1. 1 Wednesday, 29th April 1998

    2 (10 a.m.)

    3 JUDGE CASSESE: Good morning. I ask the

    4 Registrar to call out the case number, please.

    5 THE REGISTRAR: Case number IT-95-13a-T,

    6 Prosecutor versus Slavko Dokmanovic.

    7 MR. NIEMANN: Good morning, your Honours. My

    8 name is Niemann. I appear with my colleagues,

    9 Mr. Williamson, Mr. Waespi and Mr. Vos for the

    10 Prosecution.

    11 MR. FILA: My name is Mr. Toma Fila, I appear

    12 with Mr. Petrovic and Miss Lopicic for Mr. Dokmanovic.

    13 JUDGE CASSESE: Mr. Dokmanovic, can you hear

    14 me well? Thank you.

    15 Before we start, let me tell you that the

    16 Registry has informed us that we can work in the week

    17 of 18 May on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday morning, so

    18 we would sit on Monday and Tuesday from 9.30 to 12.30

    19 and from 2.30 to 5.30, whereas on Wednesday, we have

    20 only half a day from 9.30 to 12.30. I hope this is

    21 convenient for you. We now move on to our next

    22 witness.

    23 May I ask you to please stand up and make the

    24 solemn declaration?

    25 MR. FILA: Your Honour, you asked two



  2. 1 questions yesterday -- you personally -- concerning the

    2 composition of the Government and the appointment of

    3 the Ministries. The Defence has brought two laws to

    4 you -- they are not related to this particular

    5 witness. I would like to tender them in evidence if

    6 the Prosecution agrees?

    7 JUDGE CASSESE: Both Serbian and English.

    8 MR. FILA: Yes, both the Serbian and English

    9 versions. It refers to the questions asked yesterday

    10 by the judge. Could this be marked as the Defence

    11 exhibit?

    12 THE REGISTRAR: That will be Defence

    13 Exhibit D59 and the translation D59A.

    14 JUDGE CASSESE: I apologise. Could you

    15 please read the solemn declaration?

    16 MR. FILA: So two documents, two numbers.

    17 THE REGISTRAR: Yes, the other will be D60.

    18 THE WITNESS: I solemnly declare that

    19 I will speak the truth, the whole truth and nothing but

    20 the truth.

    21 MR. PETROVIC: I should first of all like to

    22 ask for the two documents that we tendered a moment ago

    23 whether the Prosecution has any objection. If not, may

    24 they be adopted as evidence.

    25 MR. NIEMANN: I have not seen them, your



  3. 1 Honour -- I am waiting for them -- no objection, your

    2 Honour.

    3 JUDGE CASSESE: Thank you.

    4 That will be D59 and D60.

    5 Mr. Petrovic, you may proceed.

    6 WITNESS DC

    7 Examined by MR. PETROVIC

    8 Q. I should like to ask you to show the witness

    9 this piece of paper so that she can acknowledge whether

    10 it is her name on the piece of paper (Handed).

    11 I suppose the witness will be given the

    12 pseudonym of DC.

    13 I should like to ask the Witness DC to tell

    14 us whether, on 18 September 1997, she talked to

    15 interviewer Miroslav Vasic and did she, on that

    16 occasion, make and sign the statement that I am going

    17 to present her with now.

    18 Will you show the witness? (Handed).

    19 THE REGISTRAR: The document is marked D62

    20 and the English translation D62A.

    21 THE WITNESS: Yes.

    22 MR. PETROVIC: If there are no objections,

    23 then I move that this be accepted and admitted as D62.

    24 I should like to ask Witness DC first of all

    25 to tell us whether she has completed the Higher School



  4. 1 of Economics, where and when, and to introduce herself

    2 in short?

    3 A. I completed the Higher School of Economics in

    4 Vukovar in 1976.

    5 Q. Where were you employed?

    6 A. In the Municipal Assembly of Vukovar.

    7 Q. Since when?

    8 A. Since 1980.

    9 Q. What job did you perform?

    10 A. In the Secretariat for Economic Affairs as a

    11 senior planner.

    12 Q. Since when have you known Slavko Dokmanovic?

    13 A. I have known Slavko Dokmanovic since 1981.

    14 Q. Can you tell us something about whether you

    15 know when Slavko Dokmanovic was elected President of

    16 the Municipal Assembly of Vukovar?

    17 A. Yes, I do. He was elected at the first

    18 multi-Party elections in 1990.

    19 Q. Until when did he perform that function?

    20 A. He performed that function until May 1991.

    21 After that he was prevented from doing so.

    22 Q. Can you tell us in greater detail how and who

    23 prevented him?

    24 A. As he was elected in 1990, he performed his

    25 function until 1991, in May, and in 1991, in May, the



  5. 1 disturbances began, and he was no longer able to go to

    2 work.

    3 Q. Do you know a concrete case of preventing him

    4 to reach his work post?

    5 A. Well, there were several threats -- a lot of

    6 cases of this kind, and they were very frightening and

    7 so he was prevented from coming to work.

    8 Q. What happened at that time in Vukovar -- at

    9 the time we are discussing?

    10 A. We are speaking about the time after May,

    11 that is to say, mid May, up until I was in Vukovar, let

    12 us say that in the municipality they brought some

    13 people wearing masks -- they were not the police -- and

    14 these individuals searched everybody upon entrance,

    15 even the deputies themselves.

    16 Q. Who were these individuals, do you know?

    17 A. Well, I learned of this later on, because

    18 they had camouflage uniforms and I heard that they were

    19 members of the national guard.

    20 Q. What happened afterwards?

    21 A. A series of events took place afterwards --

    22 shops were blown up, houses were shot at, fired at,

    23 people disappeared -- people were replaced at work.

    24 Q. Do you know any particular cases in which

    25 people were replaced at work?



  6. 1 A. Yes, I do. For example, the director -- the

    2 then director of the radio station was replaced as well

    3 as the Secretary for National Defence, the director of

    4 Borovo.

    5 Q. Do you know why and who replaced them -- who

    6 removed them from office?

    7 A. Mr. Dokmanovic had performed the duties of

    8 President of the Assembly until that time. He was

    9 replaced by Mr. Vidic and the Assembly of the time,

    10 which met, made these changes -- their members, their

    11 deputies and up until then it was the Serbs that held

    12 these functions. Afterwards, their own people were

    13 appointed.

    14 Q. Do you know something about the replacement

    15 of the editor in chief of the Vukovar papers and Radio

    16 Vukovar?

    17 A. Yes, I do.

    18 Q. Will you tell us what you know?

    19 A. I also know that this happened in May, in

    20 view of the fact that it was my father in fact -- he

    21 was suspended and then he received, in July, a decree

    22 saying that he was relieved of his duties -- it was a

    23 retroactive decree.

    24 MR. PETROVIC: May we dwell or stop for a

    25 moment. I would like to show you some documents and we



  7. 1 will go on to comment on them later on.

    2 Will you show the document to the witness,

    3 please. (Handed).

    4 THE REGISTRAR: Document is marked D63 and

    5 the English translation D63A.

    6 THE WITNESS: This is a telegram.

    7 MR. PETROVIC: Just one moment, please. This

    8 other document as well, please. (Handed).

    9 THE REGISTRAR: Document is marked D64,

    10 English translation D64A.

    11 MR. PETROVIC: Could you tell us what those

    12 documents contain?

    13 A. This is a telegram which states that the

    14 Ministry of Information allows the broadcasting of the

    15 present Radio Vukovar under the new name, the Croatian

    16 Radio Vukovar, and appoints a new director -- there is

    17 an error here -- he is not Mladen, he is Zdravko

    18 Seremet, who will take over his duties within 24 hours,

    19 immediately. Mr. Seremet has been appointed as the

    20 editor in chief -- the acting editor in chief following

    21 the suspension of Milan Covrko and Milan Stankovic and

    22 it is an official document and it is signed by the

    23 Minister, Hrvoje Hitrec.

    24 Q. So the Ministry of Information of Croatia

    25 recalls the director of the Serbian radio who was a



  8. 1 Serb national -- the second document, could you read

    2 out the date please?

    3 A. I said that it was dated 4 May 1991.

    4 According to this document, once again from the

    5 Ministry of Information of the Republic of Croatia,

    6 there is information sent out which states the Ministry

    7 of Information of Croatia approves the broadcasting of

    8 Radio Vukovar under a new name, Croatian Radio Vukovar,

    9 and appoints Zdravko Seremet as its director. This

    10 decree comes into force immediately.

    11 Q. Were there removals and replacement before

    12 Croatia proclaimed its independence?

    13 A. Yes.

    14 Q. What happened with the former editor in chief

    15 of the Vukovar papers?

    16 A. After that decree relieving him of his duty

    17 followed, which on 30 July was handed to him --

    18 MR. PETROVIC: Would you take a look at this

    19 document and tell us whether that is the document in

    20 question? (Handed).

    21 THE REGISTRAR: Document is marked D65 and

    22 the English translation is D65A.

    23 THE WITNESS: I do not want to read out

    24 this decree.

    25 MR. PETROVIC: No, just comment on it,



  9. 1 please?

    2 A. This is a decree which arrived on 30 July

    3 1991, by which my father, as the editor in chief of

    4 former Radio Vukovar, the Vukovar newspapers, was

    5 relieved of his duties, as of 6 May 1991. The decree

    6 is retroactive and, with that document, he was relieved

    7 of his duties. The explanation is given that Zdravko

    8 Seremet was appointed to replace him. I do not think

    9 there is any special comment that I can make there.

    10 MR. PETROVIC: For the purposes of

    11 illustration of the atmosphere prevailing in Vukovar at

    12 the time, would you look at an article -- a newspaper

    13 article, which also relates to your father, and tell us

    14 what the article is about? (Handed).

