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Show " iiii it's till true. " didn't invent the world I write about Graham Greene (1904-1991- ). The Daily Herald Serbs, Hufus share grisly commonalities By G WYNNE DYER "We struggled tor so long, we endured m much, and now we are burned out by our own people." said a woman in Grbav-i.- a whose apartment was torched by Bosnian Serb thugs two days ! ctore the Sarajevo suburb was handed .nor to the Bosnian eov eminent on March uni-torm- N. The Bosnian Serb leadership, forced to h md over the fixe suburbs of Sarajevo that remained in its hands throughout the war. decided to leave neither residents nor habitable buildings behind. So it sent in troops A 6 Wednesday, April 3, 1996 in Sarajevo. The Bosnian government's army, though predominant!) Muslim, is a secular and multi-ethnforce, and despite four years of bitter war it has almost no atrocities on its record. So why did the vast majority of Sarajevo Serbs abandon their homes and become refugees rather than live under the Bosnian government? Half the answer is gusli or rather, the psychological contortions you must go through to avoid confronting your guilt. When you have been implicated in the murder of innocent people, as so man) ordinary Bosnian Serbs and Rwandan Hutus were, then to justify vour action ic to tughten the Serbs who wanted to stay :u leaving, or eKe burn their apartments mound them. This happened last month, in front of il.c television cameras, and with no seri- us intervention by NATO's heavily you must define the group vour victims .tniied troops stationed five minutes away. belonged to as dangerous monsters. And People who wanted Sarajevo Serbs to you must then act as though that definileave have achieved 85 percent of what tion were true, even to the extent of the) wanted." said UN aid official Kris becoming a penniless refugee rather than .Luiowski bitterly stay and face the fact that they are not But watchinc monsters. Bosnian Jiunken That's half the Serb soldiers who We answer. The other half is manipulation pent the past four of proportion over ) ears murdering oth-- 1 by those who origiethnic groups this. It is started the nally t nallv turn their vio-i.nto to genocide and must Guest Opinion shouldn't lose our JLJ sense agamt their aii tribe. I was leminded of another recent genocide "i Kwa ;Ja. he pat leuis .ire eerily the t 1 - .line. It's not just the .ale of the slaugh-kwhich was uind 10 percent of i. . i much, much harder belong the group that is the victim of the genocide, and that's where most of our sympa thy and support should go. But it is hard to belong to the group that committed the genocide, too. v total population in each case. About 200.000 people, over-v-helmi- Muslims and Croats, were Jeansed" by the Serbs of Bosnia. Around 700.000 people, overwhelmingly iutsi. were massacred by the Hutus of Rwanda. And the great power- behaved the same V'MV in Kith cases, of course Firvt thv J. limed that the killings in Bosnia anil Kwanda were just a spontaneous outbreak ol Balkan or African 'tribalism.".growing n of historical roots too deep and tangled to understand. And when 'it ;';c media final!) did force them to recog-'is- e what was going on. they still shirked iiieir duty as much as the) could. (See i:Kivica. above.) But it's perfectly normal for governments to avoid expensive commitments overseas if they possibly can. It's also v natural, alas, for people in the grip i 'I nationalist or racist paranoia to turn without warning and slaughter the family next door, with whom they used to sit and gossip, just because they belong to the 'v rong ethnic or religious group. No, where the similarities between Bosnia and Rwanda grow eene is in the psychology of those who were implicated m the killing, and the tactics of the leaders who manipulated them. Remember two years ago when the Rwanda Patriotic Front's arm), trained in neighbouring I'ganda. finally'marched in and ended the genocide? Most of the RIT"s soldiers were Tutsi, and the country ws literally carpeted with mutilated Tutsi corpses, but there were almost no instances of Rl'F troops taking private vengeance; it was a remarkably disciplined army. Vet two million Hutus. about a third of the country's surviving population, fled beyond the borders. They languish in ghastly refugee camps in Zaire and Tanzania, even today Why did they flee, and why do they stay in the camps despite huge international pressure for them to go home? Now consider w hat has just happened - non-exper- ts per-uetl- now shield them- selves from punishment for it. People like "President" Radovan Karadic. who still rules the Serb Republic" despite the fact that he is an indicted war. criminal and former "Bosnian Rwandan Prime Minister Jean Kambanda. who moves freely between Kenya and his power base in the refugee camps of Zaire. Power base is precisely what it's about. Kambanda's Hutu government broadcasts monstrous lies about nonexistent RPF massacres of Hutus in order to get several million people to flee into exile with the leaders. W hy ' It needed them for protection and support. And if Hutu refugees try to go home, the old regime's militia, still active in the