Page 9326
1 Monday, 2 September 2002
2 [Open session]
3 [The accused entered court]
4 --- Upon commencing at 2.16 p.m.
5 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Madam Registrar, could you call the case,
6 please.
7 THE REGISTRAR: Yes, Your Honour. This is the case number,
8 IT-99-36-T, the Prosecutor versus Radoslav Brdjanin and Momir Talic.
9 JUDGE AGIUS: And Mr. Brdjanin, good afternoon to you. Can you
10 hear me in a language that you can understand?
11 THE ACCUSED BRDJANIN: [Interpretation] Good afternoon, Your
12 Honours. I can hear you and understand you.
13 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you.
14 And General Talic, can you hear me in a language that you can
15 understand?
16 THE ACCUSED TALIC: [Interpretation] Good afternoon, Your Honours.
17 I can hear you and understand you.
18 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you. You may sit down.
19 These -- Madam Registrar, if you could find them a place, because,
20 for example, I'm not seeing Mr. Trbojevic, because -- they obstruct the
21 view.
22 Appearances for the Prosecution.
23 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, Joanna Korner, assisted by Hasan Younis,
24 case manager. Good afternoon, Your Honours.
25 JUDGE AGIUS: Good afternoon to you.
Page 9327
1 Appearances for Radoslav Brdjanin.
2 MR. ACKERMAN: Good afternoon, Your Honours. I'm John Ackerman
3 along with Marela Jevtovic. As I reported to you last week, Mr. Trbojevic
4 will be absent this week in Banja Luka. And that's probably why you don't
5 see him.
6 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you.
7 Appearances for General Talic.
8 MR. ZECEVIC: Good afternoon, Your Honours. Slobodan Zecevic and
9 Natasha Ivanovic-Fauveau for General Talic.
10 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you, and good afternoon to you.
11 So, as we agreed, the first half hour to be dedicated to the
12 admissibility or objections that are being raised supposedly by the
13 Defence on the -- to the video. I got a video this morning which I
14 thought it was it, but it had nothing to do with the case. It had to do
15 with the Mrdza or Mrdzic.
16 MS. KORNER: Yes. Your Honour, I have two other short matters to
17 deal with, but I think I'll leave them till afterwards.
18 Your Honours, thanks to real commitment by members of the language
19 staff who are not really part of the investigation over the weekend,
20 we've had prepared a transcript in both -- well, in B/C/S originally,
21 translated into English.
22 Now, Your Honour, Mr. Ackerman objected to Your Honours seeing the
23 transcript. I do not in all conscience understand how an argument against
24 admissibility can be mounted unless Your Honours know what on earth
25 everybody is talking about. So Your Honours, my application this
Page 9328
1 morning -- this afternoon is that Your Honours now get a copy of the
2 transcript and that if necessary you can watch the video, which is
3 available.
4 JUDGE AGIUS: Mr. Ackerman.
5 MR. ACKERMAN: Your Honour, whoever it was that did -- made the
6 effort to get this transcript prepared in the short time involved should
7 be commended I think by all of us. It's a remarkable job.
8 The second thing: I have been in consultation with counsel for
9 General Talic. We have both had an opportunity to both view the tape and
10 to look at the transcript. And at this point our objection is limited to
11 those portions of the tape which contain the voice of persons who are not
12 identified, and specifically there are significant portions of the tape
13 where there's a voiceover done by some unidentified commentator, and we
14 cannot identify who that person is, and therefore we could not -- we could
15 neither interview nor call that person for testimony here.
16 The other people are people who we have been able to identify and
17 we think probably the tape is appropriate with regard to those people who
18 were chief of police, part of the Crisis Staff, things like that in Kljuc
19 at the time. So our objection is limited to the unidentified voices that
20 appear on the tape.
21 MS. KORNER: Well, Your Honour, the first application was that
22 Your Honours should all be given copies of the transcript, because the
23 unidentified voices so-called by Mr. Ackerman are in fact clearly a
24 television commentator, and it is as much the commentary to this tape that
25 we say is relevant and admissible for what we say is, as Mr. Ackerman
Page 9329
1 pointed out yesterday -- Friday, propaganda.
2 JUDGE AGIUS: Was this -- may I ask, what is this video exactly?
3 What -- is it a TV documentary or what?
4 MS. KORNER: It's -- it appears to be a programme that went out
5 on, it is thought, by Mr. Filipovic, Banja Luka Television. He can't say
6 who taped it or when it was, but he can identify a lot of the places, the
7 people, and the like. And he actually gets a special mention on the
8 tape.
9 JUDGE AGIUS: Can we verify if Mr. Filipovic is in a position to
10 identify the commentator? Because if it's a local production, I mean,
11 I'm -- looking at this coming from a small place, a small country, where
12 normally if you are familiar with -- you will be able to identify the
13 commentator very easily, if there are only two or three local stations.
14 MS. KORNER: Your Honours, it may well be. I don't know. And
15 he's not here at the moment I don't think. Well, he may have been brought
16 here. But Your Honour, in our submission, it wouldn't -- it would of
17 course be added weight. But it wouldn't matter whether or not he could
18 identify the commentator. But Your Honour, I don't know whether
19 Mr. Ackerman or Mr. Zecevic maintain their objection to Your Honours
20 having a copy of the transcript at the moment.
21 JUDGE AGIUS: You realise, Mr. Ackerman, that very much -- we very
22 much need to see -- have something in our hands before we can really
23 say --
24 MR. ACKERMAN: I think you should see it, because I think it will
25 help you understand what our objection is about. There is just --
Page 9330
1 JUDGE AGIUS: How long is it?
2 MR. ACKERMAN: It's 20 pages in the English version.
3 JUDGE AGIUS: The video recording itself, how long is it?
4 MS. KORNER: [Microphone not activated] I'm afraid to say I
5 haven't actually timed it.
6 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, counsel, please.
7 MS. KORNER: I think it's about --
8 MR. ZECEVIC: It's about 40 minutes, I think, Your Honours.
9 JUDGE AGIUS: About 40 minutes.
10 MS. KORNER: Yes. But I'm cutting out -- the first 20 minutes
11 whoever it was pointed out is all about some bullfight. So I'd say all in
12 all the relevant part is about 20 minutes. I mean, I've set up a
13 particular video to start at that part.
14 Well, would the -- would the answer be -- as the objection really
15 only relates now to what is the voiceover of the commentator, if
16 Your Honours were to take the transcript now and perhaps read through it
17 and we can -- I think it will be a much shorter -- and indeed we can have
18 Mr. Filipovic in at quarter to 3.00 and ask him that question.
19 JUDGE AGIUS: I think that's what --
20 Yes, Mr. Ackerman.
21 MR. ACKERMAN: Well, I'm just wondering if it makes sense for you
22 to do that if Mr. Filipovic is here, we could go ahead and start and just
23 save using the tape or any part of it until tomorrow, and that would
24 give you more time to look at the transcript and the tape if you wanted
25 that additional time, rather than interrupt testimony. But that will be
Page 9331
1 up to you, the way you want to do it.
2 JUDGE AGIUS: That seems -- it makes sense to me, provided that
3 it is anticipated to go into tomorrow with this witness.
4 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I -- Mr. Filipovic will undoubtedly be
5 going into tomorrow, probably into Wednesday, probably into Wednesday,
6 because --
7 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. Then I think we can read this at home this
8 evening and then we'll discuss it tomorrow morning.
9 [Trial Chamber confers]
10 MS. KORNER: Well, then, Your Honour, I'm going to ask that Your
11 Honours be handed now copies of the transcript.
12 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. I don't think we need the video recording for
13 the time being, because it doesn't make sense looking at it too, apart
14 from these transcripts. So basically --
15 MR. ACKERMAN: Well, unless --
16 JUDGE AGIUS: I take it that this is the --
17 MR. ACKERMAN: Unless you'd like to see the bullfight, Your
18 Honour.
19 JUDGE AGIUS: Not exactly my -- I have got strong reservations
20 about that sport, if you call it a sport.
21 MR. ACKERMAN: It's not the typical man fights bull. It's
22 bull fights bull, which is a different variation of that whole process
23 than I've ever seen.
24 JUDGE AGIUS: It's one of the cruelest -- yes.
25 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, then can I move to two other matters.
Page 9332
1 Could we go into private session for the first, because it relates
2 to witness protection.
3 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes.
4 Madam Registrar.
5 [Private session]
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Page 9338
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23 [Open session]
24 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, there are just two matters that remain,
25 both of which really relate to motions that were put in. The first is the
Page 9339
1 application to 92 bis, a number of the Kljuc witnesses. I was going to
2 say that Kljuc will be quite fast. This witness and another one will be
3 long, because they're going to deal with documents. But the rest will be
4 very short. It's all crime base. And we anticipate starting Prijedor
5 towards the end of September. So we'd like to know if Your Honours would
6 be kind enough, whether we can have the ruling on Kljuc.
7 JUDGE AGIUS: [Microphone not activated] Yes. This morning,
8 actually -- I haven't had time to --
9 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, Your Honour, please.
10 JUDGE AGIUS: I haven't had time to discuss, but the --
11 [Trial Chamber confers]
12 JUDGE AGIUS: So basically I worked on the basis of the
13 discussions that we had had between ourselves and also with our legal
14 staff on 92 bis. There were a few addenda to be made in the decision to
15 make it reflect the various opinions and have a unanimous decision. And I
16 take it that should -- yeah, I should have it on my desk tomorrow morning
17 for signature, and that should keep you all very happy. So that's -- the
18 protective measures one also was delayed precisely because I wanted to air
19 my -- our concerns about this risk assessment business. However, more or
20 less we are in a position to hand down the judgement -- the decision any
21 time. So -- but I understand that you -- 92 bis is perhaps more urgent
22 because Prijedor ...
23 MS. KORNER: Well, Your Honour, as Your Honour knows, a number of
24 the witnesses already received protective measures from not one but two or
25 three other cases, so it may be that that's a simpler --
Page 9340
1 JUDGE AGIUS: Protective measures. I also asked for my staff to
2 make a -- particularly with regard to Prijedor -- to make a comparative
3 study with those witnesses that are common to both Stakic and this case
4 that had asked for and were afforded, accorded protective measures. There
5 are one or two that had not asked for protective measures in Stakic or
6 were not produced in Stakic and produced as witnesses in this case. So
7 but it's something that is in hand. So it's -- I don't think it's going
8 to cause us any problems. We will need to sit down and go through it,
9 make sure that it -- there is agreement on each and every part of that
10 decision. And we can hand it down pretty soon.
11 MS. KORNER: And Your Honour, then the last matter is
12 Mr. Shellow's response to our analysis of straightforward pure law on
13 contempt and misconduct.
14 Your Honour will recall last week when it was raised Your Honours
15 hadn't had a chance to read it.
16 JUDGE AGIUS: I have read it now.
17 MS. KORNER: And I said that if Your Honours were going to take --
18 as it's an argument on the fact, then it may well be that we should
19 respond, because it's not in fact what was --
20 JUDGE AGIUS: Ms. Korner, there are two options. We either
21 expunge it from the records straight away, which is the temptation that I
22 have, and we would leave it at that. The other alternative is obviously
23 what you are suggesting now. We haven't reached a decision on whether to
24 expunge it or not because we did not discuss it again. We discussed it
25 very briefly last week. I suppose before we tell you yes, before we give
Page 9341
1 you the green light for a reply, we better decide whether to keep it in
2 the records or expunge it straight away.
3 MS. KORNER: Well, Your Honour, I don't actually --
4 JUDGE AGIUS: Because it's definitely beyond what was --
5 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I mean -- well I'm not going to go into
6 what Mr. Shellow thought he was doing. But in any event, Your Honours
7 will recall that when this procedure first came up, I expressed my
8 reservations about -- we were actually in one sense pre-judging something,
9 because this is an argument on everything. All I can say is we would be
10 unhappy about having to put a reply into this because we would be in a
11 sense arguing a matter which may well be dealt with by another branch of
12 this Tribunal and not Your Honours. And as I say, it's always been a bit
13 difficult to work out what Mr. Shellow's -- what the procedure which
14 allowed Mr. Shellow to address Your Honours actually was. So Your
15 Honours, I'm merely raising it. But if Your Honours intended to take it
16 into account in making your decision as to whether or not to institute
17 either proceedings for contempt or misconduct, then I think Your Honours,
18 it would only be right that we should ask for the right to reply.
19 JUDGE AGIUS: But in all fairness, we haven't discussed it again.
20 So I think we will need to postpone our decision after we have discussed
21 it between us.
22 There is another option, of course, and that is returning
23 everything to Mr. Shellow, telling him to re-file -- re-file it within the
24 terms of what we had agreed should be the parameters of the discussion.
25 That is another -- another way of approaching it. But --
Page 9342
1 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, yes. Because in fact he doesn't refer
2 to any authorities anywhere --
3 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, exactly. But please do accept my apologies.
4 MS. KORNER: -- on this matter.
5 JUDGE AGIUS: We were supposed to have a meeting, the three of us,
6 last week, which I had to cancel at the last minute because of something
7 urgent that came up. So we haven't had a time to meet --
8 MS. KORNER: That all right, Your Honour. I just saw it lying
9 there, so I thought I'd raise it gone.
10 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. Ready to --
11 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] Mr. President.
12 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes.
13 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] Since Ms. Korner has just
14 said that she hopes to start with the Prijedor municipality at the end of
15 September, I would like to ask her in public so she can disclose
16 us the list of witnesses for Prijedor and the List of Documents, because
17 it is a municipality which is by all means the largest ones, and we won't
18 have the time if we receive the list at the last minute, we won't be able
19 to deal with the trial and to file all the documents at the same time.
20 MS. KORNER: [Previous translation continues] ... we would I think
21 transmit the List of Documents plus their definitive -- as far as Prijedor
22 ever is definitive -- list of witnesses by the end of this week.