    15 THE REGISTRAR: Document is marked D66 and

    16 English translation D66A.

    17 THE WITNESS: This is an article from the

    18 "Slobodni Tjednik", published in Osijek on 28 June

    19 1991. On the first page, it has the title, "Mirko

    20 Stankovic sentenced to death". I shall read out just

    21 one segment:

    22 "The one-time head of the Vukovar radio, now

    23 correspondent at Television Belgrade, has been

    24 sentenced to death on the part of the armed Croatian

    25 guerrilla. Five individuals have been assigned to carry



  10. 1 out this sentence. He is a disinformer and instigates

    2 hatred. There are stories that he did not want to tell

    3 us anything precisely. There are two groups of five

    4 people that have been designated to liquidate Stankovic

    5 -- his house would have been blown up long ago but the

    6 house he is living in does not belong to him."

    7 MR. PETROVIC: I should like to tender D66 as

    8 evidence -- documents 63 to 66.

    9 MR. WILLIAMSON: We would object to this. It

    10 is a newspaper article reporting on something. We do

    11 not know who this was written by or anything about the

    12 truthfulness of this document.

    13 MR. PETROVIC: The same --

    14 JUDGE CASSESE: We have decided to admit it

    15 into evidence, although of course it is a press article

    16 with obvious limitations inherent in this fact.

    17 MR. PETROVIC: When did you leave Vukovar?

    18 A. I left Vukovar on 22 July 1991.

    19 Q. Could you tell us the circumstances under

    20 which you left Vukovar and why?

    21 A. I was threatened by phone in my home, and at

    22 my parents' house, the house was shot at three times

    23 and this caused fear and unrest and, therefore, we were

    24 forced to leave the town.

    25 Q. I should now like to go back to 20 November



  11. 1 1991. Were you in Vukovar on that day?

    2 A. Yes, I was.

    3 Q. How do you know that you were in Vukovar on

    4 that day?

    5 A. On 19 November I was at VELEPROMET because my

    6 mother and grandmother were in the cellar throughout

    7 the duration of the war. I found my mother on the 19th

    8 and took her out, but as my husband and I were looking

    9 for my husband's aunt and uncle, we did not find them

    10 on the 19th and we took my parents to Sid and, on the

    11 20th, once again, returned to VELEPROMET to look for my

    12 husband's aunt, because that is all the family that he

    13 has left.

    14 Q. On the 20th, who did you see in the courtyard

    15 of VELEPROMET?

    16 A. I saw many people -- the people from the same

    17 town, people I knew. There were many people there at

    18 the VELEPROMET compound, because they had left the

    19 cellars after the war.

    20 Q. Did you see Slavko Dokmanovic?

    21 A. Yes, I did.

    22 Q. Where did you see Slavko Dokmanovic and when?

    23 A. I saw Slavko in the courtyard of VELEPROMET.

    24 Q. When?

    25 A. It was somewhere around 2 o'clock -- 2 p.m.



  12. 1 MR. PETROVIC: Could we show the witness tape

    2 D2 -- would the witness tell us whether she recognises

    3 the events at VELEPROMET which can be seen on the

    4 tape?

    5 Is that the atmosphere that prevailed and are

    6 those the people who were present on the occasion?

    7 (Videotape played)

    8 MR. PETROVIC: When you recognise somebody,

    9 please tell us?

    10 A. I have already recognised someone.

    11 (Videotape continued)

    12 MR. PETROVIC: Tell us who you recognise,

    13 quite freely?

    14 A. Goran Hadzic, Slavko from the back side,

    15 Mr. Jaksic, my husband, Mr. Jaksic, that is my husband on

    16 the left-hand side.

    17 Q. That is sufficient, thank you. Was that the

    18 particular day and the people you saw on that

    19 particular day?

    20 A. Yes, on both counts.

    21 Q. How long did you stay at VELEPROMET?

    22 A. I stayed until up around half past 3 --

    23 3.30 p.m.

    24 Q. Were you in the courtyard the whole time?

    25 A. No, I was not in the courtyard the whole



  13. 1 time. I said hello to the people I knew -- the ones

    2 that I mentioned -- and then I left them in the

    3 courtyard and I went into a room to get warm, because

    4 it was cold.

    5 Q. When did you leave VELEPROMET and what

    6 direction did you take?

    7 A. I think that I left at around half past 3 in

    8 the afternoon towards Negoslavci and Sid.

    9 Q. Did you stop on the way?

    10 A. Yes.

    11 Q. Where?

    12 A. We stopped for a brief moment in the village

    13 of Negoslavci and, after that, somewhere in front of

    14 the village of Orolik.

    15 Q. Why in front of Orolik?

    16 A. There was a column of buses which moved in

    17 front of us and it had stopped, because they had been

    18 brought tea, some hot beverages and some food, and the

    19 column was there for a little over half an hour.

    20 Q. Who was in the buses?

    21 A. I think they were all the people from

    22 VELEPROMET.

    23 Q. Please continue?

    24 A. Yes, we stayed there for some time, and my

    25 husband went out of the car.



  14. 1 Q. When was this -- what time?

    2 A. Well, dusk was falling -- about 5 o'clock

    3 perhaps. My husband left the car to see whether we

    4 would be moving on soon, because nobody liked driving

    5 in the dark in those days, so he went out and he came

    6 back fairly quickly. He told me that there seemed to

    7 have been an incident of some kind, that Slavko had an

    8 incident with a policeman, an encounter with a

    9 policeman and that the whole thing ended peacefully and

    10 that they would be letting us through, so that we

    11 passed by the column of buses and moved in the

    12 direction of Sid.

    13 Q. Do you remember how Slavko Dokmanovic was

    14 dressed on that particular day?

    15 A. No, I do not. I did not pay attention to

    16 what he was wearing, because I just said a brief hello

    17 to him and we continued -- I cannot really say.

    18 Q. Where do you live now today?

    19 A. In Vukovar.

    20 Q. Are you still employed?

    21 A. Yes.

    22 Q. What is the situation in that town today?

    23 A. Well, if you ask me honestly and if you want

    24 an honest answer, I think that it is even worse than it

    25 was in 1991.



  15. 1 MR. WILLIAMSON: I object. We are seven

    2 years past the event and the status of what is going on

    3 in Vukovar today is irrelevant to these proceedings.

    4 JUDGE CASSESE: Yes, sustained.

    5 MR. PETROVIC: The book that we have been

    6 discussing for several days was also published a long

    7 time after the events and we are spending at least one

    8 hour talking about it every day so we just want to

    9 illustrate the situation and the continuity of the

    10 relationship towards the Serb population in the town.

    11 I want to show two documents for illustration purposes,

    12 as to the relationship towards the Serbs before, during

    13 and after the events, but if the court considers this

    14 to be irrelevant, we will withhold that.

    15 JUDGE CASSESE: Yes, it is irrelevant. You

    16 were mentioning that book -- of course we have only

    17 seen some parts of the book -- those parts which have

    18 been translated into English, they are relevant because

    19 they relate to events back in 1991 and 1992, so

    20 therefore the reference to that book is not immaterial

    21 to our matter.

    22 I do not think that there is any relevance to

    23 the present issue we are discussing, so therefore can

    24 you explain to us what sort of documents these are

    25 before we decide whether or not to admit them into



  16. 1 evidence?

    2 MR. PETROVIC: The documents -- the first

    3 document is the sentence of an organisation of an

    4 Ustasha character, sentence passed over individuals,

    5 including Jacques Klein, who was the UNTAES

    6 administrator in the Srem Baranja region. The second

    7 is a document which was handed into the houses and

    8 letter boxes of the Serb nationals, with serious

    9 threats which later on made them leave Vukovar.

    10 Just for purposes of information -- just as

    11 an illustration -- perhaps you could have a look at

    12 them and then you will be able to decide whether you

    13 admit them or not.

    14 JUDGE CASSESE: Time and again we have

    15 insisted that we are really only concerned with the

    16 facts and the legal issues surrounding the present

    17 indictment. So we do not want to take into account

    18 historical events which happened before or things which

    19 happened after the event with which we are concerned.

    20 Let me consult my colleagues.

    21 We cannot admit them into evidence.

    22 MR. PETROVIC: I have no further questions,

    23 your Honour, thank you.

    24 Cross-examined by MR. WILLIAMSON

    25 Q. Witness DC, you indicated, or the documents



  17. 1 that have been introduced by the Defence indicate, that

    2 your father was suspended from his position on 4 May

    3 1991; that is correct?

    4 A. No. That was the telegram -- that was before

    5 the suspension which came in July, as I said, but it

    6 was backdated to May -- I think it was 5 May, or 6 May

    7 -- I am not sure now, because I do not have the paper

    8 here with me.

    9 Q. But, in any event, the decision was made on 5

    10 or 6 May and that is when he was informed about it,

    11 although it did not officially occur until June or

    12 July; correct?

    13 A. He was informed on 30 July and a telegram

    14 itself was not given to him at all, because he had been

    15 suspended before that time, so he was unable to go to

    16 work, so it was only on 30 July that he learned that he

    17 had been -- that his employment had been terminated and

    18 that it was backdated.

    19 Q. But it was on 4 May then that he was

    20 suspended, is that correct, and it was only later that

    21 he was actually informed of the circumstances under

    22 which this had occurred?

    23 A. Yes.

    24 Q. So, this was two days after the incident in

    25 Borovo Selo; correct?



  18. 1 A. Yes.

    2 Q. What were you doing during the course of the

    3 battle -- were you working during that time?

    4 A. I do not know -- what battle are you

    5 referring to?

    6 Q. In Vukovar -- in the autumn of 1991, the

    7 events that we are talking about here, were you working

    8 during the course of those two or three months when the

    9 fighting was going on in Vukovar?

    10 A. No, nobody worked in Vukovar during the war.

    11 Q. Did you have any type of employment outside

    12 of Vukovar during that time period?

    13 A. No.

    14 Q. Did you have occasion to see Slavko

    15 Dokmanovic during that time period prior to 19 or 20

    16 November?

    17 A. No, only on that day.

    18 Q. On 20 November, when you were at VELEPROMET,

    19 were you wearing a uniform?

