Serbs denounce Milosevic defence

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (CNN) -- Slobodan Milosevic's defence strategy before the war crimes tribunal in The Hague where he faces genocide charges has been criticised by some in the country he once led.

Backed by a series of gruesome photos, Milosevic accused NATO on Thursday of waging war on Yugoslavia based on "an ocean of lies."

He has also tried to justify his actions in Kosovo as a "struggle against terrorism," and said he was a victim of twisted facts and "terrible fabrication."

Milosevic said the 1999 NATO bombing campaign was "the product of propaganda and the abuse of global media as a means of war against my country."

He attacked his trial and the NATO bombing of his country as "an outrage against a whole nation and a whole people."

VIDEO Former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic blames massive civilian deaths in Kosovo on NATO. CNN's Christiane Amanpour reports (February 14) Play video (QuickTime, Real or Windows Media)   MORE STORIES • Key quotes: Milosevic  • Charges: A summary of the indictment  • Timeline: The Milosevic years  • The view from Serbia    EXTRA INFORMATION In pictures: Milosevic in court  In-Depth: The case against Milosevic  CNN Presents: The people against Milosevic    RESOURCES • On the scene: CNN's Alessio Vinci reports  • On the scene: Christiane Amanpour: Classic Milosevic    CNN.com Europe More news  from our European edition

"This whole thing is a manipulation, a fabrication," the former Yugoslav leader said. In contrast he said Serbs had mounted "a heroic defence" of their country.

But reformers who ousted Milosevic blasted his strategy, accusing the former Yugoslav president of trying to hide behind the Serb people.

"He was a coward throughout his time in power so I wouldn't expect him to act any differently in court," Goran Vesic, a senior official in the ruling Democratic Party, told the Beta news agency on Thursday.

He added: "Milosevic is on trial for what he has done personally. Rather than defending himself, he is trying to hide behind Serbia's citizens."

Dragor Hiber, a deputy leader of one of the smaller parties in the alliance that ousted Milosevic in October 2000, took issue with another element in the former president's speech.

Milosevic insisted he had been elected fairly and his actions were the expression of the will of the people.

But Hiber said it was irrelevant how Milosevic had entered high office. "The defence is politically unacceptable and legally unfounded," he said.

"No matter how one comes to power, by fair elections or by rigging the vote, one can't be absolved of responsibility for the criminal acts one commits."

Milosevic faces a total of 66 counts of genocide and other war crimes relating to a decade of strife in the republics that once made up Yugoslavia. Each count carries a maximum sentence of life in prison.

He began giving evidence in his defence on the third day of his trial at the U.N. court at The Hague by showing a video recording of a German TV documentary.

It included a comment from a German general saying he was ashamed of his government during NATO's bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999.

"This is just an atom ... in an ocean of lies ... against my country," Milosevic said following the video.

"Civilian targets," Milosevic said, "were NATO's main targets," pointing to the deaths of women, children and the elderly.

"They hit many more hospitals than they did tanks. They hit many more schools than they did tanks."

He provided photographs of his claims, showing grisly images of severed body parts and charred corpses he said were ethnic Albanians killed during the bombing of Kosovo on April 14 when they were returning to their homes. The bombing occurred near Djakovica.

"Everybody could see they were civilians and peasants in their carts," Milosevic said. "They were intentionally targeted... They were targeted because they were going back to their village."

Milosevic argued that mass deaths in Kosovo did not begin until the NATO bombing. He said the western intervention was contrived and "concocted," and that there had been no human disaster in Kosovo, as claimed by the west, until the bombing began.

He denied that Serb military forces expelled hundreds of thousands of Kosovar Albanians, and said they actually had fled the KLA and the NATO bombing.

"When people were fleeing from these places of conflict, this is called deportation," he said. "They want to make me accountable for the crimes they perpetrated themselves."

He also branded the Serb opponents who defeated him in 2000 elections as a "puppet regime" of the West and accused the media of inherent bias.

"This is a crime against the truth. This is a competition between justice and injustice," he told the court's three scarlet and black-robed judges facing him across the austere modern courtroom.

Milosevic, who pointed his finger and thumped the desk at times as he spoke, said the case was not against him alone but against the whole Serbian people. "Our citizens stand accused, citizens who lent their massive support to me," he said. "My conduct was an expression of the will of the people," he said.

Milosevic said he was only defending his country and his people, arguing he was waging a war on terrorism.

"The Americans go right [to] the other side of the globe to fight terrorism in Afghanistan... and that is considered to be logical and normal," Milosevic said.

"Whereas here (at the war crimes tribunal), the struggle against terrorism in the heart (of) one's own country... is considered to be a crime. That means that you are not master in own home."

The prosecution case against Milosevic claims he was responsible for the deportation of millions of non-Serbs and the killing of hundreds of thousands more during the wars in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo, in a brutal campaign to entrench his own personal power.

Milosevic is the first head of state to be called to justice before an international tribunal. His case is the most prominent war crimes trial since military tribunals tried the leaders of Nazi Germany and Japan after World War II.