1 Thursday, 16th September, 1999
2 [Open session]
3 --- Upon commencing at 10.30 a.m.
4 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Please be
5 seated. We will have the accused brought in, please.
6 All right. Shall we have the witness brought
7 in? We're a little late this morning.
8 [The accused entered court]
9 [The witness entered court]
10 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] We shall try to
11 hurry up. I should like to say good morning to
12 Mr. Ramic.
13 THE WITNESS: Good morning.
14 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] All right. You
15 are here. Yes, well, let us try now to make up for the
16 time we lost.
17 Mr. Greaves, do you think you can help us
18 with that? I should like to say good morning to the
19 interpreters and everybody else, to the counsel for the
20 Prosecution, the Defence, and the accused, and we shall
21 begin.
22 Mr. Greaves, the floor is yours.
23 MR. GREAVES: Thank you very much, Your
24 Honour.
25 WITNESS: MUSTAFA RAMIC [Resumed]
1
1 [Witness answers through interpreter]
2 Cross-examined by Mr. Greaves:
3 Q. Mr. Ramic, we were talking yesterday, and I
4 would like you to have again the list that you prepared
5 in front of you, please.
6 MR. GREAVES: Thank you very much,
7 Mr. Usher.
8 Q. Mr. Ramic, can I ask you to look, please, at
9 Number 13, Suljevic Hamdija. Again, in relation to
10 him, can you say from whom it was that you heard that
11 he had been killed?
12 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Excuse me, what
13 list? I'm not really -- oh, yes, it was the list
14 which was submitted to us by the Prosecution. It is
15 the original list, the Exhibit Number 13, isn't it?
16 THE REGISTRAR: I gave to the witness,
17 Mr. President, Exhibit 59, Annex H.
18 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Very well.
19 Thank you very much.
20 MR. GREAVES:
21 Q. Number 13, Suljevic Hamdija. Can you tell
22 us, please, Mr. Ramic, from whom it was that you heard
23 he had been killed?
24 A. Let me say straightaway that Hamdija Suljevic
25 was a personal friend of mine. I knew him very well.
1
1 He was an elderly man, and he lived in a part of town
2 called Gluhakovac. I heard that he had been killed
3 from several persons, among others from his son, who
4 today lives in the territory of Brcko that is under our
5 control. There were witnesses who saw his dead body,
6 that is.
7 Q. And were you given information as to when he
8 was killed?
9 A. Yes. That was on the 3rd or 4th of May.
10 Q. And any information as to who it was who
11 killed him, whether by individual name or whether a
12 group of people can be identified as his killers?
13 A. The name? The name of the murderer I do not
14 know, but I heard that he had been killed by a group of
15 people who came from the direction of Bijeljina. And I
16 heard that he was killed in a very harsh manner; that
17 is to say that his throat had been slit.
18 Q. Number 15, please. We've discussed Number
19 14. Number 15, Muhamed Jakubovic.
20 A. Yes. He was my personal friend too. He was
21 an engineer who lived in Kolobara, and he worked in the
22 Tesla factory in Brcko. So he was a man who was my age
23 and who I was friends with from the days of our youth.
24 And he was killed in Kolobara itself, on the same day
25 when many other people from this settlement were
1
1 killed. This was an entire series of people, and I
2 heard that this man was killed by a man named Kosta
3 Kostic, from Modrane, near Bijeljina.
4 Q. Thank you. Next page, please, Mr. Ramic,
5 Number 18, Midhat Uzejrovic; I hope that's the correct
6 pronunciation.
7 A. Yes, Midhat Uzejrovic was also a personal
8 friend of mine. He was one of the assistant directors
9 of a factory called Bosna Plod. He was an economist,
10 and he lived in the settlement of Kolobara too, near
11 the health centre. I heard that he had also been
12 killed by a group of persons who came from Bijeljina --
13 I don't know the names -- and he was killed on the 3rd
14 or 4th of May.
15 Q. Thank you. The next few names we've had
16 quite a lot of evidence about, so I won't go over
17 those. Can I now take you, please, to Number 27,
18 Muhamed Zelenjakovic, otherwise known as Lola. Again,
19 if you can just give us -- without my going through the
20 questions; you've got the format, Mr. Ramic. Can you
21 tell us about him?
22 A. Muhamed Zelenjakovic was also a man I knew
23 very well. He also lived in the part of Brcko called
24 Kolobara. He was a man who worked in the hospital --
25 in the health centre, rather -- as a kind of janitor.
1
1 I've known him from the days of our youth. He was
2 almost 60 years old. And I heard that he had been
3 killed, together with his son, also by people who were
4 led by the name of the accused. The name of the
5 accused is involved in this matter. Again, this is the
6 beginning of May.
7 Q. Meho Sejdic, Number 28, please.
8 A. Meho Sejdic; he is also from the Kolobara
9 settlement, from a street which is called Osman
10 Dzikic. He was an elderly man who worked, as far as I
11 can remember, in the Izbor footwear factory. I knew
12 him personally. He was my sister's neighbour, and he
13 was killed during the first days; that is to say the
14 3rd, 4th, or 5th of May.
15 Q. Any information as to by whom?
16 A. If the distinguished Trial Chamber allows me
17 to explain, I would like to say that there were several
18 persons from Kolobara who were killed on the same day.
19 And I heard that orders were issued by the accused and
20 that it was carried out by Kosta Kostic. So according
21 to the information that I received, the killer of Meho
22 Sejdic was this same man.
23 Q. Next name, please, Mr. Ramic, Number 30,
24 Ahmet Fatic. Same questions, please.
25 A. Ahmet Fatic I think is the oldest man on this
1
1 list. He was over 80 years old. I personally knew him
2 very well. He loved fishing, and everyone knew that,
3 and he did it from the days of his youth, and everybody
4 in town knew about that, how fond of fishing he was.
5 And I've known him from the days of my youth, because
6 he lived in the neighbourhood where I was born. We
7 heard about his death from a Serb who, at the request
8 of his son -- that is to say, the son of Ahmet Fatic
9 lives in a place called Srebrenik. He went to bury
10 him, and he found him killed at his doorstep, and
11 that's where he buried him. We heard that he had also
12 been killed by the mentioned Kosta Kostic.
13 Q. Number 31, please, the father of Dr. Fatic.
14 The same questions, please.
15 A. Thirty-one is the father of Dr. Fatic. I
16 cannot remember his first name with certainty. I think
17 it was Omer. He was an elderly man. He was 75 to 80
18 years old. He was very sick; practically he was
19 immobile. He stayed at home.
20 We heard that he was killed in his home on
21 that same day by the mentioned person. He also lived
22 in the same neighbourhood, in the immediate vicinity of
23 the aforementioned.
24 Q. When you say "the mentioned person," is that
25 Kosta Kostic again?
1
1 A. Yes, it is Kosta Kostic.
2 Q. Thank you. The next page, please, Mr. Ramic,
3 if you'd be so kind. Osman Suljic.
4 A. Osman Suljic was a student. He studied
5 mechanical engineering in Sarajevo, so he would have
6 been a colleague of mine had he graduated. I knew him
7 personally. I knew his parents.
8 He was about 30 years old and he was killed
9 at home as well, during this same assault; that is to
10 say, with all the others that were killed on that day.
11 Q. Number 35, we've just got on the list a first
12 name but not a second name. Having thought about it,
13 can you add any more detail to the surname, Mr. Ramic?
14 A. Yes, I know. At that moment when I was
15 making the list, I could not remember the name, but
16 later on I remembered the last name also. His last
17 name is Huremovic, Selim Huremovic.
18 He lived in another part of town. He lived
19 near the bridge on the Brka River; that is to say, in
20 the centre of town.
21 I personally knew him very well. We worked
22 together for a few years. I was a young engineer at
23 the time; I had just started working in town. His wife
24 was a Croat, an ethnic Croat, and according to the
25 information I received, he was killed by a group that
1
1 was led by the person who is accused here.
2 Q. Osman Vatic. Would this be right: He was,
3 in fact, detained in Batkovic camp and remained there
4 until much later in the year of 1992?
5 A. Osman Vatic. That's right. He was detained
6 in the camp. Many eyewitnesses corroborated this. He
7 was badly mistreated there.
8 I must say that he was a lawyer by
9 profession, and he was our Member of Parliament in the
10 local parliament, but he was an invalid, a disabled
11 person. He did not have a leg. He was detained
12 together with his wife, who had been raped, according
13 to the information we received, by the man accused here
14 and his group, and she was forced to serve them in
15 different ways.
16 We received information that Vatic had
17 suffered terribly and his psyche had changed terribly.
18 The accused and the rest let him go home, but on that
19 very same day or on the next day -- I'm not sure
20 whether it was on the same day or the next day -- a
21 team was sent to kill him at home, and that's what they
22 did. They did that with another group of people who
23 are not here on this list but who are on the big list
24 where there are 100 names.
25 Q. Mujo Borovac, please.
1
1 A. Mujo Borovac. Mujo Borovac is a man who I
2 also knew very well personally -- he was a technician
3 in the local radio station -- until the very last day
4 he went to work, and he was present when I spoke for
5 that radio. He was taken away and his name's also
6 mentioned as one of the persons who is missing.
7 However, I found out from his family that they believe
8 that he had been killed.
9 Q. Enes Jasarevic.
10 A. Enes Jasarevic is also a man I knew very
11 well. He was an economist by profession. He is also
12 on the list of 100 names that I gave, and I gave a
13 correction in relation to his name.
14 He is also a man who was very well known in
15 town. He was the son of my Sunday school teacher, a
16 very well-known person in town. We heard that he was
17 killed by a group led by the accused.
18 Q. The final name, Izudin Brodlic.
19 A. Izudin Brodlic is an elderly man. He was
20 about 70 years old; 70, 75. He was a neighbour of
21 mine. He was a neighbour of my parents, actually, and
22 a man whom I knew pretty well. He had two daughters
23 and one son. His daughter was married to a friend of
24 mine, Dr. Kanlic. He was also one of the prominent
25 citizens in town.
1
1 He was not killed during the first days. He
2 was killed, according to the information we have, about
3 two months later; that is to say, in the month of
4 August.
5 Q. Thank you. Could you now have a look,
6 please, at Exhibit 59I? If I could go, please, to
7 number 14, Sadik Ljaljic.
8 A. Sadik Ljaljic is a man whom I knew well. He
9 was elderly man, about 60 years old. He worked on
10 central heating. He worked in the municipality. He
11 worked for me. Before I became mayor, I knew him very
12 well too.
13 He was an elderly man who lived in the very
14 centre of town. His house was right behind the police
15 building, the SUP building. That's where he was
16 killed. He was killed during the first days, I think
17 on the 4th or 5th of May.
18 Q. The next name, number 15, Ibro, son of Murat
19 -- and I'm not going to even pronounce that one --
20 Vlahovljak?
21 A. Your pronunciation is fine. Ibro Vlahovljak
22 was an elderly man as well. I knew him very well. I
23 mentioned Selim Huremovic on this last list. They
24 worked in the same company where I worked as a
25 mechanical engineer. He was a captain of a ship, and
1
1 during the war he was a retiree. He lived in the same
2 building where the mentioned Selim Huremovic
3 Hurajmanovic was killed. So he was killed, together
4 with him, by this same group of people during the first
5 days of the war.
6 Q. Number 17, Mr. Ramic, Franjo Vugrincic.
7 A. Franjo Vugrincic was a Croat who lived in a
8 settlement which was almost purely Bosniak, which was
9 called Meraji. He was a middle-aged person, and he
10 worked as an electrician in the Interplet textile
11 factory. He was killed during the first days of the
12 war.
13 Q. The next page, please, Safet Sahrimanovic,
14 also known as Sarajka. Can you help us about him? Is
15 this right: that he is someone who had a criminal
16 past, had been engaged in criminal activities?
17 A. Safet Sahrimanovic, known as Sarajka, was
18 well known in Brcko as a bohemian person.
19 I could not say he was a criminal or anything
20 like that, but his behaviour was a bit erratic. He
21 behaved perhaps in a bit different way. There are such
22 persons in other towns as well. I do not think that he
23 could be considered a criminal.
24 I know that he was killed by a group that was
25 led by the accused. They forced him to run. They
1
1 said, "You will be saved if you run," and, of course,
2 they killed him on the spot.
3 Q. Who gave you that information?
4 A. Well, the people who were detained together
5 with him.
6 Q. Number 22, please, Muhamed Mujanovic.
7 A. Muhamed Mujanovic is a man whom I do not know
8 personally; however, I have received information that
9 he was killed together with his son. His son is Meksud
10 Mujanovic, number 19 on the same list. Both of them
11 were killed on the same day, the 3rd of May.
12 Muhamed Mujanovic that you're asking me about
13 had a truck, and he was, therefore, involved in
14 transportation.
15 Q. Do you know when it was that he was killed?
16 A. He was killed on the 3rd or 4th of May,
17 during the first days, immediately.
18 Q. Do you know by whom he was killed?
19 A. I do not know the names, but it concerns a
20 group of people who are mentioned in connection with
21 the accused, who committed a series of killings in a
22 part of town called Mujkici. That's the area where he
23 was killed. His dead body was seen, as well as that of
24 his son.
25 Q. Number 25, please, Mr. Ramic, Bake, son of
1
1 Atif, Durmic.
2 A. Bake Durmic and his brother, number 27,
3 Redzep Durmic, lived in the centre of town, in a
4 settlement that we called Prnjavor. Its official name
5 is Djermanovic though, and I mentioned that in my
6 documents.
7 He was killed during the first days of the
8 war, on the 3rd or 4th of May, in the well-known camp
9 of Partizan. Both of them were killed. Our
10 information states that he was killed by -- I forgot
11 his name now. That's a man who, together with the
12 accused, participated in all the killings. I'm going
13 to remember the name.
14 Q. Is the name Ranko Cesic?
15 A. Right. Right. Ranko Cesic, right.
16 Q. Number 26, please, Mr. Ramic, Sakib
17 Becirovic, known as Kibe.
18 A. Sakib Becirovic was a man in his 50s. He
19 worked as a butcher in the Bimeks meat factory, and he
20 was pretty well known in town. He was a very vivacious
21 person, great fun. He was a patient of my late
22 brother, Dr. Ibrahim Ramic, and inter alia, he was best
23 man at his wedding.
24 He was killed together with the
25 above-mentioned in the Partizan camp, by Ranko Cesic.
1
1 Q. Number 27, Redzep Durmic. Is he related to
2 the former --
3 A. I mentioned that.
4 Q. All right.
5 A. I mentioned him in connection with 25.
6 They're two brothers.
7 Q. I was going to check to see whether they were
8 related. Thank you for pointing that out to me.
9 Bottom of the page please, Miroslav
10 Kljukijevic.
11 A. Miroslav Kljukijevic was well known in town
12 by the nickname of Vogna. He was a man whom I knew
13 personally. He was a ethnic Croat. He was a man whom
14 I knew from the days of my early childhood. We went to
15 school together and we were friends, very good
16 friends. He lived in Kolobara; that is to say, in a
17 settlement that was predominantly Bosniak.
18 He was also killed during the first days of
19 the war -- that is to say, the 3rd or 4th -- together
20 with a group which, to the best of my knowledge, was
21 connected to the accused who is present here today.
22 Q. Next page, please, Mr. Ramic. Number 39. I
23 can't read the first name, but Rovcanin, a retired
24 police officer.
25 A. Yes. Izo Rovcanin. Izo Rovacnin. That was
1
1 a retired policeman. I do know that he died. I'm not
2 sure how or where, whether he was killed or whether he
3 lost his life due to the effects of the war. I know
4 nothing in particular about that man.
5 Q. If I can just help you possibly about that.
6 Did you hear that he had joined the Bosnia-Herzegovina
7 armed forces?
8 A. Quite possibly. Let me just tell you that I
9 cannot say with any certainty where each and every
10 citizen was. I knew that man personally -- Izo
11 Rovcanin, that is to say -- and he really was a retired
12 policeman.
13 Quite possibly he was included in the
14 defence. If he was and if he was killed, this probably
15 took place in the first couple of days after the war
16 started.
17 Q. Again, if I can just assist you, did you hear
18 anything that he may have been killed whilst on active
19 service, on or about the 8th of May, in Dizdarusa
20 district?
21 A. Yes, perhaps that is correct. But as I say,
22 I was not in a position to get information of that
23 kind, but quite possibly that was how it was, yes.
24 Q. Thank you. The next name, please,
25 Mr. Ramic: Admir Rizvanovic. Can you help us about
1
1 this: Did you serve in a military capacity during the
2 course of the war?
3 A. I was a citizen of a state that was called
4 Yugoslavia, and like everybody else, I was duty-bound
5 to do my military service, and I did this to best of my
6 ability. So at the time, and when I was of an age to
7 do military service, yes, I did. I served in what was
8 called the Yugoslav People's Army. But that was 20
9 years before the war.
