BERLIN — The Yugoslav military Saturday released a former general whom it had arrested Thursday and accused of giving secret military documents to a U.S. diplomat. The diplomat was also detained and held incommunicado for 15 hours.
The United States and Serbia, Yugoslavia's dominant republic, accused the army of fabricating evidence. Western officials said the arrests raised profound questions about whether elements within the army were committed to the country's new democracy.
Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic said the military's intelligence arm informed neither its political superiors nor the military brass before arresting the two men, plus a Yugoslav military officer and a civilian, in a restaurant south of Belgrade. Djindjic said the military intelligence service has "gone out of control."
The incident has strained relations between Yugoslav authorities and the government of Serbia. The army falls under the ostensible political control of Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica, who has infuriated Western officials by refusing to purge military leaders appointed by Milosevic.
Over Kostunica's objections, the Serbian government handed Milosevic over to the international war crimes tribunal in The Hague, where he is on trial for genocide and crimes against humanity during the Yugoslav wars.
Kostunica appeared to defend the military action when he said, ". . .the legality of the procedure itself, from the standpoint of domestic procedure, is not disputable."
Kostunica's comments were likely to further alienate the United States. The arrests come as Congress is about to consider whether Yugoslavia is cooperating sufficiently with the war crimes tribunal to warrant continued financial aid.
The State Department said it was outraged by the arrests and the treatment of John David Neighbor, the first secretary at the U.S. Embassy in Belgrade, who was allegedly manhandled and held with his head covered for extended periods.
A Western official said the Yugoslav Foreign Ministry had apologized in a diplomatic note for the treatment of Neighbor and that the United States was satisfied the matter had been resolved. Western officials cautioned, however, that Yugoslavia needs to resolve problems about the role of its army.
Media reports in Belgrade said the military was accusing Momcilo Perisic, a former Yugoslav army general who now is a deputy prime minister of Serbia, of giving documents to Neighbor that would buttress the prosecution's case in Milosevic's trial. Perisic was commanding general of the Yugoslav army until he was fired by Milosevic just before NATO went to war with Yugoslavia over its treatment of ethnic Albanians in the Serbian province of Kosovo in 1999.
Perisic went on to form a political party and was a leading figure in the popular revolution that swept Milosevic from power in 2000. Since then, Perisic has been increasingly critical of the military and in particular his successor, Gen. Nebojsa Pavkovic, who was appointed by Milosevic but retains Kostunica's support.
"I am released and I believe I am not guilty," Perisic said today. The state news agency Tanjug said, however, that a military court had forwarded criminal charges to army prosecutors. One of Perisic's aides, Nebojsa Mandic, said the former general was "ready to appear before state authorities . . . and reveal a plot against him and the people of Serbia."
A military statement said one of the other men arrested Thursday, identified as Lt. Col. Miodrag Sekulic, gave confidential documents to Perisic, "some of which he later passed on to a foreign citizen." The evidence pointed to "the criminal act of espionage," the statement said.
Neighbor, who identified himself but was not allowed to contact the U.S. Embassy, was also charged with espionage before he was released Friday. Western officials said Neighbor had been invited to dinner by Perisic. About 15 minutes after the two men sat down, four men dressed in civilian clothes burst into the restaurant and took them away in handcuffs.