The Yugoslav Foreign Minister, Mr Goran Svilanovic, has hinted at a willingness by the new government to put Mr Slobodan Milosevic on trial for war crimes in the Federal Republic.
Following a ground-breaking meeting in Washington on Thursday with the outgoing Secretary of State, Ms Madeleine Albright, at which the remnants of sanctions against Yugoslavia were discussed, both emerged to say that the coutry's democratic revolution had laid a sound basis for a new relationship.
Mr Svilanovic fell short of promising full co-operation with the UN's International Criminal Court at The Hague. "There are possibilities to fully co-operate with the tribunal and to prosecute all indicted personalities in co-operation with the tribunal on the territory of the FRY [Federal Republic of Yugoslavia]," he said, an offer he knows will not satisfy the court.
He noted that tribunal investigators are already on the ground in Yugoslavia and said he hopes they will be able to open an office soon. FRY officials will discuss the issue with the chief UN war crimes tribunal prosecutor, Ms Carla Del Ponte.
Two weeks ago, Ms Del Ponte rejected suggestions that Mr Milosevic could be tried in Yugoslavia instead of The Hague.
"Yugoslavia is not - and for many years will not - be in a position to hold a fair trial of Milosevic for the charges brought, and to be brought, by this tribunal," she said.
Ms Albright reaffirmed the longstanding US view that Mr Milosevic and others indicted by the International War Crimes Tribunal, based in The Hague, Netherlands, "must be held accountable by The Hague for their actions . . . International crimes, or crimes against the international community, require international justice."
Mr Svilanovic had asked to meet the Secretary of State-designate, Gen Colin Powell, but officials said he was turned down because the latter wants to avoid meeting foreign leaders until he assumes office later this month. He was due to meet Powell advisers yesterday.
While the oil embargo and the flight ban have been lifted by the US and EU, an "outer wall of sanctions" remain in place.
US officials say they are working with others to remove these, a process helped by FRY membership now of such organsiations as the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, the International Monetary Fund, and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
Kosovo's UN administrator, Mr Bernard Kouchner, met with health officials in Pristina yesterday to try to establish whether munitions used by the US air force in bombing Mr Milosevic's forces during the Kosovo war pose a health risk to the province's residents.
The talks coincided with a visit to Pristina by Italy's Under-Secretary for Defence, Mr Marco Minniti, whose government has been vocal in demanding information on the use of weapons containing depleted uranium (DU).
Mr Minniti first met with the Italian commander of Kosovo's KFOR peacekeeping force before moving on the visit the headquarters of his country's contingent in the province.
Earlier, KFOR chief Lieut Gen Carlo Cabigiosu said that a link between the use of DU inmunition fired during NATO's Bosnian and Kosovo campaigns and leukaemia later suffered by the Alliance's troops had "yet to be determined."