23 Your Honour, I was going to raise it at a later stage, but I agree
24 with Mr. Ackerman that I think if Your Honour gives two days on top of the
25 time off we're already having -- I can't remember when the first break is
Page 9343
1 now. Is it the last week in September?
2 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, it's 27 -- 29th of September.
3 MS. KORNER: Well, then, Your Honour, I think it might be sensible
4 if all parties were agreed, if Your Honours were to add on two further
5 days the following week for -- but with the provisor that all parties have
6 to get together.
7 JUDGE AGIUS: Usually the way I do it, Ms. Korner, is that I
8 usually leave it in the hands of the parties to agree on the dates.
9 MS. KORNER: Yes.
10 JUDGE AGIUS: There being flexibility on our parts. In other
11 words we don't have any other commitments ourselves except the work that
12 we have in this Tribunal. So basically if you try and sit round the table
13 and tell us what you -- what you require, what you want, we will be in a
14 position to accommodate you --
15 MS. KORNER: Or Your Honour, it may even be the two days before.
16 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, exactly whichever. Whether you want the two
17 days before, or the two days after, it doesn't really make a difference to
18 us because we are here.
19 MS. KORNER: Yes.
20 JUDGE AGIUS: It's only -- Mr. Ackerman wants to go to Texas.
21 MR. ACKERMAN: No. If we're talking about Prijedor, and we are.
22 JUDGE AGIUS: Yeah.
23 MR. ACKERMAN: The other question that arises: We have been
24 provided recently with what appears to be maybe a few thousand pages of
25 transcript of testimony from the Stakic case. And I don't know if the
Page 9344
1 Prosecutor is having those translated into the language of the accused or
2 intends to provide us with tapes. But one or the other I would suggest
3 ought to be done with as much dispatch as possible so that the accused
4 will have an opportunity to see what it is these witnesses have said in
5 the Stakic case.
6 JUDGE AGIUS: Prijedor is a very important municipality. It's
7 make it or break it, in my opinion, Prijedor. After Prijedor we should
8 all know more or less what the situation looks like on the horizontal.
9 So --
10 MS. KORNER: That's -- Kotor Varos, Your Honour, which -- I agree
11 that in between there are a number of smaller municipalities. But Kotor
12 Varos is a major municipality. And Bosanski Novi is not exactly small.
13 JUDGE AGIUS: But anyway please do take Prijedor because I
14 envisage it's going to take us a long time to start with. And it's not an
15 easy -- from what I know, what I have followed from the Stakic case, it's
16 not an easy municipality at all. It's -- it will be a difficult one. So
17 if you can sort of thrash these things amongst yourselves.
18 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, yes, certainly I will. I know that I've
19 been reminded by Mr. Younis that a request was made to the registry by Ms.
20 Gustin sometime ago for the tapes, I think before she left on her summer
21 holiday so we'll make inquiries to what's happening both that.
22 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay.
23 MS. KORNER: And the answer is no, we won't be trying get it
24 translated.
25 And Your Honour, one of the things we discussed, and I hope we can
Page 9345
1 discuss again with the Defence, is that the shortest way of asking
2 witnesses to testify who have already testified at least once and in some
3 cases twice and three times - one of them Mr. Sejmenovic - this will be
4 his fifth testimony.
5 JUDGE AGIUS: This is it. I mean, I would prefer you to sit down
6 round a table and come to some kind of agreement, because we -- we can
7 hear each and every witness viva voce in chief and then in cross, but ...
8 MS. KORNER: Well, Your Honour --
9 JUDGE AGIUS: If there is an easier way out ...
10 MS. KORNER: My suggestion, and I'll leave it now, because as I
11 say, I think we need to discuss this with the witness and maybe with Your
12 Honours -- is that where there is somebody that has really testified on a
13 number of occasions, that his prior transcripts or some portion become the
14 major part of his evidence in chief but with obviously a few additional
15 questions on -- concentrating on the really important parts.
16 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Okay.
17 Can we bring the witness in. He is open session, yes.
18 [The witness entered court]
19 JUDGE AGIUS: Mr. Filipovic, good afternoon to you.
20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Good afternoon.
21 JUDGE AGIUS: You will be continuing with your testimony today.
22 And before you do so, may I kindly ask you to repeat your solemn
23 declaration to tell us the truth once more, please. Thank you. Please go
24 ahead.
25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I solemnly declare that I will speak
Page 9346
1 the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
2 WITNESS: MUHAMED FILIPOVIC [Resumed]
3 [Witness answered through interpreter]
4 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you. You may sit down.
5 Ms. Korner.
6 Examined by Ms. Korner: [Continued]
7 Q. Mr. Filipovic, before we continue with your description of the
8 events in Kljuc, can I just ask you this: The videotape that you brought
9 with you and which you've watched, there's apparently a television
10 commentator. Did you by any chance know who that television commentator
11 is?
12 A. I don't know his name, but at the end of the tape - I think it's
13 there - and his face appears and he's bald. It's possible to recognise
14 the speaker. The speaker can be identified. I can point him out to you
15 on the videotape.
16 Q. All right. Thank you very much. We'll -- we'll deal with it when
17 we come to the tape then.
18 All right. Mr. Filipovic, when we broke on Friday, we had just
19 looked at a document that your -- a letter that your brother had been
20 sent. And I want to move on from there to really the next document.
21 MS. KORNER: Forgive me one moment.
22 Q. Yes. Now, I think you mentioned in your evidence on Friday that
23 it was the takeover or the inability to receive television programmes from
24 Sarajevo but in fact from Serbia that increased ethnic tensions in Kljuc.
25 Is that correct?
Page 9347
1 A. That's correct.
2 Q. All right. I'd now like you to have a look, please, at a document
3 that was issued by the MBO on the 1st of August, 1991, Exhibit P856.
4 MS. KORNER: Which will be behind divider 14 in volume 1.
5 Q. Now, Mr. Filipovic, do you remember a document being issued by --
6 on the 1st of August? In fact, it's stamped and it's got a signature.
7 Was it your brother's signature?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. And complaining that the -- well, in fact, "The pirate-like
10 infiltration of the frequencies of Sarajevo Television's second channel,
11 the employees of the phantom Krajina television introduced Mitel to our
12 homes and prevented us from following Sarajevo TV's regular programme."
13 A. Correct.
14 Q. And it goes on to complain, I don't think we need to read all of
15 it. The second paragraph: "We who know what media darkness is, do not
16 need Serbian information blindness. We want to see and hear with our own
17 eyes and ears what is happening in the country called Bosnia, in the
18 country that once was and we hope today is still Yugoslavia. We do not
19 need the information bulletins of Milosevic's commissars such as Mitevic
20 or his successor Vico. We want objective information and not selected
21 news."
22 Who would have written this type of communication? Would it have
23 been written by your brother himself?
24 A. Yes. He wrote them. And the reason for writing this official
25 note is that after the break-in -- the vandalistic break-in of the
Page 9348
1 then-JNA -- I think it was the JNA, because they were wearing uniforms.
2 They entered the repeater at Kozara and redirected the second programme of
3 Sarajevo television, so that we citizens from Bosanska Krajina were only
4 able to watch the first programme of Sarajevo Television and the second
5 programme of Belgrade Television. And in my statement earlier on I said
6 that the second problem of Belgrade Television was that -- the second
7 programme of Belgrade Television was such a programme that an ordinary
8 person who wasn't filled with nationalist hatred and intolerance, in a
9 very short period of time such a man would have been turned into a man who
10 hated other peoples and who hated his fellow citizens. And this was
11 intolerable. On several occasions we appealed to Sarajevo Television.
12 However, Sarajevo Television was not in a position to do anything. It was
13 helpless.
14 Q. Yes. Thank you very much.
15 MS. KORNER: You can put that document away.
16 Q. Now, you also told us on Friday that there was an objection to the
17 Kljuc municipality becoming part of the Autonomous Region of Krajina. And
18 I'd like you to have a look, please, at the next document in the bundle,
19 P857, dated the 17th of September, 1991 I should say.
20 Now, again, was this a document issued by the MBO? And on this
21 occasion was it signed by you?
22 A. Yes, it was. This document, among other things, relates to the
23 event when my late brother, Omer Filipovic, was called to go and join the
24 reserve JNA forces. We were surprised and we wondered why. It was only
25 so that -- why should Omer Filipovic alone get a call to join the
Page 9349
1 reservists and why not other leaders of other political parties? Because
2 in Kljuc others and the SDS in particular were bothered by Omer Filipovic,
3 because given his advanced, progressive ideas, he made it impossible for
4 the SDS and the radical party of the SDS to do what they wanted to do.
5 So --
6 MR. ACKERMAN: Your Honour, I object to this monologue. The
7 question was: Was it signed by you? The answer was yes, and that should
8 have ended it.
9 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, in fact --
10 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes.
11 MS. KORNER: In fact, Your Honour, I was going on because one can
12 see clear through reference to this part of the document. So I -- he's
13 pre -- jumped the gun, as it were, but I was going to ask about it anyhow.
14 JUDGE AGIUS: That solves it. Mr. Ackerman's objection is
15 sustained. But of course you're free to ask the question and he can
16 continue on from where he left.
17 Please go ahead.
18 MS. KORNER:
19 Q. Mr. Filipovic, can I please remind you, I know it's difficult,
20 you've had a nice weekend, I hope. But if you can just answer the
21 question I asked and I'll be asking some other questions and maybe that
22 will cover what you want to say.
23 A. [No audible response]
24 Q. Okay. Can we just look at the beginning part of the document and
25 then we'll come to the part that deals with your brother. It's dated
Page 9350
1 the 17th of September, 1991, and you're providing information to the
2 public.
3 MS. KORNER: And Your Honour, this came from the Radio Kljuc
4 collection, as it were.
5 Q. "The proclamation of the so-called Autonomous Region of
6 Krajina by the Serbian Democratic Party is just the latest "principled"
7 move in the unprincipled policy of this party. It is a principled move in
8 the sense that it continues the party's violent, unprincipled policy,
9 combined with ultimatums and dictates and supported with weapons. And it
10 is an unprincipled policy because it demands and takes but does not give;
11 because its proponents are against the abuse of ethnic domination but they
12 themselves abuse it," and so on and so forth.
13 What was the reference in that first sentence "Combined with
14 ultimatums and dictates and supported with weapons"? What were you
15 referring to there?
16 A. Well, as far as I can remember, all I can say is that I wanted to
17 say that at the time -- the only thing -- whatever the SDS had on its mind
18 went through in Kljuc. So the other parties, whatever our objectives were
19 and whatever we attempted to do, we didn't succeed in doing this because
20 we were in the minority and we weren't in power. And this relates to this
21 aspect. It would be implemented -- a decision would be implemented if
22 the SDS needed to implement something. This would be done. An ultimatum
23 would be issued. They would simply threaten not to provide salaries or
24 other things. So they were those who decided everything. And if we go
25 back 10 or 12 years I can see that we were -- we just tried to fight for
Page 9351
1 ourselves and all we could do was write things down, scribble.
2 Q. All right. Can we look, then, please further down the page. You
3 mention in the third paragraph the occupation of the television relay
4 station on Mount Kozara, which you've already referred to. Then you refer
5 to a man named Martic being arrested. The Court may remember. But just,
6 Mr. Filipovic, can you remind us who Martic was.
7 A. Martic was an army commander in the Serbian Autonomous Region in
8 Croatian Krajina. And he was arrested in Bosnia-Herzegovina near Bosanska
9 Krupa, and then there were big demonstrations of SDS members and he was
10 released.
11 Q. And then at the bottom of the page you say this: "We want
12 Yugoslavia, and we want it to be based on our agreement. We recognise no
13 Autonomous Region of Krajina, nor will we recognise the announced
14 constitution of the quasi-state. We want to continue living in this
15 territory as good neighbours and brothers. We want BiH in a federation of
16 the sovereign republics of Yugoslavia because it's a political fact that
17 four out of six republics are in favour of that solution to the Yugoslav
18 political crisis."
19 Now, were those the views that you had in September of 1991? And
20 apart from you, were those the views of the MBO?
21 A. Yes. Yes, they are.
22 Q. And then finally, as you say, the communique ends with a complaint
23 that your brother was called up for military service but not Mr. Kondic.
24 How long -- I'm sorry, did your brother respond to the call-up?
25 A. He went to Prijedor. He went to the barracks near the stadium. I
Page 9352
1 don't know what the barracks is called. He was there for three days. On
2 the third day he had to run away from the reserve forces because that was
3 not the army that all of us Bosniaks had sworn for. We swore that we were
4 ready to fight for the JNA and that we were ready to sacrifice our lives
5 if necessary. But this was not for some drunken army. During the day
6 these soldiers would drink, they would watch pornographic films. And when
7 night fell, they would start shooting in the air and they would terrorise
8 the citizens of Prijedor.
9 Q. All right. So your brother remained three days and then he left?
10 A. I think he left on the third day.
11 Q. Now, I want to ask you, then, please to look at one more document
12 on the question of mobilisation at this period. Could you look, please,
13 at P859.
14 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Before he does so, Ms. Korner, I have a short
15 question.
16 You were asked to tell the Tribunal who Martic was. I noticed
17 that you mentioned Martic in this document that you've been referred to in
18 the same context as Mount Kozara, the takeover of Mount Kozara TV relay
19 station. Was there a connection between Martic and the incident in
20 Kozara, Mount Kozara?
21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, Your Honour, in my opinion,
22 this was all connected because Martic was a citizen of another state but
23 he moved around our state in Bosnia-Herzegovina, he moved around freely,
24 so that I personally didn't see him issuing orders. I didn't see his men
25 taking the relay station on Kozara. But it was customary for us to say
Page 9353
1 whatever is happening is the responsibility of Martic, Martic is behind
2 this.