    20 A. No.

    21 Q. Did you ever wear a uniform at any time?

    22 A. No.

    23 Q. You have indicated that you were there

    24 looking for your husband's aunt; correct?

    25 A. Yes.



  19. 1 Q. Approximately what time did you arrive at

    2 VELEPROMET, you and your husband?

    3 A. On that day, around 10 a.m.

    4 Q. And what did you do in the period between 10

    5 and 2 in the afternoon?

    6 A. As I have already said, the courtyard of the

    7 VELEPROMET was full of people we knew -- Vukovar is a

    8 small town, we all know each other so I spent the

    9 entire time with them.

    10 Q. And you were just talking about things that

    11 had happened and what was going on on that day?

    12 A. Yes, absolutely.

    13 Q. Did you find out any information about your

    14 husband's aunt while you were there?

    15 A. Yes. We received information that one part

    16 of the town from the River Vuka towards Borovo left to

    17 Dalj and the rest gathered in VELEPROMET and that is

    18 the reason why around 3.30 p.m. we went back to Sid in

    19 order to look for her on that side, so we had to go

    20 around to reach Dalj and to find her there.

    21 Q. So, it was around 3.30 in the afternoon that

    22 you got this information that the people from north of

    23 the Vuka had been taken to Dalj; correct?

    24 A. Yes.

    25 Q. Prior to that time -- obviously all your



  20. 1 efforts to find her had been unsuccessful; correct?

    2 A. Yes.

    3 Q. And were you and your husband anxious about

    4 locating her and what had happened to her?

    5 A. Yes, since these are the only relatives left

    6 to my husband, because he does not have his parents any

    7 more -- they are not alive.

    8 Q. When you were unable to find your husband's

    9 aunt at the JNA barracks -- sorry, at VELEPROMET, did

    10 you go to the JNA barracks to look for her?

    11 A. No, since we had learned that she had been

    12 unable to leave towards that area.

    13 Q. I am talking about prior to that time --

    14 prior to 3.30, you were there for approximately five

    15 and a half hours and had been looking for her; during

    16 all of that period, when you were not able to locate

    17 her, you never made an effort to go and try and find

    18 her at the JNA barracks?

    19 A. No, because I did not know that there were

    20 any civilians in the barracks -- it never occurred to

    21 me.

    22 Q. Did you go to the JNA barracks at all on 20

    23 November for any reason?

    24 A. No.

    25 Q. So, it would be untrue that you and your



  21. 1 husband approached some buses -- they were lined up at

    2 the JNA barracks and your husband said in your presence

    3 to Emil Cakalic that he was on the wrong bus?

    4 A. No.

    5 Q. And it would also be your testimony that in

    6 reply to a question from Mr. Cakalic as to what was the

    7 right bus, your husband said, "It does not matter, they

    8 are all the same"?

    9 A. I do not know whether my husband said that

    10 and my acquaintance with Mr. Cakalic is so frail, and we

    11 never went to the barracks.

    12 Q. Your husband knew Mr. Cakalic from having

    13 worked with them at the municipality though, did he

    14 not?

    15 A. I guess.

    16 MR. WILLIAMSON: I would like to give you a

    17 small piece of paper and ask you to write your maiden

    18 name on this piece of paper, if you would, please.

    19 I would enter this as the next Prosecutor's

    20 exhibit, please.

    21 THE REGISTRAR: Exhibit 203.

    22 MR. WILLIAMSON: If it can be shown to the

    23 Defence as well.

    24 So, as I understand it, Witness DC, it is

    25 your testimony that you and your husband remained at



  22. 1 VELEPROMET the entire time between 10 in the morning

    2 and approximately 3.30 in the afternoon -- correct?

    3 A. Yes.

    4 Q. And you said that you were in the courtyard

    5 for a while and then you went into this office. While

    6 you were in the office, do you know what was going on

    7 outside in the courtyard?

    8 A. No, I could not really say -- I had gone into

    9 the building because I was cold, I had a hot tea and

    10 then my husband called me when we were about to leave.

    11 Q. You said you saw Slavko Dokmanovic arrive

    12 around 2 p.m. Was he alone or was he accompanied by

    13 other persons?

    14 A. He was accompanied by the persons I saw on

    15 the screen here.

    16 Q. Those people that you saw on the film were

    17 ones that came in with him at 2 o'clock?

    18 A. Yes.

    19 Q. Can you say the names of the people that you

    20 saw him come in with -- you have pointed them out on

    21 the screen, but can you be more specific as exactly who

    22 you saw him with, those whose names you knew?

    23 A. Yes.

    24 Q. Please?

    25 A. Slavko Dokmanovic, Rade Leskovac, Goran



  23. 1 Hadzic, Duskojakic, Mr. Cvetkovic -- I met him that day,

    2 as well as Mr. Lazarevic.

    3 Q. Did you speak with Mr. Dokmanovic on that

    4 occasion?

    5 A. Just a couple of words -- how his family was,

    6 how was he and that is what he asked me and that was

    7 all and then I left that area, because there was a

    8 large number of men and they were all talking.

    9 Q. Did you speak with Goran Hadzic?

    10 A. No, I just said hello.

    11 Q. Do you know Goran Hadzic?

    12 A. Yes.

    13 Q. In what way -- how do you know him, how long

    14 have you known him and in what context?

    15 A. I do not know him in the private capacity.

    16 We would not be able to discuss anything, but to

    17 exchange greetings -- that would be the extent of our

    18 acquaintance.

    19 Q. Do you know why he was wearing a military

    20 uniform on that day?

    21 A. I did not notice that anyone was wearing a

    22 uniform, because there was such a crush of people and

    23 the commotion -- we were all so upset and excited,

    24 because it was two days after the liberation, so many

    25 people had passed there and I cannot really recall who



  24. 1 was wearing what.

    2 Q. If I put it to you that on the video we just

    3 viewed he was in some type of military uniform, would

    4 you be able to say why this was? If you wish, we can

    5 view the video, but I am just asking do you know one

    6 way or the other why he might have been in an uniform?

    7 A. As to why, I could not say -- I do not know.

    8 Q. Were you aware of a meeting which took place

    9 at VELEPROMET on 20 November?

    10 A. No.

    11 Q. You have indicated that you saw Mr. Dokmanovic

    12 and that you spoke with him prior to going into the

    13 office. Did you see him again after you came out of

    14 the office, shortly before you left the VELEPROMET

    15 facility?

    16 A. I do not remember.

    17 Q. When you left VELEPROMET, where did you go

    18 exactly?

    19 A. We set off towards Negoslavci, we were behind

    20 the column of buses.

    21 Q. And how many cars were there in your group,

    22 or how many vehicles of the people leaving from

    23 VELEPROMET?

    24 A. I cannot give you the exact number, but the

    25 column was quite long.



  25. 1 Q. And where were you located in this column --

    2 near the front, near the middle, near the back?

    3 A. Well, near the front.

    4 Q. And who else was in your vehicle with you?

    5 A. My husband was with me.

    6 Q. It was just the two of you in the vehicle?

    7 A. I cannot remember whether we had given anyone

    8 a lift -- I really cannot.

    9 Q. So, as I understand it, you departed

    10 VELEPROMET and went straight from there to Negoslavci;

    11 where you stopped briefly; correct?

    12 A. Yes, that is right.

    13 Q. Then from Negoslavci to Orolik; right?

    14 A. Yes, in the direction of Orolik.

    15 Q. Approximately what time did you arrive in

    16 Orolik?

    17 A. Well, it may have been around quarter past 4

    18 -- 4.15. We stopped there and we stayed there for

    19 maybe about half an hour, maybe even more -- since, as

    20 I said, the people on the buses were given hot

    21 beverages.

    22 Q. And in Orolik, you said that your husband

    23 told you that there had been some type of incident in

    24 which Mr. Dokmanovic was involved; correct?

    25 A. Yes.



  26. 1 Q. Did you personally see Mr. Dokmanovic or

    2 witness this incident that occurred?

    3 A. No, it was already dusk -- I did not leave

    4 the car. He had left the car to see how long we would

    5 be staying there, and, when he reached the barricade,

    6 he saw silhouettes of some people -- among others there

    7 was Mr. Dokmanovic, but at that time the incident had

    8 already been solved and military police officers let us

    9 through -- the whole column of cars -- we were allowed

    10 to pass by the buses.

    11 MR. WILLIAMSON: I have no further questions,

    12 your Honour.

    13 Re-examined by MR. PETROVIC

    14 Q. I would like to clarify one situation; did

    15 you see Slavko Dokmanovic get to the VELEPROMET

    16 compound or standing in the VELEPROMET compound?

    17 A. I saw him stand there.

    18 MR. PETROVIC: Thank you.

    19 JUDGE MAY: Mr. Williamson, I do not think

    20 this is really a question for the witness, but while it

    21 is in my mind, could you clarify it or help clarify

    22 this? It is in relation to the position of VELEPROMET

    23 in relation to the barracks.

    24 MR. WILLIAMSON: VELEPROMET is located across

    25 the street from the JNA barracks and approximately --



  27. 1 somewhere between 100 and 400 metres south of the

    2 barracks in the direction of Negoslavci, so it is

    3 directly across -- sorry, it is across the street and

    4 then down somewhere between 100 and 400 metres.

    5 JUDGE MAY: That was the evidence.

    6 JUDGE CASSESE: I assume there is no

    7 objection to the Witness DC being released?

    8 MR. WILLIAMSON: No objection.

    9 JUDGE CASSESE: Witness DC, thank you so

    10 much for coming here to give evidence. You may now be

    11 released.

    12 (The witness withdrew)

    13 JUDGE CASSESE: I wonder, Mr. Fila or

    14 Mr. Petrovic, are you suggesting that we are going to

    15 see the videotape?

    16 MR. FILA: Yes.

    17 JUDGE CASSESE: You said yesterday that it

    18 is about two hours to view the videotape.