10 Q. I wasn't asking about your military service
11 to the JNA; I was asking about the period of the war.
12 Did you serve in the army of Bosnia-Herzegovina or any
13 other military unit during the course of the war that
14 started in 1992?
15 A. I explained yesterday that my mandate as
16 president of the municipality -- that is to say, mayor
17 -- that in case of the outbreak of war, which is what
18 we're talking about, I, by law, was at the head of a
19 body called the war presidency.
20 Of course I did not lead any military action,
21 but I was at the head of a defence body in part of the
22 territory that we called Free Brcko.
23 Q. There was a unit, was there not, called
24 108 Battalion or 108 Brigade? Were you ever a member
25 of that unit, Mr. Ramic?
1
1 A. No, I was not, precisely for the reason that
2 I mentioned. That is to say, I was above this. I was
3 a politician, so I led the authorities.
4 That 108th Brigade that you mentioned was
5 formed on the 17th of May, 1992, from under pressure of
6 attack. So I did take part in its participation, the
7 participation of the 108th Brigade, but I was not its
8 member.
9 Q. Admir Rizvanovic, from whom did you hear that
10 he had been killed?
11 A. I heard this from an eyewitness. Admir
12 Rizvanovic was a very young man. He was just 17 years
13 old. Of course, I didn't know him personally, but I
14 did know some people close to him. I knew his brother,
15 for example, who was a member of the 108th Brigade. In
16 the course of those war days, he told me, on one
17 occasion, his brother, this young Admir Rizvanovic, was
18 killed during the first three or four days of the war.
19 Days of the war.
20 Q. What was his brother's name?
21 A. His brother, I can't remember his name, but
22 he had a very characteristic nickname, Talon, and I
23 think that all the citizens know this person that went
24 by the name of Talon. He is an invalid today and has
25 one leg missing.
1
1 Q. Did you continue to have dealings with or
2 responsibility for 108 Brigade into March 1993,
3 Mr. Ramic?
4 A. In 1993, no. Let me tell you straightaway,
5 after the establishment of the brigade, a system of
6 military command was set up, and I, as a politician and
7 representative of the municipality, had no direct
8 influence on any activities whatsoever of a military
9 nature. They had their own chain of command, that is
10 to say, these military men from the top echelons of
11 Bosnia-Herzegovina, so I had no immediate influence on
12 their activities.
13 Q. Were you aware in any way that Admir
14 Rizvanovic was in fact sill alive on the 11th of March,
15 1993, and indeed on that date received a commendation
16 for his military prowess?
17 A. You are in fact talking about somebody I
18 mentioned a moment ago; that is to say, his brother,
19 Talon. His brother received a commendation of this
20 kind. And so, as I said, it was his brother who told
21 me of the death of Admir Rizvanovic, and it was the
22 brother who got this commendation for his military
23 prowess.
24 Q. Was the brother also called Admir, or did he
25 have a different first name?
1
1 A. I can get that name for the Tribunal, but I
2 can't remember the name exactly at this point. I think
3 it was similar to Admir, like Amir or Asim; a similar
4 name. But I couldn't actually tell you the exact name.
5 Q. All right. Please go to Number 52 now,
6 Mr. Ramic: Anis Preljevic.
7 A. Anis Preljevic is a young man. Here, as you
8 can see, he lived in a settlement called Mujkici. And
9 he was the son of somebody I knew very well, a woman
10 working in the centre of town, at the pharmacy there.
11 I knew her very well; that is to say, I knew his mother
12 very well. Perhaps I saw him around, but I didn't
13 actually know him personally. But what I do know is
14 that he was killed together with his father, whose name
15 was Seco, whose name is not on this list. As I say,
16 both of them were killed, in the settlement called
17 Mujkici, in the first days of the war.
18 Q. Next page, please, Mr. Ramic, a group of
19 names, 69, 70, 71, and 72. As far as that group of
20 people are concerned, is your information that they
21 were killed by Kosta Kostic?
22 A. Yes, but I must add -- and I'd like to ask
23 the Court's indulgence -- this is something I mentioned
24 a moment ago. This is a group of people -- I'm talking
25 about number 69, 70, 71. Safet Karamovic and Mirsad
1
1 Karamovic are father and son. Began Hasanbasic was
2 married to the sister of the above-mentioned Safet, so
3 they are members of one and the same family. And they
4 were released by the accused from Luka, but on the same
5 day they were released they were sent -- and we have
6 information that the accused issued an order to Kosta
7 Kostic, who executed the aforementioned many killings
8 in Kolobara, in the settlement Kolobara. And he killed
9 69, 70, 71, and 72 in the same place. They were seen
10 dead in that same place, in a street called Osman
11 Dzikic Street, in the Kolobara settlement.
12 Q. From whom did you get that information?
13 A. From people who were sent to collect the dead
14 bodies.
15 Q. Were they present, any of those people
16 present when these orders were given, as far as you
17 know?
18 A. A lot of killings took place there, and they
19 all took place on the same day. I cannot claim that
20 they actually saw the killing of this group of
21 individuals, but at that same time, they witnessed the
22 killing of other people, people who had died that same
23 afternoon and were killed by Kosta Kostic. Yes, they
24 did see those killings.
25 Q. They may have seen the killings, but the
1
1 question I asked was, were they present when the orders
2 you claim were given were handed out?
3 A. The aforementioned Kosta Kostic is a man from
4 Bijeljina; that is to say, he is very well known to the
5 accused. The accused was the commander of that group
6 of people from Bijeljina who committed the killings,
7 and witnesses claim that they saw him communicate with
8 all those people.
9 Q. In fact, wasn't the commander of Kosta Kostic
10 a man called Mauzer, not Goran Jelisic?
11 A. Mauzer was the commander of the overall SDS
12 area, the forces of the aggressor in the Brcko area.
13 He was commander of all of them. But I should like to
14 mention that the accused was in contact with the
15 aforementioned Kosta Kostic. And how can you explain
16 the killing on the same day that they were released
17 from Luka, that same day?
18 Q. Number 78, please, on page 5, Mr. Ramic.
19 Vlado Rebac. From whom did you hear that he had been
20 killed?
21 A. I must admit that I do not have a lot of
22 information with respect to that particular name, where
23 and when he was killed, but I do know the man
24 personally, very well. He went to school with me, so I
25 know him very well. At one time he was the director of
1
1 a catering enterprise in Brcko. He is a Croat by
2 ethnicity. And I have no other information about him.
3 Q. 89, Almir Tursic.
4 A. 89 and 88 are two brothers, Almir and Aldin
5 Tursic. They are young men who -- I didn't know them
6 personally, but they were, in a way, members of the SDA
7 party, the youth organisation of the SDA. Their mother
8 was a salesperson. I knew her. She worked in a shop
9 called Kluz in Brcko. And I have information that they
10 both were killed in the first days of the war.
11 Q. Final page, Mr. Ramic: 97, 98, and 99.
12 A. That is a group of people killed, as far as I
13 know, by the aforementioned Kosta Kostic, at the same
14 time and on the same occasion. Muhamed Jakubovic,
15 Pestalic -- it says "Pestalic," without his first name,
16 and I should like to add that after seeing this list, I
17 didn't understand who it was. But looking at his date
18 of birth, I realise that it was a very old woman, as
19 you can see, an extremely old woman, and her name is
20 Lasli or Lasla Pestalic, and Mehmed Slomic. I knew him
21 personally. He was about 60 years of age and he was --
22 his intellectual capacity was limited, but he was known
23 in town as a very peaceful man, and everybody liked
24 him.
25 So all these three individuals were killed in
1
1 the Kolobara settlement, according to information, by
2 the same man, Kosta Kostic.
3 Q. Isn't it in fact right that the date of death
4 of the lady, Pestalic, was on or about the 26th of
5 June, 1992, and two men, Kosta Kostic and Dragica
6 Todorvic, were involved in her murder?
7 A. According to my information, the killing in
8 the Kolobara settlement at the beginning of May by the
9 aforementioned Kosta Kostic includes this name too.
10 And I'm not wrong -- I cannot be wrong there, because
11 it was a woman, she was an invalid, she was immobile,
12 and she was found dead, lying on her bed. She was
13 bedridden.
14 MR. GREAVES: Would Your Honours give me a
15 moment, please.
16 Q. Thank you. I've finished with the list,
17 Mr. Ramic. I want now to turn to another subject,
18 please.
19 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] How much longer
20 will you go on? I should like to remind you that the
21 examination-in-chief lasted for around 35 minutes, that
22 yesterday you took one hour, and today you've had 40
23 minutes. And I should like to hear, when do you think
24 you will finish?
25 I am really very sorry, but time is something
1
1 that we should bear in mind. Even the Defence is under
2 a certain constraint of time, even if not in the same
3 manner. But could you please -- so now you have used
4 two hours and five minutes, and could you please tell
5 us, how much more will you need?
6 MR. GREAVES: [Previous translation
7 continues] ... but Your Honours, remember, this is an
8 important witness as far as the Defence is concerned --
9 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Yes, but I
10 should like to remind you, in general terms, will you
11 please try, will you please try to focus your
12 cross-examination on the subject covered by the
13 examination-in-chief, and you know I have already said
14 a number of times why that is done. You are using two
15 hours and a half for your cross-examination, and you do
16 know that your cross-examination could be better
17 synthesised at times. So will you please try to do
18 that?
19 MR. GREAVES: I'm sorry, but I don't accept
20 that, Your Honour. This is an important witness for
21 the defendant, and this is not just a debating chamber
22 where you turn a light on and counsel has to sit down.
23 The defendant is facing a possible life sentence, and
24 these are important matters that I wish to discuss with
25 him. The list of people is a subject of part of the
1
1 examination-in-chief, and I respectfully submit that I
2 am perfectly entitled to go through those matters.
3 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] I should like
4 to consult my colleagues.
5 [Trial Chamber confers]
6 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] The Judges will
7 give you 20 minutes. It is 11.20, and you will have to
8 finish by 20 to 12, and I will stop you then.
9 MR. GREAVES:
10 Q. I want to turn now, Mr. Ramic, please, to an
11 issue about which you asked yesterday, the importance
12 of the town of Brcko. Would you accept that the town
13 of Brcko is of strategic and tactical importance to
14 both of the parties who've been involved in the
15 Arbitration Commission; in other words, Republika
16 Srpska and the Federation?
17 A. Yes, I think it is.
18 Q. And is this right: that to the Federation
19 side, there are a number of features which make it
20 important? First of all, if, as a result of the
21 Arbitration Commission, control had passed to the
22 Federation, that would effectively have cut in half
23 Republika Srpska?
24 A. I don't think exactly along those lines,
25 because I think that Brcko is in a specific position,
1
1 and that through it, the Republika Srpska, both from
2 the east and from the west, can maintain contacts in
3 the proposed solution.
4 Q. Yes. I'm not talking about the solution at
5 which the Commission has arrived at. The proposition I
6 put to you was that if the Federation controlled and
7 had as part of its territory the town and opstina of
8 Brcko, territorially, that would cut in half one side
9 of Republika Srpska from the other, wouldn't it?
10 A. If the Court permits me, I will have to
11 expound on that. I can't answer that question
12 briefly.
13 Can I?
14 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Well, it is
15 very simple. You can answer the way you like, but we
16 shall end the cross-examination at 20 to 12. So you
17 may answer, and you may now expound the grand strategy
18 of the war. That will only delay things, but it is
19 really up to you.
20 A. Well, the answer would be as follows: A
21 response to all these -- an answer to all these
22 activities could be interpreted in that way, but I
23 would like to say that we're going back to 1992, prior
24 to the war, when Bosnia was a uniform state, and when
25 there was no eastern and western part of some kind of
1
1 Serbian republic, and there was no reason for anybody
2 to ensure passage. It was accessible to one and all.
3 From today's aspect, it could be taken in that way;
4 that is to say, I could give a "yes" to your question.
5 Q. And the second importance of the town of
6 Brcko is in its economic importance. Firstly, it has a
7 river port which is the conduit for exports and imports
8 of goods from Bosnia; isn't that right?
9 A. Yes, Brcko has got a port, and from that
10 aspect, it is important. But let me add that traffic
11 via the port was not as important as was other means of
12 communication.
13 Q. Well, I was going to turn to that. Isn't it
14 right also that it provides the centre of a road
15 network which leads to, and is the conduit for, exports
16 and imports to Eastern Europe?
17 A. Well, I couldn't say that. Brcko was a very
18 well-trafficked area, but it was not the sole
19 communications route. You could also take the Bosanski
20 Brod route, or by Bosanski Samac to Zvornik, and to the
21 west via Bihac. There were several crossings of that
22 type.
23 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Prosecutor, do
24 you want to contest the fact that Brcko was an
25 important town? If it is not contested, I do not think
1
1 it is really worth mentioning. Are you contesting that
2 Brcko was an important town, an important crossroads?
3 MR. NICE: I don't think so.
4 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Very well.
5 Then will you please move on to another question?
6 Otherwise you will waste all your time.
7 MR. GREAVES:
8 Q. Did you take part in the activities of the
9 arbitration commission, Mr. Ramic?
10 A. No, I didn't, not in any way.
11 Q. You gave no advice? Did you give evidence at
12 all to the commission?
13 A. No, I did not.
14 Q. Are you --
15 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Please
16 continue.
17 MR. GREAVES:
18 Q. Are you familiar with the proceedings of the
19 commission? Did you take an interest in that?
20 A. I did take an interest, yes, but what I
21 wanted to find out was what the results of the
22 commission's work would be. I didn't go into detail,
23 nor did I seek information of that kind.
24 Q. Help me about this, please: Amongst the
25 items that you were aware of as being placed before the
1
1 commission, were you aware that in the early stages of
2 the proceedings, that the issue of whether or not there
3 had been genocide in Brcko formed an important part of
4 the submissions made on behalf of the Federation?
5 A. Yes, I was aware of that.
6 Q. That was one of the reasons being advanced as
7 to why Brcko should be handed over to the Federation
8 side. Do you accept that?
9 A. The side of the Federation, the Federation
10 side, really did have that as one of its arguments, but
11 if you want my opinion, I personally consider that that
12 did not have any significant share in the
13 decision-making.
14 Q. It may not have had a share in the
15 decision-making, but you confirm it was one of the
16 reasons being advanced for Brcko to be handed over?
17 A. Well, at all events, yes, but the strongest
18 of all reasons, which we mustn't forget, was that the
19 Brcko area was inhabited by a vast majority of the
20 Bosniak population who experienced great suffering, and
21 it was logical that this was a subject discussed.
22 Q. Help me about this. I didn't ask you
23 yesterday. Did you remain a member of -- as opposed to
24 taking part in the activities of -- a member of the
25 SDA?
1
1 A. Yes, I have remained a member of the SDA,
2 although I have fully frozen my political activities;
3 that is to say, I no longer engage actively in
4 politics.
5 Q. Have you discussed with anybody in authority
6 the evidence you were to give before this Tribunal?
7 Not from the OTP, but from the Bosnia-Herzegovina
8 authorities.
9 A. No, except for the Prosecution of this august
10 Tribunal. I did not talk to the representatives of the
11 Bosniak authorities, if that is the question in this
12 regard.
13 Q. Finally, Mr. Ramic, I want to ask you this:
14 You have asserted that you were not a military person
15 within 108 Battalion, 108 Brigade. I suggest to you
16 that that is not true, that, in fact, you were a
17 member, an active military member holding officer rank
18 in that institution.
19 A. I would own up to you that I would be
20 honoured had that been the case, and I wouldn't hide
21 that, just as I did not hide my identity before this
22 Tribunal, and but it would have been an honour for me
23 had that been true, but it was not true, for logical
24 reasons. I was president of the municipality, a
25 politician who was above military structures, as mayor,
1
1 and our organisation was such that politics were apart
2 from the military structures, so no.
3 But there is something else. Perhaps you
4 have in mind my rank which I had at the time of the
5 previous system, and I really did have the rank of
6 officer in the Yugoslav People's Army. And as I
7 said --
8 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Mr. Greaves, I
9 believe you already asked that question. He answered
10 that he had a post in the municipality, that he
11 participated in the establishment, but that he did not
12 take part in logistic and military activities. That
13 was already answered.
14 MR. GREAVES:
15 Q. I have one question for him. Are you aware
16 that you are being sought for and proceedings exist in
17 relation to war crimes allegedly committed by you as a
18 member of that unit, and by -- and the location of
19 those proceedings is in Republika Srpska?
20 A. I need to say, just as this trial is showing,
21 ever since the outbreak of the war, we have collected a
22 great deal of information committed against the
23 Bosnian-Herzegovinian population about crimes
24 committed, including the person accused here, and that
25 that term --
1
1 Q. It's a very simple question. It demands a
2 yes or no answer. Were you aware of such proceedings?
3 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] You were asked
4 a simple question, Mr. Ramic. Will you please answer
5 the question "yes" or "no," "I don't know" or "I know,"
6 but please answer the question.