3 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay.
4 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, we'll hear evidence in relation to --
5 JUDGE AGIUS: We have already.
6 MS. KORNER: You've already heard some. And when we get to
7 Bosanska Krupa, Your Honours will hear about Martic.
8 JUDGE AGIUS: Now, Exhibit 8 ...?
9 MS. KORNER: 859.
10 JUDGE AGIUS: 859.
11 MS. KORNER:
12 Q. This again is a document issued some two days after the last that
13 we looked at by the MBO and I think signed by your brother -- or stamped,
14 anyhow. I think there was a signature. The copy is not very good. And
15 it states that the -- in the second paragraph, that "The MBO is opposed to
16 any arming of people which may fall outside the context of orders issued
17 yesterday on the mobilisation of the Territorial Defence and the reserve
18 police force. Any other arming activity and according to our sources such
19 activities are in progress, is only to the detriment of security and peace
20 in the area. Therefore we wish to use this forum and this opportunity to
21 warn those who trust their might to their mace that a mace is a deadly
22 weapon, for he who deals justice with a sword will be slain by a sword.
23 As sworn peace-lovers, we resolutely oppose uncontrolled arming."
24 Now, that -- first of all, the document suggests that there was a
25 call for mobilisation on the 19th of September of 1991. What other arming
Page 9354
1 activities were you referring to in September 1991?
2 A. We believed that legal arming was only that of JNA members as they
3 were going to the front and members of the Territorial Defence and the
4 reserve police force. But at that time throughout Bosnian Krajina,
5 particularly in Kljuc, there were helicopters, JNA helicopters, and they
6 would land only in Serb villages. They took out wooden crates, and those
7 of us who served in the army, we knew what was in those wooden crates. So
8 according to the sources that we had and information that we received,
9 they distributed weapons in the Serbian villages, automatic weapons in
10 these Serb villages. This is what this is referring to.
11 Q. All right. So already by September of 1991 you were receiving
12 reports of arms being delivered to Serb villages; is that correct?
13 A. That's correct.
14 Q. Did you ever see a delivery of arms by these helicopters yourself?
15 A. Personally I did not see when a helicopter would land and then
16 weapons unloaded, but I would see the helicopter go round and then land.
17 And for instance, land in Ljubine village. It is unthinkable what an army
18 helicopter -- what work has it got to do in Ljubine village? Why didn't
19 this helicopter land in the village of Zgon or Humici?
20 Q. And Ljubine village is where roughly? I'll ask you to look at a
21 map in a moment.
22 A. The village of Ljubine is located above Zgon. Very near the town
23 of Kljuc.
24 Q. Okay.
25 MS. KORNER: Would Your Honour forgive me.
Page 9355
1 A. It's a very small village, so it is quite possible that it doesn't
2 appear on some maps.
3 MS. KORNER: All right. Can we just for the moment have a look,
4 please, at the map P1097.
5 MR. ACKERMAN: There's no translation of his last statement, Your
6 Honour.
7 JUDGE AGIUS: Mr. Filipovic, you had just finished saying, "It's a
8 small village, so it's quite possible it doesn't appear on some maps."
9 Did you say anything else after that? And if you did, what did you say,
10 because the interpreters didn't quite catch it?
11 A. I said "if you bring me the map, I can show you where it is."
12 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you, Mr. Ackerman. I thank you.
13 Mr. Filipovic, you have the map now.
14 MS. KORNER: Can we have it on the ELMO so that Mr. Filipovic --
15 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, exactly.
16 And if you can point on the ELMO. I don't think it is that
17 important to have it marked on the map as well.
18 MS. KORNER: No. I think we just want to look at --
19 THE WITNESS: [Indicates]
20 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes.
21 MS. KORNER:
22 Q. And that appears to be part of the Muslim area. What ethnicity
23 was most of this village of Ljubine?
24 A. Serb nationality.
25 JUDGE AGIUS: And the other village which was just Zgon or the
Page 9356
1 other village that you mentioned? What was the ethnicity or the
2 prevailing, if there was?
3 MS. KORNER:
4 Q. I think you said Zgon, didn't you?
5 A. 99.99 per cent Muslim. There was only one Croat family.
6 JUDGE AGIUS: What was the distance between one and the other, the
7 two villages?
8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Perhaps as the crow flies between 1
9 and 2 kilometres. But if you walk, it's a little longer.
10 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you. Ms. Korner, he's in your hands.
11 MS. KORNER: Yes. Yes, thank you. You can put the map away.
12 Q. What effect did the reports of these delivery of arms have on you
13 personally and the Muslims that you knew generally?
14 MR. ACKERMAN: Your Honour, I don't think he said there were any
15 reports on delivery of arms. The question states a fact that's not in
16 evidence.
17 MS. KORNER: Sorry. I thought --
18 JUDGE AGIUS: He didn't testify there were any reports on delivery
19 of arms.
20 MS. KORNER: He said he had reports of delivery of arms to -- if
21 Mr. Ackerman goes back.
22 JUDGE AGIUS: In fact, that's what he said. He said he never saw
23 them himself.
24 MR. ACKERMAN: But he's talking about people telling him. And now
25 she wants know what effect that had on population. He's not talking
Page 9357
1 about public reports.
2 JUDGE AGIUS: He's definitely -- now you're qualifying it by
3 public reports.
4 MR. ACKERMAN: She's talking about facts that don't exist.
5 MS. KORNER: I never mentioned the word "public."
6 JUDGE AGIUS: Exactly. And the question is perfectly legitimate
7 if this is something that he went into and he investigated himself and had
8 feedback from members of his own community or within the party or
9 whatever.
10 MS. KORNER:
11 Q. Right. Mr. Filipovic, ignore the interruption, please, and tell
12 us --
13 MR. ACKERMAN: Well, I'm going to make another objection. I'm
14 going to object to her saying ignore the interruption and I'm going to go
15 back to her question -- the evidence that he gave was that he had reports
16 of these deliveries.
17 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes.
18 MR. ACKERMAN: And her question was: "What effect did the reports
19 of these deliveries of arms have on you personally and the Muslims, that
20 is, that you knew generally." He never said that anybody else got reports
21 but him.
22 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. But they are still reports. And the question
23 remains perfectly legitimate. I agree with you that Ms. Korner shouldn't
24 tell the witness -- in any case, it should be us who tell him ignore or
25 not ignore and wouldn't say -- wouldn't use the word "ignore." But on the
Page 9358
1 other hand, I think your objection cannot be sustained for a very simple
2 reason that it goes back to square one. He had reports -- now, they were
3 not public reports. You came on a second -- at a second time to tell us
4 that these were public reports. We're not referring to public reports
5 here.
6 MR. ACKERMAN: I totally agree.
7 JUDGE AGIUS: This is information that he received.
8 MR. ACKERMAN: I totally agree. But the question was, what effect
9 did they have on the Muslim population.
10 JUDGE AGIUS: On him.
11 MR. ACKERMAN: No, on him is fine.
12 JUDGE AGIUS: And also he is a member of a political party.
13 MR. ACKERMAN: How did they know. He said he got the reports.
14 JUDGE AGIUS: Have you never been a member of a political party,
15 Mr. Ackerman?
16 MR. ACKERMAN: Unfortunately, yes.
17 JUDGE AGIUS: So have I. So we all know what we are talking
18 about.
19 So Mr. Filipovic, now please take instructions from me. The
20 question is: Referring to -- look at me, please. Referring to these
21 reports that you referred to before in your testimony, what effect did
22 these reports have on you personally and then on members of -- on Bosniaks
23 that you were familiar with that confided with you their impressions,
24 their reactions, or their concerns with regard to these reports? Let's
25 start with you first. What effect did these reports have on you
Page 9359
1 personally?
2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] You mean the reports on the arming
3 through the means of helicopters and such like. Well, you know what the
4 reports were. We lived in a state where we were all citizens of
5 Yugoslavia, Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia. And what
6 happened is there were contributions for the JNA out of our income. And
7 suddenly came a period when the JNA is only giving to one ethnic group, to
8 one nation, to one people their weapons. We, the Bosniaks, were
9 completely humiliated, lost any rights. We could see that the war was
10 hanging above our heads. We could see that the war would break out. And
11 in order to try and protect ourselves, to protect our homes, our wives
12 and children, we would have to take out the very last savings to do that,
13 while the Serb people are just given by JNA helicopters literally brought
14 to their door. And I have proof of that. A neighbour of mine by the name
15 of Jovan Blagojevic, who -- he was -- he wasn't bright at all and yet he
16 received weapons. When I asked him why, he said, "Muhis, you just have
17 to. You just have to."
18 JUDGE AGIUS: And to your knowledge were other members of the
19 Muslim community in your area, other Bosniaks that you knew, did these
20 reports that were reaching you reach them as well? And if they did, did
21 they confide with you their reaction or concern? Do you know whether you
22 were the only person to receive such information, such reports, or whether
23 there were others that were receiving similar reports?
24 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] There were others. There were
25 others. There were other citizens, members of Bosniak nationality --
Page 9360
1 JUDGE AGIUS: Did they share with you your concern?
2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, with me and with my late
3 brother and with Mr. Egrlic and others, because you could see the
4 helicopter going around above our village. And if a village is easy [as
5 interpreted], to where is he going to go and complain. He's going to come
6 and complain into the town. He's not going to go to the police. He's not
7 going to go to them. He's going to come and complain to Omer Filipovic,
8 Muhamed Filipovic and Egrlic.
9 JUDGE AGIUS: Go ahead, Ms. Korner.
10 MS. KORNER: Thank you, Your Honour.
11 Q. You mentioned this neighbour of yours, Mr. Blagojevic, who
12 received weapons, and you told us that he told you about it. Can you
13 remember what his exact words -- or more or less what his exact words
14 were?
15 A. Yes, I can. Yes, I can reconstruct accurately the event that
16 happened. My neighbour and a great friend, late Kemo Bender, he came to
17 me and -- and I apologise, Your Honours, that I have to use our words in
18 Bosniak what I have been told. Kemo approached me with this other
19 neighbour, Jovo also being my neighbour -- Kemo told me, "Muhis, fuck the
20 state which gives Jovo a rifle." So I said, "What happened, Kemo?" And
21 he said, "Our Jovo got an automatic rifle." So I said to the two of them,
22 "What happened, Jovo?" And he said, "Muhis, I had to. If I didn't
23 receive a rifle, God know what would have happened to me." So I said to
24 him, "Jovo, make sure you don't use that rifle against Kemo and myself."
25 And he said, "No, I won't." And this very same Jovo is now dead and so is
Page 9361
1 Kemo. Both of them died in Bihac. Kemo was defending it while Jovo was
2 attacking it.
3 Q. Yes. And finally on this document - and that may be the
4 appropriate time for a break - in the last paragraph -- well, I'm sorry,
5 there's an invitation in the paragraph before to join -- for the SDS to
6 join talks. And you say, "We want --" I'm sorry, the document says, "We
7 want to talk around a table, not over the barrel of a gun. We advocate
8 peace, not war or arguments," and so on and so forth. And therefore we
9 have arranged inter-party talks of which we expect a lot to take place on
10 Wednesday, 25 September. Do you remember now, did these talks ever take
11 place?
12 A. Representatives came of the SDA and MBO, as far as I remember.
13 And the representatives of SDS did not come.
14 Q. All right. Thank you.
15 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, would that be an appropriate time --
16 JUDGE AGIUS: We still have a quarter of an hour, actually.
17 MS. KORNER: I'm working on the 2.00. Sorry about that.
18 JUDGE AGIUS: So we can proceed, instead of having a break now.
19 MS. KORNER: Yes, certainly.
20 Q. All right. I want to move, then, please to -- sorry. Forgive me
21 for one moment -- really to the documents that until the end of
22 September -- I've just lost my list for the moment. Yes. Could we move,
23 please, to -- no, I think that's all. I want to then move with you to
24 documents in December.
25 I want to ask you, please, now Mr. Filipovic about the effect of
Page 9362
1 the mobilisation and the war with Croatia in Kljuc itself between
2 September 1991 and December 1991. What effect did that war have
3 specifically on the events in Kljuc?
4 A. To tell you the truth, Serb forces as they were leaving for the
5 front towards Croatia and later on to Bosnia, to Kupres, had such
6 influence that people were frightened. People didn't feel like doing
7 anything. The men started sending women and children en masse to Austria,
8 Germany, wherever they worked earlier on in their working years. And the
9 hardest period was when these Serb soldiers were returning from the front.
10 Then they were, I have to say, like maniacs. They would shoot round the
11 town. They would throw hand grenades around the town, from the lorries.
12 God forbid that you were in their way as they were returning on the road.
13 So after every departure and arrival from the front, the people were hurt.
14 They simply did not know what to do. They would say, "What should we do,"
15 and then they would come and those who were slightly unstable, they would
16 start crying, saying, "Look what's happening. We're living in a state
17 where some people are haves and the others are have-nots." And the
18 passage of Serb reservists to the front certainly added a great deal to
19 the fact that the people themselves had to organise themselves for the
20 defence.
21 Q. Now, in Kljuc, you've told us about your brother's response to the
22 mobilisation call. What sort of proportion of the population -- the
23 Muslim population of Kljuc responded?
24 A. Well, to be honest, I don't have the exact data. But if you -- if
25 I give it in percentages, this is not even 1 per cent. A few people
Page 9363
1 responded to the call-up. Perhaps only dozens of people. While there
2 were in Kljuc 18.000 Muslims, so perhaps 10 or 15 only responded.
3 Q. I'd like you now to have a look, please, at document P862. It's a
4 document --
5 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I'm just waiting. I can hear the
6 interpreter flicking over the pages in my earphones.