    19 MR. FILA: Yes, that is right. It is two

    20 hours long, but only two or three minutes right at the

    21 beginning are very important, because there we can see

    22 who is what, but I repeat once again why it is

    23 important -- it is dated 1991, and Mr. Dokmanovic

    24 presents his views there. He did not know at that time

    25 that he would be facing trial now here before you in



  28. 1 1998, so the things that he is saying at that time are

    2 important for this court to see whether he is an

    3 extremist or not, or whether he was a member of the

    4 Serbian National Council or not, because it is evident

    5 from the tape -- we are talking about 1991 -- and the

    6 Prosecution witness Vidic Bili mentioned this tape and

    7 that is why I took that tape, to show it to you.

    8 JUDGE CASSESE: Mr. Williamson?

    9 MR. WILLIAMSON: We have no objection to the

    10 tape, but the copy that we received yesterday was only

    11 a 50-minute programme, so I am not sure if we have

    12 actually viewed the tape that he plans on showing.

    13 MR. FILA: Yes, my apologies, Mr. Williamson.

    14 I do not want to appear to be lying, but I am just

    15 repeating what my investigators told me -- if you saw

    16 only 50 minutes, then it is just 50 minutes.

    17 MR. WILLIAMSON: No objection then, your

    18 Honour.

    19 JUDGE CASSESE: We will now take a 10-minute

    20 recess and then we will come back and view the

    21 videotape.

    22 (10.50 a.m.)

    23 (A short break)

    24 (11.03 a.m.)

    25 JUDGE CASSESE: We can go ahead with the



  29. 1 tape.

    2 MR. FILA: Your Honours, the man by the name

    3 of Ilija Petrovic, he is the author of the book

    4 proffered by Mr. Williamson. I do not mean Mr.

    5 Williamson's book, but the book shown by Mr. Williamson.

    6 (Videotape played)

    7 THE INTERPRETER: Please note for the record

    8 that the interpreters do not have the transcript.

    9 THE INTERPRETER:

    10 "Speaker: We have invited Ilija Petrovic,

    11 member of the National Council; Ilija Kuncarevic,

    12 Secretary-General of the Serbian National Council; Pero

    13 Matic, a teacher from Beli Manastir; Slavko Dokmanovic,

    14 the President of the Municipal Assembly of Vukovar;

    15 Goran Hadzic, the President of the municipal committee

    16 of the Serbian Democratic Party for Vukovar, and a

    17 member of the main committee of the Serbian Democratic

    18 Party for Knin, and Caslav Ocic from Dalj.

    19 The Serbian National Council for Slovonia,

    20 Baranja and Western Srem was established this year in

    21 -- "

    22 MR. FILA: We did not see the beginning,

    23 I apologise. Can we please rewind to the beginning, so

    24 that we hear how the persons are introduced, because

    25 this has not been on the tape?



  30. 1 (Videotape played)

    2 THE INTERPRETER:

    3 "Speaker: We have invited to the studio

    4 Ilija Petrovic, member of the National Council; Ilija

    5 Kuncarevic, Secretary-General of the Serbian National

    6 Council; Pero Matic, teacher from Beli Manastir; Slavko

    7 Dokmanovic, the President of the Municipal Assembly of

    8 Vukovar; Goran Hadzic, the President of the municipal

    9 committee of the Serbian Democratic Party for Vukovar,

    10 and a member of the main committee of the Serbian

    11 Democratic Party for Knin, and Caslav Ocic from Dalj.

    12 The Serbian National Council for Slavonia,

    13 Baranja and Western Srem was established this year in

    14 Sidski Banovci at Christmas. Of course, the Orthodox

    15 Christmas. So far, of the members of the Serbian

    16 National Council we only knew the name of Ilija

    17 Koncarevic, the Secretary-General, and today we

    18 identify another member, Ilija Petrovic.

    19 Mr. Petrovic, why the secrecy surrounding the

    20 names of the Serbian National Council?

    21 Mr. Petrovic: Well, the reason is quite

    22 simple. In Croatia we have an Ustasha regime, and we

    23 have seen what the scenario is according to which they

    24 work. It is logical that if they knew the names, they

    25 would also be on the list of people to be eliminated



  31. 1 and that is why we thought it quite normal that the

    2 names of the remaining 19 members of the National

    3 Council be kept secret for the time being. The fact

    4 that the names have not been disclosed does not mean

    5 that the National Council is not operating. This

    6 Council for Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srem is fully

    7 operational and in the meantime they issued two

    8 proclamations and I hope that they will continue to do

    9 so.

    10 I have to add here that the Serbian National

    11 Council for Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srem, as its

    12 name says, operates in a narrower area of what is today

    13 the Republic of Croatia and that it works in accordance

    14 with the declaration on the establishment of the

    15 Serbian National Council passed at the Convention,

    16 passed in Srb in July and now, because some of us have

    17 maybe forgotten something from geography we learned so

    18 far in the past, and maybe we were not at school that

    19 day, Western Srem, according to our views, extends from

    20 its eastern line, Ilok, Lovas, Sid, Tovarnik and

    21 Jamena, and to the west it is bordered by the line

    22 extending from Cepin down 15 kilometres to Slavonski

    23 Brod.

    24 Slavonia extends from that line, Cepin,

    25 Slavonski Brod, and to the west it is from the estuary



  32. 1 of the river Ilova down to the Virovitica.

    2 Baranja can be most easily defined. It is

    3 the triangle edged by Drava and the Danube and by the

    4 Hungarian border, the border between Hungary and

    5 Yugoslavia.

    6 Question: Mr. Koncarevic, were you the most

    7 brave person, since you gave your name to the public?

    8 Mr. Koncarevic: Well, I was not the most

    9 courageous one, it was simply necessary to do so.

    10 I spent most of my time in Slavonia and Baranja and

    11 also Krajina. The Council requested me to do so and

    12 I performed that task. In the proclamation on the

    13 establishment of the Serbian National Council it is

    14 stated as follows: faced with the fact that Slovenes

    15 and Croats have issued separate decisions on seceding

    16 from the State of Yugoslavia, which they joined,

    17 together with Serbs, in a joint decision, and the

    18 rights of the third partner, the Serbs, have been

    19 completely ignored, so that is the reason why Serbian

    20 National Council was formed.

    21 Question: Can you tell us something about

    22 the reasons why it was established in Sidski Banovci

    23 and why on Christmas?

    24 Mr. Koncarevic: You have three questions,

    25 I will try to answer them in turn. We are a part of



  33. 1 the Serbian National Council which was formed in Srb

    2 and this area that we cover is a geographically

    3 specific area -- the second question, why in Sidski

    4 Banovci -- there is a reason why. We wanted to show

    5 how absurd it is to draw some kind of (INAUDIBLE)

    6 borders which are now used by the HDZ as their own

    7 borders. So, Sid remains -- the western part of the

    8 municipality of Sid remains outside that area and it

    9 does not contain -- this area does not contain any of

    10 the surrounding villages, although it is logical that

    11 the Sidski Banovci village should be in Sid

    12 municipality and not in Vinkovci municipality as it is

    13 now, and that was the reason why we wanted to show just

    14 how absurd this is, by our choice of the location.

    15 Why on Christmas? Well, first of all we

    16 Serbs live according to the principles of Saint Sava.

    17 We are unable to wish ill on anyone and we cannot do

    18 anything bad to any other people, least of all on

    19 Christmas. In one of the paragraphs of our

    20 proclamation we called on our Croatian brothers to stop

    21 their Croatian "national fighters", in inverted commas,

    22 and to make them recognise their rights and to tell

    23 them that all the wars so far have ended in history and

    24 that the irrational of the Croatian national fighters

    25 against Serbia should stop.



  34. 1 We also told him that the Serbian nation has

    2 its roots in this area and that the Serbian spirit

    3 remains there and we wanted to tell them that they

    4 should not do any harm to the Serbian people -- not do

    5 anything to the Serbian people that they would not wish

    6 the Serbian people to do to them.

    7 Question: Mr. Matic, Croatia reacted to the

    8 Serbian National Council by stating that Serbs wanted

    9 to make this area more Serbian -- is that true

    10 Mr. Matic?

    11 Mr. Matic: Well, that is what they state,

    12 that is their view, but if you look at the history and

    13 if you know some facts, they have no reason to claim

    14 this, because Serbs have been present here since time

    15 immemorial -- many historical documents dating as far

    16 back as the 10th century testify as to the presence of

    17 Serbs in this area.

    18 However, since we are here linked mostly to

    19 Baranja and to Western Srem, I would like to stress

    20 once again the problems linked historically with this

    21 region. These are mostly Serbian areas. You will find

    22 in history, for instance, from Duke Rakoci in the 18th

    23 century, he calls the area from Balota to the place

    24 where the Drava River joined the Danube, "the Serbian

    25 land". Serbs never conquered this region, they



  35. 1 inhabited, settled this area when they fled from the

    2 Turks and searched for new areas where they could

    3 recognise and realise their political existence. They

    4 found this area in Baranja and that is how they came to

    5 live here.

    6 The Serbian nation has full historical

    7 legitimacy, but, in a series of tragedies that befell

    8 the Serbian nation and many misfortunes, one of the

    9 misfortunes happened to them in 1946. It is well-known

    10 that, due to arbitrary political decisions, and this is

    11 what people who lived to see this region -- that

    12 Baranja and Western Srem came to be a part of Croatia,

    13 although we know that historically, before the First

    14 World War, this area belonged to the Danube Vojvodina,

    15 Danube Banovina and before that to southern Hungary and

    16 to Serbian Vojvodina. That is why this interpretation

    17 that we are making this country a Serbian place is not

    18 true, but Serbs have lived there for a long time --

    19 they have their deeds to land to prove that, and

    20 unfortunately, in the past, in the last war, this has

    21 been stolen -- this property has been stolen from them.

    22 Question: Mr. Matic, you are from Beli

    23 Manastir and not Bijeli Manastir, so let us put right

    24 an error that occurred on the screen in the caption?

    25 Mr. Matic: Yes, officially the name is Beli



  36. 1 Manastir.

