosevic appeared yesterday before an international tribunal that has accused him of crimes against humanity and dismissed the court with disdain as an "illegal organ." Jutting chin raised contemptuously, Milosevic sat flanked by two guards near seven empty chairs intended for his lawyers. The former Yugoslav leader, who plunged the Balkans into four ethnic wars, chose to appear without counsel and deliver his own rebuttal in English: "I consider this tribunal false tribunal and indictments false indictments."

REHABILITATION of Serbia in Europe's good standing begins now. The extradition of its former dictator, Slobodan Milosevic, to stand trial for crimes against humanity, before the International Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in the Hague, makes it possible. The extradition brought an immediate promise of $1.28 billion in much-needed economic aid from a donor group of nations, including $181.6 million from the United States. This should jump-start needed energy infrastructure reconstruction and Danube River clearance after the NATO bombing campaign of 1999.

WASHINGTON - The United States often tries to control world events by turning its financial aid spigot on and off, but rarely does the technique produce results as significant or successful as the events yesterday in Belgrade. Twice Washington has set deadlines for Yugoslavia to move forward with bringing former President Slobodan Milosevic to justice, vowing to withhold aid if the deadlines were missed. Twice a reluctant Belgrade has responded at the 11th hour, first at the end of March, when Yugoslavian authorities arrested Milosevic, and again yesterday, when they delivered him to a tribunal to face charges of crimes against humanity.

For a long time, Slobodan Milosevic, who Serbian authorities handed over yesterday into the custody of the United Nations war crimes tribunal, seemed destined to be an unremarkable leader. His notoriety came first from words, then deeds. He began uttering notably inflammatory words in 1987, by promising the Serbs of Kosovo that they would one day lord it over the ethnic Albanians who then dominated the province. His deadly deeds began in 1991, when he sent tanks to the border of Slovenia, triggering a brief war that began the breakup of Yugoslavia at an eventual cost of tens of thousands of lives.

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia - Every war has a hotel. In Saigon, it was the Continental-Palace, a graceful colonial building famed for the "Continental Shelf," a veranda bar that was the meeting place for journalists and the military. In Beirut, it was the Commodore, which featured a parrot that could imitate incoming artillery rounds and telex machines that never broke down. In Baghdad it was the Al-Rashid with a mosaic of former President George Bush that you had to step on to get into the lobby.

WASHINGTON -- It may seem on the surface that all is well in the Balkans, but tensions are rising again and may well end in the disappearance of Yugoslavia from the map of Europe. The place to watch is tiny Montenegro, a mountainous, inhospitable spot with just 600,000 people. It is one of only two republics left in Yugoslavia -- little sister to the dominant Serbia. The old Yugoslavia was a medium-sized country founded in 1918. Its breakup a decade ago shrank the remainder by two-thirds, leaving just 10 million people.

PODGORICA, Montenegro - Montenegro took a modest step toward independence yesterday, with early results in the general elections showing a majority of voters supporting parties that favor breaking from Yugoslavia. The governing coalition headed by President Milo Djukanovic held a narrow lead last night with over half the ballots counted in what officials described as a vote with an exceptionally high turnout of 81 percent. An adviser to the president, Miodrag Vukovic, claimed an early victory and said the coalition had won 43 percent of the early returns, predicting that Djukanovic would be able to form a majority government.

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia - Slobodan Milosevic, the imprisoned former strongman of Yugoslavia, would not have to walk far from his jail to see what calamity was wrought by his decade of bloody-minded nationalism. Less than 100 yards from the iron gates of his prison, he could walk on a potholed street, cluttered with crumbling houses that provide the unmistakable signs of poverty in a shrunken state $13 billion in debt. Nearby, a police car, a rusted Yugo painted blue and white, is occupied by a couple of police officers whose mere presence only a few months earlier would have struck fear into the heart of almost any citizen under Milosevic's regime.