7 Q. It's a document dated the 5th of October, 1991, and it's headed
8 "Staff." It doesn't seem to identify itself in any other way. So can I
9 ask you whether you recognise the names. I think you've already mentioned
10 Veljko Kondic. Who was he?
11 A. Veljko Kondic was the director of the post office in Kljuc. He
12 was president of the SDS in Kljuc before he became the director of the
13 post office, I think that he was a lawyer in the Sana factory in Kljuc.
14 Q. You've already told us about Vinko Kondic, your old friend.
15 A. Vinko Kondic.
16 Q. Don't worry. Slobodan Jurisic, do you know who he was?
17 A. Yes. Slobodan Jurisic, he's a teacher. After, I'm not sure what
18 he did. But I think he's got qualifications as a teacher. I don't know
19 which subject, but he worked at the Secretariat for National Defence. He
20 was a great friend at the time when the League of Communists was in
21 power. He was a friend of Milan Kovacevic. And Milan Kovacevic managed
22 to get him a job.
23 Q. Was he a member of the SDS, do you know?
24 A. I presume that he was, because otherwise he wouldn't have remained
25 at such a post, working post had he not been. That's just my assumption.
Page 9364
1 Q. Can you tell us very briefly, Lazar Amidzic?
2 A. Lazar Amidzic, he is an economist from Kljuc. I think that the
3 time of war or when the war broke out -- I can't quite tell you what he
4 did, I can't tell you exactly, but I think he was a director of the
5 factory of carpets. For a while he was a bank director. So I'm not quite
6 sure which one of those two posts as a director he was the last.
7 Q. Do you know whether he was a member of the SDS or not?
8 A. I presume, madam, that he was at the time in 1991/1992. Nobody
9 could be at any high post guaranteeing power unless that person was a
10 member of the SDS party.
11 Q. All right. And just one more so that we can deal with the content
12 of this document. Jovo Banjac I think you told us was the president of
13 the municipality; is that right -- of the municipal assembly?
14 A. Yes, he was president of the municipality, but he was a civil
15 engineer and before he became president of the municipality, he was
16 one of the directors at the GP Sana factory. He's dead now.
17 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Madam Fauveau.
18 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Mr. President.
19 This is just for the transcript. General Talic objects to this document
20 because we don't know who the author of the document is. We don't know
21 where the document was found. We only know that it was given to the OTP
22 by the AID service.
23 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you, Madam Fauveau.
24 MS. KORNER: Well, Your Honour, I -- that's why I'm going through
25 the document. I should add though that there's a lack of some
Page 9365
1 consistencies in this because some of the documents unsigned and whatever
2 are not -- found from AID are not objected to and others are.
3 JUDGE AGIUS: Yeah, but that becomes an argument. It's -- it's a
4 fact but it's predominantly or mainly an argument. So let's leave it for
5 the time being. And for the record, this goes down there is an objection
6 being entered formally by the Defence team for General Talic.
7 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] Mr. President, it is true
8 that some documents that are not signed are not objected to, but this is
9 mostly to do with documents from the radio or from some reports. But this
10 is just what I wanted to say accurately to Mrs. Korner so that she would
11 know what this is about.
12 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. Thank you.
13 Next person, Dane Pejic.
14 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I wasn't going to go any further because
15 we're going to come across these names.
16 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay.
17 MS. KORNER: I just wanted to establish, if you like, the indicia
18 of reliability.
19 Q. Mr. Filipovic, I want to ask you about a couple of things in this
20 document. In paragraph 1, Vinko Kondic talks about visiting the Banja
21 Luka and Knin Corps. In October of 1991, were you still on friendly terms
22 with Mr. Kondic -- Mr. Vinko Kondic?
23 A. Well, there was some friendship still, but it wasn't as close as
24 before. When we would stay at each other's houses the night, when we
25 drank in bars. But just in passing we would say hello and how are you,
Page 9366
1 that kind of thing, and then we would just pass by. And already by the
2 end of 1991 our friendship started to break.
3 Q. You told us earlier that you were aware that he made visits to
4 Banja Luka because of the drivers or the use of official cars. Did he
5 ever tell you that he had -- himself that he had made a visit to the Banja
6 Luka Corps?
7 A. To tell you honestly, he never told me anything personally because
8 a little bit -- he's a little arrogant when he gets to power, Vinko is.
9 So when I told him, "Vinko, you cannot use a municipality vehicle when
10 you're travelling for the party," and then Vinko said, "What are you
11 getting involved in?" And then he then invented this job. And then once
12 we went to Srebrenica precisely because of Vinko. We used the car.
13 Q. Yes. All right. So the answer is the question is he never told
14 you that he was visiting the Banja Luka Corps or anyone else in Banja
15 Luka.
16 A. That's correct. But his duty was to go. Whether -- what he would
17 do there, I have no idea.
18 Q. It goes on to say that "The conditions in these areas are those of
19 war. You must realise they are trying to spread the war to BH. The Serbs
20 responded well to mobilisation, while the Muslims responded poorly."
21 Then Mr. Jurisic talks about bringing manpower levels up to
22 strength. In the middle of that paragraph, the sentence, "However,
23 everything the army orders, we do. When manpower levels were being
24 brought up to strength, it proved to be 100 per cent Serb soldiers. The
25 Supreme Command made a decision to form the 30th Division."
Page 9367
1 Were you aware of the formation of the 30th Division?
2 A. I'm not sure whether it was called the 30th Division. I know that
3 when the Croatian authorities forced out the Knin Corps, they made
4 barracks in Laniste. And I know we protested about it. But I don't know
5 whether it was called the 30th Division or some other military term was
6 used, but I know that we called it the Knin Corps.
7 Q. And then finally over the page in the translation, "Information
8 dissemination," Mr. Banjac says that everything is to be censored and it's
9 been left with Mr. Kapetanovic, Veljko Kapetanovic. Is that the person
10 you talked about when we looked at one of the earlier radio station
11 documents?
12 A. Yes, Veljko Kapetanovic, at that time I believe he was the
13 editor-in-chief of Kljuc Radio.
14 Q. Thank you.
15 JUDGE AGIUS: We'll break now for the usual 25 minutes, resuming
16 at -- no, at -- quarter of an hour, resuming at 4.00. Thank you.
17 --- Recess taken at 3.45 p.m.
18 --- On resuming at 4.08 p.m.
19 MS. KORNER: [Microphone not activated] I'm sorry, Your Honour,
20 yes.
21 Q. I want for a moment, please, Mr. Filipovic, to stick to the topic
22 of the arming that you have been talking about of Serbs and then look at
23 the Muslim reaction in terms of arms and organisations. Could you for a
24 moment, please, have a look at document which is numbered P887.
25 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, it's objected to, I think.
Page 9368
1 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] Yes, we've contested this
2 document.
3 MS. KORNER:
4 Q. Now, first of all, can you --
5 MS. KORNER: I'm sorry, could Madam Fauveau just remind me on what
6 grounds this one is objected to, because it's signed and sealed
7 apparently.
8 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] It has no number and it has
9 no date. And it was obtained by -- through the intermediary of the AID
10 agency.
11 MS. KORNER:
12 Q. All right. Now, first of all, Mr. Filipovic, can you tell us, do
13 you recognise the signature?
14 A. Vinko Kondic.
15 Q. All right. What's the stamp on it? Do you recognise that stamp?
16 A. This is a stamp of the Socialist Republic of Bosnia and
17 Herzegovina.
18 Q. And what sort -- in your experience as a member of the assembly,
19 what sort of documents would this stamp be placed on?
20 A. This stamp would be placed on important documents brought in to
21 the Ministry of Defence or to the Ministry of the Interior. On all
22 documents in Bosnia, there would be a stamp.
23 Q. As is pointed out, this document is undated, and it's a list of
24 names. I don't want you to go through every name, but can you tell us, do
25 you recognise any of the names?
Page 9369
1 A. Yes, I do.
2 Q. Can you just tell us which ones.
3 A. I've just cast a glance at it. Kuburic Boro, Kuburic Radenko,
4 Micanovic Stojan.
5 Q. I'm sorry, what number?
6 A. Number 3, number 4, number 6, number 11, 12, 13, number 16.
7 Q. Okay. That's fine. It will do. These people, what nationality
8 were they?
9 A. They were Serbs. I think that this is a list of people armed by
10 the local commune and the Ministry of the Interior, that is to say, the
11 police provided them with weapons.
12 Q. All right. Thank you. And I think I want you to look at one
13 other document, please. Yes. Could you look at, please, P891.
14 MS. KORNER: Again, Your Honour, this is objected to.
15 Q. Now, this appears to be a diary of some sort or a diary page.
16 It's blank and we don't know the date, but I would actually imagine it
17 would be May of 1992 if it's anything. That's just the diary. It says:
18 "Distribution of weapons from depot. Take out all weapons and by the
19 given deadline distribute to individuals on the list adopted at the latest
20 session of the Peci local commune."
21 What sort of a place was Peci? In other words -- first of all,
22 where was Peci?
23 A. The local commune of Peci is on the road between Kljuc and Sanski
24 Most. It's between the village of Kamicak and the village of Krasulje.
25 Kamicak is a Muslim village and Krasulje, a Muslim village too, whereas
Page 9370
1 Peci is a village which is 100 per cent Serb and the local commune had its
2 headquarters there. Slobodan, a salesman in Zadar, he was active in the
3 local commune.
4 Q. All right.
5 A. He is the person who probably compiled this report.
6 Q. And what makes you say that? Oh, because -- I can see, because
7 it's signed, "Slobodan." I'm sorry. He was a salesman.
8 A. Well, yes.
9 Q. And what kind of a salesman?
10 A. Well, before the rise of nationalism, people thought he was a good
11 salesman. And in Bosnia, as opposed to in the West, the shops are small,
12 so one salesman worked in a shop in one village and sold food, and he
13 worked in a mixed goods shop which provided for the needs of the village.
14 They provided food, petroleum, some textiles, et cetera. That was a mixed
15 goods shop, which was in the community home in Peci.
16 Q. If we just look at the other entries briefly. This record was
17 made and approved by the president of the Peci local commune, the proposal
18 of the Serbian Democratic community of the Kljuc municipality and approval
19 was also granted by the Assembly of the Republican Democratic SDS with its
20 seat at Pale. And then under the page for Saturday, May: "In forthcoming
21 days a certain quantity of packages for the Serbian people should be
22 expected and the packages immediately distributed." And then finally
23 under that: "List of personnel for destruction and the destruction of
24 their material property. This list includes all persons who are not
25 members of the Serbian people, principally the Muslim population."
Page 9371
1 All right. You can put that document away. Thank you very much.
2 Before I come to a document for December 1991, as a result of the events
3 that you have described, what actions did the MBO decide to take?
4 A. The MBO, cooperating with the SDA, attempted to prepare the people
5 as much as possible for the situation that was going to develop in Kljuc.
6 These activities of ours were such that we would visit inhabited places
7 and we would speak to the people there. But we could only do this through
8 speaking to people. It wasn't possible to have public gatherings because
9 we would immediately be considered as Muslim fundamentalists and they
10 would consider us to be involved in an uprising. But some of us went into
11 a village and with some prominent people from the village we would hold
12 conversations, we would then split up, have some coffee. And then the
13 people who remained in the village, they would relay this information to
14 the people. And in this document you can see what I have mentioned, what
15 I mentioned earlier on. These were packets that were brought in by
16 helicopter. And we had to warn the people about this because we had
17 information, and this relates to what you have just asked me about, madam,
18 because as I said, Bosnia was mixed. There were people who had failed.
19 They were losers who would do anything for a cognac. They'd sit down,
20 have a drunk, and everything would be found out. So that's how we found
21 out things too. That's how we obtained information. There were such
22 people, such losers in addition to the regular people.
23 Q. All right. We're going to see reference in later documents to a
24 patriotic league. Who formed that patriotic league?
25 A. Are you referring to Kljuc or ...?
Page 9372
1 Q. To Kljuc.
2 A. Bosnia-Herzegovina?
3 Well, several of us who were in charge of the MBO and SDA
4 parties.
5 Q. And the purpose of that patriotic league being what?
6 A. In Kljuc it was just to prepare the people for what was going to
7 happen, because from the time that war broke out in Croatia onwards, we
8 were 100 per cent convinced that Moljevic's plan to form a greater
9 Serbia was being implemented, and we knew on the basis of the massing of
10 Serbian forces, we knew where they were being deployed. We knew what
11 would happen. And we knew that war would break out in our town of Kljuc
12 too. It was just a matter of days. So we attempted to prepare the people
13 for what was going to happen.
14 Q. Roughly in Kljuc, leaving aside Bosnia-Herzegovina, how many
15 Muslims or non-Serbs joined the patriotic league?
16 A. Well, first of all, when the war broke out in Croatia in the first
17 wave a small number because the people were suspicious. They would
18 approach us with suspicion. So perhaps in the year of 1991 about 50
19 people. But then as the war escalated in Croatia, in my opinion, because
20 we didn't have any records, we were -- we existed on a legal basis in
21 Kljuc at the time. If something would be agreed on a meeting, we would
22 write this down in code and then we would destroy it later on. So I'd say
23 about 100, 150 people. This is just an estimate of mine. That differed
24 from the Territorial Defence, that's the difference between the patriotic
25 league and the Territorial Defence.
Page 9373
1 Q. All right.
2 JUDGE AGIUS: Just one very minor interruption, just to make it
3 clear. You did mention a plan to form a greater Serbia. And the
4 transcript says here Moljevic. Did you say "Moljevic" or "Milosevic"?
5 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Moljevic. Moljevic. That was a
6 Serbian politician from the nineteenth century.
7 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay.
8 MS. KORNER:
9 Q. Now, from out of that patriotic league, did you yourselves then
10 form a Crisis Staff? Again, we'll see reference in some documents later
11 to that?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. Who was on that Crisis Staff?
