Letter: Fascism forced on Croatia

Sir: No, it is not true that Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia 'has opened the way to a fascist dictatorship' ('Milosevic 'aims to be dictator' ', 4 June) with the arrest of Vuk Draskovic, leader of the so-called Serbian Renewal Movement, which has in the past three years demoted itself from a political party to a worthless caricature of its own leader.

By quoting Milovan Djilas, you have not only published comments by a half-forgotten dissident of Tito's era, but also symbolically and correctly extracted Mr Draskovic from that particular age, since he, too, used to be a member of Tito's Communist Party and a recipient of all its privileges. He did not wait too long after his master's death to transform himself into a political leader of the far right, and in the process suffered two crushing political defeats in the 1990 and 1992 general elections.

His response has been to downgrade himself both morally and politically, the final straw being last week's open incitement to armed warfare against the government. About 700 teenagers, supported by the street element, responded to his call by damaging the Federal Assembly and killing one policeman.

Mr Draskovic's appeal to the public fell on deaf ears, proving his total unpopularity and the fact that the Serbian people, contrary to your statement, even after a 500-year relationship with the Ottoman Turks, are not advocates of 'brute force'.

Yours sincerely,

BRANKO FILIPOVIC

Chief of the 1st Directory

The Republic of Serbian Krajina

Belgrade

5 June