7 A. I did not know about the proceedings. It was
8 at a later stage that I heard that I had been accused
9 of some war crimes.
10 MR. GREAVES:
11 Q. So was that before you gave a statement to
12 the Office of the Prosecutor that you became aware of
13 those proceedings?
14 A. In the course of the war, towards the end of
15 the war, it could be.
16 Q. What date would you give to that?
17 A. I could not really remember the date, but it
18 could have been in 1994. We got a newspaper from
19 Brcko, and it said that a list had been compiled saying
20 that people who held the power in Brcko were being
21 accused of war crimes.
22 MR. GREAVES: I have no further questions.
23 THE PRESIDING JUDGE: Thank you, Mr. Greaves,
24 for concluding your cross-examination within the
25 prescribed time.
1
1 Mr. Nice, do you wish to ask additional
2 questions, which is your right?
3 MR. NICE: I have a few questions.
4 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Yes, but very
5 quickly. Very quickly.
6 Re-examined Mr. Nice:
7 Q. Yes, just about the war crimes of which
8 you've been accused. You say the people of Brcko were
9 accused. Was it you or a number of people?
10 A. The authorities -- I mean, in Brcko and -- I
11 have to expound on this. Having heard that we had
12 started with the investigation of war crimes, they
13 simply countered and with a similar thing. So they
14 simply covered all the people who held any responsible
15 posts, either in politics or in the army, and they
16 compiled a list of all those -- they covered -- they
17 compiled a list of the names of all of those who held
18 some responsible post, whether civilian or military,
19 but they never really specified the crimes of which
20 they were accusing.
21 Q. That was my next question. Have you received
22 any detail of the allegations made against you in any
23 form, whether in the form of the detailed indictments
24 published by this Tribunal or otherwise?
25 A. No, never. Even that newspaper that I
1
1 mentioned, that Serb newspaper from Brcko which carried
2 that article, it did not mention anything. All it said
3 was "war crimes," but they simply did not specify those
4 war crimes. They did not specify the offences, nor
5 times, nor site -- nor sites or anything.
6 Q. Two very short questions on this topic. One,
7 roughly how many people were named as the subject of
8 war crimes allegations in this newspaper article; 5,
9 10, 15? How many?
10 A. It was a list with at least 30 names. It was
11 the war presidency which I headed, then the government.
12 Q. That's all I need. That's all I need, 30
13 names.
14 Since the publication in that newspaper, have
15 any steps been taken, to your knowledge, to bring you
16 or any of the other 30 names or thereabouts to trial?
17 A. Never.
18 Q. Thank you.
19 A. And I think it is ridiculous.
20 Q. Next question: You've been asked several
21 questions relating to Kostic and Kostic's killings,
22 which you have connected to Jelisic. I want you just
23 to give the best detail you can to the Judges of the
24 source of your information and of its proximity or
25 remoteness.
1
1 First, was the information that Jelisic lay
2 behind the Kostic killings something that you heard
3 from one person or from more than one person? If more
4 than one person, approximately how many?
5 A. Well, some of the things are beyond doubt.
6 Kostic did kill, to begin with. Also, Kostic was
7 linked to the accused --
8 Q. I'm going to stop you.
9 A. All right. All right. All right. I will
10 answer.
11 Q. I will just want an answer to that question
12 at this stage. How --
13 A. Yes, I will answer that. I will tell you. I
14 heard from different people that Kostic was receiving
15 orders from the accused.
16 Q. How many different people, if you can help
17 us?
18 A. Well, I cannot be all that accurate, but I
19 heard that from people who were in the town and
20 eyewitnesses. Well, it could be about ten people or
21 so.
22 Q. Next question is the proximity or distance of
23 the information. Were these people who were talking to
24 you about Jelisic and Kostic providing rumour or were
25 any of them providing detailed information of the
1
1 type: "I was there when the instruction was given" or
2 "I was told by a person who was there when the
3 instruction was given," something of that sort? How
4 remote or proximate was the source of the information?
5 A. Well, people saw them talk. Of course, they
6 could not overhear everything. There were also people
7 who heard the accused, and that was one of the
8 information I received, that the accused said roughly,
9 "Well, never mind that. That one of mine finished off
10 all those Balija," and information like that.
11 Q. I see. Thank you. One question about the
12 strategic importance of the town of Brcko and its
13 relation to the Republika Srpska. When was the
14 Republika Srpska first declared or formed, to your
15 recollection?
16 A. They proclaimed the Republika Srpska after
17 the aggression. The first time I heard about the
18 Republika Srpska was in late May 1992; that is, the
19 name "Republika Srpska".
20 Q. So when it was suggested to you that Brcko
21 divided the Republika Srpska, would you like to
22 contrast that with the alternative proposition that it
23 was the only way by which two separate parts could be
24 joined; i.e., at the time of the aggression, was there
25 anything to separate or was it still the case that
1
1 there was something or some things that other people
2 wished to join through Brcko?
3 A. I'm not sure I understood your question
4 properly, but I shall do my best to answer it.
5 Brcko was indeed an area in which the
6 Muslims, the Bosniaks, constituted a overwhelming
7 majority. If somebody wanted to set up a separate
8 state on both sides of it, then he had to know that he
9 had to go through Brcko. In order to secure that
10 particular territory, he would have to eliminate the
11 majority of that original population.
12 Q. By the end of the aggression, how much of the
13 original Bosniak population was left, in percentage
14 terms?
15 A. I mentioned already that according to the
16 information that we have, and according to our
17 estimates and data in the town of Brcko, in the town,
18 that is, and the aggressors' rule, there are only about
19 3.000 people left. We also estimate about 2.000 people
20 were killed.
21 Q. And 3.000 people represents what as a
22 percentage of the overall remaining population? Can
23 you help us?
24 A. Three thousand would be -- would be some
25 five, maybe six per cent in the municipality of Brcko.
1
1 Or if you are referring to the town of Brcko, to the
2 town of Brcko, then it would be eight per cent of the
3 population.
4 Q. Thank you. Then lastly, I've a few questions
5 on the lists, in light of the details you've given.
6 MR. NICE: May the witness take, please,
7 first, Appendix H, the list of 39 names? I have, I
8 think, five names to ask him short questions about.
9 Q. In each case, Mr. Ramic, I just want some --
10 may want some further details, if you can provide
11 them.
12 Number 9, you told us that -- killed with, I
13 think, a number other people outside a cafe. What were
14 the circumstances? How many other people? Where was
15 the cafe?
16 A. Number 9 and number 10 are two brothers,
17 Mustafa Medinic and Ado Medinic. They are young men of
18 about 20 to 25.
19 I did not really know them particularly well,
20 but I knew their father. I heard it from a different
21 source, yes, from different sources and from a number
22 of witnesses, that they had been killed by a group
23 headed by the accused.
24 The latest information I received from their
25 father, with whom I had talked on several occasions,
1
1 and who is quite ready to confirm that -- be anywhere,
2 including this Tribunal -- that on the 4th of May, the
3 accused came from Brcko to Bijeljina, that he entered a
4 butcher's -- and there are eyewitnesses to that, and it
5 is corroborated, that there is a certificate, that
6 their father has a piece of paper about that. So he
7 came to the butcher's --
8 Q. My mistake for not making the question
9 clear. I want you to tell us, according to the
10 information you've told us about, where was the cafe,
11 how many people were killed? That's all I want to
12 know. Where was the cafe?
13 A. It is a cafe called Evropa, and it was in the
14 municipal hall, about 50 metres from the municipal
15 hall, about 150 metres from the police station. About
16 30 people, mostly young, between 20 and 25 years of
17 age, were killed there, and those two were among them.
18 Q. Were they all killed at the same time, the 30
19 people, or at a different time, on the information you
20 received?
21 A. They were all killed at the same time.
22 Q. Where is that cafe in relation to the very
23 large hotel that's near to the police station,
24 effectively opposite it?
25 A. From that aforementioned hotel, it is about
1
1 150 to 200 metres.
2 Q. Number 15, please. Here I'm going to be
3 asking you questions -- don't trouble yourself with
4 why, but I'm going to be asking you questions that
5 relate to other sources of information about these
6 witnesses.
7 You've told us about this witness and what he
8 does. Does what he did -- start again. Did what he
9 did, this man, involve making harnesses for horses or
10 making goods out of leather?
11 A. Yes. This man knew how to do that, and that
12 was what he did.
13 Q. Thank you. Number 18. When was he killed,
14 number 18?
15 A. Number 18, Midhat Uzejrovic, he was also
16 killed on the 3rd or the 4th of May; that is, in the
17 early days.
18 Q. Okay. Number 27.
19 A. Muhamed Zelenjakovic --
20 Q. -- him, just for clarification. Did he also
21 have anything to do with a barbershop?
22 A. Yes. He had two brothers, and they were --
23 and they had that barber's, and I went there. One of
24 them was my barber.
25 Q. Number 37. Interplet is what as a business?
1
1 A. Interplet is a large textile factory at the
2 exit from Brcko towards Bijeljina.
3 Q. Does that have anything to do with a
4 television station, or not?
5 A. I don't understand your question. No.
6 Q. That's all I need to know. Don't worry.
7 Appendix I, please. That's the other list. If he can
8 have that.
9 I've got four names to ask about here only,
10 and then I've concluded.
11 Number 17 on the first page, the Croat,
12 Franjo Vugrincic.
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. From the information coming to you, was there
15 any explanation for why this particular Croat was
16 killed? Alternatively, can you think of any reason,
17 logical reason, for why this Croat should be killed?
18 A. Franjo Vugrincic, a Croat. Well, the reason
19 for his murder, to my mind, is purely and simply
20 ethnic. Because he lived amongst the Muslims, he was
21 their friend, that is why they did not like him. There
22 is no other reason. There is no other explanation.
23 Q. The following page, number 18, the young man
24 who was of bohemian behaviour and forced to run. When
25 you say "forced to run," do you mean forced to run
1
1 somewhere in the street in public, or forced to run
2 from a prison? In a sentence, explain that just a
3 little more.
4 A. Yes. It was in the camp. He was detained
5 with all the others and was subjected to ill-treatment,
6 but they wanted to play a practical joke on him. As I
7 said, "We'll let you go if you manage to cross over the
8 fence and run away quickly," and of course, he failed
9 to do that.
10 Q. The following page, number 40. The
11 commendation suggested as being in the name of Admir,
12 and you said that was in his brother's name. If
13 somebody were to show you a document -- I'm not in a
14 position to do so, but if someone were to show you a
15 document dealing with the name of Rizvanovic, would you
16 be able to help us further? Anybody able to show you
17 the commendation document?
18 A. I mentioned his brother, Rizvanovic, who was
19 an active-duty man in 108th Brigade and a very brave
20 combatant, and yes, he was commended; that is also
21 true. But I heard from different sources, and from him
22 personally, that his 17-year-old brother was killed in
23 the very early days in Brcko.
24 Q. Thank you.
25 MR. NICE: I don't know if the Defence has a
1
1 document that they wanted to put as the commendation,
2 to check on the accuracy of this. I'd be grateful if
3 they would provide it. I assume that they haven't got
4 it; otherwise they would have put it.
5 Q. Number 78, please, on the following page, I
6 think, or two pages on. Number 78.
7 MR. GREAVES: Can I just deal with that? We
8 do have a document, but I didn't put it because I was
9 fearful of being accused of intimidating the witness by
10 making a positive assertion.
11 MR. NICE: Well, I would prefer it, if
12 it's -- if the document exists, I've got another
13 observation to make in general about this in a
14 minute --
15 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Excuse me,
16 Mr. Greaves, but I must answer. The intimidation of
17 the witness is something that the Judges decide about.
18 I've never said that you were intimidating the witness,
19 but it's a completely different matter to produce
20 proof. I mean, if, when you ask a question which is
21 merely an affirmation -- we're going back to a
22 discussion that we had yesterday; I'm quite ready to go
23 back to that. But I said that when you ask a question
24 without producing something to corroborate that, then
25 it may look as if you were trying to destabilise the
1
1 witness. But we shall always be happy to see when you
2 can produce a document.
3 The Prosecution has asked you now, and now
4 the Judges ask you, do you have a document to
5 corroborate the question? It is not a matter of
6 producing proofs; it is not a matter of intimidating
7 witnesses. And on the basis of Article 98, I am asking
8 you to produce the document.
9 MR. GREAVES: Yes, of course.
10 MR. NICE: If that can be shown to the
11 witness, and perhaps put on the ELMO, unless there is
12 any reason for its not going on the ELMO.
13 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Is there a
14 reason -- is there any need for confidentiality? I
15 believe we can see the document to see what it is.
16 Could we have it put on the ELMO, please, so
17 that everybody can see it.
18 MR. NICE:
19 Q. Well, Mr. Ramic, first of all, we can see the
20 name on the right-hand side. Do you know, just from
21 looking at it, what the publication is you're looking
22 at?
23 A. Yes, I do.
24 Q. What is it?
25 A. This is a newspaper. It is a newspaper. It
1
1 is a fragment from an article from a newspaper of the
2 time. It is a daily, a daily newspaper.
3 Q. The headline of the list of --
4 THE INTERPRETER: Your microphone, Mr. Nice,
5 please.
6 MR. NICE: Sorry.
7 Q. The headline of the list of names, what does
8 that say? Just help us. If you read it out, then the
9 interpreters will read it for us. Just read the
10 headline, please.
11 A. It says, "I commend members of the 3rd
12 Battalion of the Motorised Brigade of Brcko."
13 Q. Can you put it back on the ELMO so that we
14 can follow what's going on?
15 Does it say anything there about this person,
16 number -- we can see number 4; "Admir" is the name
17 given. Does it say anything about why Admir's name
18 appears on this list? If you can just read out what is
19 relevant, and then the interpreters will translate it
20 for us.
21 A. Yes. They are commended for military valour.
22 Q. Does seeing this name in a list in these
23 circumstances affect your opinion that it was the
24 brother who was commended, and not Admir, listed as
25 Number 40 in your list?
1
1 A. Naturally. It is a combatant whom I know,
2 and I can't go wrong there. His nickname is Talon, and
3 everybody knew it, throughout the territory.
4 Q. Are you saying that the list here is wrong
5 and that your evidence is correct? Or are you saying
6 that your evidence may be incorrect on this topic?
7 A. No, I'm not wrong. I am referring to a man
8 who was, for the duration of the war, in the free
9 territory. He was the one who was commended, and his
10 nickname is Talon. I am not wrong there. And I'm not
11 referring to the man who is listed amongst the killed.
12 Q. Back to the list, then, please. Appendix I,
13 two more names only. Number 78, Vlado Rebac, Croat:
14 Can you give a reason for why this Croat was killed?
15 A. He was also a prominent citizen of the town
16 of Brcko. He was one of the directors. We went to
17 school together. When we were children, we were close
18 friends; he was a friend. And he was probably someone
19 who had to be eliminated for those reasons.
20 Q. Then, finally, on the last page, the old
21 lady, number 98, Pestalic. From your evidence so far,
22 it's not clear whether you're saying she was killed or
23 whether she may have died of natural causes. Can you
24 explain, please?
25 A. I said that we received data about the
1
1 persons who were killed from people who were forced to
2 collect dead bodies. Her body was found in her bed.
3 She had been killed.
4 Q. Thank you. How had she been killed?
5 A. Firearms.
6 Q. Could there be any reason you could think of
7 why this woman, of that very great age, should be
8 killed?
9 A. That was in the central settlement of
10 Kolobara; that is to say, the central settlement of the
11 Bosniak population, where almost 95 per cent were
12 Bosniak. These people were supposed to be eliminated;
13 that is to say, to have the least number of Bosniaks
14 possible.
15 MR. NICE: That concludes my questions, Your
16 Honour. The only other point is this: It's obvious
17 from the detailed cross-examination by the Defence that
18 they have quite a lot of information, or a lot of
19 information about people who have been killed in this
20 fighting, and it may be that they'll be disposed to
21 adduce further details in the course of the Defence
22 case. If there are further details they have -- and
23 they've treated this witness very substantially as a
24 library of information, rather than as somebody to
25 attack. If they have further details that he can
1
1 confirm or assist with, then obviously if they can
2 provide us with the information now, we can check it,
3 so as to agree it when it's forthcoming in the Defence
4 case and to avoid, for example, recalling this witness
5 or calling other witnesses to deal with matters that
6 might be in dispute.
7 It may be that Mr. Greaves has already
8 provided, through cross-examination -- in the entirely
9 appropriate way, as I accept -- all the detail he
10 presently has. If there are other details, it might be
11 thought sensible to exchange those details now, so that
12 we can verify them before the witness leaves for
13 Bosnia.
14 Subject to that, I have nothing else to add.
15 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Does that mean
16 that the witness should stay here? The Judges will
17 also have some questions, but before that, we shall
18 have a break. But does that mean you want the witness
19 to be kept here, or do you intend to call him back
20 again? I didn't quite understand.
