Mixed emotions in Belgrade

Citizens of Belgrade watch the live broadcast in a cafe

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia (CNN) -- Slobodan Milosevic's first appearance in front of the United Nations war crimes tribunal was broadcast live on most Yugoslav television stations.

CNN's Alessio Vinci says there were mixed emotions as viewers watched the former president face the court he had criticised for being biased against Serbs.

"The country here seems evenly split between those who say he should be tried for war crimes, and those who say he should have faced justice in Serbia for abuse of power and corruption," he added.

He said Milosevic's defiance in court worries some of the politicians who toppled him last year.

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They warn the former president could use the trial to deliver political speeches broadcast live on national television.

Alexander Popovic, of the Democratic Party of Serbia, said: "He will give political speeches in the Hague, and he will say the truth, he will say NATO committed some war crimes.

"NATO bombed bridges full of civilians, NATO bombed buses full of civilians, NATO bombed ... trains full of civilians and he will ask why you didn't prosecute the NATO? And we all know that is truth and by doing that he will get points."

Journalist Miroslav Filipovic, who wrote about what he saw as the truth of Serbian war crimes when Milosevic was still in power and was jailed for it, says the trial will help Yugoslavia come to terms with its troubled past.

"The process has started, there are more and more people writing about war crimes and I hope the time will come when this society will promote the notion that war crimes should be punished and all those who committed those crimes should pay for it."

A lawyer defending Milosevic from domestic corruption accusations said the hearing in The Hague was like "a dialogue of the deaf," with both the ex-president and the international community refusing to take account of the other's viewpoint.

"I think he has chosen the best line of defence and I am proud of him as a man and as a lawyer," Belgrade lawyer Veselin Cerovic told Reuters, adding he believed Milosevic may persevere with his strategy of defending himself alone.

But opinion pollsters say the recent discovery of mass graves in Serbia proper, with victims presumed to be from Kosovo, has helped convince some Serbs who did not know or want to know that forces acting in their name committed war crimes.

Bosnian Serb television did not show live pictures of Milosevic's arraignment hearing. Several Serbian and Yugoslav channels did broadcast the live footage from The Hague but most offered little in the way of comment or analysis.

Belgrade newspapers were similarly subdued on the morning of the hearing, with some giving it only a brief mention on the front page or relegating it to inside pages.