    2 Question: Mr. Dokmanovic, you are President

    3 of the Municipal Assembly of Vukovar. Could you tell

    4 us what it means to be the President of the

    5 municipality of a town in HDZ rule?

    6 Mr. Dokmanovic: Vukovar is an area where 23

    7 nations and nationalities live. Until one year ago

    8 they lived fairly peacefully and that is how they

    9 should live. Vukovar is Yugoslavia in small and that

    10 is how everybody behaved. Nobody ever stressed their

    11 national and religious affiliation. This was never a

    12 hindrance of life together. Before the first

    13 multi-Party elections took place, the HDZ endeavoured,

    14 by all means available, to homogenise the Croat people

    15 and the people lived up to that and we had a division

    16 and this national tension is fairly evident, there is a

    17 lot of mistrust and the politics of the day -- the

    18 militant policy contributes to this, of the insurgent

    19 side and they are playing at the razor's edge and this

    20 can lead to serious incidents with unforeseeable

    21 consequences.

    22 In Vukovar at the elections these socialists

    23 were victorious, they have a significant majority in

    24 the Assembly. The work of the Assembly is evolving

    25 under fairly difficult conditions and I can tell you



  37. 1 that it is a thankless task to be the President of the

    2 Municipal Assembly at this particular point where the

    3 leftist side has won.

    4 Question: Can you tell us as a Serb in the

    5 municipality whether you have -- there has been any

    6 coercion and pressure exerted on you and there were

    7 attempts to dismantle this. What is the situation like

    8 today?

    9 Mr. Dokmanovic: The overall economic

    10 situation has contributed to an even more difficult

    11 situation, together with the national situation, so the

    12 settling of accounts, which is taking place between the

    13 Serb leaders, it is a settling of accounts with the

    14 ancient regime, generally the Communists, and that is

    15 where the Serbs are mostly the victims.

    16 Question: Mr. Hadzic, you are President of

    17 the municipal council of Serbian Democratic Party,

    18 municipal committee of the SDS and it has been set up

    19 and you have been able to organise yourselves. From

    20 that aspect, tell us the position of the Serbs there?

    21 Mr. Hadzic: As you said yourself, we

    22 organised ourselves relatively late, but our Croatian

    23 -- by virtue of the acts of our Croatian brethren we

    24 had to organise ourselves. The position of the Serbian

    25 people is a very difficult one. I cannot say that the



  38. 1 people are frightened -- after all, the events that

    2 have occurred -- we know that there was 1941 and 1945

    3 and we have nothing to fear any more. After the

    4 constitution of Croatia, we have been wiped out as a

    5 people in these areas -- nothing remains apart from our

    6 head on our shoulders and life itself so we have

    7 nothing to fear any more, but perhaps we as individuals

    8 -- and we had a meeting last night and one of the

    9 conclusions was that while we are frightened that a

    10 part of the leadership and the presidency of the

    11 republic could make moves which are errors, we are

    12 afraid of something else, that is, the Croatian

    13 silence, and I think that, after that, nobody has

    14 distanced themselves from the events that have taken

    15 place. That is more frightening, because -- anybody

    16 can make a mistake, leaders can make a mistake but a

    17 nation must not make a mistake and I do not think this

    18 can be done by the Croatian people and they are our

    19 friends, they are our neighbours and we know that they

    20 arm themselves. We thought this was individual, but we

    21 are very sorry to see that nobody distanced themselves

    22 from these facts.

    23 Question: How does the Serbian nation

    24 explain recognition of the images that appeared? How

    25 do you explain the situation?



  39. 1 Mr. Hadzic: Well, it is tragic. It would be

    2 funny were it not tragic and that is why we find it

    3 difficult, because people are trying to justify

    4 themselves and that is absurd.

    5 Question: Mr. Ocic, the programme of

    6 Television Novi Sad is viewed in Slavonia and Baranja,

    7 and viewers very often call us and not only Serbs; the

    8 Croats too call us and tell us about the situation in

    9 Slavonia and Baranja and say the Serbs are rich there.

    10 You said something about the economic situation there.

    11 Let me remind you that the Serbs in Slavonia, Baranja,

    12 Croatia and Dalmatia were never serfs and they were a

    13 free enterprising people and they were always ready to

    14 undertake risks and that they were great entrepreneurs

    15 in the initial days of capitalism.

    16 In the 19th century, as I say, they were very

    17 good entrepreneurs, enterprising people both

    18 individually and collectively, and it is thanks to

    19 their entrepreneurial spirit they became rich.

    20 One of the largest banks in Croatia was the

    21 Serbian bank at the time. The Serbian "Compos"

    22 newspaper shows there were Serbian monetary funds and

    23 institutions on the territory of what was the

    24 Austro-Hungarian empire.

    25 Not only individually were they rich but they



  40. 1 showed affiliation towards collective organisation.

    2 For example, there were many businessmen and

    3 entrepreneurs were trained systematically and there was

    4 a very important man at the time, Vladimir Matejevic,

    5 who was one of the individuals who systematically

    6 organised foundations and legacies and training for

    7 entrepreneurs.

    8 One of the reasons for this irrational hatred

    9 of the Serbs was this spirit of entrepreneurship and

    10 their riches and their shops were destroyed in Zagreb.

    11 This can be compared to the pogroms against the Jews,

    12 so Serbs were very successful businessmen and talented

    13 and therefore fairly well-off. The attacks on Serbian

    14 property in the first war and Second World War was

    15 evident and destroyed much of the properties they had.

    16 The situation after the war was such that, through a

    17 regional policy, systematic -- organised colonisation

    18 was resorted to and people left for economic reasons --

    19 came to urban environments and economic prerequisites

    20 for assimilation were set up in which they lost their

    21 national identity, and there was less possibility for

    22 Serbs, as opposed to the Austro-Hungarian empire where

    23 there was the fair play and the rule of law. They lost

    24 their economic status, the status that they had

    25 previously, so by isolating them communicationwise from



  41. 1 other areas where Serbs lived and worked, gave rise to

    2 the economic prerequisites for separating them

    3 economically and nationally.

    4 The classical thesis that was supported

    5 before the war and is still supported is that we cannot

    6 with the form of autonomy for Serbs become organised

    7 because that is the HSS thesis -- as everything is

    8 repeated today, and history repeats itself so it is an

    9 association of the poor people.

    10 But if we look at natural resources and the

    11 human potential and everything else, then we can

    12 conclude that there is a very healthy, good foundation,

    13 economic foundation for all kinds of independent

    14 decision-making and taking one's fate in one's own

    15 hands. However, the situation of late is to undermine

    16 the economic background of the collective of Serbs in

    17 Croatia -- Serbs are being laid off and only those who

    18 are of a proper ethnic background are being employed --

    19 Serbian personnel in charge of certain companies are

    20 being attacked, so this overall discrimination and the

    21 bringing into jeopardy of basic human rights is being

    22 conducted.

    23 These are not just situations on the verge of

    24 the incident -- this is State terrorism and Serbs are

    25 being deprived of their economic basis for their



  42. 1 existence.

    2 Attempts to make something about that -- some

    3 kind of unofficial organisation, association of people

    4 -- for instance, in Dalj people tried to organise

    5 themselves in economic terms, encountered such fierce

    6 resistance and in all the media there were such fierce

    7 attacks against those people who just tried to fight

    8 for their own economic existence.

    9 The situation is so horrible -- the

    10 accusations are so horrible, so instead of enabling

    11 everybody, regardless of their religious or ethnic

    12 backgrounds, to live in economic terms, they attack the

    13 very existence, at the roots of the very existence. In

    14 Europe, virtually in the 21st century, we have this

    15 Nazification, the revival of fascism, because Croatia

    16 never went through the process of de-Nazification such

    17 as happened in Germany and it never accepted its status

    18 as a defeated power.

    19 It is incredible that we are seeing now this

    20 darkness again -- it is a systematic effort, striking

    21 at the very roots of the Serbian national identity. We

    22 promised that our viewers will also take part in our

    23 programme, we have somebody on the line."

    24 THE INTERPRETER: The interpreters apologise,

    25 this is really inaudible.



  43. 1 "Speaker: You are on the air.

    2 Caller: I wanted to ask a question of the

    3 gentleman from Knin. Since in this situation today we

    4 are discussing the future of Yugoslavia, I want to know

    5 why, today, representatives of the Knin Krajina and the

    6 Bosnian Krajina in the beginning said that they would

    7 have a united front regardless of the fact of whether

    8 Yugoslavia would be a federation or a confederation.

    9 At any rate, whatever the agreement is, it would always

    10 be to the detriment of Serbs in Croatia. Although in

    11 Bosnia and Herzegovina today Serbs are in a better

    12 situation than in Croatia, but I feel that if they had

    13 a united front in the negotiations today, if a Krajina

    14 was to be formed, an autonomous republic, I do not

    15 know, I think that they would have a much better

    16 negotiating position, and they would be able to base

    17 their future life on a much stronger foundation, so

    18 that is what I would like to know, whether the

    19 representatives of the Bosnian and Croatian Krajina

    20 would reach a deal so that is the former military

    21 Krajina -- that there should be a unified Serbian

    22 Krajina in Yugoslavia which should be an entity there,

    23 so I want to know why they have failed to reach an

    24 agreement and why the representative from Bosnia are

    25 silent now, when in Knin and in the other areas there



  44. 1 are fierce discussions about the survival of Serbs and

    2 so on?

    3 Speaker: Obviously this is a question for

    4 Goran Hadzic, who is the President of the municipal

    5 committee of the Serbian Democratic Party for Vukovar

    6 and he is also a member of the Serbian Democratic

    7 Party, the main committee from Knin. Can you give us

    8 an answer to that?

    9 Mr. Hadzic: I will try to answer. I would

    10 like to thank the friendly advice. I do not know

    11 whether the viewer is aware of the fact that the

    12 province of Krajina has been proclaimed and we

    13 recognised it -- multi-Party elections in Bosnia were

    14 conducted and most of the Serbian people voted for SDS,

    15 which means that the Serbs are political people in

    16 Bosnia -- and recognised as such, as opposed to

    17 Croatia, and that was the reason why Krajina was

    18 formed.