21 MR. NICE: I was simply saying that if, by
22 chance, any part of the Defence case could be the
23 subject of discussion or agreement now with the
24 witness's assistance, then we could probably avoid even
25 the possibility of his having to be the subject of a
1
1 request to recall at a later stage. If, on the other
2 hand, there's either no more information presently
3 available from the Defence, for one reason or another,
4 or if information comes by way of a surprise in the
5 course of the Defence case, and if it's important
6 information, I shall want to verify it, and it may be
7 that I will turn to this witness, and I will then seek
8 his assistance, at his inconvenience. So that's the
9 position.
10 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you.
11 All right, I think we shall now have a break
12 of half an hour. The Judges may have some questions,
13 so -- perhaps not so much a question, but of
14 precision. Judge Riad will have some questions, but
15 this is merely seeking some precision.
16 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Good
17 morning, Witness Ramic. I should simply like to seize
18 this opportunity to have the Exhibit P59, to ask you if
19 the "H" which you added on various pages means that
20 these persons were Croats. Is it that all persons
21 where you have added an "H" are Croats or not? Is that
22 what it means?
23 A. Yes, that's exactly what it means.
24 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you very
25 much.
1
1 All right. Now we shall have a break of 30
2 minutes, and the Prosecution and the Defence will try
3 to reach an agreement.
4 Thank you. The session is adjourned.
5 --- Recess taken at 12.05 p.m.
6 --- On resuming at 12.35 p.m.
7 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Please be
8 seated.
9 Mr. Registrar?
10 THE REGISTRAR: C3. It is C3, court
11 exhibit.
12 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Judge Riad, you
13 have the floor.
14 JUDGE RIAD: [Interpretation] Thank you,
15 Mr. President.
16 Questioned by the Court:
17 JUDGE RIAD: Good morning, Mr. Ramic.
18 A. Good day.
19 JUDGE RIAD: I have a few global questions to
20 ask you, to make things a little bit clearer in our
21 minds. I won't go into details, so don't answer me in
22 details.
23 Concerning the lists of killed people, the
24 list of 39 and the other list, I realise that it covers
25 a very wide range of occupations, that it goes from the
1
1 president of the local executive to a truck driver.
2 And then we see that it even concerns a woman, an old
3 woman. And the age range is from 22 to 70, and I
4 suppose the old woman must have been older than that,
5 too. So what could be the common denominator between
6 all these people killed?
7 A. I think that I explained that this is
8 obvious; that is to say that the link between all of
9 this is religious and ethnic affiliation. I'm
10 convinced that all of these people were killed because
11 ethnically they belonged to the Bosniak people, or if
12 they expressed certain sympathies -- that is to say, if
13 they were oriented towards the SDA party.
14 JUDGE RIAD: Now, just a second. So I would
15 conclude from that that anybody of ethnic -- what you
16 call Muslim -- was a target to be killed?
17 A. Yes.
18 JUDGE RIAD: I'll just continue asking about
19 this old woman, Pestalic, who was killed, and I want
20 just to understand what you said. You said she
21 belonged to the central settlement of the Bosniak
22 population, where 95 per cent were Bosniak Muslims and
23 had to be eliminated. What is the meaning of that?
24 Why did this part have to be eliminated completely?
25 A. In order for the town of Brcko to have the
1
1 least percentage of the Bosniak Muslim population
2 possible.
3 JUDGE RIAD: And, according to your
4 knowledge, how much should have been eliminated? I
5 mean, they wanted to reduce it to one fourth, one
6 tenth, what? To keep nobody? Was there a plan?
7 A. Yes, we did receive information. It was no
8 secret. The SDS wanted to reduce the number of
9 Bosniaks to below 10 per cent.
10 JUDGE RIAD: And how far did they succeed?
11 A. I said that according to the information that
12 we have and according to our estimates and records,
13 that in town, at the moment of the aggression -- that
14 is to say when the SDS military organisations took over
15 power -- that there were about 3.000 Bosniaks.
16 According to our information, about 2.000 people were
17 either missing or killed. However, that does not mean
18 that they could have eliminated everyone, because they
19 were not within their reach -- the rest, I mean.
20 JUDGE RIAD: And they eliminated also Croats,
21 you said?
22 A. Yes, yes, also.
23 JUDGE RIAD: They wanted also to reduce the
24 percentage of the Croats?
25 A. Yes, that's right.
1
1 JUDGE RIAD: To how much?
2 A. I just said that they wanted other ethnic
3 groups, the non-Serb population, to account for a total
4 of 10 per cent.
5 JUDGE RIAD: The whole thing? Not only the
6 Muslims?
7 A. All of them, yes.
8 JUDGE RIAD: All of them. Now, concerning
9 the killings committed by, I think, Kostic, how far is
10 Jelisic involved in these killings? In other words,
11 Kostic was the executive power of Jelisic? Would he do
12 what he asks him to do, and was he able to order him
13 not to do? Or was he an independent agent, regardless
14 of what Jelisic wants? What was Jelisic's authority in
15 that case?
16 A. As regards that question, I cannot give you
17 an accurate answer because I did not have insight into
18 the actual relationships involved. However, the
19 information that we received from the witnesses who
20 overheard things, they say that Kostic killed people at
21 the request of Jelisic.
22 JUDGE RIAD: And just by the way, you
23 mentioned that Jelisic went to tell the butcher to
24 inform the family of -- I think the people who were
25 killed, numbers 6 and 7 of the list. What was the
1
1 purpose of this, informing them? Was it to spread fear
2 or to express condolences? What was it? Why was he
3 going on to advertise that?
4 A. The first, precisely. He wanted to sow fear
5 among all the rest. And that is what the witnesses
6 claim. With his full authority, he wanted to impose
7 himself upon others and to say, "See how we resolve
8 matters over here."
9 JUDGE RIAD: And that would lead, perhaps, to
10 their running away? Is that the reason?
11 A. That's right. That is correct as well.
12 JUDGE RIAD: And this policy worked?
13 A. Well, it did. People would leave if they had
14 the opportunity to do so. And that was the other
15 thrust involved in their activities. They left certain
16 people alive on purpose, because they got their
17 property; they looted it or they bought it for peanuts,
18 but they just wanted these people to leave.
19 JUDGE RIAD: Now, a very strange question you
20 yourself asked, and I want you to give me the answer.
21 You said they would release people and then kill them
22 the same day. What was the idea behind that? Who
23 would be doing that?
24 A. I said that they wanted to reduce the number
25 to less than 10 per cent. Therefore, they would leave
1
1 some people alive.
2 As for this group, they sent them from the
3 camp to their homes, but at the same time they asked
4 for them to be killed, through Kosta.
5 JUDGE RIAD: So you think this also could be
6 linked to -- if it's Kosta, then it could be linked to
7 Jelisic?
8 A. I assert that that is linked.
9 JUDGE RIAD: Thank you, Mr. Ramic. Thank
10 you.
11 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you very
12 much, Judge Riad.
13 Judge Rodrigues, you also have some
14 questions?
15 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Yes. Thank
16 you, Mr. President.
17 Witness Ramic, the bomb explosion and the
18 dead, you said amongst them there were no Serbs. Why
19 did you say that?
20 A. The explosion occurred early in the morning
21 of the 30th of April. During the month of April, it
22 was quite noticeable that citizens of Serb ethnicity
23 were leaving town, all of them.
24 When the explosion took place, it is only
25 then that we actually realised what was going on. They
1
1 knew that that would happen, so they left according to
2 a plan; that is to say that they were aware of the
3 danger involved.
4 The group of people who came over the bridge
5 was a group of people who were coming to see their
6 families. We have received information that members of
7 the Serb people had already been informed on all sides
8 about what could follow.
9 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Another
10 question: Were those dead buried? Was there a funeral
11 service for them?
12 A. You know, there was no funeral. There was no
13 official funeral. These dead were actually dismembered
14 bodies. So this was an enormous mass of people that
15 was there directly. They had come to the place where
16 the vehicle with the dynamite was parked. So these
17 were dismembered bodies, and we only managed to bury
18 these parts of bodies that were there.
19 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Yes, but
20 where were they buried? Where were those remains
21 buried?
22 A. You see, I could not tell you that for sure.
23 Please bear in mind that at that point, there was great
24 commotion in town, and I, as mayor, could not have
25 handled that at all. So an accurate answer would be:
1
1 I do not know exactly where this happened. But what I
2 do know for sure is that all the bodily remains were
3 gathered and taken to be buried at the cemetery, of
4 course, at the cemetery.
5 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] The
6 elections, who was the -- how did you vote in the
7 elections; that is, something about the elections. The
8 elections. Was it by secret ballot or not? How did
9 you vote in the elections?
10 A. Voting was by secret ballot, in accordance
11 with the laws that were then in force. There were no
12 problems with regard to the elections themselves. They
13 were held in a peaceful and democratic way.
14 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] My question
15 is: You said that you knew that some persons had voted
16 for the SDA. How is it, then, that you knew that?
17 A. Well, that could have been established after
18 the elections, after the elections were completed. We
19 received reports. That was no secret. That is to say,
20 at every voting post. This was according to regional
21 principles.
22 It was well known how many citizens would
23 come to vote there, what the ethnic composition was.
24 We knew all of that, and then we got the outcome of the
25 elections. So it was by pure mathematics that we could
1
1 ascertain that.
2 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Yes, but in
3 relation to some persons, to some individuals, is it
4 they who told you that they voted for the SDA?
5 A. Yes. There were such people too who did not
6 conceal that. There were such people who did not
7 conceal that, who said, "I had voted," and, "I shall
8 vote." There were some people who did not conceal
9 that.
10 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] So there
11 were some people who talked to you and said, "I voted
12 for the SDA," but could it also be possible that some
13 other people or those same people could have given you
14 a whole range of information concerning people who were
15 dead? Did they speak to you directly about those
16 deaths?
17 A. I did not quite understand this question.
18 Which people are you referring to and which death cases
19 are you referring to?
20 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] You
21 compiled a list on the basis of information which some
22 people gave you. You did not see with your own eyes
23 anybody kill anyone. So you said that these people
24 were dead because somebody had told you so.
25 My question is: If we are talking about this
1
1 same thing -- I mean, people confide in you. They're
2 with you and they're revealing a secret to you: "I
3 voted" or "I voted for the SDA." Could it be, under
4 the same circumstances that some other people or those
5 same people told you about a part of their lives, a
6 very private one, saying, "Yes, my father," or, "my
7 son, my brother, my friend was killed by so-and-so"?
8 Did those people tell you those stories directly, in
9 the same manner in which they told you about who they
10 had voted for?
11 A. Yes. That's right. There were a lot of
12 people who spoke that way.
13 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Right.
14 Then information, or at least some of this information,
15 was it told to you directly by eyewitnesses?
16 A. Yes. Yes. That's right.
17 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Another
18 question: I believe you admitted to having had
19 relations with people from other parties, and as a
20 mayor, did you also maintain relations with people from
21 the SDS before the conflict?
22 A. Yes.
23 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] In meeting
24 them, did those people, the SDS people, did they speak
25 to you about their concerns, about their wishes, about
1
1 their hopes, about their plans? Did you have any
2 information that would lead you to conclude that a
3 conflict would break out?
4 A. Yes. Yes. Yes. I can even tell you about
5 the details, if you wish.
6 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] More
7 specifically, did these people speak to you about those
8 10 per cent that you referred to in answering my
9 colleague, Judge Riad? Did they tell you that there
10 should be 10 per cent? Did they tell you about these
11 ideas, about their policy? Could you be more specific
12 about that and give us some detail?
13 A. Yes. Yes, I can. Of course, before the
14 conflict, none of them mentioned the percentage. We
15 found out about the percentage when the conflict had
16 already broken out, but from quite a few of them we
17 found out following: For example, I knew the president
18 of SDS pretty well, Dr. Vojnovic. My brother, Dr.
19 Ibrahim Ramic, was a colleague of his; they worked
20 together. Of course, they would see each other often
21 and talk.
22 In response to a question expressed directly
23 to him why they were doing that and why they needed a
24 Serb municipality of Brcko or a Serb region, he
25 answered that that is what those who were above him
1
1 required from him. He was referring to Karadzic,
2 Dr. Karadzic, who was president of the SDS of
3 Bosnia-Herzegovina, and that he had to carry that out.
4 In another conversation, when we agreed to
5 talk about a division, in response to my question as to
6 how we could carry out a division when the entire area
7 is inter-mixed and when three-quarters of the area is
8 covered by the Muslim people, his answer of this same
9 president of the SDS, Vojnovic, was, "If you do not
10 want to accept that, then that will be carried out by
11 force." He did not say that he would be it, but he
12 said that it would be implemented by force, meaning
13 someone would come to do it.
14 And a third point: When we talked about this
15 the last time, that was just before the mentioned
16 assembly on the 27th of April. I organised a
17 meeting -- and I said that here -- where I brought them
18 to; that is to say, the main people of the HDZ, the
19 SDS, and the SDA. There were about ten of us there,
20 and I mentioned Dr. Vojnovic was there as well, as well
21 as some other people. They even brought us maps of the
22 town, of the municipality, where they marked those
23 areas that they wanted to be the Serb municipality.
24 I said to them directly, "How are you going
25 to do this? This is Muslim. Can't you see?" How
1
1 could I say that to the Bosniak people, that that is
2 going to be a Serb municipality? I'm sorry, I haven't
3 finished yet.
4 One of them said in response to that -- I
5 would not want to mention his name because of his own
6 safety, but I can give his name -- he asked me that we
7 have a private conversation. That is to say, that is a
8 man who did not wish me personally any evil. That is a
9 man who knew me for many years. "Mustafa" -- that is
10 my name -- "Accept this. Otherwise, bad things are
11 going to come out."
12 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Right.
13 When you finished your television interviews, you
14 left. You said that your private -- and you went back
15 to your private car. You were already quite certain
16 that the conflict was about to break out, were you?
17 A. Yes. At that point, I understood that the
18 conflict had just begun. Until that point, there had
19 been no shooting. But during that television programme
20 the shooting had started, and I realised that nothing
21 more could be done.
22 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] And your
23 private car was there by chance or did you always keep
24 it there?
25 A. No. I explained that I asked for a meeting
1
1 with the garrison commander. He did not accept that.
2 He said that if I wanted to have a meeting with him,
3 that I should go to see him at the barracks, and that
4 was the reason my car was there, because I took my own
5 car to get to that meeting.
6 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Thank you.
7 Thank you.
8 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] You have
9 answered very many questions, and we -- before we
10 break, I should like to ask you: After you left the
11 television studio, you went to a village -- I didn't
12 quite remember the name -- between Brcko and Maoca. Is
13 that it? Is that the village that you went to? You
14 went to a cottage, to a villa or something --
15 A. Yes.
16 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] -- not far from
17 Brcko?
18 A. Yes.
19 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] How many
20 kilometres?
21 A. No. From the first moment, that very moment
22 when I got out of that part of town that was taken by
23 the Serb aggressor forces. It's not that the entire
24 town had been taken; the part up to the Brka River had
25 been taken. That was about two-thirds of the town.
1
1 They had not reached the other side of the river yet.
2 That part of town was not under their control.
3 I went there, and I stopped to see a friend
4 at the Brod settlement, which is on the outskirts of
5 the town of Brcko. Then he told me that -- my friends
6 and co-workers had informed me that I should go to
7 Gornji Rahic, if I make it there.
8 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Right. Right.
9 And you're out there in practically no time; is that
10 so?
11 A. Well, yes. It's 15 kilometres by car.
12 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Right. But I
13 was simply trying to bring your attention back to what
14 I'm going to ask you, and that is: Throughout that
15 period after you had moved to that village, which I
16 can't remember the name, were you kept abreast of
17 things that were happening and what had happened in the
18 camp of Luka? Because you were a Mayor, and as far as
19 I can understand, you were officially still the mayor.
20 Were you kept abreast of things that happened in Luka
21 -- that is, atrocities which had been committed -- and
22 also in other places, the Laser and other places? Did
23 you know about these things?
24 A. Yes.
25 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Did they also
1
1 speak to you about the role of the accused? Did they
2 speak to you about him? Did they say, "There's a man
3 called Jelisic who is committing these murders" or "Who
4 is behaving in this or that way"? Did they mention
5 him, or not at all?
6 A. We found about that very fast. During those
7 first days, yes, his name was mentioned. I cannot tell
8 you exactly which date this was, but I'm talking about
9 the first ten days of the month of May. His name was
10 already known.
11 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Did they
12 describe him? It has to do with the question asked to
13 you by Judge Riad. Was he described to you as an
14 executor or -- you know, in Luka there is somebody who
15 keeps it all under his control, who makes things
16 happen, and so on and so forth. How was he described
17 to you?
18 A. We think, and the information that we
19 received was approximately as follows: that he was
20 basically a person who executed things, that he was
21 receiving orders as well from persons who were above
22 him.