14 A. I think there were seven or eight people.
15 Q. Were you one of the people?
16 A. Yes, I was.
17 Q. Your brother?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. Mr. Asim Egrlic?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. A gentleman named Amir Avdic?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. And I think others -- and I'm not going to bother to go through
24 them. No doubt you'll be asked about them if they're thought to be
25 relevant.
Page 9374
1 Who was head of the Crisis Staff?
2 A. I was at the beginning.
3 Q. Roughly at what stage did you form this Crisis Staff?
4 A. I can't remember the exact date, but I think it was in the second
5 half of 1991.
6 Q. And why did you feel it necessary to have a Crisis Staff within
7 that patriotic league?
8 A. Well, madam, because it was easier for five or six people to have
9 a meeting than 50 people. And if there was something for us to carry out,
10 it was easier for the five of us to meet and to agree on something -- it
11 was easier to do that than to try and gather 50 people.
12 Q. Did you actually call yourselves a Crisis Staff?
13 A. For the sake of form, yes, we called ourselves such. Because in
14 the Bosnian language there's a headquarters for everything. So if we're
15 harvesting, we say "the harvesting headquarters," et cetera. So all those
16 people who were in charge of something, who have positions of
17 responsibility, they have a headquarters. If there's some sort of a
18 crisis, for example, when there was an earthquake, you would select a few
19 people and then one would say they're in charge of the Crisis Staff. So
20 this word is a word which is part of our vocabulary.
21 Q. Now, other than forming this Crisis Staff, you told us that you
22 were aware that the Serbs from 1991 onwards, from the war in Croatia had
23 been providing -- had been given arms. Did you make any attempts to
24 obtain arms that could be distributed to the Muslim population?
25 A. We tried to and in various ways. The only legal means which we
Page 9375
1 found -- well, we managed to -- in the local Territorial Defence which had
2 been mobilised by the Serbs at the time, we managed to get Muslims to be
3 included from certain areas, but they had to remain within the territory
4 of the municipality of Kljuc. I don't know how long they were there, but
5 for a certain period of time they responded to the mobilisation and they
6 were part of the Territorial Defence. They were issued weapons, but when
7 returning home they had to return the weapons. When they went home, they
8 had to return their weapons to the units. This was not the case for
9 certain Serbs who would take their weapons with them. But we also
10 considered this to be progress, because when people went on patrol, there
11 were Muslims who were on guard with Serbs in villages, and all of our
12 weapons -- well, we armed ourselves by having people buy their own
13 weapons.
14 Q. All right. Now, I want to leave aside the events of 1992 for a
15 moment and just concentrate on 1991. By the -- December of 1991 what sort
16 of arms had you acquired? You've told that you were having people buy
17 weapons.
18 A. Well, I had a pistol, 7.65 millimetre calibre. The general is
19 over there. He knows what kind of a pistol that is. I bought it with my
20 own money. I paid 1.100 marks for it and I had a permit for this. 80
21 per cent of the population bought weapons. When Serbian soldiers came
22 back from the front in Kupres, they would sell weapons. And only later I
23 personally -- only when I was arrested in Manjaca in Stara Gradiska I
24 realised that this is something that -- a trap that had been laid for us
25 by the Serbs, because for me as a man it was illogical. If I've bought a
Page 9376
1 weapon from a Serb, how can there be someone in Manjaca who knows from
2 whom I bought this weapon? So I consider this to be something that was
3 arranged with the leaders of the SDS. There was an agreement that the
4 Muslims should be armed or if they bought weapons such as Zoljas, heavier
5 weapons, well, for example you'd get a Zolja without a part, with some
6 sort of deficiency, and the Zolja would not be functional but you would
7 pay a lot of money for it.
8 Q. Just pause there for a moment, please. You said that -- that a
9 trap had been laid for you by the Serbs, and you discovered this when you
10 were in Manjaca and Stara Gradiska. What do you mean by that?
11 A. Yes. Well, I would tell Your Honours that it is not logical that
12 if I am smuggling, I'm doing some sort of smuggling, I'm involved in some
13 kind of criminal activity, how can a superior know that I had sold to
14 somebody such and such a rifle, and it is unthinkable, because when I was
15 serving in the JNA the weapons were not supposed to be taken out of the
16 army, so it is unthinkable that it is possible for weapons just to be
17 carried just like that. And then this person who came to be interrogated
18 later on, they had exactly the number, the serial number of the rifle and
19 all the details.
20 Q. So when people like yourself were being interrogated in one of
21 these camps, you're saying that the Serbs would put to them that they --
22 that you had a particular gun with a particular serial number. So they
23 knew about it.
24 A. Yes. Specifically speaking, they knew about my case. They took
25 the weapon away from me. I had a legally owned gun, a handgun, a pistol,
Page 9377
1 because MUP gave me a permit. But people who bought guns from the Serbs,
2 this was illegally acquired weapons. But the Serbs knew about that as
3 well. In a position to what I had as weapons or for instance, if someone
4 in Kljuc was a hunter, it was all legal. They had a permit. It was all
5 registered. So we have to make a separation. We have legally owned
6 weapons, permits issued by MUP, handguns or hunting rifles. So they could
7 have these numbers. But in my view, it was not possible to have the
8 numbers of this other illegally acquired weapons.
9 Q. All right. Now, two other matters just before the end of 1991.
10 First, why did you and other Muslims that you knew feel it necessary to
11 acquire weapons?
12 A. Well, I don't know how I could answer this. I could only tell you
13 by asking you a question. What would you do if you were watching that
14 someone was planning to do harm to your child or to your husband? In some
15 way you would have to defend yourself. It was just the question of day,
16 when we would be eliminated. And we couldn't get any help from anyone.
17 What could we do? Die honourably, or be lambs to the slaughter?
18 Q. I'll take it that was a rhetorical question.
19 Second -- again can we just concentrate. December of 1991,
20 roughly how many arms had been acquired that you knew about by the end of
21 December 1991? And by "you," -- I'm sorry, how many arms you had
22 acquired, I mean the Muslims in Kljuc.
23 A. According to my approximate estimate, this would include the
24 weapons that people had as hunting weapons and the weapons like the one I
25 had, a handgun, and also illegally acquired from the Serbs as they were
Page 9378
1 coming from the front. I didn't count it. I would estimate it as between
2 five and seven hundred pieces of weapons. I believe that's what we had,
3 except that the hardest part was of course the ammunition. If we had a
4 rifle or a pistol, we would only have 20, 30 bullets.
5 Q. Were you acquiring any weaponry -- and by "you," I mean the
6 organisation, the Crisis Staff -- from outside Bosnia?
7 A. Yes, with great difficulty.
8 Q. And how much were you getting from sources outside Bosnia?
9 A. I don't recall this. I only remember that there was a small
10 delivery just some Heckler guns, automatic guns from Croatia. That's
11 what I remember that we received. But I cannot tell you how many of them
12 there were. This is a 9 millimetre calibre.
13 Q. The weaponry that you owned outside hunting rifles and pistols,
14 what sort of quality of weaponry was it? Was it modern weaponry or older
15 weaponry?
16 A. To tell you honestly, when I said "five to seven hundred pieces of
17 weapons," a large number of them were old-fashioned handguns. These were
18 Kuburas [phoen]. These were very old-fashioned handguns. I don't know
19 whether Your Honours know what this is. These were handguns from the
20 Middle Ages. They would be kept by people -- if somebody broke into the
21 house, they would be able to defend themselves. Now, defending oneself
22 with these old fashioned handguns from tanks and multiple rocket
23 launchers, that is not at all appropriate. And for the most part the
24 weapons we had were old fashioned.
25 Q. We'll come back to that when we look at some of the documents
Page 9379
1 later. But could you now please look at the document numbered P865.
2 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, again, this is objected to.
3 Q. It's headed -- I think if you have the original rather than the --
4 yes, they're copied together actually -- headed "Minutes of the sixth
5 meeting of the executive committee of the SDS municipal board in Kljuc
6 held on the 23rd of December, 1991." And we then see the agenda.
7 And I want to do the same thing I did with the last document, and
8 that's go through the people who are mentioned here.
9 Under agenda item 1, apparently Veljko Kondic informed the meeting
10 of the instructions for the organisation and activities of the Serbian
11 people in BH. "All organs will be required to act in accordance with those
12 instructions. Whoever is not ready to fulfil his duties should say so
13 immediately and it will not be held against him."
14 And you've already told us who he was.
15 Then the next gentleman who's mentioned Vlado Uncanin, who was he?
16 A. Vlado Uncanin, he was a member of the top leadership of the SDS in
17 Kljuc SDS. He worked in the electricity supply factory in Kljuc and in
18 the -- and in Sanica.
19 Q. Then the next person, I think a lady, Jovanka Cvijic, do you know
20 who she was?
21 A. Jovanka Cvijic. At the time when she needed it, she was Tito's
22 youth club member. He worked in the Sipad work community. I'm not quite
23 sure which department, but I know that she worked at the Sipad work
24 community.
25 Q. And do you know whether or not she was a member of the SDS?
Page 9380
1 A. Since she attended this meeting, I believe she was.
2 Q. Then next somebody called Brane Vojvodic, who says he can accept
3 all Karadzic proposals without seeing them. Do you know who he was?
4 THE INTERPRETER: Could the witness approach the microphone,
5 please.
6 MS. KORNER:
7 Q. Sorry, could you lean forward, yes, for the microphone. Thanks.
8 A. He was Brane Vojnovic, not Vojvodic. And he's a citizen of
9 Sanica. He worked at the factory in Sanica. I believe that he was a
10 warehouse keeper. He declared himself a Vojvoda at the end of 1991.
11 Q. All right. And then Mr. Kondic goes on to say that all -- "That
12 means that all suggestions and tasks from the instructions are accepted
13 in their entirety." And it sets out the composition of the Crisis Staff.
14 And then we see under item 6 "Deputy in the assembly,
15 vice-president of the executive committee of the municipal assembly,
16 Dragan Smiljanic." Do you know who he was?
17 A. Dragan Smiljanic was not a deputy at the assembly. He's a doctor,
18 a physician in Kljuc. Dragan Smiljanic at the time -- when we were
19 children, his nickname was Grsa. He used his participation in the SDS
20 and managed to get hold of a permit to build a house where he wasn't
21 supposed to build one.
22 Q. Then Ljuban Bajic, who I think we're going to see on the video.
23 Who was he?
24 A. Ljuban Bajic, a teacher. At the time before the war he was a
25 Communist and he worked for the League of Communists. He managed to get a
Page 9381
1 qualification of a teacher working part time. My brother helped him. By
2 the time of the aggression, as far as I believe, he was a SDS
3 spokesperson.
4 Q. Then Vinko Kondic went on to say that "We have to implement the
5 federal and not Bosnian laws because the Bosnian laws are passed by
6 outvoting the Serbs."
7 "Velko Kondic, will be responsible for cooperation with the SDA.
8 Tihomir Dakic will be responsible for the municipal assembly reserves."
9 Who was Mr. Dakic?
10 A. Tihomir Dakic was a vice-president of the executive committee. He
11 was a member of the Crisis Staff of the SDS. And according to the
12 information that I had, sometime in 1993 or 1994, as far as I know he
13 parted ways with these ideas. He wasn't happy. Otherwise, he's an
14 economist.
15 Q. We've dealt with Mr. Jurisic. Bosko Lukic, who we see written
16 there, who was he?
17 A. Bosko Lukic, he was a teacher of people's defence. I believe he
18 was the commander of Territorial Defence. I don't know what it's called,
19 but in any case he worked at the Territorial Defence.
20 Q. And over the page for us. But we see that Mr. Kalabic was there,
21 who we've identified as the SDS member of the regional --
22 A. Kalabic is a deputy.
23 Q. And then Milan Jovicic. It says: "I think that the Assembly of
24 the Serbian Municipality of Kljuc should be proclaimed at the assembly
25 session. I ask that this meeting be informed about the second stage."
Page 9382
1 First of all, who was Mr. Jovicic?
2 A. Milan Jovicic is a mechanical engineer. I believe that he was the
3 director of the sewing mill [as interpreted] in Kljuc. He was, unless I'm
4 very much mistaken, he was a deputy at the Kljuc Municipal Assembly. And
5 we knew about his viewpoints, that he was talking about in the session.
6 From our own channels, we knew that the Serbs were preparing to declare a
7 Serbian Kljuc.
8 Q. I was going to ask you that, because we're going to see what you,
9 the Muslims, did. When did you first become aware that the SDS were
10 proposing to, as it were -- as you said, declare a Serbian Kljuc?
11 A. We knew that by the end of 1991. And we were -- that hit us in
12 the head when -- I believe that it was in the last ten days in December
13 1991, when 25 buses of Croats were forced out of Slunj, and they were
14 stopped by the Serb police. They were mistreated. They were beaten. And
15 then we knew for sure that this had to happen, that this was going to
16 happen very soon.
17 Q. All right. I think we can deal with the next item on the agenda
18 fairly quickly. This was talking about the formation of companies and the
19 like.
20 And then if we come down, please, to apparently what somebody
21 called Jovan Kevac said. He said: "If war starts in BH, we should pull
22 our people back from the war zones into this area. We have to take care
23 only of the Serbian population. I advise the Crisis Staff that we should
24 arm our people. The Crisis Staff should do more to keep the Serbian
25 people informed."
Page 9383
1 Who was Mr. Kevac? Did you know him?
2 A. Jovan Kevac was the commander of the Territorial Defence before
3 Bosko Lukic. I don't know what he did exactly. He was some kind of a
4 clerk. But he was Captain First Class at the JNA reserves. And as this
5 happens, Serbs had to be leaders or managers, and he was posted as the
6 main administrator for people's defence and self-protection at the
7 Sumarska or forestry department.
8 Q. And just to complete this document finally, Ljuban Bajic says all
9 of us are right. "Can we find a compromise so that we would have our own
10 option if it comes to war." And Bosko Bajic -- I can't remember whether I
11 asked you about him. I don't think I did. Who was Bosko Bajic, if you
12 knew him?