camps, often kills them. Karadzic's tactics are identical. He lost the war. and he now faces a grave challenge from those he led to disaster. "Our main goal now is to lake these war criminals, like Karadic. and put them on trial." said Miodrag Zivanovic, leader of the opposition Liberal Party, in January. "The Bosnian Serbs must punish those who carried out these crimes; otherwise, in the eyes of the world, we will bear the guilt tor the atrocities they committed in our name." Exactly. With his power base rapidly shrinking back toward its original core in the Serbian suburbs of Sarajevo. Karadzic could not afford to let that key population slip out of his control. If w here they live is passing back under Bosnian government control, then they will just have to move. So. flee! Or the Muslims will eat your babies. Flee! Or mv troops will burn you out. Flee! I need you around me. to protect me. even if you all have to live in tents. We shouldn't lose our sense of proportion over this. It is much, much harder to belong to the group that is the victim of the genocide, and that's where most of our sympathv and support should go. But it is hard to belong to the group that committed the genocide, too. (Did I hear someone say. 'Good'?) Gwynne ther is a freelance London-buse- d journalist whose articles appear in more than 30 i omit he s. Making English official would sever many from government From THE MIAMI HERALD There's a useful simplicity to Florida's "official English" constitutional provi- The court may not reach this issue, though. It first wants to know if the group that is defending the Arizona provision has legal standing to do so. This seemingly arcane matter may have important sion. Approved by voters in 1988. it says: "English is the official language of the slate of Florida. The Legislature shall hav e the power to enforce this section by appropriate legislation." That wording gives comfort to any who fear finding themselves strangers in their implications for individuals seeking the right to question state law and constituown land, yet it doesn't discomfit tional initiatives. Arizonans for Official and visitors here. Thus far. the strangers is defending the amendment English has not made Legislature wisely mischief because officials so dislike it that state that turns away business people and do so. refused to they tourists or Americans. there may be some mercy if the court Without a doubt, the 1988 referendum doesn't decide the primary issue. This on this amendment, generated by initiative court already has approved government petition, didn't spring from benign intent. restrictions on the speech of people receivStill, it's not as injurious as an Arizona ing federal funds. Hut forbidding a state constitutional amendment that will be employee to speak another language debated by the U.S. Supreme Court. That means that many citizens and residents are measure requires all government "funcbarred from participating in government tions and actions" to be in English. It has or enjoying its benefits It would be a sad been challenged on h grounds by day for the Lady with the Lamp should the a stale employee who had spoken Spanish highest court find constitutional blessing to residents when it was helpful to them. for that. GgmEnontayy free-speec- v. Editor's note The following two letters were submitn ted for publication together, as they to the same topic. Tliey were written by mother and daughter, respectively. er-tai- happening (or not happening) in our courtrooms, perhaps we can come to some solutions together. In my opinion, one good solution is to rid ourselves of a judge who cannot execute equitable judgments conviction 2. Brought me back into court after a decision had been made in my case and imposed a harsher sentence (monetary payment plus 12 months probation not imposed before), just because I asked a reasonable question. 3. Did not extend to me the same respect he seems to demand for himself. I once had this idea that a courtroom was presided over by an honorable judge who made sure that justice prevailed. I'm rethinking that idea now. There was nothing honorable or just about the way I was treated by judge Joseph Dimick. Kelly Crtx kett Orem to tit the crimes. Meanwhile, every one of us needs to remember not to wear a hat or halter-toto .court or some of us may just find ourselves sleeping in a cell on a hard, little cot compliments of the honorable judge p A day in court Last year my daughter was thrown, d punched, choked and kicked by a male body builder who was wearing steel toed work boots. With the long wait finally over, my daughter, the plaintiff, recounted the details of that horrible assault while standing in the courtroom presided over bv the honorable judge Joseph Dimick of the Fourth Judicial Circuit Court The judge heard testimony from the responding officer and also viewed photographs of the huge, swollen bruises this young woman sustained from this terrible beating. Judge Dimick commented that one of the bruises was the worst he had ever seen. He read a statement by the attending paramedic who responded to the 911 call. He was also told of the fractured tailbone s on file at the Utah Valley Regional Medical