23 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Yes. Right. I
24 believe this has already been said. But in the -- did
25 people tell you that he was running the business at the
1
1 camp, more or less, that he had people under him and he
2 ordered them about, or was he simply carrying out
3 the --
4 A. Yes. He was the one who was issuing orders
5 to other people, yes. He had people that he was
6 issuing orders to.
7 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] He was ordering
8 it. I am asking the question, even though it may be
9 implicit from your answer: You never had an
10 opportunity of seeing Mr. Jelisic at close quarters and
11 being near him?
12 A. I think I never saw him.
13 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Right. Very
14 well. Right. First we have to thank you.
15 Mr. Nice, you wanted to say something? No?
16 I think it is time to adjourn, because it is already
17 ten past 1.00, but did you have some information to
18 give us?
19 MR. NICE: I'm going to suggest that after
20 lunch, the Chamber ensures that it has its copies of
21 the exhumation report, in French or English, with it,
22 because that's the first topic to which we will be
23 turning, and it would be inconvenient if you had to
24 have them retrieved from your rooms.
25 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] I not only have
1
1 the French version; I also have the English version.
2 It may seem superfluous, but, nevertheless, there are
3 some photographs, and I thank you very much for that.
4 [The Trial Chamber confers]
5 JUDGE JORDA: Judge Rodrigues reminds me that
6 you should try to talk to the Defence and try to
7 agree. I don't know if you did. Perhaps you can do it
8 subsequently. Perhaps you've discussed it. It's
9 already ten past 1.00, so I don't think we should stay
10 here.
11 At any rate, we should thank the witness for
12 coming here. What we could do is first ask the witness
13 not to move, but I should like to thank him for the
14 patience, of which he has given us proof, answering in
15 detail the questions of the Prosecution, the Defence,
16 and the Judges, and I hope that in your current life,
17 and in the future, you will manage to -- perhaps not
18 forget all these events, because they're not a thing
19 that one can forget, but I hope that having testified
20 here, you'll be able to find more peace and more
21 serenity in your future life. Thank you very much and
22 farewell back.
23 Now, I should like to propose we shall not
24 resume at 2.30 but at 2.45, in view of the time, and I
25 believe that everybody then will have a time to recover
1
1 a little; and then we shall, if need be, discuss about
2 your communication with the Defence, and I hope that my
3 colleagues will also have their reports ready by that
4 time. So at quarter to 3.00, 14.45. Thank you. The
5 session is adjourned.
6 --- Luncheon recess taken at 1.10 p.m.
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
1
1 --- On resuming at 2.50 p.m.
2 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] The hearing is
3 resumed. Please take your seats, and have the accused
4 brought in.
5 [The accused entered court]
6 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] I think we have
7 a new witness this afternoon, Mr. Prosecutor.
8 MR. NICE: The chair of the witness is
9 occupied by the usher --
10 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, please,
11 Mr. Nice.
12 MR. NICE: I apologise.
13 The chair of the witness is occupied by the
14 usher because this afternoon, by helpful co-operation
15 of the Defence, the exhumation report of Richard
16 Wright, dated the 23rd of August of 1998, subject to
17 very minor deletions, can be read, or, more accurately,
18 summarised, in its effect, to the Tribunal. The usher
19 is sitting in the witness's chair because although I
20 will read from the body of the report, which is quite
21 short, that refers to various figures that feature as
22 part of the report and certain photographs, and as they
23 are referred to, the witness will place them on the
24 ELMO so that the hearing remains truly public.
25 I trust the booths are all supplied with
1
1 copies of the report in the appropriate language, and I
2 will read such parts as it is necessary to read, being
3 corrected when I go too fast, and I will slow down
4 immediately.
5 First of all, the curriculum vitae of the
6 expert is set out in the body of the report. As the
7 report is unchallenged, as he is an eminent person in
8 his field -- indeed, he is a professor in his field,
9 from Australia -- it's not necessary to read out the
10 curriculum vitae unless either my learned friend or the
11 Court wish me to do so.
12 He sets -- the exhibit number to the report
13 shall become --
14 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] I beg your
15 pardon, Mr. Nice. I'm just looking for the curriculum
16 vitae, but I would like to thank the Defence for
17 cooperating with the Prosecutor on all essential
18 points.
19 And Judge Rodrigues has just shown me the
20 curriculum vitae, so that's all in order now. Thank
21 you. You may continue, Mr. Nice.
22 THE REGISTRAR: [No translation]
23 MR. NICE: I started what is page 2 in the
24 English version, paragraph 1, where the professor
25 says: "In June 1997, ICTY contracted me to assist in
1
1 their investigations at Brcko. Martina Fietz, an
2 investigator of the ICTY, took me to a place on the
3 outskirts of Brcko. She had information that there
4 were mass graves at that place.
5 "My instructions were to search for the mass
6 graves, supervise their exhumation, and report to the
7 ICTY. The field work was carried out during the period
8 of the 30th of June to the 15th of August 1997."
9 The report then identifies all the people who
10 assisted, and I turn to the next paragraph, location of
11 graves.
12 "The area with mass graves is located on the
13 southeast fringe of the town of Brcko, on the northern
14 bank of a small river named Grcica. This area is just
15 to the west of a sealed road that crosses the river
16 Grcica. The exact location is shown on Figure 1 as
17 'area with graves.'"
18 While the usher very helpfully places
19 Figure 1 on the ELMO, the Tribunal members may find it
20 helpful to turn to the back of the English volume, and
21 it is registry number, at the top right-hand corner,
22 630213. The Tribunal may already find the plan
23 familiar, for they will see on it, those marked in
24 black, the two roads running respectively south and
25 south-southeast from Brcko that we have looked at on
1
1 another map, and indeed that we looked at in order to
2 show the approximate area of the mass graves, and the
3 Tribunal will recall that on the bottom left-hand
4 corner of the map is the area of the Laser Bus Company,
5 just for orientation purposes only.
6 The Tribunal members may find it helpful to
7 keep a finger or a marker in the figure references, for
8 we will be running through them sequentially.
9 I return to the body of the report: "At the
10 place in question is a roughly level area" --
11 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Just a minute,
12 if you will. I'm looking at Exhibit 58, that you were
13 using, I suppose.
14 Very well; thank you. You may continue, and
15 I do apologise.
16 MR. NICE: Not at all. I'm sorry if I was
17 going too fast.
18 On 58 -- which we can always place on the
19 ELMO, but I think it's comparatively easy to follow --
20 there are simply the two roads running out of Brcko,
21 one almost south and one south-southeast, and the area
22 on the plan or map produced in the report matches what
23 we've seen. It's most easily identified by the
24 horizontal marks at the foot of the plan.
25 "At the place in question is a roughly level
1
1 area formed by the floodplain of the river. The area
2 measures approximately 100 metres by 40 metres.
3 "When I first saw it, the area had been a
4 place for the dumping of town rubbish and debris from
5 the demolition of buildings. The patchy covering of
6 vegetation consisted of weeds, the most conspicuous
7 species being Dwarf Elder."
8 "Figure 2," which is to be found at registry
9 page 630214, "shows topographic details of the area
10 resulting from our survey, together with the locations
11 of the subsequently discovered graves."
12 Figure 2, if I can offer this explanation
13 from contact with the witness, and it's
14 noncontroversial, you will see the axes of the plan
15 refer to northings, going from bottom to top, and
16 eastings, in metres, going from left to right. And as
17 is explained elsewhere in the report, mapping for these
18 purposes is achieved from a single fixed point from
19 which I think either all coordinates that are required
20 are made, or, alternatively, from which further fixed
21 points are identified, they then being used to map
22 further coordinates elsewhere.
23 This chart, Figure 2, shows elevations of the
24 area, and also identifies by the typed figures graves
25 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5, easily to be seen, although they
1
1 were yet to be discovered at the time that this survey
2 of the territory was conducted.
3 So if I can return to the discovery of the
4 graves and how it came about that they were
5 discovered. That's at paragraph 4. The Professor goes
6 on to say:
7 "We were unable to see any signs of graves
8 on the surface of the weed covered rubbish and
9 demolition debris."
10 "We therefore used a backhoe to dig deep
11 exploratory trenches, initially in three places. In
12 the course of digging the trench that is just to the
13 south of Grave 1 (see Figure 4)."
14 So one must turn to registry page 636216, and
15 look to the Figure 1 and to the narrow oblong shapes
16 that have been drawn on to this map.
17 "... just at the south of Grave 1 we
18 encountered a stratigraphic section that suggested that
19 a grave was nearby. The vertical section in the trench
20 showed, from the top down:
21 "0.5 metres of town rubbish;
22 "1.0 metres of demolition debris (bricks,
23 tiles, cement);
24 "a horizontal buried land surface on which
25 the demolition debris rested (this surface was covered
1
1 with grass, twigs and other humified material);
2 "pure and disturbed loess ..."
3 and I'm not sure of the pronunciation of that word,
4 it's defined as:
5 "... wind-blown silty clay dated from the
6 last Ice Age ... was seen to depths of half a metre."
7 The report goes on:
8 "Of particular interest in the search for
9 graves were lumps of clay. These were visible in the
10 section and rested on the buried land surface."
11 The Chamber will recall that that's the third
12 section down in this stratigraphic section that they
13 identified.
14 "These were visible in the section and
15 rested on the buried on the land surface."
16 The report goes on:
17 "Their size indicated that they had been dug
18 out of the underlying loess by machinery, then left on
19 the land surface that was subsequently covered by
20 rubbish and demolition debris."
21 "Acting on the assumption that these lumps
22 of clay had come from a mass grave, we expanded our
23 trenches. In this way we found Grave 1 in close
24 proximity."
25 He refers again to Figure number 4, which
1
1 shows a number of trenches being constructed in the
2 area of figure 1, which was, of course, the grave
3 subsequently to be identified.
4 The report continues:
5 "In summary, our observations indicated the
6 following sequence of events:
7 "Grave 1 was dug into the loess from the
8 then land surface;
9 "the grave was refilled with part of the
10 excavated clay, the surplus being left on the land
11 surface;
12 "the land surface, with the surplus clay
13 resting on it, was finally buried under 1.5 metres of
14 demolition rubble and town rubbish."
15 "The depth of debris on the buried land
16 surface precluded an immediate exhumation of Grave 1
17 and the search for other graves. Further investigation
18 was therefore postponed until we had bulldozed the
19 rubbish and demolition debris from the top of the
20 buried land surface. This bulldozing operation
21 resulted in a final appearance of the site that is
22 represented in Figure 3."
23 Which can be found at Registry page 36215.
24 It's a map that is similar to the previous figure and
25 probably of no particular significance now to the
1
1 Chamber in light of the fact that the history of
2 expiration of the graves is not challenged.
3 The report continues:
4 "After the bulldozing operation we were able
5 to commence the exhumation of Grave 1 and
6 systematically search the uncovered land surface for
7 further graves.
8 "Detailed examination of the now uncovered
9 land surface revealed four more graves visible in
10 plan. The graves were readily detected because they
11 had the following attributes that distinguished the
12 grave fillings from the surrounding undisturbed soil:
13 "a greenish blue filling, in contrast to a
14 light brown natural soil;
15 "blocky texture, in contrast with
16 homogeneity;
17 "upwardly seeping putrid water, in contrast
18 with dryness."
19 "These attributes were distinct enough to
20 make me confident that we successfully discovered all
21 the graves within the major area to the north of the
22 southernmost delimiting line in Figure 4."
23 That is the line at the bottom of that chart
24 viewed in the -- viewed with the writing the correct
25 way round, and it's the line, above which is the word
1
1 "Berm over shrubs." So he's saying he's confident he
2 found everything to the north of that line, and goes
3 on:
4 "That figure ..."
5 that is Figure 4:
6 "... shows our exploratory trenches, many of
7 which were put in to test local areas where the buried
8 land surface had not been fully exposed by the
9 bulldozer."
10 Those various trenches and short trenches are
11 easy to be seen.
12 The report continues:
13 "The only area about which I am not
14 absolutely confident is that shown to the south of the
15 delimiting line on Figure 4. As the label 'Berm over
16 shrubs' indicates, this is the place where we had to
17 pile up several thousand tons of bulldozed rubbish and
18 demolition debris. In most places we were able to
19 bulldoze this debris to a position that was south of a
20 line of shrubs and small trees. This vegetation, to
21 judge by its maturity, pre-dated the digging of the
22 graves in 1992. There was therefore little risk of
23 missing a grave beyond the margin of this vegetation.
24 "However I cannot be entirely confident that
25 we successfully pushed the berm completely over this
1
1 line, and therefore there remains some possibility that
2 we missed a grave close to this southern boundary of
3 vegetation."
4 "Exhumation Procedures", the next section of
5 the report.
6 "The following procedures were used during
7 the exhumation of the four graves that contained bodies
8 (a fifth grave had no bodies).
9 "Survey of graves, their contents, and
10 surrounding features was done with a Sokkia EDM
11 instrument.
12 "Surveyed coordinates of easting, northing
13 and elevation were global for the whole area under
14 investigation, resulting in three-dimensional
15 coordinates that are directly comparable regardless of
16 which grave was surveyed."
17 That, I think, relates back, if I can
18 interject, to what I summarised as a single fixed point
19 from which all three-dimensional coordinates could be
20 measured, either directly or possibly with an
21 indirect -- an intervening measuring post.
22 "Logs were kept for;
23 "complete, or virtually complete bodies;
24 "body parts;
25 "artefacts such as shell cases, wallets,
1
1 keys, and photographs.
2 "Sequential numbering of items in the log
3 was prefaced by the grave number (except for Grave 1,
4 which had no numbered preface)."
5 He sets out how that numbering system
6 operates, and I need not read that out.
7 And having dealt with the fact that
8 photographs were logged says:
9 "The scene of exhumation was videoed at the
10 start and close of the day. ICTY site custodians
11 guarded the scene at night.
12 "Multiple anatomical landmarks on each
13 complete body (e.g. head, left wrist) were surveyed in
14 three-dimensional space, allowing for the subsequent
15 reconstruction of the distribution of bodies within
16 each grave.
17 "The location of a body part was surveyed by
18 a single position in three-dimensional space ..."
19 of the grave.
20 I'll come back to the significance of that
21 with some visual demonstration shortly. The report
22 continues:
23 "For each complete body there was filled out
24 'Checklist for location, attitudes and properties of a
25 body'. Copies are included as Attachment 2."
1
1 This can be found immediately after the body
2 of the report at registry page -- the title page is
3 36141, but if we look at the first example, it's
4 36142.
5 I think I marked it with a yellow tag, if
6 that will help the usher. No, it's earlier than that,
7 much earlier. It's nearly at the beginning, you'll
8 find. It's one of the earlier yellow stickers. Thank
9 you very much.
10 Just as an example of how the work was done,
11 we can see, first of all, there's a tick for which
12 parts of this body had the coordinates recorded. There
13 are then circles for the position of the body, whether
14 it was on its front, whether it was extended, and so
15 on. There's references to its disarticulation; to its
16 skeletonisation; to the possibilities of cuts,
17 crushing, and burns; to whether the body was one where
18 there were prostheses; whether there were any material
19 artefacts; anything about clothing, in this case there
20 were underclothes over the knees of the body; and then
21 what conservation measures were taken, and there are
22 similar pages for each body that was found or part
23 body.
24 And I can return to the body of the report
25 which goes on to say that:
1
1 "Bodies and body parts were photographed in
2 situ, showing a scale.
3 "Bodies and body parts were put into a
4 locked chiller van, and delivered to Dr. Hunt, at the
5 Visoko morgue, for autopsy.
6 "Artefacts and exposed film were handed over
7 to the ICTY offices of at The Hague.
8 "At the completion of the work, the graves
9 were refilled and covered with the bulldozed debris."
10 Section 6 deals with the graves that were
11 found.
12 "Graves 1-3 and 5 have vertical sides, with
13 no entrance ramp. Bulldozers and front-end loaders
14 require ramps for entry into the hole, and of ramps
15 there was no sign. I therefore conclude that these
16 graves were dug by means of a backhoe that reached down
17 and scooped dirt out of the hole. Grave 4 was too
18 badly damaged (see below) to say how it was dug.
19 "Grave 1. A subcircular grave, measuring
20 approximately 6 metres by 4 metres in plan and 2 metres
21 deep. It contained 25 bodies.
22 "Bodies were distributed from top to bottom.
23 "There were no signs of disturbance to the
24 grave.
25 "Grave 2. A roughly rectangular grave
1
1 measuring approximately 10 by 6 metres in plan and
2 1.5 metres deep. It contained 23 bodies (but more
3 originally) and 2 substantial body parts.
4 "Bodies were distributed from top to bottom,
5 those in the southeast quarter being damaged during the
6 original refilling of the grave.
7 "This grave was severely disturbed after
8 original burial, resulting in the truncation of
9 existing bodies and the removing of an unknown number
10 of bodies across a trench 3-4 metres wide (see Figure
11 7) ..."
