Yugoslavia: A History of its Demise - Indymedia

THE BEGINNING OF THE END 65
Finally, at the beginning of June 1988, Janez Stanovnik, head of the European
Division of the UN, succeeded France Popit, who as a member of an earlier
generation no longer understood the world, at the helm of the Slovenian
presidency. Stanovnik represented the transition to a multi-party, democratic
state; he had not made his career in the communist apparatus and this fact gave
him credibility. His dignified appearance kindled in the minds of many Slovenes
the hope of independent statehood, even though Stanovnik, in all his
conversations with me in 1988 and 1989, always underlined that he could not
imagine Slovenia existing outside Yugoslavia; maybe young people saw things
differently. In this regard he was of the same mind as Jože Smole.
The Slovenian leadership, which at that point in time could not yet afford to
ignore the legal situation, focused, where the trial of Janša was concerned, on
two points: First, the leadership demanded a speedy end to the investigation; and
second, it seconded the demand of the public demonstrators that the trial be held
in Slovenian, rather than in Serbo-Croatian. This was not a purely military affair,
in which the language of command, Serbo-Croatian, should be used, Kučan
argued. 27 This issue brought the Slovenian leadership and the so-called
opposition together. “The Slovenes,” Kučan told the Central Committee at the
end of June, “cannot accept a state which does not guarantee them the use of
their mother tongue and their equality, and in which the freedom, sovereignty,
and equality of the Slovenian people are not safeguarded.” Kučan spoke these
words after conducting utterly fruitless talks with General Kadijević, 28 and after
the Yugoslav state presidency headed by Dizdarević had expressly rejected the
Slovenian demand that the Slovenian language be used in proceedings of military
courts on the territory of Slovenia. 29
The sentences of the military court in Ljubljana were, as a result of the
pressure of the general agitation in Slovenia, relatively mild: one and a half years
in prison for Janša and Zavrl, five months for Tasić, but four years for Borštner.
Under law, the defendants had to be released to the custody of the Slovenian
judicial system, which was supposed to carry out the sentences, This the
Slovenian judicial authorities passively did. Meanwhile, the defendants revealed
that the military judges had been more interested in asking them about the
internal dynamics within the Slovenian leadership than in probing the
accusations as such. 30
After the trial, the political situation in Slovenia changed significantly. Not
only had the population and leadership now drawn closer on questions of
democratization and the defense of national interests, but the notion of an
independent Slovenia entered for the first time into the field of vision—in view of
the danger emanating from Belgrade. In July 1988, an opinion poll found that 63
per cent of the population favored independence (this view being especially
widespread among younger people), even if the course which might be charted to
this goal was not yet clear. 31 The notion that Yugoslavia might be transformed into
a loose confederation of independent states now emerged. Functionaries of the
older generation, such as Jože Smole, continued to believe that Slovenia might