Center. Amazingly, the defendant was acquitted! The judge deemed the city did not present the burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. During these proceeding, this "alleged" assaulter was not sentenced to one day in jail, not commanded to perform one minute of community service, not fined one single penny! He was neither ordered to reimburse my daughter's medical expenses, nor did he receive even a small reprimand! Worst of all, he is now free to throw, punch, choke and kick his next female victim, as well as to continue pursuing his present hoped-fo- r career in law enforcement! Just imagine in contrast: This very same daughter was recently stopped by a police officer because she was driving an unregistered, uninsured vehicle. Not only was her car impounded. Judge Dimick fined her S297.(X). Interestingly, in this same courtroom where these two cases were prosecuted, a warning is posted in several locations. It reads: If you are sitting in this court wearhalter top or shorts, ing a hat. tank-toyou are about to go to jail. Now, let me try' to get this straight. If you drive an unregistered vehicle, you can lose vour car and be fined; if you wear shorts in court, you may be incarcerated; but. if you severely beat another human being and break her bones, you walk free! Is something amiss here? Author Philip Howard thinks so. In his book, "The Death of Common Sense," he speaks extensively about this issue. As more of us become aware of what is 2S0-poun- y p. W v V r I m m M Joe Dimick! Kay Grover Spanish Fork Another day in court On Feb. 3th. I stood before Judge Joseph Dimick in Orem's Fourth Circuit Court and pled guilty to charges of driving on a suspended license without insurance and registration. I had chosen to disregard the law and I was willing to face the consequences. My car had already been impounded and I was now being ordered to pay a fine of $297.00. which the judge offered to suspend if I wanted to do 40 hours of community sen ice. As I left the courtroom that day. I remembered back one month when Judge Dimick had acquitted a man who had brutally assaulted me. My common sense told me that something was very wrong here. So while waiting for my ride, 1 wrote a short note to the Judge on the back of my information sheet. I thanked him for allow ing me community serv ice, as I have no source of income, and then I asked him why my offenses were worthy of punishment when my perpetrator's heinous crime w as not. A week later. I received a notice in the mail informing me that there were to he further proceedings involving my case. I appeared in court again not sure what was going to happen. I hoped the judge was going to say something that would alleviate some of my confusion regarding the discrepancies I witnessed between the judgments in the two cases. Well, there was contempt in court that day. and it was the obv ious contempt that judge Dimick had for me! Addressing me by my first name, he informed me that he would tolerate no discussion in his courtroom about his decisions. He asked me questions and then rudely interrupted me when I tried to answer. He then rescinded his community serv ice offer, reinstated the $297.00 fine and placed nic on probation. I felt that Judge Dimick had called me back into court to try to publicly intimidate and humiliate me and to punish me for asking a simple question, Now, I don't claim to know, much about the legal system, but I do wonder about this judge w ho: I. Acquitted the Deroetrator of a brutal assault w hen there was ample evidence for I 1 Blinded by the lights In your feature section. Spring and Summer Car Care, published on March 27th. there was an article titled. "Day time headlights reduce accidents." It is important to note that this caption is not necessarily the case. The issue revolves around daytime running lights (DRLs). Historically, imports coming into the states petitioned to have DRLs. Quoting from your article. "In 1993 a federal safety agency e state law s that would have barred them." Does this sound familiar, federal government overriding states' rights? We now have another Federal edict: Title 49. Section 571. Standard 108. Now enters GenenJ Motors Corporation. They plan to equip all their new cars w ith DRLs. Intelligently. Chrysler Corporation has no such plans, while Ford Motor Company seems to be taking a attitude. Canada, which has a DRLs law. has not experienced a measurable reduction in accidents just blinding lights. What does this mean to you and me? Vehicles w ith their lights w ired "on" have now made null and void all those special vehicle situations using headlamps to enhance conspicuity. It places at risk motorcycles, school buses, ambulances, police "cars, funeral convoys, military convoys, etc. The greater safety issues are in a heap of federal bureaucracy and automobile manufacturover-rod- "look-and-se- c" now-burie- short-sighte- Paul Letters policy Letters to the editor Please address them to: Daily Herald. P.O. Box 84603-071- m OUT I you I UTBH ( FAX 77. Editor. The Pmw, UT BY GARRY TRUDEAU . I OF7WS'Ie JDMK-- I GOT A R&wA SOFZjT IV fWUJYTO TtesTocx- - 7. are welcome. . 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