12 which we can find on Registry page 636231, and
13 photograph 13, which is very nearly at the end bundle.
14 If we can look at that, and without
15 necessarily troubling with the photograph, the figure
16 shows it, 6231. Thank you. That's on the ELMO. It
17 shows the remains of bodies to the right, bodies or
18 truncated bodies to the left, and then an area of
19 disturbance in the middle, with the possible line or
20 track of a right leg bone.
21 The notes to this page read:
22 " Stratigraphical and osteological
23 indications of secondary disturbance to Grave 2. A
24 north-south band across the grave contains no bodies.
25 There are indications of truncation to, and disturbance
1
1 of, the bodies in the undisturbed sections of the grave
2 to both the east and west of the area of secondary
3 disturbance.
4 "The image is adapted from a 3D diagram on
5 the disk attached ..."
6 I'll show that to you imminently.
7 Photograph 13 again shows a body remain, and
8 I think the intervening trench to the right of it. Not
9 intervening trench but the trench, the digging of which
10 led to truncation of bodies to the right.
11 So I can return to the body of the report
12 which says this:
13 "I identify this grave as the one
14 illustrated in a contemporary photograph of burial
15 published in the magazine 'Time' Vol. 147 No. 5 of
16 January 1996 (for a further discussion of this
17 identification see Section 8)."
18 Now, if the usher can very kindly find,
19 please, the page 06 -- it says section 8, but I think
20 we should look for section 6, in fact. If we turn to
21 Registry page 636230, the photograph on the left is
22 part of a photograph or of a series of photographs with
23 which the Chamber is already in part familiar because
24 it has seen the open grave at the time that it was
25 filled with bodies for the purpose, indeed, of looking
1
1 at a vehicle at that stage.
2 The photograph on the right is another
3 photograph, and I'll read what the report says of these
4 two figures, 6a and 6b.
5 "6a is the reproduction of a photograph that
6 appeared in 'Time' Vol. 147 No. 5 of 29th of January,
7 1996 ..."
8 "The caption states that the photo was taken
9 in 1992. Figure 6b is reproduced from a photograph
10 taking during the exhumation of Brcko Grave 2 in
11 1997."
12 The two figures reproduced above serve as a
13 key to match the identifications made from the original
14 colour photographs. The numbers on figure 6B -- that's
15 to the right -- signify the body numbers assigned
16 during the exhumations. On figure 6A, the numbers
17 serve as a key to the matches identified between the
18 two photos. The dark horizontal line at the top of
19 figure 6A -- and then one can see that to the right of
20 the young man's head, running a little lower than
21 horizontal, slightly at an angle -- the dark horizontal
22 line is the organic rich land surface from which the
23 grave was dug. The paler clay above the spoil dug
24 out when excavating the grave -- sorry; I'll re-read
25 that.
1
1 The paler clay above being the spoil dug out
2 when excavating the graves. Bodies 2BK08 -- that's the
3 top left body -- and body 2BK14, that's the body to the
4 right of that, protrude above this land surface. On
5 exhumation, number 8 was found to be truncated and
6 Number 14 to be decapitated, evidently by the machinery
7 used to refill the original grave. See photo 8 for
8 details of that.
9 Before I turn to Photo 8, just to conclude
10 this page, body 2bk19, which is at the bottom
11 right-hand corner, shows only as a leg and a foot in
12 6B. The remainder of the body lies obscured by a body
13 that does not appear in the Time photo.
14 So if we go then to photograph number 8,
15 towards the end of the bundle, and this is a further
16 and more detailed photograph of the decapitated body.
17 I can return to the body of the report at
18 English registry page 6129, to deal with Grave 3.
19 Grave 3 was "A circular grave, measuring approximately
20 5,5 metres in diameter and 3 metres deep. It contained
21 six bodies and two substantial body parts.
22 "Bodies were distributed from top to bottom."
23 Grave 4: "A subrectangular grave, measuring
24 approximately 8 metres by 3 metres. The original depth
25 is unknown because of severe mechanical disturbance to
1
1 the grave during an earlier removal of bodies. It
2 contained 12 bodies (but more originally).
3 "The original distribution of the bodies is
4 unknown. Bodies remained only at the northwest end of
5 the grave.
6 "Signs of mechanical disturbance were
7 observed at the southeast end of the grave."
8 Grave 5: "This grave measured approximately
9 4 metres by 4 metres in plan and 1,5 metres deep.
10 "No bodies were found in the filling of this
11 grave, merely a fragment of skull and some patches of
12 hair.
13 "There is no evidence that enables me to
14 decide whether (a) this was a grave that was used and
15 then emptied out, or (b) a prepared grave that was
16 never used but refilled.
17 "The latter explanation is not precluded by
18 the discovery of the fragment of skull and patches of
19 hair. The surface landscape at the time of the filling
20 of Grave 5 may well have contained isolated body
21 parts ..." And then it refers to Section 6 for the
22 damage done to bodies during the refilling of Grave 2.
23 7, Attitudes of the Bodies: "The bodies in
24 all the graves lay in a jumble. The attitudes of all
25 the bodies are portrayed in figures 5a to 51."
1
1 That can be found at registry page, in the
2 English version, 6217 and onwards. And if we just put
3 one of those pages on, please, it's number 5 in the
4 yellow stickers.
5 And again, since the report is -- Figure 5,
6 at the bottom, says -- it's the beginning of that
7 section.
8 The first page simply is an example of the
9 methodology whereby the position of bodies is recorded,
10 but since the report is not in dispute, we can turn to
11 the second page, registry page 6218, which shows some
12 six bodies and the various different and jumbled
13 position in which the bodies were found.
14 I return to the body of the report: "The
15 bodies show no sign of being carefully placed within
16 the graves. They face in all directions, lie on their
17 face and back, and have their limbs in disarray.
18 "Further details of the attitudes of the
19 bodies may be seen in the 3-D simulation of the bodies
20 in the graves contained on the computer disk" -- the
21 title of which is given, attached to the report, and I
22 can just show that for you, I think.
23 What you have here is the view from the top
24 of Grave Number 1, with, so far as possible, each
25 identified body being drawn out in a different colour,
1
1 so that the expert and his team took the coordinates of
2 the body parts -- head, shoulder, limb, foot -- charted
3 the positions of the bodies, both as to horizontal and
4 depth.
5 And this, it must be said, rather clever
6 piece of software enables us to do this, I think --
7 I'll have to do it slightly better -- you can move the
8 image so that one can look at the grave as if looking
9 at it side on, and indeed you can then swivel it round
10 and catch it in any profile that is helpful.
11 That's Grave 1. It's perhaps particularly
12 helpful in respect of Grave 2, which the Chamber will
13 recall is the grave said to have been disturbed by the
14 horizontal trench in the middle.
15 There you have the view from above, and if
16 I'm able to elevate the picture so that it's more or
17 less horizontal, you can see immediately that there is
18 a horizontal slice taken out, with bodies to the right
19 and some bodies to the left.
20 I'll quickly just show you what the computer
21 programme reveals for the other three graves. As far
22 as number 3 is concerned, the picture is this, and I
23 needn't do the swivelling exercise. The computer
24 programme will be available for the Chamber, and of
25 course my learned friend, if he wishes to explore it.
1
1 THE INTERPRETER: Would the counsel speak,
2 please, into the microphone?
3 MR. NICE: I'm very sorry. Yes, I will.
4 So that was number 3; this is number 4, which
5 perhaps can be seen as a less clearly defined grave at
6 the time it was explored.
7 And then, finally, number 5 -- I don't seem
8 to be able to manage number 5. Perhaps it wasn't dealt
9 with in this way. But that computer disk can be
10 produced as part of the exhibit and used, if it's
11 helpful. It's particularly helpful, the Chamber may
12 think, in relation to the disturbance of Grave 2.
13 The report goes on: "From the attitudes of
14 the bodies, I conclude that they were thrown or dumped
15 into the graves."
16 "Identification of Grave 2 with a
17 Contemporary Photograph," although I've taken you to
18 the passage where he dealt with this in the annex, the
19 report reads as follows: "The magazine Time" -- I've
20 already given the reference -- "published a photograph
21 that showed bodies being dumped into a mass grave. The
22 text of the article states that the photograph was
23 taken at Brcko in 1992.
24 "In the course of our exhumations, we
25 recognised that bodies at the southeastern end of
1
1 Grave 2 were lying in the same attitudes as those in
2 the Time photograph. Further confirmation of the
3 identification came from a comparison of the clothing.
4 "Photograph 7" -- that is Photograph 7, not
5 Figure 7, which we can find towards the end of the
6 bundle, "Photograph 7 shows the relevant part of
7 Grave 2. The relevant part is also signified on
8 Figure 7," which we've already looked at, and the
9 discussion he deals with, we've already read.
10 "I conclude," says the professor, "that
11 Grave 2 is the grave represented in the Time
12 photograph."
13 From now on, the report should not -- the
14 body of the report, that is, the text of the report --
15 should not be placed on the ELMO, because from the text
16 there have been one or two material amendments and
17 deletions, and therefore it shouldn't be displayed.
18 "The Demolition Rubble." "As already
19 discussed, the demolition rubble lay on the buried
20 ground surface and covered the graves to a depth of up
21 to 2 metres.
22 "There are five main components of the
23 demolition rubble: Bricks in their thousands; without
24 a depression for the cement; measuring 288 millimetres
25 in length, 143 millimetres in breadth, and 73
1
1 millimetres in thickness; they are unlike the bricks
2 used in modern buildings in the area.
3 "Tiles."
4 And then: "Broken cement blocks, often with
5 reinforcing steel rods. Some blocks are massive,
6 measuring up to 1,6 metres by 1,25 metres by
7 0,5 metres; their irregular form suggests that they are
8 broken-up cement foundations of large buildings.
9 "Dressed masonry blocks, some with obtuse
10 angled faces."
11 And finally he lists "Clay, mixed in with the
12 above, and evidently from the levelling of the site of
13 demolished buildings."
14 The next three lines in the English version
15 are excised, or edited out, and we turn to
16 Photograph 10, which may be displayed, please.
17 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] To the French
18 version, could we know which -- in French, we're on
19 page 12. I believe --
20 MR. NICE: I'm so sorry. I should have dealt
21 with this specifically.
22 Page 12, penultimate paragraph, beginning
23 "Les blocs" and ending in " tailles." So it's the
24 first two lines and three words are deleted.
25 JUDGE RIAD: Excuse me. Can we make it more
1
1 clear? It starts with "Les blocs de maconnerie"?
2 MR. NICE: Yes, and then it's deleted -- that
3 line, the following line, and the next three words.
4 JUDGE RIAD: [Interpretation] "... les blocs
5 tailles"?
6 MR. NICE: Yes.
7 JUDGE RIAD: Then what about the last
8 paragraph? "J'ai frequemment observe"?
9 MR. NICE: [Previous translation continues]
10 ... and I think it'll make sense.
11 There are two other editing deletions to
12 make, and I'll deal with this --
13 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Yes, you will
14 read it to us, because the Defence needs to follow. So
15 we have a block of cut masonry, of mason work.
16 MR. NICE: And with respect of Photograph 10,
17 the statement goes on to say, in English or in the
18 French version, at that third line of the
19 paragraph, "Precise measurements of angle are not
20 possible on such roughly dressed blocks, but our
21 approximately recorded estimates, done in the field,
22 were 145 degrees. If the true angles were in fact
23 144 degrees, then the blocks could have come from a
24 ten-sided polygonal structure.
25 "I have frequently seen such polygonal
1
1 structures forming minarets of mosques in Bosnia, but
2 have never seen such polygonal structures in secular
3 architecture.
4 "Elsewhere in Bosnia, I have seen bricks of
5 the type described above cemented to the inside of a
6 demolished minaret of a mosque."
7 That then brings us to the next paragraph,
8 which in the English and in the French has the first
9 sentence deleted. And in the French, in order to
10 reflect -- sorry; in the English version, in the
11 following sentence, the hyphenated words "non-secular"
12 should be edited out; that is, the second word of
13 the -- the second and third words of the third line of
14 this paragraph.
15 I think, in order to achieve the same effect
16 in the French, it will involve deleting the single word
17 "sacre" on the fourth line, so that as edited, the
18 report continues: "One other object is a tombstone,
19 inscribed in Arabic, was found in the demolition rubble
20 that we bulldozed off the buried landsurface
21 (Photograph 12)."
22 It is now on the ELMO.
23 The report --
24 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Excuse me,
25 Mr. Nice; if you don't mind, could you please read
1
1 again this whole paragraph in its final version?
2 MR. NICE: Certainly. This paragraph reads:
3 "One other object is a tombstone, inscribed in Arabic,
4 was found in the demolition" --
5 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] The whole
6 paragraph; excuse me. His observations, his
7 observations. "On the basis of the above observations,
8 I conclude ...."
9 MR. NICE: Yes, those two -- that first
10 sentence has, by agreement, been edited out, which is
11 why I didn't read it.
12 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] All right. So
13 that it begins with "One other object," and we strike
14 out "non-secular," or "sacre" in French.
15 MR. NICE: Exactly, sir.
16 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you very
17 much. I'm sorry. Pray continue.
18 MR. NICE: And the next paragraph is as
19 follows: "Most of the demolition rubble was brought to
20 the site after the filling of the original graves, and
21 also after the disturbances that removed some of the
22 bodies from Grave 2 and Grave 4."
23 And Photograph 11, the immediately preceding
24 photograph, please, shows that. We can see the rubble
25 there, and angled pieces of masonry.
1
1 "I base this conclusion on the fact that
2 none of the disturbance to those graves was visible in
3 the demolition rubble that overlay the graves.
4 However, a few of the aforesaid bricks were found in
5 the undisturbed deposits of Grave 4, indicating that
6 some bricks were in the area when the grave was
7 originally filled with bodies."
8 He then goes to deal with powder on the
9 bodies: "Martina Fietz ... told me that there was a
10 contemporary report of powder being sprinkled on
11 bodies, in order to reduce the smell.
12 "In Grave 2, we found a substance on the
13 bodies that may be consistent with that report."
14 Photograph 14, please, refers. It shows
15 excavated territory with a whitish colour to it.
16 The report goes on: "Three samples were
17 taken (the substance and controls) and submitted to the
18 Forensic Science Laboratory of the Netherlands for
19 analysis. The samples are ..." He gives the labels,
20 which I needn't read out. And as the origin, one
21 sample was the substance; the next was a control soil
22 5 centimetres distant from the substance, and the third
23 item was natural soil.
24 The report continues: "The laboratory's
25 report of the 10th of September 1997 concluded that the
1
1 substance of..." -- and that the substance that was
2 sent off -- " ... is consistent with being calcium
3 oxide.
4 "Calcium oxide, or quicklime, is used as a
5 germicide because it generates heat when it comes in
6 contact with water. The immediate residue of the
7 reaction is calcium hydroxide, or slaked lime.
8 "The problem with identifying the substance
9 as calcium oxide is that the bodies lay below the water
10 table in Grave 2. Calcium oxide is highly reactive
11 with water, and the bodies covered with the substance
12 lay below the water table in the grave. Calcium
13 oxide's high reactivity with water must therefore
14 preclude the substance surviving in the grave. I
15 therefore asked the forensic science laboratory to
16 examine the substance again.
17 "In a second report, dated the 3rd of August
18 1998, they conclude that the substance is more
19 consistent with being calcium carbonate. The control
20 samples merely contain traces of calcium, indicating
21 that the substance has chemical integrity and is not
22 merely some colour difference in the soil.
23 "Since calcium oxide ultimately reduces to
24 calcium carbonate in wet soil (via calcium hydroxide),
25 there remains the possibility that the original
1
1 substance was the germicide calcium oxide.
2 "Another widely used germicide is calcium
3 hypochlorite. That, too, reduces to calcium carbonate
4 in wet soil.
5 "Finally, the original substance spread over
6 the bodies might have been calcium carbonate in its own
7 right, though that has no germicidal properties.
8 "The most I can conclude is that an unusual
9 substance was found on the bodies in Grave 2 (unusual
10 in the sense that such a substance was not seen in the
11 other graves). If it was put there as a germicidal
12 agent, it could have been originally calcium oxide or
13 calcium hypochlorite, both of which undergo chemical
14 degradation in wet soil and end up as calcium
15 carbonate.
16 "Summary" -- and the Court will know that
17 the penultimate summary has been edited out, so I read
18 the balance: "In 1997 I supervised the finding and
19 exhumation of mass graves at Brcko.
20 "Four graves contained 66 complete bodies and
21 some body parts.
22 "I conclude from the attitude of the bodies
23 that they were thrown or dumped into the graves.
24 "Grave 2 is the grave that is represented in
25 a contemporary photograph from 1992, which shows bodies
1
1 being dumped into a grave.
2 "Soon after the graves were filled, attempts
3 were made to remove bodies from two of the graves. Not
4 all bodies were removed.
5 "After these attempts to remove bodies, a
6 few thousand tons of demolition rubble was spread over
7 the site to a depth of up to 2 metres."
