After nearly two months of isolation in a UN detention centre, former Yugoslav president Mr Slobodan Milosevic went on the offensive this week, in a sneak interview with US television in which he hit back at charges of war crimes and lashed out at NATO.
The former Yugoslav president telephoned a journalist from US Fox News on Thursday to give an interview, in violation of the rules of the tribunal in The Hague where he's being held.
Mr Milosevic is charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity for his role in the 1998-99 Serbian crackdown on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).
In the interview from his jail cell, he defended himself against the charges, saying he never directed his troops to kill civilians in Kosovo. But he said they had been under strict orders to "eliminate terrorist groups".
Extrajudicial killings had occurred, but the perpetrators had been punished, he said. The former president said the proof of what he was saying was that more than 500 different individuals had been arrested by the police.
He blamed NATO for the killings, which he said "were consequences of (a) chaotic situation created by (the) massive bombing of NATO". He told Fox News he was "sorry" lives were lost in Kosovo.
"I'm proud for everything I did in defending my country and my people. All my decisions are legitimate and legal, based on the constitution of Yugoslavia and based on the rights to self-defence, which belongs to every nation in the world," he said in English.
Since his transfer to the tribunal, Mr Milosevic has refused to comment on the war crimes charges or appoint counsel.
He lodged a complaint with a Dutch court challenging the legality of the tribunal and demanding his immediate release from the UN jail. A judge will decide next week if the case can go to court.