    19 Our positions are clear. Serbian people will

    20 live in one State and that is Yugoslavia. For as long

    21 as this Yugoslavia exists, it is not necessary. In

    22 fact, Krajina was formed because Croatia erased the

    23 Serbian people from the constitution.

    24 Speaker: Mr. Koncarevic, you wanted to say

    25 something about that?



  45. 1 Mr. Koncarevic: You have to know that the

    2 Serbian people in Krajina, in Bosnia, is now in the

    3 Parliament, in the Government, it is a constituent

    4 people there, political people, and there is no reason

    5 to change anything there. As for this part of the

    6 nation which is in Croatia, they will have to

    7 articulate themselves through their political claims,

    8 through the Serbian National Council. A democratic

    9 politician said at one stage that everybody is for

    10 Yugoslavia if there is no other solution. It is

    11 possible that we may face this problem, too, and that

    12 one day we will face the question, what if Yugoslavia

    13 cannot survive?

    14 The Serbian people will probably have to take

    15 a very firm stand and to start the unification into a

    16 single Serbian State and for about six months I have

    17 been calling this State the Serbian land in the

    18 singular -- not the Serbian lands, because if we were

    19 to use the term "Serbian lands", that would make it

    20 possible for any of those areas or territories who were

    21 to join this State, to secede at one point once the

    22 passions have calmed down -- they would be able to say,

    23 "I am just one of the territories belonging to those

    24 lands", so from the very beginning we should clearly

    25 define the Serbian -- the borders of the Serbian State.



  46. 1 At that point we will probably have to face

    2 the problem of how to achieve that. Everybody thinks

    3 there has to be a war. It does not have to be a war.

    4 We have had a war and Serbian people have paid the

    5 price. The people in power in Croatia today refer to

    6 the thousand years dreams and aspirations, they claim

    7 they are inheritors of the independent State of Croatia

    8 and we have to let them know quite clearly that the

    9 independent State of Croatia is the defeated side.

    10 They have lost the war, they have to sign the

    11 capitulation, they have to sign the armistice and the

    12 conditions of the armistice are dictated by the winning

    13 power and in this case the winning power, the victors

    14 are the Serbian people and the Serbian State.

    15 Speaker: Mr. Matic, whenever we start talking

    16 about Serbs living in a single State, the reactions in

    17 Croatia amount to -- they always say that Shiptars

    18 should also live in Albania. It is clear they do not

    19 admit there is a difference between ethnic minorities

    20 and nations. It is obvious that according to that

    21 theory Serbs are a national minority in Croatia?

    22 Mr. Matic: Well, according to the latest

    23 constitution they adopted, Serbs are treated by them as

    24 a national minority. However, Serbs are a political

    25 people -- a political nation in that area. They have



  47. 1 their territories -- of course, in the context of the

    2 State of the Yugoslav peoples you cannot talk about the

    3 Shiptar people. They cannot have the same rights as

    4 the Yugoslav peoples and we all know that Serbs are a

    5 Yugoslav people regardless of the areas where they

    6 lived in this country of ours, because we treat it as

    7 our country. But opinions differ and of course if any

    8 borders are to be drawn, especially between Serbs and

    9 Croats, because these are the areas that are most in

    10 dispute, if there should be a confederation or a

    11 break-up of Yugoslavia -- and Croatia has been really

    12 working on this -- we should not despair, because

    13 historical documents, if we use historical documents,

    14 the principle of history is on our side, international

    15 law is on the side of the State-forming people and that

    16 is the Serbian people in this case, and of course any

    17 ethnic interpretations that they can come up with when

    18 they put together apples and oranges in their media,

    19 that will not be of assistance to them, because the

    20 data from the census clearly speak -- of course, the

    21 census that we can rely on -- also indicate the ethnic

    22 principle will be on the side of the Serbian people.

    23 Speaker: Quite obviously there is a lot of

    24 interest from our viewers for this programme. We have

    25 someone on the line, good evening?



  48. 1 Caller: I should like to congratulate the

    2 National Council for having given us their names,

    3 disclosed their names for the first time and I should

    4 like to ask a question related to borders, but before

    5 I go on to ask my question concerning the borders,

    6 I should like to ask comrade Dokmanovic to answer who

    7 organised the care of the Baranja children when they

    8 were sent to the Sombor municipality, that is to say,

    9 to the village of Prigravica, because there was a voice

    10 on Belgrade 202 television programme, radio programme.

    11 I should also like to talk about the borders

    12 of good old Serbia and I hope she will live on. I am

    13 -- there is a ransom on my head as well, I feel. We

    14 know the old borders of Serbia, Sombor towards Karlovac

    15 and Virovitica, and that is the most difficult

    16 situation today. Baranja never belonged to Croatia and

    17 I do not know what right in 1946 gave people the right

    18 to appropriate it. I consider Josip Broz to blame for

    19 this, but I also feel that the Serbian traitors or

    20 those who helped them were to blame.

    21 I now have a concrete question anybody can

    22 answer, and that is whether the borders of old Serbia

    23 -- are they possible in the present day and I should

    24 like to ask all of you individually a collective

    25 question: when we come to vote for Yugoslavia, or for



  49. 1 another option, will you come out in favour of a united

    2 Serbia, or for Yugoslavia.

    3 I am in favour of a united Serbia and long

    4 live Serbia. May I have your answers please.

    5 Speaker: Mr. Matic, I feel that this is

    6 taking part in our discussion here, but can you answer

    7 the question -- can you answer our viewer? The

    8 gentleman, who did not give us his name for

    9 understandable reasons, brought up the question of the

    10 Baranja children and I will try to answer him as far as

    11 I am able, because I am not connected to any Party,

    12 I am outside parties fighting for the Serbian people,

    13 to the best of my ability, but this drive was organised

    14 by all the parties from Baranja in which the Serbian

    15 people are included, and for well-known reasons, if an

    16 explosive situation takes place which can lead to a

    17 civil war and which could have done so, at that

    18 particular time, to see that the children were safe, so

    19 this was an agreement and cooperation that existed

    20 between people in Backa and people in Baranja.

    21 As far as the second question is concerned

    22 about the borders, these are all ideas that we have in

    23 mind, and perhaps it is one of our tragedies that we

    24 did not think earlier in the way that we are thinking

    25 now, that our level of national awareness is now at its



  50. 1 peak and it is possible and not possible to think about

    2 borders at the same time -- of the Serbia that we have

    3 -- greater or not. It is a fact that Baranja never

    4 belonged to Croatia, and neither did it belong to the

    5 independent Croatia that the leaders refer to. It was

    6 Hungary and finally Baranja was a component part of the

    7 Serb State.

    8 I have here the coat of arms -- for those who

    9 do not know this, that the Serb Vojvodina existed and

    10 what it united. Baranja, like Western Srem has its

    11 historical identity within the province of Vojvodina.

    12 On the right-hand side, you can -- the photograph is

    13 very bad but you can see the pictorial representation

    14 of Srem -- it is the deer symbolising Srem, on the

    15 opposite side is the lion symbolising Banat and on the

    16 right-hand side is a maiden representing Backa and the

    17 lamb on the other side symbolising Baranja. There we

    18 have the coat of arms of Serbian Vojvodina and it is

    19 very relative to ask how long it lasted, but it did

    20 exist, and it has its historical identity.

    21 Speaker: Mr. Dokmanovic, part of the question

    22 was addressed to you?

    23 Mr. Dokmanovic: This question -- the answer

    24 was supplied to the question by Mr. Matic about the

    25 children from Beli Manastir. I am President of the



  51. 1 Municipal Assembly of Vukovar. I do not know the

    2 situation there and if the information satisfies our

    3 viewer, I am very happy. I am not in favour of those

    4 who write off Yugoslavia so easily. I think that there

    5 is a lot of chance of putting things right, after

    6 clarifications have been made, and that a State could

    7 be set up of equal nations and nationalities as far as

    8 is possible, but I am not in favour of having somebody

    9 forced to stay in Yugoslavia -- everybody has the right

    10 to create a State as corresponds to his needs so nobody

    11 must be prevented from doing so, because any prevention

    12 will lead to problems, and conflict if you will.

    13 At all events, all nations in Yugoslavia

    14 should be allowed to create a State of their own as

    15 they see fit, as would correspond to their needs and in

    16 which they will be happy.

    17 We mentioned the National Council here -- we

    18 are not all members of the National Council in Sidski

    19 Banovci, which does not mean that we are not working

    20 for the interests of the Serbian people, and not only

    21 the Serb people -- we are in favour of having every

    22 nation who is jeopardised fought for -- that their

    23 rights become the rights -- equal to the rights of

    24 other nations.

    25 Question: Does the Serbian people have any



  52. 1 reason to prevent Croats from having a State of their

    2 own?

    3 Mr. Ocic: No people can prevent or deny the

    4 legitimate right of every people to their own State.

    5 This goes for the Serbian people as well. No other

    6 people has the right to prevent the Serbs from creating

    7 their own State and of developing their economic

    8 resources. A large part of the Serbian people devoted

    9 their energies and were sacrificed to recreate other

    10 people's States. Whether we want to admit that or not

    11 the Serbian people created the first and second

    12 Yugoslavias. The Serbian people has morally more right

    13 -- maybe not politically more right -- to decide on

    14 the fate or break-up of Yugoslavia. If Yugoslavia was

    15 just a station they passed through en route to their

    16 own State which they were unable to create without the

    17 assistance of Serbs in 1918 and 1945, Serbs should not

    18 pay the price of creating other people's States, and

    19 the illusions today, we have paid the price."