8 Going straight to the last conclusion:
9 "The bodies in Grave 2 have a covering of a
10 substance that may have been used as a germicide to
11 stop the smell of decomposition."
12 That concludes that report, and thus the
13 evidence of Professor Wright.
14 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] All right.
15 There are no other observations, I presume.
16 MR. NICE: Mr. Tochilovsky is now in a
17 position to call the next witness, whose report, I
18 think, has also been made available to the Chamber.
19 With many thanks to the usher for his
20 assistance.
21 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Could you
22 please indicate which report?
23 MR. NICE: Professor Hunt.
24 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you. We
25 should also like to thank the usher. I don't think we
1
1 have it. Oh, yes. Thank you very much.
2 I should also like thank the Office of the
3 Prosecutor and the Defence for arriving -- for managing
4 to arrive at an understanding, an agreement, so as to
5 enable us to avoid calling in the witness.
6 MR. NICE: I should say, in respect of the
7 next witness, before Mr. Tochilovsky calls him, that we
8 have made arrangements to have him give evidence today
9 in the hope that he would be able to conclude his
10 evidence today. He is a very busy and eminent man with
11 many responsibilities, and I do hope he can be
12 concluded today.
13 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] All right.
14 [The witness entered court]
15 JUDGE JORDA: Right. Professor, can you hear
16 me?
17 THE WITNESS: Yes.
18 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Very well.
19 Will you please first remind the Tribunal of your full
20 name, your date of birth, your occupation, and after
21 that take the oath.
22 THE WITNESS: My name is Albert Charles
23 Hunt. I was born on the 26th of December, 1927. I am
24 a forensic pathologist. I'll take the oath.
25 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Excuse me,
1
1 perhaps -- will you first take the oath, please?
2 THE WITNESS: I solemnly declare that I will
3 speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the
4 truth.
5 WITNESS: ALBERT CHARLES HUNT
6 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you very
7 much. You may be now be seated. Thank you for coming
8 to this courtroom to participate in the process which
9 is conducted by the Prosecution in the International
10 Tribunal against the accused Goran Jelisic, who is
11 sitting on your left-hand side.
12 We called you here so that you could
13 contribute to this hearing, and Mr. Tochilovsky will
14 immediately proceed to asking you some questions.
15 MR. TOCHILOVSKY: Before we start with the
16 questions, can we have the number assigned to the
17 report that was distributed.
18 THE REGISTRAR: The report will be 61, 61A in
19 French and 61B for the B/C/S version.
20 MR. TOCHILOVSKY: Thank you.
21 Examined by Mr. Tochilovsky:
22 Q. Dr. Hunt, could you tell the Court about your
23 qualifications in the field of forensic pathology?
24 A. I am a Doctor of Medicine, which in my
25 country is a post-graduate qualification; a Fellow of
1
1 the Royal College of Pathologists. I have practised
2 forensic pathology since 1951. I have been a lecturer
3 in forensic pathology at the London Hospital; Leader in
4 Forensic Pathology at the University of Bristol; and a
5 consultant pathologist in the south-west of England,
6 with responsibility for the forensic pathology for
7 that. I am a member of the -- in fact, I'm the
8 Chairman of the British Government Committee on Quality
9 Assurance in Forensic Pathology, and from next month I
10 will be the current president of the British
11 Association in Forensic Medicine.
12 Q. Dr. Hunt, did you supervise during forensic
13 autopsies on human remains removed from a grave site in
14 Brcko?
15 A. I did, yes.
16 Q. Can you tell the court when and where the
17 autopsies were conducted?
18 A. The autopsies took place in a purpose-built
19 mortuary in Visoko, in Bosnia, from the 16th of
20 September until the 7th of October.
21 Q. Your findings are contained in the report
22 which was distributed -- a copy of which is before you;
23 is that correct?
24 A. Yes, a summary of my observations and reports
25 from the various pathologists who took part in the
1
1 investigation.
2 Q. Just in general about the procedure and
3 methodology which were used, were they widely
4 recognised proceedings? What kind of proceedings did
5 you follow?
6 A. Yes. We try to follow the most perfectionist
7 and those ideal investigations, and I think that they
8 satisfied everything that is mentioned in the
9 Minneapolis order. It's called -- the Minnesota, I beg
10 your pardon, recommendations. It probably went further
11 than them.
12 We X-rayed, with a fluoroscope or with
13 ordinary X-rays, every single body part, and every body
14 part was fully examined.
15 Q. How many bodies were examined?
16 A. The total represented 70 bodies. I say
17 represented, because some of them were fragmented.
18 There were a few other body parts which could have come
19 from other bodies, but we were unable to -- in other
20 words, we were unable to say whether or not they came
21 from one of the 70 or whether they represented some
22 other bodies.
23 Q. Out of those 70 bodies, how many of them were
24 males and how many females?
25 A. There were, in fact, 9 females, leaving
1
1 61 males. I should qualify that, Your Honours, by
2 saying that two of the ones that we regard as female
3 are not a hundred per cent proven. They are probably
4 female.
5 Q. What was the age group of the victims,
6 according to your findings?
7 A. The males were preponderantly in the age
8 group 25 to 40, with a sort of peak really between
9 25 and 35. That applied to the females, but as there
10 were a fairly small number of females, the significance
11 of that is difficult to say.
12 Q. Were there any identity documents found with
13 the bodies?
14 A. Yes. Five of the men were carrying identity
15 documents.
16 Q. And the names -- these are the names which
17 can be found on page 7 of your report?
18 A. Yes. To assist the Court, I made a very
19 short summary of each case, and the ones that I
20 identified have been cross-hatched, I mean the ones
21 that had identity papers. It doesn't mean that they
22 were theirs, but they are the cross-hatched ones.
23 Q. According to page 7, these are the names
24 Almir Tursic, Sakib Becirovic, Franjo Vugrincic, Mehmed
25 Grozdanic, Muhamed Mujanovic.
1
1 A. That was what the various documents said,
2 yes.
3 Q. What were your findings in regard to the
4 clothing of the victims?
5 A. Well, first of all, two stood out, as they
6 were dressed in pyjamas. Two men were in their
7 pyjamas.
8 One victim was dressed in what appeared to be
9 a kind of military clothing. When he was X-rayed, in
10 fact by Professor Crane from Belfast, a hand grenade
11 was identified -- which we stopped working in the
12 autopsy room for a little while -- and he was also
13 carrying a rifle ammunition.
14 One another body, male body, had a much
15 decomposed jacket which -- shirt, rather, which had a
16 camouflage pattern, but whether there was a fashion
17 camouflage or a military one, it was impossible to
18 tell; the clothing had deteriorated too much.
19 Otherwise, the men were in sort of ordinary,
20 everyday clothing, often with jeans and bomber-jacket
21 or shirt.
22 The females -- the first body, actually, from
23 the graves was a female, and there was no obvious
24 clothing on the body. There was a rolled up -- sort of
25 crumpled up strip of cotton which was obviously
1
1 decomposed, but it didn't appear to be an item of
2 clothing. We kept that so that it could be examined,
3 if necessary, later.
4 Our experience of the other bodies makes one
5 think that she was probably put in the grave
6 unclothed. If she had been scantily clothed in a
7 material that rots easily, such as cotton or wool, that
8 is a possibility; in other words, that she might have
9 been scantily or lightly clothed when she was put in.
10 The other women were dressed in ordinary,
11 everyday clothing.
12 Q. Were there any other exceptional findings
13 among the male victims?
14 A. Yes. There were several that stood out as
15 being somewhat different from the others. If I can
16 just refer to my notes at the moment.
17 For example, one we had, when found in the
18 grave site, a pair of handcuffs on his left wrist.
19 When we saw the body, the anthropologists, because the
20 handcuff had come off, had put the handcuffs into a
21 container. And as I've already said, two victims were
22 wearing pyjamas.
23 One victim from the second grave site had two
24 bullet wounds very close together. I can show you a
25 photograph of these, Your Honours, but it was
1
1 exceptional inasmuch as they were only sort of half an
2 inch apart and, therefore, must have been fired, I
3 guess, with the muzzle -- or probably fired with the
4 muzzle of the gun very close to the head, as if he'd
5 been fired at twice in quick succession, because
6 otherwise, they wouldn't have been so close.
7 We kept all the bullets for ballistic
8 examination because, as I'm sure you are aware,
9 pathologists are not ballistic experts, and our
10 speciality is the wounds caused by the bullets rather
11 than the bullets themselves. So most of the
12 pathologists preferred not to describe the bullets. In
13 summary, most of them were jacketed military ammunition
14 or military-type ammunition.
15 But two of the victims, at least, and
16 possibly others, appeared to be shot with more than one
17 type of ammunition. In other words, although we didn't
18 know what it was in exact ballistic terms, we knew that
19 there were different types of -- two different types of
20 bullet present in the bodies.
21 Q. With regard to injuries of the male victims,
22 can you summarise the procedure?
23 A. All but four had been shot. Of the four, one
24 had no head, so he might have been shot.
25 As far as the women were concerned, one of
1
1 them was only 13, and that was actually one of the ones
2 that was in doubt as to the sex, because it's very
3 difficult to sex bodies of that age except by DNA
4 testing, which we did take, but I don't think that had
5 actually been pursued.
6 Of those, only four had been -- I'll check
7 that -- yes. Four had been shot. We didn't find a
8 cause of death in two, and in one there was a stab
9 wound, I guess a fairly wide-bladed knife, in the
10 centre of the back. It had actually cut through one of
11 the ribs, and the cut in the clothing was still
12 visible, as was the cut in the decomposed soft tissue.
13 So, I mean, it was an absolutely classic stab wound
14 through the lower part of the chest cavity at the
15 back.
16 Q. All but five male victims had been shot?
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. Can you tell the Court what was the
19 predominant position of the gunshots?
20 A. The predominant position of the gunshots were
21 in the head, and of those, 20 of them had been shot in
22 the back of the head.
23 Q. In those instances with more than one shot in
24 the head, would the first head shot have caused the
25 victim to fall?
1
1 A. In the great majority of cases they would.
2 Q. The findings of these injuries can be
3 found -- diagrams on pages 11A and 11C. These are the
4 diagrams that reflect the positions of gunshots?
5 A. Yes. I would emphasise, of course, that
6 these are two-dimensional diagrams because there is no
7 software package that I know of that can produce a
8 three-dimensional picture of so many. So they are
9 approximations.
10 Q. May we have the usher's assistance in putting
11 on the ELMO the diagrams which are pages 11A, 11B,
12 and C. So this is 11 --
13 A. 11A.
14 Q. The next is -- the next page, 11B, and the
15 last page, 11C. So these diagrams actually show the
16 predominant position of gunshots was in the back of the
17 head?
18 A. Yes. But, I mean, there were many other
19 shots as well and, of course, this multiplicity of
20 shots is not the sort of thing you see in combat.
21 Q. One of my following questions, but first:
22 Does your findings suggest that the shooting was random
23 or deliberate?
24 A. Inasmuch as there seemed to be a deliberate
25 targeting of the head and upper chest, this would
1
1 appear that most of the cases must have been
2 deliberate.
3 Q. Is it possible that the injuries were caused
4 in combat?
5 A. No. I think one of the characteristics of
6 combat injuries is that they're not usually so
7 multiple, and they don't predilect for the head and
8 upper chest in this way.
9 Q. Were there any bomb fragments and metal blown
10 into the bodies?
11 A. No. We knew that there had been an explosion
12 on the bridge in Brcko, and we did carefully -- we did
13 carefully look for the possibility of metal fragments
14 or any other fragments blown into the bodies. Of
15 course, one of our experts was Professor Crane from
16 Belfast, who is particularly expert in this subject.
17 Q. Finally, with regard to your Table 1, summary
18 of your findings, on page 7, 8, can we have those pages
19 put on the ELMO? Page 7 where Table 1 starts.
20 Could you explain to the Court, please, the
21 system you used on this table?
22 A. Well, first of all, the serial number is the
23 same ones referred to as Professor Wright. A lot of
24 them had zeros in front, because of course when you
25 start an investigation, you don't know whether you're
1
1 going to go over 10 or not, so I've taken those out for
2 clarity.
3 The age in all these cases was assessed by
4 anthropological data. Sometimes the pathologists
5 thought they could make an assessment as well, and most
6 of the anthropological data are plus or minus five
7 years, and so I have just taken an arithmetic mean of
8 that to make the table easier to understand.
9 The sex, I think, is self-explanatory, and
10 the other, the number of shots. And then other
11 injuries, which were actually quite seldom -- there
12 were some with odd injuries, like one man who had a
13 little depressed fracture in his forehead, and one or
14 two with fractured limbs, and some with fractured ribs,
15 in fact, but they were all thought to be probably
16 post-mortem because of the weight of material on top of
17 them.
18 Q. This table continues on page 8 and 9; is that
19 right?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. On page 10, are these the charts you referred
22 to when you mentioned the age of the group --
23 A. Yes, these were prepared by the
24 demographic unit --
25 Q. Can we have the page?
1
1 A. Page 10; sorry.
2 Q. Page 10?
3 A. They were prepared by a demographic unit
4 here, who had figures for the age and sex distribution
5 of the normal population, as a survey in 1991, so that
6 we could show in the bottom two diagrams that this
7 diagram here is a different pattern from that diagram
8 there, showing, as I've already said, that there was an
9 undue number of males of that age group, 25 to 40,
10 represented in the graves.
11 I mean, for example, for all we know, there
12 may have been an excessive number of males in the
13 population, but of course the census shows that there
14 weren't.
15 Q. And page 11, Table 2.
16 A. That, again, to help to summarise the whole
17 thing and save us having to go through hundreds of
18 reports with a -- well, 70 reports -- was a summary of
19 where the shots were. And as you see, 11 of the men
20 had a single shot in the head; 11 had several shots in
21 the head, with no shots elsewhere; 19 had shots in the
22 head and shots elsewhere; and only 10 were shot in the
23 body alone.
24 Q. So the first three lines, with head shots?
25 A. Yes.
1
1 Q. Thank you, Dr. Hunt.
2 MR. TOCHILOVSKY: Your Honours, I have no
3 further questions.
4 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you.
5 Mr. Greaves? But before that, I would like
6 to suggest that we take a break. I think we've been
7 working for quite some time. I apologise,
8 Mr. Greaves.
9 So let us take a 20-minute break now. I
10 adjourn the hearing.
11 --- Recess taken at 4.12 p.m.
12 --- On resuming at 4.34 p.m.
13 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] The hearing is
14 resumed. Please have the accused brought in.
15 [The accused entered court]
16 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Mr. Greaves, I
17 give you the floor.
18 Cross-examined by Mr. Greaves:
19 Q. Dr. Hunt, I'm going to go through -- fairly
20 logically through your report with you, if I may.
21 Could I direct you first of all to -- and yours is the
22 English version -- page 6, a section headed "The
23 Autopsy Findings," with a subparagraph, "Degree of
24 Decomposition."
25 A. Yes.
1
1 Q. And can I direct you to paragraph 2 of that
2 heading --
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. -- in which you deal with the inability to
5 reach an accurate estimation of the time of death.
6 A. Quite.
7 Q. Would you be prepared -- and if you're not
8 prepared, say so -- be prepared to venture any
9 parameters or ranges of dates for the bodies that were
10 found in those graves?
11 A. I think the most one could --
12 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone for the witness,
13 please.
14 A. Hello? Yes.
15 I think all one can ever say is perhaps more
16 than a year and less than five or six, that sort of
17 wide distribution.
18 MR. GREAVES:
19 Q. Thank you. Can I now ask you to go to
20 page 7, please, a paragraph headed "Identification."
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. Do you have any note of the nature of the
23 identity documents that were found with those bodies?
24 A. They would all have been listed -- they were
25 all listed in the logs, and I doubt if I actually do
1
1 have any details. They would have been documents that
2 were recovered from the clothing, and I don't think
3 that I have these. I'm sorry.
4 I do have some, anyway. In the case of Almir
5 Tursic, there was one ID card with a photograph, three
6 cards, a bunch of keys, and a press cutting.
7 It really depended upon whether the
8 pathologist who did the examination made a note of it.
9 Yes, the 2BK7, which was Besirovic, there was
10 a medical card and a note, "Born 1942."
11 In the case of 13, that is Grazdanic [phoen],
12 there was a wallet containing documents and an ID card
13 with the name Mirsanovic [phoen], Muhamed, date of
14 birth 10/3/41.
15 In 19, that is Vugrincic, there was a watch,
16 a pocketbook with some loose papers, a leather pouch,
17 and a metal box which contained a rubber stamp, and the
18 stamp apparently had the name upon it. That was the
19 evidence in that case.
20 And 3BK5, there was an identification card,
21 an ID card, but I have no other details in these
22 notes.