13 A. As for Bosko Bajic, I couldn't tell you 100 per cent who he is.
14 Very vaguely. I am trying to remember. There were several Bajics, but I
15 actually don't wish to tell you and then make a confusion as far as people
16 are concerned.
17 Q. All right. Well, he seems to have something to do with the
18 Territorial Defence because he says that "Everything having to do with the
19 Territorial Defence has to be finished by the 10th of January, 1992.
20 Issue a decision to dismiss the current Territorial Defence commander."
21 Can we pause there for a moment. In December 1991, who was --
22 what nationality was the commander of the Territorial Defence?
23 A. I don't remember. As far as I know, the commander was Bosko Lukic
24 as far as I can remember.
25 Q. All right. And then finally, D, "Since 400 people have left for
Page 9384
1 the war zones, we have the right to demand weapons and I advise that the
2 president schedules a meeting with Talic and to ask for weapons and to
3 make that the accepted conclusion of the executive committee."
4 All right. That document, I think, brings us to the end of
5 December 1991. You've told us that you were -- you, the Muslims, were
6 aware of --
7 JUDGE AGIUS: Ms. Korner, in the B/C/S version of this document,
8 the last page, bottom of the page, left corner, there seems to be what
9 appears to be a signature. Perhaps ask the witness whether he's familiar
10 with that signature, whether he recognises that signature.
11 MS. KORNER:
12 Q. Mr. Filipovic, you've heard the question. Do you recognise either
13 the writing or the signature?
14 A. No, I don't recognise it.
15 [Trial Chamber confers]
16 MS. KORNER:
17 Q. Thank you.
18 A. No, I don't recognise it.
19 JUDGE AGIUS: And Bosko Lukic, what ethnicity was he?
20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Serb.
21 MS. KORNER:
22 Q. All right. Let's move then, please, to January -- no, I'm sorry,
23 before we do that, can I ask you this: As a result of what you say you
24 knew, that they were going to set a Serbian -- set up a Serbian Kljuc, did
25 you and the MBO and/or the SDA take any decision as to what you were going
Page 9385
1 to do?
2 A. We decided that we would go before them, that we would do that
3 before they did. So we were the only town in Bosnia-Herzegovina in
4 opposition to the Serbs who gave a prefix of "Serb" to everything they
5 were going to declare or proclaim as Serbian Kljuc, while we proclaimed or
6 declared Bosnian Kljuc because we lived in Bosnia, and there's no way that
7 you can say "Serbian Kljuc" in Bosnia or Hungarian or Dutch, because it
8 could only be Bosnian. We did not want to call it Muslim Kljuc but we
9 wanted to call it Bosnian Kljuc.
10 Q. All right. Can we then look please next at document P869.
11 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I think we've already -- I'm sorry, Your
12 Honour, I seem to have ticked that on my list. We may already have looked
13 at that with the witness. Maybe not. Let's just check it.
14 Could the witness have it. Sorry. My fault.
15 Q. This on the 16th of January allegedly confirms that the -- Kljuc
16 will join -- I'm sorry, let's be a bit more careful -- that
17 representatives from the Kljuc Municipal Assembly to the Assembly of Banja
18 Luka regional community are confirmed as legally and legitimately elected
19 representatives and that the president of the Kljuc Municipal Assembly is
20 hereby authorised to sign again the adequate documents on the membership
21 of the Kljuc municipality in the Autonomous Region, and it will enter into
22 force on the day of its adoption.
23 Were you -- was this matter debated in the assembly in January of
24 1992?
25 A. In December 1991 we left the assembly, and this decision was
Page 9386
1 issued without the presence of Muslim deputies. At that time Muslim and
2 later on Bosniak ethnicity. It was in December 1991 that we left the
3 assembly, and to our call to leave the assembly other opposition deputies
4 also left the assembly who were of Muslim ethnicity. So this decision was
5 passed without the presence of Muslims.
6 Q. All right. We can see in its preamble it talks about -- or the
7 document states that "The Kljuc Municipal Assembly at its 10th session
8 held on the 26th of December, 1991 adopted the following." Had you left
9 before that date, or was it on that date, the 26th of December, that you
10 left?
11 A. I think it was on the 26th of December. Don't take this for
12 certain, but I think that was the date that we left, because I know it was
13 towards the end of December, but I don't know the exact date.
14 Q. And what was the reason that you and the other opposition parties
15 left the assembly?
16 A. Well, this was the main obstacle. The SDS wanted to put on the
17 agenda accession to the Autonomous Region of Bosnian Krajina, and we
18 didn't want to do this, and we were just a screen for them, to enable them
19 to pass through a law for which they required two-thirds majority. And at
20 that point we said that this item of ours should be after this one and
21 that we would be present. They kept us there until this item appeared on
22 the agenda. Once this item appeared, my late brother rose up. He called
23 the president and the engineer Banjac and he said, "Engineer, we haven't
24 agreed on this." He said, "So what are you going to do then, teacher?"
25 And that's when he left.
Page 9387
1 Q. All right. Now, can you turn, please, to the -- or can you be
2 given, please, the next document, 870. It's dated the 30th of January.
3 And again, it's a Radio Kljuc broadcast, headed "Municipality of Bosanski
4 Kljuc." And it says, "At yesterday's session of the SDA and the MBO
5 deputies' club, the formation of a new municipality of Bosanski Kljuc was
6 proclaimed which does not accept the unlawful and unconstitutional
7 decisions of the municipal assembly concerning the inclusion of this
8 municipality into the Autonomous Region of the Bosnian Krajina."
9 And it says that "This is the first part of the official
10 statement handed out to journalists at today's press conference by
11 Omer Filipovic, who was elected the first president of this municipality
12 and deputy president of the Kljuc Municipal Assembly."
13 And Filipovic said "The interim assembly of the Bosanski Kljuc
14 municipality had also adopted several decisions: To call a referendum ...
15 And to accept the existing Kljuc municipality as long as it respects the
16 constitution and the laws of Bosnia and Herzegovina," and so on and so
17 forth.
18 And over the page in English it says this: "The administrative
19 organs of the Kljuc Municipal Assembly are required to respect the laws of
20 the Socialist Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina and to pay tax and
21 contributions into the budget and the funds of the Republic rather than
22 those of the Autonomous Region of the Bosnian Krajina." Now, on that,
23 what had been happening about the payment of taxes and contributions to
24 the Bosnian budget?
25 A. Well, you see, as far as taxes and contributions are concerned,
Page 9388
1 well, it is on this basis that the state can function. And when the SDS
2 took over all power, it cut the transfer of payments and in the so-called
3 Autonomous Region Bosnian Krajina taxes and contributions were redirected
4 to Banja Luka instead of going to Sarajevo. And in our opinion, it was
5 illogical for us to have a state and for our taxes and contributions not
6 to go to the centre of the state but to Banja Luka. And it's from that
7 town that they would make payments.
8 Q. And then finally the document ends by saying: "It is also true
9 that this is the first Muslim municipality in Bosnia and Herzegovina, but
10 its fate depends on the move of the partner, the SDS, because if there is
11 no regionalisation on an ethnic basis, then there will be no municipality
12 of Bosanski Kljuc either."
13 Can you just explain what was meant by that.
14 A. Well, that meant that if the SDS stops carrying out its actions
15 and considers that there is no Serbian Kljuc in Kljuc, then we too would
16 declare that there was no such thing as a Bosnian Kljuc, that there was
17 only one Kljuc. And we would immediately join the structures of the
18 municipal assembly in Kljuc.
19 Q. All right. Thank you. Now, when the Assembly of Bosanski Kljuc
20 was established in January of 1992, where did it meet?
21 A. It met in the centre, the social centre in Pudin Han. Those are
22 the suburbs of Velagici.
23 Q. Now, can you move, please, to -- can we look at P874. Now, this
24 is apparently an announcement dated the 3rd of February of 1992. And it
25 says: "From the beginning of the war to today, the Serbian armed forces
Page 9389
1 conducting fast and energetic operations have completely broken up the
2 Muslim combat formations on the territory of our municipality. Only small
3 and isolated groups of the most hardened extremists remain, although they
4 are disoriented. Unfortunately, they have not stopped provoking the
5 defence forces of the Kljuc municipality, thereby inflicting the greatest
6 damage on themselves and their own people. And therefore, we again call
7 on the Muslim people to hand over their remaining weapons and to help
8 capture and hand over these lunatics."
9 Now, this is February 1992, and it's not known -- well, perhaps
10 you can help. Do you recall any sort of announcement like this?
11 A. This is just one of the games that the SDS played. And I
12 personally think that this is one of the many lies, because in February
13 1992 there were no conflicts, no armed conflicts in Kljuc. And I can
14 claim this for sure. There were verbal disputes, et cetera, through
15 announcements over the radio, but in February 1992 there was no armed
16 conflict because -- there was no shooting in Kljuc until the 25th of May,
17 1992. And that's three months. There are three months between these
18 dates.
19 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Mr. Ackerman.
20 MR. ACKERMAN: Your Honour, the question was: Do you recall any
21 sort of an announcement like this? And I don't think it's been answered.
22 JUDGE AGIUS: He hasn't answered the question, yes. Indirectly he
23 has, giving us the impression that this was only one of several.
24 But do you recall this particular announcement? Do you recall
25 having heard or come across this particular announcement?
Page 9390
1 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] There were announcements, as many as
2 you like. But on the 3rd of February, 1992 there wasn't.
3 MR. ACKERMAN: Well, Your Honour, I would object to this document
4 unless there can be some showing that it -- that it actually was an
5 announcement rather than just a piece of paper. You know, announced how?
6 To whom? By whom?
7 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. You are --
8 MR. ACKERMAN: It has no force if it never got out of somebody's
9 file.
10 JUDGE AGIUS: We'll come to that later on, Mr. Ackerman. I can
11 tell you that if that is of concern to you, it is of concern to us.
12 Yes, Madam Fauveau.
13 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] We also object to this
14 document, and I have informed Mrs. Korner of this.
15 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you.
16 Yes, Ms. Korner.
17 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] In a letter.
18 MS. KORNER: Yes. I'll make a point when I reach documents which
19 I know are objected to by Madam Fauveau of indicating that.
20 Q. Okay. So Mr. Filipovic --
21 JUDGE AGIUS: We have five minutes. So that's --
22 MS. KORNER: All right. Because I was going to move to the next
23 document, Your Honour. Which may -- it will be a larger topic.
24 JUDGE AGIUS: Shall we stop now?
25 MS. KORNER: Yes.
Page 9391
1 JUDGE AGIUS: So we'll have a break, resuming at -- 15 minutes
2 from now. Thank you.
3 --- Recess taken at 5.11 p.m.
4 --- On resuming at 5.34 p.m.
5 MS. KORNER:
6 Q. Yes. Could you have a look, please, at document P875. This
7 document, Mr. Filipovic, is a report emanating from the 5th Corps in Banja
8 Luka, as it then was, dated the 11th of February, 1992. And I want you to
9 have a look, please, at paragraph number 4, entitled "Situation in the
10 territory." And could you at the same time, please, be given the map that
11 was exhibited as P1079. Thank you.
12 MS. KORNER: And if that could go up on the ELMO.
13 Q. It states this: "In the sector of Laniste on the Kljuc-Bosanski
14 Petrovac road the inhabitants of the villages of Pudin Han, Velagici,
15 Hadzici, Castovici --"
16 A. Castovici.
17 Q. Castovici, yes. "Hadzici are holding rallies and barricades and
18 demonstrations may be expected. The reason for the rallies is they expect
19 the arrival of JNA units."
20 If we look, first of all, at the map, we can see Laniste, Pudin
21 Han, Velagici, Hadzici is not marked -- oh, it is, I'm sorry.
22 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, it is.
23 MS. KORNER: Yes, it is. I think the only one that's not marked
24 is the one I can't pronounce. Castovici, whereabouts is that place?
25 A. The village of Castovici is above the village of Hadzici. It's a
Page 9392
1 very small village inhabited by Muslims. So -- so that it doesn't appear
2 on these kind of maps. It should appear on a military map, ratio 1 to
3 25.000. On such a map it would be possible to see the village of
4 Castovici.
5 Q. All right. Now, do you know anything about rallies and
6 demonstrations taking place in February having something to do with the
7 arrival of JNA?
8 A. Yes. And on several occasions I have pointed out that the people
9 were unhappy about the transfer of the units of the Knin Corps from
10 Croatia to Bosnia-Herzegovina. And in the area of Laniste, where there is
11 a forestry company, a forestry workshop, on the basis of the decision of
12 those in power at the time, of the authorities in the so-called autonomous
13 region of Bosnian Krajina, it was necessary to construct a barracks there.
14 And this was in fact done. So a forestry area was turned into a barracks
15 for the Knin Corps. And as proof, anyone who likes could go to Kljuc.
16 The remains of the building are still there. It was built in a very short
17 period of time. It's a building on three floors.
18 Q. Yes. What I really was asking about was why didn't the
19 inhabitants in this particular area want the Knin Corps to be posted
20 there?
21 A. Well, because the people were expecting what was to happen.
22 Citizens of Muslim and Croat nationality knew that those soldiers who had
23 been transferred from Croatia, they knew that they only bore the false
24 name of the JNA. In fact, it was the Serbian army and the people were
25 unhappy because it wasn't an army protecting all the peoples. They were
Page 9393
1 only protecting one people and people weren't happy about this. And in
2 the Laniste area, that is the only place where it is possible to obstruct
3 the arrival of the corps from the direction of Knin without putting
4 civilians at risk.