    20 MR. FILA: I apologise, your Honour, in the

    21 transcript, it is not clear that this gentleman is

    22 answering this question. It appears that Mr. Dokmanovic

    23 is the one providing the answer. The name has not been

    24 changed -- the name of this gentleman is Ocic --

    25 I think it is clear to distinguish, because the purpose



  53. 1 of this tape is to show what Mr. Dokmanovic had said,

    2 because he is the one being tried here.

    3 THE INTERPRETER:

    4 "So they have paid the price to keep the

    5 States of other peoples alive and the illusions have

    6 been paid dearly today, and we should not be slaves to

    7 those illusions. Everybody should be allowed to create

    8 the State that they want, and the Serbian people has

    9 that right. It cannot be denied to it. So I am in

    10 favour of a civilised parting of ways, and nobody can

    11 love each other by force.

    12 The only thing we should pay attention to is

    13 to minimise the costs, especially in terms of human

    14 life, and the threats coming from the other side, what

    15 Sime Djodan said, that one million Croats would die in

    16 order to exterminate the one million Serbs who live in

    17 Croatia, if that should come true. I think that no

    18 Serbs -- no Croats should die in order to create those

    19 States in the Serbian ethnic territory, and when they

    20 issue such genocidal threats to Serbian people, they

    21 forget that it is not only 1 million Serbs who live in

    22 Croatia, Serbs live elsewhere. If we were to take that

    23 to its logical limit, it would cause a spilling of

    24 blood -- that would not have any good consequences for

    25 anyone, so I am in favour of a Serbian State that would



  54. 1 make it possible for everybody to live normally.

    2 People in Lika and Kordun, they have mental illness,

    3 because they have not the basic pre-conditions for

    4 their existence there.

    5 Question: Mr. Hadzic, do you believe that

    6 civilised parting ways that Mr. Ocic was telling us

    7 about was possible?

    8 Mr. Hadzic: I am an optimist by nature and

    9 I thought it would be possible, as they said, to create

    10 a peaceful co-existence, but after the recent events

    11 I categorically state that any co-existence is

    12 impossible, it does not exist any more here and that

    13 the level of the presidency, they should have -- they

    14 should discuss some kind of peaceful parting of ways.

    15 I am not in favour of the break-up of

    16 Yugoslavia but, as Mr. Ocic said, can you imagine how

    17 the people in Croatia live after the events that we

    18 have seen on TV -- people just left their homes, and

    19 guarded their homes at night -- the police arrived --

    20 those people did not have any weapons -- the police

    21 officer arrived, he is a Serb although he does not feel

    22 that he is a Serb, he made lists of all those people

    23 who stood there peacefully. It was all very cold, the

    24 night was very cold, but you can imagine how we lived

    25 there.



  55. 1 So yesterday, at the meeting of the municipal

    2 committee, we decided to organise a meeting in the

    3 centre of Vukovar -- a meeting, a rally, which would be

    4 in support of the decisions of the presidency, and also

    5 to protest the failure to comply with those decisions

    6 of the presidency, because civilians are being armed

    7 and they are not returning their weapons. If they

    8 return their weapons, then they can get those weapons

    9 back in no time.

    10 Question: Now we will hear another viewer

    11 -- this is the third channel of the Novi Sad TV. You

    12 are on the air.

    13 Caller: I have been very upset with the TV

    14 programme I saw and some nights ago we saw the tapes

    15 that were filmed by the army about what was being

    16 prepared in Croatia and in Yugoslavia in general. From

    17 1918 on Serbs have suffered the most, and then in 1948

    18 there was this genocide against Serbs and gypsies and

    19 Jews. Has this been a lesson enough, that we should

    20 wait and have those things happen to us and that nobody

    21 reacts except for some individuals being called in for

    22 interrogation and the weapons, they are still in the

    23 houses of HDZ members and police stations -- only it is

    24 under some kind of supervision, so can we expect that

    25 we will have a peaceful night tonight and during the



  56. 1 following nights, whether our wives and children are

    2 safe or maybe we should think that the civil war is

    3 about to break out any day now -- this army of ours,

    4 can it control such incidents and if they control those

    5 events, and if it issues an ultimatum for the weapons

    6 to be returned, and then the leadership who caused all

    7 this, can they be arrested and tried publicly instead

    8 of having all this hushed up? The Croatian Democratic

    9 Union never distanced itself. We are still in fear --

    10 all of us who live here, and I am calling from Novi

    11 Sad, all of us who live in this area, we saw that map

    12 and we saw half of Vojvodina and Novi Sad was also

    13 included in the map, do we have to fear the civil war

    14 which is about to break out soon or does JNA have some

    15 kind of power in Yugoslavia where we want to live, or

    16 are we to be expecting the civil war to break out?

    17 Question: Mr. Petrovic, the Serbian National

    18 Council?

    19 Mr. Petrovic: First of all, let me just make

    20 an explanation -- whether the army has any power in the

    21 country. It is not very good to say that the army has

    22 some kind of power -- army has its task, its job, just

    23 like everybody else -- every other profession. If

    24 something were to happen as our viewer says, like the

    25 civil war, I would say that that would not be a civil



  57. 1 war -- it would be a war of two polarised peoples --

    2 Serbs --

    3 Question: Well, let us not assume now, and

    4 create hypothetical situations?

    5 Answer: The Serbian people believe the JNA

    6 will protect it. The Serbian National Council gave its

    7 support in a proclamation a couple of days ago to the

    8 presidency and we hope that things will go back to

    9 normal. How the situation will evolve, of course -- it

    10 is a hypothetical situation. We are trying for the

    11 Serbian people to gather them together, we have called

    12 on them to exercise caution, and to keep their cool.

    13 It may seem easy to say so, but it is not easy. We all

    14 have our personal impulses, which may be in

    15 contradiction of that statement, but we believe that we

    16 will have a peaceful solution.

    17 I will now go back to 1943 and something that

    18 Mr. Franklin Roosevelt said at our Anglo-American

    19 convention having learned what was happening in the

    20 independent state of Croatia and the pogroms against

    21 the Serbian people at this time. He proposed the

    22 Croatian people should be placed under tutelage. A

    23 people that is unable to act rationally -- a people

    24 that acts irrationally -- that should be a minimum, for

    25 a people to be placed under tutelage. The American



  58. 1 politicians said that at the time -- President Tudjman

    2 is probably aware of that and it is possible that he

    3 would just continue with his story that he is prepared

    4 to give up Spegelj and Bolkovac and all his leaders, so

    5 that in the end he can claim to be a Democrat, so that

    6 he retains his power, but I think that there should not

    7 be a war.

    8 Question: Mr. Matic, do you trust the

    9 Yugoslav People's Army, that it is capable of

    10 protecting Serbs in Slavonia, and Baranja and Knin and

    11 other parts of the country?

    12 Mr. Matic: Well, I profoundly believe that is

    13 possible from the aspects of the present day, but it is

    14 essential to know the situation on location. It is

    15 tense and dynamic there, and it has reached boiling

    16 point and I think that, unless these measures are

    17 consistently implemented, there will be an explosive

    18 incident, because there does not seem to be any

    19 authority which can retain and keep the people under

    20 control.

    21 Question: Mr. Ocic, I would like to hear you

    22 on that subject -- the Serbs have so many times been

    23 tricked throughout history that they have reason to

    24 doubt. How do you assess the confidence of the Serbian

    25 people in the Yugoslav People's Army?



  59. 1 Mr. Ocic: Nothing else remains for the Serbs

    2 -- they must, and in view of their fighting traditions

    3 and everything else, they believe and wish to believe

    4 in the army and the army is their force, but it is not

    5 the army that is the problem. It is the presidency

    6 there to command the army and to bring decisions as to

    7 the final denouement, disentanglement of the situation,

    8 so it is the responsibility of the presidency and the

    9 presidency must act responsibly and quickly, otherwise

    10 the situation might escape our control and it will be

    11 difficult to bring life back to normal, so confidence

    12 in the army exists with the people, but the presidency

    13 must play its role.

    14 The vice-president of this presidency says

    15 one thing and another thing; this testifies to his role

    16 and responsibility -- he is playing his role very well

    17 and in fact he is realising his goal of great division

    18 of goals that other people are acting very successfully

    19 Spegelj and Boljkovac, Bobetko and Rukavina will

    20 probably come and I think that this type of Bolshevik

    21 thinking on the problem with regard to cadre cleansing

    22 does not solve the problem at all. The problem is more

    23 acute, and it is a question of the destiny and fate of

    24 the people. It is the problem of the State of the

    25 Yugoslavia, other new States. Therefore, with this



  60. 1 sort of whitewashing operation or any other drive to

    2 mask the essence of the problem, it is no good. We

    3 must all confront the cruelty of reality and all the

    4 complexities of the real situation. We are -- and of

    5 the historical moment.

    6 Any cadre whitewashing or cleansing is a

    7 solution, only a superficial solution to the problem.

    8 In today's situation everybody has his role. All the

    9 Croatian politicians, whether they are in the

    10 presidency of Yugoslavia or in the Federal Executive

    11 Council or Government, or whether they have functions

    12 within Croatia -- this is a very good distribution of

    13 roles, they are highly, well synchronised and very

    14 effective and efficient.

    15 Question: Mr. Matic, I have one more

    16 question for you. Tudjman went to Austria recently, he

    17 asked that Austria recognise Croatia. The President of

    18 Austria, Waldheim, is not received by anyone in the

    19 world now -- does that testify to the international

    20 position in any way of the new Croatian State?

    21 Mr. Matic: Well, probably Tudjman is trying

    22 to play a hand which was uncovered in Slovenia today to

    23 contact with the remains of the Habsburgs. Perhaps

    24 they wish to save their State and to create a State

    25 which will be recognised by a sort of abridged version



  61. 1 of an Austro-Hungarian monarchy and that this is being

    2 masked under a combination of an Alpe-Adria

    3 organisation, but these are all suppositions and his

    4 travels through Europe and his writings are attempts to

    5 win over a vote for his independent State, because we

    6 must realise, understand, that, for deep historical

    7 complexes they do not know what they are about. It is

    8 a nation that has got a lot of complexes, and therefore

    9 belongs to the smallest of historical peoples.

