Former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic started his defense at the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) Tuesday morning, rejecting all charges against him.

In his defense presentation, which has been postponed repeatedly from May on due to Milosevic's poor health, Milosevic denounced the charges of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes against him as "lies" and "distortions."

"Accusations leveled against me are an unscrupulous lie and also a tireless distortion of history," said Milosevic, who was wearing a dark blue suit and a striped tie in the red, blue and white of the Yugoslav flag.

The former Yugoslav president accused the West, NATO, Kosovo Albanian drug gangs, Islamic militants and Vatican of contributing to the break-up of a multi-ethnic Yugoslavia in the 1990s.

"The international community acted ... as the main force for the destruction of Yugoslavia," said Milosevic, who looked relaxed and swinged his glasses occasionally in making statement.
 
The former Yugoslav strongman, 63, even challenged the legitimacy and the UN war tribunal.
 
"The tribunal (ICTY) is part of NATO war strategy. ...It (ICTY) is not an international institution, but a NATO institution. ... It has no independence at all," he said.

In the later part of his presentation on Tuesday, Milosevic detailed the history of conflicts in former Yugoslavia, and elaborated crimes allegedly carried out against Serbia by Croatia, Slovenia and foreign invaders.

He even tackled the Austro-Hungarian Empire, World War One, Nazi Germany's occupation of countries in the Balkans in his statement.

He was interrupted by presiding judge Patrick Robinson, who warned Milosevic of not telling anything "irrelevant to the case."

Milosevic continued his presentation on history and his presentation for Tuesday was prolonged from 1:30 PM to 2 o'clock.

Milosevic's defense presentation is expected to last three days and the tribunal will call witnesses for the defense case next week, according to ICTY information official.

Milosevic has listed more than 1,000 witnesses for his defense case, including British Prime Minister Tony Blair and former US President Bill Clinton. The judge from the ICTY has the power to decide the call of witnesses.

(Xinhua News Agency September 1, 2004)