5 Q. Do you know whether those demonstrations actually took place?
6 A. I wouldn't call them demonstrations. These were small gatherings,
7 small gatherings of people. There were such gatherings, but as usual they
8 lied to the people. Nothing was to come of that. Jovo Banjac, the
9 notorious Jovo Banjac came out. And our people are easily misled. And he
10 said that nothing is going to happen, and the people disbursed. And
11 overnight an order was issued to the Sana company, an order according to
12 which the building was to be constructed.
13 Q. All right. Thank you.
14 MS. KORNER: You can leave that document now. And can we go,
15 please, to Exhibit P877.
16 Q. This document apparently - and it's not easy to see - but it's the
17 SDS Kljuc municipal committee that also relates back to the Serbian
18 Democratic -- the SDS executive committee in Sarajevo, apparently. And
19 it's to do apparently with the appointment of judges and legal positions
20 in Kljuc. And if you go to the paragraph that begins "During the division
21 of power in the municipality, the SDA was allotted the position of
22 president of the court and the judge of Muslim nationality is currently
23 holding this position. In addition to the president of the court, another
24 judge of the Muslim nationality is currently working at the court and the
25 appointment of additional two judges of Muslim nationality to this
Page 9394
1 important state organ would be completely - it must be - would be to
2 completely disrupt the ethical equality. This would be particularly
3 unacceptable in the area where the Serbs are in a majority and where the
4 SDS won more than 52 per cent of voices and the SDA 33 per cent." And
5 then it goes on to deal with --
6 There was a candidate of Muslim nationality, Nihad Filipovic.
7 Now, first of all, is that any relation of yours?
8 A. Nihad Filipovic. Yes, we're brothers.
9 Q. That was your brother.
10 A. We're the children of two brothers -- the children of two
11 brothers. My father and his father are brothers.
12 Q. All right. That makes it clear.
13 As far as the rationale -- in the end they end up -- this is
14 obviously being submitted to Sarajevo. They end up recommending that a
15 Serb judge, Rajko Dakic, be appointed. Was this something that was -- I'm
16 sorry; I'll rephrase that question. You've told us earlier that there had
17 to be allocation between the different nationalities of various
18 positions. Was this in fact consistent with the normal allocation, or was
19 this unusual?
20 A. In my opinion, this is unusual with regard to the previous
21 arrangement, because after the first multi-party elections, the president
22 of the court, this position, belonged to deputies of the SDA and the MBO.
23 And this post was occupied by Dzemo Botonic [phoen] -- the judge Dzemo
24 Botonic. So if in a multinational environment such a court was to
25 survive, then it would be necessary for someone to be elected as president
Page 9395
1 from the Muslim people. Or if there were some sort of reshuffling, they
2 could have given us one position and we could have given them a different
3 position. We could have exchanged positions.
4 Q. Now, that document leads me on to what I want to ask you in
5 respect of jobs.
6 MS. KORNER: Thank you. You can leave the document now -- or give
7 it back to the usher. Thanks.
8 Q. By February/March of -- by February of 1992, there was this split.
9 There were two assemblies: One the Bosanski Kljuc and one the Kljuc
10 original assembly. Was there any movement then, this period, to dismiss
11 non-Serbs from their employment?
12 A. Well, let me tell you. There were no dismissals in February. But
13 there were other incidents, maltreatment, lack of -- unemployment. So in
14 my example, in the case of the job that I carried out, I only had members
15 of Muslim nationality in my party. No Serb wanted to come to me in that
16 period. My clients were never Serbs. No one came to me as a Serb
17 surveyor to carry out some sort of work. They all asked for colleagues of
18 Serbian nationality.
19 Q. Before this period, so before, let's say, mid-1991, would you be
20 employed by persons of all nationality or just by persons of Muslim
21 nationality?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. It's my fault. It was a dual question. Do you mean yes you would
24 have been employed by persons of all nationalities?
25 A. Yes, by both.
Page 9396
1 Q. All right. Can we move, please, then to the next document very
2 briefly, just to look at one thing in connection with the matters you've
3 spoken of. It's P878.
4 MS. KORNER: Again, I should tell Your Honour I think this is
5 objected to. It is.
6 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] Yes, we've objected to it.
7 All these reports are objected to because they have no signature and we
8 don't know who the author is, and we don't know if they correctly reflect
9 the contents of these sessions.
10 MS. KORNER: Well, Your Honour, it's quite right. They don't have
11 a signature. But in the sense that we can't identify who the signature's
12 is. But may I say that for Madam Fauveau's benefit, I'm just indicating
13 as we go through the ones that are objected to.
14 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. Thank you both.
15 MS. KORNER:
16 Q. Under agenda item 1 -- and this relates back to something you've
17 told us about -- B, the Assembly of the -- I think that must be Autonomous
18 Region of Banja Luka was held where there were opinions --
19 JUDGE AGIUS: I hope it is. And it's not something else, because
20 that would open other doors.
21 MS. KORNER: Yes. I think it must be -- I don't know what --
22 anyhow.
23 Q. But it was understood that -- I'm sorry, "Where there were
24 opinions that the Republic of Bosnian Krajina should be formed, but it was
25 understood that this was not the time for that." And "They then talked
Page 9397
1 about the conference regarding BH and cannonisation. All revenues would
2 belong to the region. The national bank would be based in Banja Luka ...
3 And certain services will be dislocated from Sarajevo. He spoke about the
4 unfavourable structure of those employed in the SDK in Kljuc and the
5 decision was made that all public funds would be held in Banja Luka."
6 This was in March of 1992. Did you become aware that this was the
7 decision that had been made?
8 A. That was when they severed the transfer of payments to Sarajevo.
9 That's when that happened.
10 Q. That severance of payments to Sarajevo, what effect did that have
11 on people?
12 A. Well, whoever received salaries from Sarajevo was not able to
13 receive that salary.
14 Q. And I said there was only one item. If we then, look, under
15 agenda item 3, which was "Information about defence preparations." There
16 was a briefing by Mr. Veljko Kondic and Mr. Banjac suggests that "All
17 Territorial Defence weapons should be taken to Kula." Where was that?
18 A. Kula is on the main road between Kljuc and Mrkonjic Grad. It's in
19 the immediate vicinity of the tourist site Balkana. When you go from the
20 direction of Kljuc to Mrkonjic, it's on the left-hand side. It's a JNA
21 building. That's where they had barracks and they had some sort of
22 underground structures, those sort of things.
23 Q. All right. Yes, thank you.
24 MS. KORNER: You can put that document away.
25 Can we move, then, to the next document, P880. Again, Your
Page 9398
1 Honour, objected to.
2 Q. Again, minutes of a meeting of the SDS in Kljuc held on the 12th
3 of March. And the discussion, as we can see, really centres around
4 weapons and arming.
5 At the bottom of the page, Mr. Kondic -- Mr. Veljko Kondic says
6 that "We will undertake to get additional weapons." Around this period of
7 March 1992, did you become aware of these decisions - obviously not the
8 documents themselves - but that there was a decision being taken to build
9 up weaponry and arms generally?
10 A. Well, I've already answered that question. Throughout the period
11 of time when there were helicopters flying, and that was during March and
12 February -- we're not fools. We knew that there was something happening,
13 some sort of decisions were being implemented. The pilot of the
14 helicopter can't fly without being ordered to do so. He can't use up fuel
15 without having received the order. Someone must have ordered him to fly
16 to a certain destination and to unload cases.
17 Q. Yes. You told us -- sorry -- this was happening in 1991. We're
18 now in March of 1992. Was there any obvious signs, or did you require any
19 information that there was more of a build-up going on?
20 A. Well, obviously there is some sort of a misunderstanding, madam.
21 I said from 1991 and right up until the time when the aggression started
22 there were helicopters flying over it. It wasn't just in 1991. It was in
23 the year 1992 as well. If we received any kind of information, we'd get
24 it from drunken soldier of some kind. And after returning from the
25 battlefield, he'd provide us with this information. That was the only
Page 9399
1 source of information. If we had a drunken soldier who provided us with
2 such information, then we'd link up the information provided by two or
3 three people and discover what was happening.
4 Q. All right. Yes. Thank you.
5 All right. Can we now look, please, at Exhibit 882, P882. This
6 is a report, again coming from the -- in fact, it comes from the 1st
7 Krajina Corps collection, but it's a report on the formation of the 13th
8 Partisan Brigade and addressed to the command of the 30th Partisan
9 Division, signed by Lieutenant Colonel Samardzija. It describes under
10 item 2 "The command of the 13th Partisan Brigade has the following
11 information about non-establishment units of the 13th Partisan Brigade and
12 the TO in Kljuc, 100 armed men, SDS, and then the type of weapons."
13 And then over the page, please, under paragraph 3, there's this
14 paragraph: "It is estimated that there are several paramilitary
15 formations/units in the area of responsibility, including in Kljuc
16 municipality, Kljuc itself, two companies; in Sanica, one battalion;
17 Krasulje, two companies being formed."
18 And if we skip out Mrkonjic Grad and Sipovo.
19 "The paramilitary units formed in the municipalities of Kljuc and
20 Sipovo are made up of Muslims ...."
21 Now, at this stage in March of 1992, had there been formed in
22 Kljuc itself - and I imagine it means Kljuc town - two companies made up
23 of Muslims?
24 A. It's not true. That's not true.
25 Q. Were there any sort -- had you or anyone else organised any sort
Page 9400
1 of actual military companies within Kljuc town itself by March of 1992?
2 A. We tried to organise ourselves. But Your Honours, it says here
3 that Kljuc had two companies, Sanica, one battalion and Krasulje two
4 companies that are being formed. If we had had this many people that are
5 under arms, the SDS would not have forced us out of Kljuc in 1992. We
6 would have stayed in Kljuc. We would have defended our homes.
7 Q. Well, just tell Their Honours -- they may already know, but how
8 many men would two companies be, roughly?
9 A. Well, according to my estimate, when I was serving in the
10 military, one company is about 150 people. A battalion is 500-plus.
11 Q. Yes. Thank you. Can we look, then, briefly please at the next
12 document in the bundle, which is P606.
13 JUDGE AGIUS: This was, Madam Fauveau, ex-Exhibit P883.
14 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Mr. President.
15 MS. KORNER: It had already been exhibited, so we had to change
16 the number. It's behind divider 45, for the purposes of the usher.
17 All right. I don't want to -- because there's only one line. In
18 fact, I can deal with it without asking the witness to look at the
19 document.
20 Q. By March of 1992 in Kljuc had there been any incidents of violence
21 in the town itself?
22 A. Well, there was. As far as I can recall, there were murders. But
23 I cannot now tell you whether that was in March, late March, or whether it
24 was early April. But in the municipality of Kljuc, there were two murders
25 that took place where drunken reservists on their way back from the front,
Page 9401
1 they killed two young men. One young man was killed in Kljuc near the bus
2 station, and the second young man was killed in Sanica. But I cannot tell
3 you whether that was March or April, but I know that this was during that
4 time period. And it is known who killed them, but that was the end of
5 story.
6 Q. All right. This -- can we just look very briefly. Now you've
7 been given this report which is dated the 28th of March from the 5th Corps
8 that. It states that on the 27th of March, 1992 a hand grenade was thrown
9 in front of the Galleria cafe in Kljuc and it exploded. First of all, do
10 you remember such an incident? If not, say so.
11 A. Yes. I know that a hand grenade was thrown. As I spoke earlier,
12 I'm not quite sure whether this is 27th of March or not. It was near that
13 time when the young man Dervisevic was killed that was in the immediate
14 vicinity of Galleria.
15 Q. And do you know who owned the Galleria Cafe?
16 A. The coffee bar, Galleria, belongs to a Serb who is currently
17 living in Kljuc. I can't remember his name, but the coffee bar is still
18 there. A Muslim is managing it while the owner gets the rent. I cannot
19 recall his name.
20 Q. Don't worry. Thank you.
21 Yes. Thank you. You can hand that document back to the usher.
22 MS. KORNER: I don't think we need bother -- all right.
23 Q. I want to now try and get the picture, please, before the Court of
24 the situation in the run-up to May the 27th. When did there first start
25 to be barricades and the like being set up?
Page 9402
1 A. What do you mean the barricades?
2 Q. When was the first time that the Muslims decided to set up
3 barricades?
4 A. After the 25th of May, after the 25th of May, when the village of
5 Crljeni - we don't have any evidence whether it was attacked or whether
6 the people came to do the reconnaissance of the field - but at that time a
7 group of people was captured, a group of soldiers was captured, five to
8 ten of them -- I don't know exactly how many of them there were. They
9 were captured. Their documents were showing that they were from Serbia.
10 And they were captured in Crljeni on the 25th of May. From that day
11 onwards, we considered ourselves under attack. And the most critical
12 period started in Kljuc on the 7th of May, when the Serbs took over the
13 police officially, because it was on the 7th of May that they took over
14 the police. They asked the policemen who were of Muslim or Croat
15 ethnicity to sign allegiance. When these men refused, these policemen
16 were sacked, and they had to leave the public security station. And on
17 the 7th of May, they put out a Serb flag on the police station and the
18 municipality. This is when the critical period started, the crisis period
19 started in the Kljuc municipality. There were no conflicts, but from the
20 7th of May onwards it started to become tense. I was personally present
21 when they put the flag out on the police station, because this is -- I
22 passed by there on my way back from work, and I remember very well
23 Mrs. Andja Pejic told me, "Look how beautiful it is, the Serbian flag."
24 Q. All right. Now, before the 7th of May, at any stage had you or
25 any of your fellow politicians or members of the Crisis Staff made any
Page 9403
1 plans to attack Serb villages or persons or seize weaponry from the
2 Serbs?
3 A. Before the 7th of May, something else happened in 1992. This is
4 when officially the ministry from Sarajevo appointed Omer Filipovic as the
5 commander of the Territorial Defence. And although we did make defence
6 plans, how to defend ourselves -- but at no time did we think about
7 attacking Serbs or to mistreat their civilians. I even said that those
8 that were captured on the 25th in Crljeni, that Omer Filipovic ordered
9 that they should be kept alive, preserved, because he knew what would
10 happen. He said, "Keep them alive. Keep them well. They should not be
11 harmed in any way because we will get for them our people, because now
12 Vinko and Jovo will start to take revenge on our villages." And the
13 evidence that they were treated well was that in Crljeni in the Kljuc
14 municipality there was no massacre, like in other villages.