    10 They live upon the concept of war,

    11 Catholicism against Orthodoxy -- this must not be

    12 forgotten. What is being done now by Otto Habsburg in

    13 the Parliament today might one day become the head of a

    14 revived Austro-Hungary, to call it that, and everything

    15 comes within the framework of an age-old plan to bring

    16 the inheritors of the monarchy, the Habsburg dynasty

    17 and the Carthesian war.

    18 Question: And in that context, Mr. Ocic, how

    19 do you view the smuggling of arms from Hungary?

    20 Mr. Ocic: Well, you see, everything that is

    21 unloyal should be brought before the law. If there are

    22 no elementary prerequisites for the economic life of

    23 people, if people have no ambition to undermine the

    24 country, then they will stop from living a normal life,

    25 whereas on the same count, smugglers are left to run



  62. 1 amok, and this discrepancy and these smugglers, this

    2 smuggling testifies to the nature of Government and the

    3 conception of the rule of law in the State -- something

    4 that is proclaimed as a democracy but which is in fact

    5 a privatisation and pilfering towards the State

    6 itself.

    7 I do not know how you can have a State for

    8 example where there are only Croats, where this could

    9 be tolerated. It is something that is absolutely

    10 abnormal in any State.

    11 Question: And to draw our programme to a

    12 close for this evening, let us ask Mr. Koncarevic, the

    13 Secretary-General of the Serbian National Council for

    14 Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srem, how he views the

    15 situation -- what solution he sees to Serbs living in

    16 Croatia?

    17 Mr. Koncarevic: Well, this evening, we have

    18 talked about the Serbian National Council. Today we

    19 have adopted the view and we shall be presenting the

    20 presidency with that view as to how to solve the

    21 problem. In Croatia, there is a disputed and

    22 undisputed territory -- undisputed territory is where

    23 the Croats had their ethnic majority before the

    24 beginning of the First World War. The disputed

    25 territory is that territory in the region of Krajina



  63. 1 and Western Srem, Baranja, Slavonia and Moslavina.

    2 We proposed to the President of Yugoslavia

    3 that it suspend the competencies of the Croatian SABOR

    4 and leadership in all the territories where the Serbian

    5 people are living, because their elementary human

    6 rights are being jeopardised of the Serbian people and

    7 the basic right of man is the right to life and it is

    8 that right that is being jeopardised. Furthermore --

    9 Speaker: Unfortunately, our time has run

    10 out, our programme is at the very end. These were

    11 members of the Serbian National Council for Slavonia,

    12 Baranja and Western Srem. They are prominent Serbs

    13 from the region, and they presented their views on the

    14 topical situation in Croatia. Thank you for your

    15 attention, for viewing us, and good night."

    16 MR. FILA: I apologise for you having to see

    17 things you did not have to see, but in the supporting

    18 material of the Prosecutor, the words said by Ilija

    19 Petrovic -- I do not know whether the President of

    20 America said those things or not -- that is not up to

    21 me to decide, but in the supporting material presented

    22 by the Prosecutor, these words were attributed to

    23 Slavko Dokmanovic and that is why it was important for

    24 you to see this as well as his statement as to whether

    25 he was or was not a member of the Serbian National



  64. 1 Council. I tender this tape to be admitted into

    2 evidence as a Defence exhibit.

    3 MR. NIEMANN: Yes, your Honour, I do not

    4 know what Mr. Fila is talking about and what we have

    5 attributed to Mr. Dokmanovic and what we have not. We

    6 have no objection to the tendering of the tape.

    7 THE REGISTRAR: The tape is marked D67.

    8 MR. FILA: Maybe Mr. Niemann did not

    9 understand what I was saying. In a bag which

    10 I received at the very beginning of the trial as

    11 supporting material, there was an article from the

    12 Croatian press where those things were stated -- the

    13 ones that I just explained here. The reports were

    14 incorrect.

    15 I will have no more tapes for you. The only

    16 thing that remains is this last issue -- the BBC tape

    17 -- it is three hours long. I still think that we

    18 should see it, but only if the Prosecutor agrees --

    19 I would then be tendering that as evidence, as some

    20 kind of a joint defence -- joint exhibit, if the

    21 Prosecutor objects, then I will not be seeking to

    22 tender it into evidence.

    23 MR. NIEMANN: Your Honours, if Mr. Fila

    24 wishes to tender the tape, he may do so, but we are not

    25 doing it by way of a joint exercise. We do not have



  65. 1 any particular objection to the BBC programme, except

    2 that it is a programme which has been made and edited

    3 by producers in the BBC to present a particular point

    4 of view. I am not suggesting it is wrong or there is

    5 anything incorrect in that, but I cannot see how the

    6 court can be much assisted by it. It is entertaining

    7 and extremely interesting and basically is rather much

    8 in line with the Prosecution view anyway, but I think

    9 your Honours are better assisted by hearing evidence

    10 from witnesses who can testify to these events, rather

    11 than see something that has been produced by the BBC.

    12 JUDGE CASSESE: We agree with the

    13 Prosecutor. I think probably there is no point in

    14 viewing this BBC programme. We do not want to be

    15 influenced, it has been edited by people. And also

    16 because we need time to hear the evidence to be

    17 produced by the Defence counsel -- the witnesses you

    18 are going to call in May. We may run out of time.

    19 Therefore, for the sake also of saving time, let us do

    20 without this tape.

    21 MR. FILA: Your Honour, I withdraw my

    22 proposal. When the Prosecutor tendered those two

    23 photographs I said immediately that it may or may not

    24 be interesting to you -- since you do not deem it to be

    25 interesting, I withdraw my proposal and that would



  66. 1 conclude the proposals of the Defence.

    2 MR. NIEMANN: There is one matter

    3 that I thought I might raise at this stage, if

    4 I could. It relates to our next session in either the

    5 next session or the session in May. What we would like

    6 to do is, rather than simply wait until the June

    7 sittings to present the case in rebuttal, if Mr. Fila

    8 reaches the end of his case earlier than he expects --

    9 it may or may not happen -- there is some rebuttal

    10 evidence that we could present in that time, so I would

    11 just like at this early stage to indicate that, should

    12 Mr. Fila run short of witnesses, that we would be happy

    13 to step in at that stage and could step in at that

    14 stage and fill the time.

    15 JUDGE CASSESE: Mr. Fila?

    16 MR. FILA: Your Honours, I said right at the

    17 very beginning that I, as the lead counsel, allow that

    18 whatever the Prosecutor deems to be necessary to tender

    19 into evidence, they can do so and I will not raise any

    20 objections, if it is true that we are here to determine

    21 the truth, and I think it is. So I raise no objections

    22 now and I will raise no objections in the future. The

    23 only thing is that I would like to be told in advance

    24 what the evidence is. As I said yesterday, I have the

    25 right to a rejoinder, since from the times of the



  67. 1 ancient Rome, the Defence has the right to speak the

    2 last -- to be heard the last, but not twice, as it was

    3 in your Senate, your Honour -- of course in the times

    4 of Julius Caesar.

    5 JUDGE CASSESE: The point however raised by

    6 Mr. Niemann was whether you would accept that the

    7 rebuttal evidence be heard in May without waiting until

    8 June and I see that you do agree -- if you complete

    9 your case, of course --

    10 MR. FILA: Yes.

    11 JUDGE CASSESE: I think Mr. Fila has a good

    12 point, namely, that he would like to take a look at the

    13 witness statements and I think of the rebuttal

    14 witnesses.

    15 MR. NIEMANN: By all means we will notify

    16 Mr. Fila of the evidence we anticipate to call.

    17 I should make sure I stated the matter precisely,

    18 though, from our point of view. We would not be

    19 expected to present all of it, it is just we have some

    20 available now that we can present. Until we have heard

    21 the full Defence case we are not in a position to say

    22 the totality of it.

    23 Just because Judge May raised it on the last

    24 occasion, we are not expecting anything terribly

    25 extensive in rebuttal evidence. If it happens we have



  68. 1 some time in May, that will significantly reduce any

    2 amount of time we need in June -- that is the only

    3 point we make.

    4 JUDGE CASSESE: Thank you.

    5 MR. FILA: Your Honours, I am sorry, my only

    6 concern is that this should prejudice the Defence --

    7 that the Prosecution would present its rebuttal case

    8 and, as you know, I live in Belgrade and I have my

    9 evidence stored there and not here. I need some time

    10 to learn what the Prosecution is about to present so

    11 I can make my own decisions so I am not caught by

    12 surprised, to put it very simply, and that is all.

    13 I think it is only fair.

    14 JUDGE CASSESE: Yes, of course. I hope that

    15 we all agree that our main goal should be to finish

    16 this trial by 18 June, at the latest -- I think this is

    17 important. If you need time for your rejoinder, of

    18 course we will go on to July -- we will continue in

    19 July. We would then have only one week probably

    20 available in July, but if it is possible without in any

    21 case restricting the rights of Defence to finish in

    22 June, I think this would be in the best interests of

    23 the accused as well.

    24 MR. FILA: I will be concluding my case in

    25 June -- I just wanted to see what the Prosecution will



  69. 1 present in May so that I can say what I want to say in

    2 June. I do not need July at all. Thank you very much,

    3 but I do not need it.

    4 JUDGE CASSESE: It is agreed. I hope that

    5 we will also take up a suggestion made by Mr. Fila about

    6 the closing statements -- I wonder whether the

    7 Prosecutor is prepared also, in the way of the positive

    8 suggestion by Mr. Fila -- Mr. Fila suggested, if

    9 possible, closing statements should be handed in, in

    10 writing, and then of course you will make an oral

    11 statement which could be much shorter than the written

    12 one. Let us see whether it is possible for the

    13 Prosecutor as well to do so, with a view to shortening

    14 the length of the trial. We adjourn now and resume our

    15 hearings on 18 May.

    16 (At 12.10 p.m. the matter adjourned until 18 May 1998)

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