Translated material
Ambassador to hell
Prosecutor Del Ponte will travel to Argentina
The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, Carla Del Ponte, will be able to celebrate the New Year in South America. To do this, it is only necessary that her native Switzerland receive the appropriate agrement from Argentina.Carla Del Ponte's second four-year term as prosecutor in The Hague expires in mid-September. Yielding to pressure from a number of Western countries, the Swiss government extended her business trip until the end of the year. After that, according to informed sources, she will go as ambassador to South America.
The former Swiss federal prosecutor imposed a number of conditions on her departure to The Hague in September 1999. Since the salary stipulated by the UN staffing table did not suit her, she ensured that the Swiss government took upon itself to maintain her previous earnings, as well as pay for all expenses for her stay on Dutch soil. In addition, the government undertook to employ her at the end of her mandate in The Hague in an equivalent position.
In 1999, Del Ponte found herself at the center of scandals that tarnished the reputation of the Swiss government. The noisy case of embezzlement in the Ministry of Defense turned into a fiasco, and at the trial that took place in the fall of the same year (when Del Ponte had already left for The Hague), Colonel of the Swiss General Staff, Friedrich Niffenegger, who had been accused by her, was acquitted. The failure of the “Mabetex case” , built around information about secret accounts in Swiss banks of the family of then Russian President Boris Yeltsin, caused the greatest resonance.
Television around the world showed in January 1999 how Carla Del Ponte, at the head of a detachment of federal police, stormed the Mabetex company building in Lugano. After that, she announced that she had discovered documents proving that Boris Yeltsin and his family laundered money through the Luhansk Banca del Gotardo. The then Prosecutor General of Russia, Yuri Skuratov, asked Switzerland for assistance in the investigation of the Mabetex case. But his first request was turned down by Carla Del Ponte. Further, all correspondence between the two prosecutors' offices was dictated by her. However, among the documents of the Mabetex company there was no evidence of the public accusations of the federal prosecutor. Those “documents” that she passed on to the press turned out to be fakes, and her main witness turned out to be a qualified perjurer.
In an effort to avoid the consequences of the scandal, Berne made every effort to quietly remove Del Ponte. Just then a vacancy appeared for a prosecutor at the Hague Tribunal. This idea faced serious criticism in parliament. Deputies feared that Del Ponte would cast a shadow on Switzerland with his dubious activities . Some even suggested investigating her activities as a federal prosecutor.
Both with the appointment of Del Ponte as chief prosecutor of the ICTY and with the extension of her mandate for a second term in the Swiss parliament, the question was raised: is maintaining her reputation too expensive for the national treasury? But she honestly earned the money and benefits she received in her own way, blackmailing Serbia and trying to force it to capitulate to the West . After the death of its main accused, ex-President of Serbia and Yugoslavia Slobodan Milosevic, in The Hague in March 2006, many in Switzerland felt that the main problem had been solved and the “shop” could be closed. Swiss Minister of Justice and Police Christoph Blocher personally insisted on the return of Carla Del Ponte. However, she remained in her post and even received a three-month extension of her powers.
The main headache for Bern was the problem of employing the Hague prosecutor. Formally, she remained on the staff of the Ministry of Justice and Police. However, as is clear from information leaked to the Swiss press, Minister Blocher categorically rejected the possibility of appointing a former federal prosecutor with a tarnished reputation to a high post in the field of justice. After heated debates in the government, it was decided to transfer Del Ponte to the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
By the time Del Ponte leaves the post of prosecutor in The Hague, embassy posts in South America are vacated, which allows the Swiss authorities to send the troublemaker away. Replacements are expected in Argentina, Brazil and Colombia. However, Brazil is too important from an economic point of view, and it is unlikely that the competence of a professional prosecutor can be useful in this field. In Colombia, Switzerland acts as a mediator in negotiations between the government and the rebel Armed Revolutionary Forces of Colombia. This activity requires a delicacy that is clearly unusual for Ms. Del Ponte. And although officially the Swiss Foreign Ministry remains silent, in private conversations knowledgeable diplomats make it clear that Del Ponte’s appointment as ambassador to Buenos Aires is most likely. As the informed newspaper Tan writes, “in Bern they are already gritting their teeth about Carla Del Ponte. Some have expressed serious doubts whether, given her fiery temperament, she is capable of maneuvering through the delicate functions of diplomacy.”