15 Q. All right.
16 A. So this can perhaps be a thank-you, because we kept these people
17 for them, we kept them alive.
18 Q. I want to deal with that when we get to that in context. But can
19 we now look at a document 88 -- P889.
20 MS. KORNER: This is objected to as well, Your Honour.
21 Q. This is a report dated the 24th of April, 1992 which has a
22 handwritten number on it and is signed "Milos." No, sorry, you haven't
23 got it. And states: "We have reached an agreement with the chief of the
24 Kljuc SJB that they should take weapons out of the storeroom of the police
25 station all at once and store them in a secure place because there's a
Page 9404
1 real danger of Green Berets launching an attack to seize them. We are
2 proposing that weapons be removed in this manner for tactical reasons so
3 as to avoid alarming the citizens in this area. The Green Berets pose the
4 greatest threat from Vrhpolje and Velagici, where a small area, around
5 12.500 inhabitants of Muslim background are living."
6 Three questions, please. First: Who was the chief of the Kljuc
7 SJB by April 1992?
8 A. Vinko Kondic.
9 Q. When did he become - because you've told us what his job was
10 before - the chief of the SJB, if you can remember?
11 A. I would not be able to remember that, but I think -- I believe it
12 was in 1991. But I cannot give you the exact date. But in any case,
13 after the multi-party elections, he was the secretary of the municipal
14 assembly and he then became chief of police.
15 Q. All right. Do you know whether or not weapons were removed from
16 the police station?
17 A. I presume that the weapons, together with the Territorial Defence
18 weapons, were moved to Kula [Realtime transcript read in error "Kuna"].
19 Q. Yes. I'm sorry. Whether you presume or not, do you actually know
20 from any information that you got?
21 A. Well, my information is that the weapons went. But we neither saw
22 that or heard that. It was hearsay. Nobody knew for sure, not from the
23 SDS. Nobody told us.
24 Q. And it alleges that in the Vrhpolje-Velagici area, there were
25 around 12.500 Muslim inhabitants. As far as you're aware, is that a
Page 9405
1 reasonably accurate figure?
2 A. Well, I believe it is. These are two villages wherein that part
3 there are mostly Muslims. For the most part there are Muslims located.
4 Whether it's 12.500 or 10.500, these -- to be sure, we would need
5 documents from the census from 1991 to be absolutely sure.
6 Q. Okay. Don't worry about that.
7 Yes. Thank you. You can leave that document. And could we now
8 look, please, at Exhibit P890.
9 MS. KORNER: Again, Your Honour, objected to.
10 Q. It's handwritten minutes again of the SDS municipal board in
11 Kljuc. And it mentions an assembly being held. And then Vinko Kondic
12 says this: "The situation in Kljuc municipality is unbearably calm. In
13 Bosnian Kljuc, an open conflict broke out between the Serbian Bosnian
14 Kljuc and the official Bosnian Kljuc. We are facing a relatively
15 satisfactory situation in Sanica is probably from the party --" no, the
16 translation is not great on this. "We cannot overcome the situation in a
17 peaceful way. Serbs are the majority population in Kljuc. We control all
18 the important positions. The situation is getting tenser and tenser, and
19 we can hardly avoid war."
20 Now, would you agree with that assessment of Mr. Kondic at that
21 stage on the 29th of April?
22 A. Vinko Kondic is speaking at this moment the truth. The situation
23 is calm. But he didn't say from whom the war should be avoided, whether
24 it would be from the radical side of the SDS, because they were the ones
25 clamouring for war while the Muslims and Croats were not asking for war.
Page 9406
1 And here what Vinko Kondic says is correct, when he says that is calm. It
2 was calm, apart from the murders that I mentioned earlier and some acts of
3 provocation. There was provocation in order -- so that we would go first,
4 so that we would react.
5 Q. All right. Then someone called Mirna Jakic, who I don't think
6 we've come across before, says that "Omer is in Sanica preparing the
7 Territorial Defence." First of all, do you know who this lady was?
8 A. I think this is Jokic, Marija or perhaps Mira. Because there
9 are Jokic -- Jokic people who are in Sanica. See, Omer married a girl
10 from Sanica just like I did, and each time we went to Sanica, when we went
11 there to see our wives' relatives, it was always commented on among the
12 radical SDS circles saying, "Here they are, the Filipovic brothers are
13 coming organising Green Berets." So we could never move over there
14 without being told that we were doing something against Serbian wishes.
15 Q. And was in fact your brother in Sanica preparing the TO?
16 A. Well, I said to start with, we tried to organise ourselves, and Sanica
17 is part of the Bosanski Kljuc municipality, and we attempted to organise
18 the people in Sanica as well. And I stand by that, that we did -- that we did
19 that. We worked on this. How much we succeeded, I don't know.
20 Q. Can we go to an entry apparently made by somebody called Djuro.
21 It could be Jokic as well. It's over on the second page of the
22 translation. He says: "It's taking --" something illegible and then
23 "It's taking some time. Sanski Most is an example of how changes can be
24 implemented in a peaceful way. We in Kljuc have the power, but we don't
25 use it."
Page 9407
1 By the 29th of April, were you in Kljuc aware of what had happened
2 in Sanski Most?
3 A. In Sanski Most the situation was the same as it was in Kljuc, so
4 what Djuro Jokic says, he means how the authority can be used, how the
5 power can be used. He means that we should be slaves, that we should
6 be subordinate to the Serbs. For him that was the power. That's what it
7 meant to have power, while normal democratic power as it was in the rest
8 of Europe, they didn't believe that to be true power because they wanted
9 us to be marked out, to move around with certificates. For them that's
10 what power was. That's what democracy was, the way SDS saw it.
11 Q. And then finally somebody called Branko Pucar says, "We should not
12 rule anything out. We must consider what is better for us so as not to
13 go wrong in our estimate. I think it is bad that we have no one from
14 Banja Luka here today to tell us how we should work because they are in
15 touch with the Sarajevo SDS."
16 Do you know who Mr. Branko Pucar was?
17 A. I do. I do know Branko Pucar. He was a member of the assembly
18 following the first parliamentary elections. I believe in my assessment
19 he was nuts. In the middle of the summer he was wearing working gloves,
20 and he is one of the people responsible for the massacre in --
21 THE INTERPRETER: The interpreter didn't hear the place of the
22 massacre.
23 A. He always wore the rucksack on his back and he always wore working
24 gloves, not gentleman's gloves but he was wearing working gloves that
25 workers wear when they are carrying out manual work. But he comes from
Page 9408
1 Ribnik.
2 Q. Thank you. The interpreter missed --
3 JUDGE AGIUS: One moment. Yes, exactly.
4 MS. KORNER: I'm just about to ask, Your Honour.
5 Q. Mr. Filipovic, responsible for the massacre where?
6 A. In Biljani.
7 Q. All right. Now I want you to look, please -- to go in our bundles
8 the very first document on this point of Omer preparing the TO. It's
9 P850.
10 MS. KORNER: I think this will be the last document, Your Honour.
11 I don't think that it is objected to.
12 Q. The first document that we see is a sort of sketch of the SDS
13 municipal civil defence staff and other units. First of all, have you
14 seen sketches like this before, diagrams, I should say?
15 A. Specifically this one, I haven't seen this one. But looking at
16 the structure, this is how it was done there. This is a document from the
17 session where a sketch is made or a draft is made and then another
18 official document is later on made.
19 Q. You yourself were involved in the TO. Would you prepare documents
20 like this?
21 A. I would, because it is always within a structure organisation
22 where you're supposed to make what comes from where. In the army you have
23 a system of subordination, so you have from higher to lower, from greater
24 to smaller. So where things start from, that has to be known.
25 Q. Can we look then, please, at the next part of the document, which
Page 9409
1 appears to be headed "Assignments." Under 2, it should be headed "Local
2 board and staff Sanica."
3 "The mobilisation of our forces is to be done on time and at the
4 same time as to give us an advantage over the new Muslim forces in this
5 local area. Under all circumstances and especially at the beginning, rely
6 on the support of the police station and the police force in maintaining
7 order and securing vital property."
8 And then it goes on to, I suppose, lay out a plan of action.
9 And then -- and it's not very clear. I don't know whether you'd
10 be able to read it. But apparently it says: "In Donji Sanica --" and
11 then the translator -- no, and then there's a line. One can see that in
12 the original. "In addition to the staff, have a platoon-size unit whose
13 main task would be a strong attack on Muslim, the enemy's units and use in
14 wider area."
15 Now, do you know whether such a platoon was then stationed in the
16 Donji Sanica area?
17 A. I would not be able to tell you this. Reading through this,
18 Pistanica, Priseka, and Gologlavo, these are all these places that belong
19 to Sanica where the population is of Serb ethnicity, while the actual
20 Sanica downtown is Muslim. Most of them are Muslims, although there are
21 Serbs. But around the village hill -- villages on the hill are mostly
22 Serb inhabitants. So possibly within their plan they had this. But
23 whether I knew about this in this part, I don't know.
24 Q. All right.
25 MS. KORNER: Well, Your Honour, I don't -- I thought I could
Page 9410
1 finish this document, but in fact there's quite a bit more I need to ask
2 about it, so it may be an appropriate moment.
3 Your Honour, when the witness has left court, can I just raise one
4 matter on timing. That's all.
5 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay.
6 MS. FAUVEAU-IVANOVIC: [Interpretation] Mr. President, I just
7 wanted to say that this latest -- last document, Mr. Talic's Defence
8 contests it because the date is unknown, the author is unknown.
9 Another matter: On page 64 of the transcript, lines 1, 2, and 3,
10 the witness spoke about a document from February 1992. It was a radio
11 announcement. And what comes out in the transcript is what the witness
12 would have said: [Previous translation continues] ... [In English] "this
13 is one of the many lies." As far as I could understand, in Serbo-Croat I
14 believe that he said this was one of the many false announcements, and
15 this could be quite important for the Defence. It would be good to
16 clarify this. JUDGE AGIUS: Were you following, Mr. Filipovic?
17 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] As far as the announcement is
18 concerned, I didn't say that the announcement was false. I said the dates
19 were false. Madam defence attorney of General Talic, because when the
20 time says that it happened, there was no situation. There were no tense
21 situations where there was a need to read an announcement, while there
22 were announcements of very similar content, countless announcements. And
23 I stand by what I said. But it is the date which is wrong, which is
24 false. That's what I maintain.
25 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Mr. Ackerman.
Page 9411
1 MR. ACKERMAN: Page 79, line 7, Your Honour. When speaking of
2 where weapons were taken, the transcript says Kuna, and the place is
3 actually Kula.
4 JUDGE AGIUS: Kula, yes. Point taken.
5 Okay. Mr. Filipovic, we will continue tomorrow.
6 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, Your Honour, please.
7 JUDGE AGIUS: I'm sorry. We will continue tomorrow. You will now
8 be escorted by the usher.
9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you.
10 Yes, Ms. Korner.
11 [The witness stands down]
12 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I just wanted to have a -- because we're
13 flying witnesses in. We've actually got two witnesses here at the moment
14 to follow on for this week, but it's clear that Mr. Filipovic won't finish
15 in chief until Wednesday. Does that mean -- do I take it that
16 cross-examination will last the rest of the week by both sides?
17 MR. ACKERMAN: I always get criticised for -- by Ms. Korner for
18 the predictions that I make, so I think I'll not make any more. But it
19 would surprise me if we get beyond this witness this week. But I don't
20 want to get yelled at if I don't have as much cross as I think I do.
21 MS. KORNER: Well, the two -- the two witnesses who are here will
22 have to stay here now. We didn't --
23 JUDGE AGIUS: I suppose so.
24 MS. KORNER: There's nothing we can do about that.
25 JUDGE AGIUS: It doesn't -- it wouldn't make sense to send them
Page 9412
1 over and bring them back again.
2 MS. KORNER: One of them comes from an exceedingly long way away
3 at vast expense, so he will just have to sit in the hotel.
4 MR. ACKERMAN: Well, we wouldn't need any more than those two. If
5 you were thinking of asking more than those two, no, not a chance.
6 MS. KORNER: No. Otherwise -- I'm sorry, but the -- the system is
7 that VWS brings witnesses here for the Monday, Tuesday on the Friday. But
8 if those two witnesses that we have here already will not be heard this
9 week, then we won't get anybody out till next Monday. Yes?
10 JUDGE AGIUS: I think so.
11 MR. ZECEVIC: I think it's a fair assessment that we cannot
12 finish -- if we -- if we ever finish -- I mean, if we finish Mr. Filipovic
13 this week at all.
14 MS. KORNER: Yes. All right.
15 MR. ZECEVIC: Because we don't know when the Prosecutor will
16 actually end.
17 MS. KORNER: No. I will finish. But not until halfway through
18 Wednesday because of the documents I'm taking him through.
19 JUDGE AGIUS: All right. So that's it. I thank you all. See you
20 tomorrow at the same time. Good evening.
21 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned
22 at 6.33 p.m., to be reconvened on Tuesday,
23 the 3rd day of September, 2002, at 2.15 p.m.
24
25