23 Q. Thank you. Can you tell us this: Was any
24 attempt made to match ID cards to the body, or had
25 matters gone too far to enable that --
1
1 A. Oh, yes.
2 Q. -- exercise to be carried out?
3 A. You could not recognise any from photographs.
4 Q. Thank you.
5 A. I mean, you know, from the photographs on the
6 ID card.
7 Q. Dr. Hunt, page 10, please, the demographic
8 page.
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. Just two quick matters. The bulk of these
11 victims, just so it's clear, men of military age; would
12 that be a reasonable description?
13 A. Entirely.
14 Q. And although, obviously, we can't tell what
15 the real motive for killing was, on the basis of the
16 information we have there, because of the preponderance
17 of males of a particular age, the only inferences that
18 it would be right to draw from that would be selection
19 by sex and age?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. Page 11, please. A paragraph headed "Range
22 of Fire."
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. Just so that it's absolutely clear, what
25 you're saying there is that it is possible, in any
1
1 case, that the range from which the firearm which was
2 used to cause the bullet wounds, anything from very
3 close to the furthest range of modern military weapons?
4 A. Yes. The only reservation is, of course,
5 that if wounds are close together, it's more likely to
6 have been done at short range because you can do that
7 better. But apart from that, what I really meant in
8 this paragraph was from scientific evidence, you can't
9 tell. In other words, you would normally look for
10 powder blackening and all the rest of it. That, you
11 couldn't see; they were too decomposed.
12 Q. The closeness of the shots, I think a
13 firearms expert would call that "grouping"; is that a
14 phrase you're familiar with?
15 A. Oh, yes.
16 Q. And, of course, if you're an expert shot, you
17 can do that at greater ranges than someone who is not
18 well trained?
19 A. Oh, yes.
20 Q. Yes. Thank you.
21 Then the final paragraph on that page, which
22 is in a paragraph headed "Direction of Fire," and is
23 the fourth paragraph of that.
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. The reconstruction of the injuries, can you
1
1 help me about this: You refer to the limitations of
2 autopsy evidence; can you describe what those
3 limitations are, please?
4 A. Well, the main limitation of autopsy evidence
5 over direction is that quite a small movement of the
6 body can alter the apparent direction of fire. For
7 example, if a bullet is coming to you at that
8 direction [indicates] and you turn slightly there, it
9 looks as if it's coming from that direction.
10 Q. Yes.
11 A. And so one can never give a very accurate
12 direction.
13 Q. Can I just ask you, there is one thing that I
14 was puzzled about, and it may be that there's a very
15 simple answer to it. On page 11B, there is a body
16 identified as 2BK1, which just has, to the right-hand
17 side of the box, a question mark. Can you just tell us
18 what that is?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. Because I couldn't find a reference to it on
21 your key.
22 A. I think it was that we weren't sure, but I'll
23 just check that, if I may -- 2BK1 -- I did this report
24 so long ago, I have not got an -- as far as I can
25 recall, that question mark meant that I wasn't quite
1
1 sure from which direction the bullet had gone, or the
2 pathologist wasn't.
3 Yes, I have to go right back to the original
4 notes, that -- as far as I can recall, the -- he didn't
5 actually -- he had a shot through his leg, and there
6 was a hole in his abdomen which was thought, as far as
7 I can recall, to be, but I would -- perhaps I shouldn't
8 have put it in as a query, but as a negative.
9 Q. Thank you. At page 12, please, Dr. Hunt.
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. At the top, you have this little diagrammatic
12 assessment of how a head shot can --
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. -- produce misleading information.
15 A. Yes, and in fact that was what I was doing --
16 Q. I was going to ask you that. It applies
17 equally as a principle to body shots as it does to head
18 shots, or indeed, limb shots?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. It very much depends where -- if a body is
21 lying on the ground and moves, it can produce a
22 misleading track?
23 A. Yes. And for example, if somebody points a
24 gun at you, you are quite likely to do that, or that,
25 or that [indicates]. You can't tell.
1
1 Q. Yes. Looking at some of your diagrams,
2 Dr. Hunt, there are a number -- would you agree with
3 this -- a number which have head-shots which appear to
4 have arrived, and of course subject to your views of
5 the misleading nature of the tracks, but some which
6 have arrived from an acute angle; i.e., higher up than
7 the victim?
8 A. Oh, yes.
9 Q. In the course of your work, have you seen
10 injuries caused, for example, by a sniper -- sniper
11 fire from the top of a building, or seen it described
12 in medical literature, or anything like that?
13 A. I don't think there's very much evidence
14 of -- published evidence that I know of of the effects
15 of sniper fire, but one has always assumed that a
16 sniper takes one shot, but I suppose he could take
17 other shots after the body is on the ground.
18 Q. That was one question that I was going to
19 ask; for example, if he shot the person in the head, a
20 good shot in the head from, say, four metres, a body
21 falls, appears to be alive, possibly he could put a
22 second or third round into it to make absolutely sure?
23 A. Yes. As I said, I know the literature very
24 well, and I have never come across any accounts of
25 sniper fire injuries.
1
1 Q. Possibly your colleague in Northern Ireland
2 might be better versed in that.
3 A. That's a good point. I must ask him, yes.
4 But he hasn't published it, I know.
5 Q. Thank you. Again on page 12, reference to
6 non-gunshot injuries, paragraph in the middle of that
7 page.
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. Post-mortem injuries. How might those have
10 been caused?
11 A. With hundreds of tonnes of masonry on top of
12 the grave site. There must be pressure downwards. If
13 you have a hard object, like a head on somebody's chest
14 and it's pushed down, you can crack your ribs. In
15 other grave sites I've seen in other places apart from
16 this, sometimes many of the chests have been crushed
17 after death.
18 Q. Thank you. The next paragraph deals with one
19 particular body, one BKB13, and you make an observation
20 at the final paragraph of page 12:
21 "Although these non-gun shot injuries are
22 consistent with having been caused in life, the
23 possibility that they were caused after death cannot be
24 excluded."
25 What were the indicia that lead you to
1
1 conclude that, in fact, those injuries were ante-mortem
2 as opposed to post-mortem?
3 A. Well, first of all, the curious mark in the
4 skull would have had to been done by a fairly sharp
5 object. I suppose it could be done after death with
6 appointed pickaxe or something of that nature.
7 Q. We've heard a description of the grave sites,
8 that they were dug out by a kind of digger with a
9 rear --
10 A. What we call a JCB.
11 Q. A JCB with tines on the end of it. Could
12 that be the kind of injury we're talking about?
13 A. I don't think so, because it was a quite a
14 small dig into the bone. It wasn't very severe.
15 Q. Yes. Thank you. Page 13, please. The
16 single body wearing -- which I think was minus its
17 head, wearing military-style clothing and the one that
18 caused, I suspect, a momentary panic in the autopsy
19 room, the gentleman with the hand grenade?
20 A. Yes. That's right.
21 Q. A reasonable inference from the nature of his
22 injuries and the state in which he was found is that
23 was somebody who was killed in action?
24 A. Well, he was certainly carrying military
25 equipment when he was killed. How he was killed, I
1
1 don't know.
2 Q. If he had been detained for any length of
3 time, it's likely, isn't it, that he would have been
4 searched by his captors and the hand grenade removed
5 from him. So the circumstances suggest someone killed
6 and buried almost immediately after death?
7 A. I'm no more qualified to say that than
8 anybody else.
9 Q. Right.
10 A. But it sounds very obvious.
11 Q. Thank you. The other one with military
12 clothing, you made a remark about it could have been
13 fashion camouflage. Young men, young women wearing
14 modern military-style clothing.
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. Not really a very good idea in a war zone to
17 be dressed up in fashion camouflage clothing, would it
18 be fair to say?
19 A. No. But in my experience in other parts of
20 Bosnia or Croatia, is that very often clothing was
21 short and you wore what you could lay hands on. So I
22 just don't know.
23 Q. Of course. As far as all the others who were
24 in either civilian clothing -- and I leave out of this
25 question the ones wearing pyjamas -- were any tests for
1
1 firearms residue possible or carried out or, again, had
2 they gone beyond that state?
3 A. They had gone beyond it, and for
4 identification purposes and for finding injuries, we
5 decided that there would be no traces and, therefore,
6 it would be safe to wash them. So they were all washed
7 and dried.
8 Q. You say that you considered that there would
9 be no traces. Is that because of the length of time
10 that had elapsed or because you made an assumption
11 about the fact that they were civilians that they were
12 unlikely to have been --
13 A. Purely on the length of time and --
14 Q. I see.
15 A. -- the fact that they were soaked in
16 decomposition material.
17 Q. I see. So on that basis, it could not be
18 excluded that they had, in fact, been involved in some
19 form of military activity, albeit, in civilian
20 clothing?
21 A. I can't exclude that, obviously.
22 Q. Thank you. Page 13 again, under the
23 paragraph labelled "Exceptional Findings Amongst the
24 Male Victims". Subparagraph 4.
25 A. Yes.
1
1 Q. The ammunition was, as far as you can recall,
2 obviously of the military type?
3 A. Yes. In other words, military ammunition, by
4 the Geneva Convention, has to be fully jacketed and
5 this was all fully jacketed. Not all, most of it.
6 Q. Most of it. Of course you're not a
7 ballistics expert, and I don't want to put this to you
8 in a ballistic expert's way, but was it obvious because
9 some of them were small, for example, 9 millimetre-type
10 rounds, and others larger calibre things, but what was
11 it that led you to say they were obviously different?
12 A. They were of a different calibre. There were
13 small ones and big ones in the same body in this these
14 two cases.
15 Q. Yes.
16 A. And I -- in ordinary practice, one would
17 expect them all to be examined balistically, but I
18 believe in this instance they haven't been. Most of
19 the pathologists felt that it wasn't their expertise.
20 Q. Page -- yes. Sorry. Can you just tell us
21 how many of the total fell into that category, in other
22 words, bodies where more than one type of ammunition
23 was recovered?
24 A. Definitely two, and in some the pathologists
25 said, "I wonder if this is two sorts?" And we said,
1
1 "It will be examined by the ballistics expert." So
2 there were impressions in several and definitely
3 different in two.
4 Q. Thank you. Page 14, Dr. Hunt. Below the
5 table, Table 4, you make some observations in the third
6 paragraph thereafter about females who had no bullet
7 wounds to them.
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. It would be right, wouldn't it, that those
10 remarks apply equally to male bodies found without
11 bullet wounds?
12 A. Oh, yes.
13 Q. As far as natural disease is concerned,
14 you've made the observation that it is unlikely in that
15 group, but can you just go and agree with me that as
16 you put it, it can't be excluded? Something more, was
17 an assessment made with or without information about
18 the incidence of natural disease in the population of
19 Brcko in 1992?
20 A. It was made without any information as to the
21 incidence of natural disease, but in the world in
22 general, there isn't all that much that kills youngish
23 women. There's tuberculosis and all those things we
24 wouldn't have been able to exclude.
25 Q. Yes. Next, if I may ask you to move to your
1
1 conclusions page, please. I want to deal, first of
2 all, with paragraph 5. It may have been a slip on your
3 part. The evidence that you gave was that all but four
4 were shot, but your report says, "All but five have
5 been shot," and then there's the qualification about
6 one of them.
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. Can you just confirm that -- you said all but
9 four. That may have been a slip and it just --
10 A. Yes. If it was in my report, which I did
11 with all great care, it would have been five.
12 Q. Thank you. As to paragraph 7, you speak
13 there of a predominance in both sexes of shots in the
14 head. Would you accept that the number of wounds, head
15 wounds that you found -- if I'm got the math wrong, I'm
16 sorry -- but 80 for head wounds and for body and limb
17 61 or 63, because I think one body had two or possibly
18 four wounds in it?
19 A. I'm sure you've counted them accurately --
20 Q. Yes.
21 A. -- and give or take a few. I don't think we
22 would argue.
23 Q. Would that reflect the balance, as it were?
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. You used the phrase: "This finding is
1
1 against the possibility that the shooting was random."
2 What do you mean by the phrase "random", if I can ask
3 you that, please?
4 A. I think in combat, for example, and, in fact,
5 there have been several publications in the last couple
6 of weeks from the International Committee of the Red
7 Cross that in combat, the wounds are distributed much
8 more widely across the body, while in deliberate
9 shootings there tend to be a predominance in the head
10 and upper chest. That's been my experience in Croatia,
11 for example.
12 Q. Yes.
13 A. But I would emphasise that these are only
14 sort of indicators rather than proof.
15 Q. There was a period in Sarajevo when there was
16 a serious problem with snipers in Sarajevo. Was any
17 literature published about injuries in connection with
18 that?
19 A. No, not to my knowledge.
20 Q. Using your expertise, would this be
21 reasonable proposition: If there were killings by a
22 sniper, does that imply, first of all, a degree of
23 expertise on the part of the shooter; and secondly,
24 would that indicate a rather better expertise at
25 placing shots in bodies, both head and heart, for
1
1 example?
2 A. Well, again, and I wouldn't know any better
3 than anybody else, but obviously the better shot you
4 are, if you are aiming at the head -- I was taught
5 during the Second World War that you aimed at the
6 biggest portion rather than -- you didn't aim at the
7 head, you aimed at the biggest target.
8 Q. The advice for the ordinary infantryman, I
9 suspect.
10 A. Exactly.
11 Q. And although you say, "Suggests deliberate
12 killing at short range," again, to make it absolutely
13 plain, you cannot exclude, in any case, the possibility
14 that it may be a rather longer range than close?
15 A. No. In any one case, I don't think one can
16 say this. It's just overall, the fact that the shots
17 were grouped in the way I've described, it's very
18 suggestive.
19 Q. Yes. You talked about, in paragraph 8, the
20 most likely explanation being someone felled by the
21 first shooting and then shot again on the ground.
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. Is it also equally possible where, for
24 example, you have someone with both head and body shots
25 or head and limb shots, is it possible that somebody
1
1 was shot first through the body and fell and was then
2 shot again in the head?
3 A. Yes. Whether you fall when you're shot in
4 the body is a matter of debate. There's been also
5 recent work that -- for example, it doesn't depend upon
6 muzzle velocity, and the old idea that if you have a
7 large calibre, high-velocity thing it knocks the person
8 over by its force doesn't actually apply. So it's
9 difficult to say whether you fall with one body shot,
10 but most people do, but not necessarily.
11 Q. A fair number of the ones who were shot in
12 the body are multiple shots, are they not?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. Yes. And the likelihood of falling increases
15 with the numbers of shots to the body?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. You've talked about characteristic combat
18 injuries and that you didn't feel that these were
19 they. Can I just, by way of example, look at example
20 1BK7, which I think is on page --
21 A. The table is page 7.
22 Q. Yes. Page 11.
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. There, for example, we have four body-shots
25 at approximately a similar angle of travel --
1
1 A. Yes. It's --
2 Q. -- depending on the direction?
3 A. Yes. It's a rather misleading picture
4 because it looks like they've gone right through the
5 body. What it says in the footnote just means that the
6 pathologist wasn't capable of saying whether it came
7 from the front or the back. Of course, if you're using
8 an automatic weapon --
9 Q. That's my next question.
10 A. -- you can achieve this sort of result.
11 Q. Yes. A heavy-calibre machine gun would
12 produce that sort pattern quite easily?
13 A. Yes, or an assault rifle.
14 Q. Yes.
15 A. Or a hand-held machine pistol like the
16 Heckler.
17 Q. In this day and age those would produce
18 characteristic combat injuries?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. Thank you. Do you want to just give me a
21 moment, please?
22 MR. GREAVES: Thank you. I have no further
23 questions.
24 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you for
25 being concise, Mr. Greaves.
1
1 Mr. Tochilovsky.
2 MR. TOCHILOVSKY: Just one question, Your
3 Honours.
4 Re-examined by Mr. Tochilovsky:
5 Q. Dr. Hunt, the question from the Defence and
6 then your answer, and then I will ask my question. The
7 question was: "Although we cannot tell what the real
8 motive for the killing was, on the basis of the
9 information we have here, the only inference that it
10 would be selection by sex and age," and your answer to
11 this question was, "Yes."
12 My question is: Are you in a position to
13 exclude any other motives for the killings such as the
14 ethnicity of the victims, for instance?
15 A. Such as?
16 Q. Such any other motives for the killing of
17 these victims, such as ethnicity, let's say, of the
18 person?
19 A. No. I would qualify that, of course. The
20 fact that there were nine -- probably nine women, and
21 what the motivation for of killing those women is -- in
22 civilian practice, it would not be uncommon.
23 Q. So with your qualification, are you in a
24 position to provide the Chamber, the Court, with a
25 motive for the killings?
1
1 A. No.
2 Q. Thank you very much.
3 MR. TOCHILOVSKY: I have no further questions
4 Questioned by the Court:
5 JUDGE RIAD: Thank you, Mr. President.
6 Dr. Hunt, I would have a question concerning one of
7 your conclusions. It is number 7 in the summary of
8 conclusions. In it I find one affirmation and one
9 suggestion.
10 You say, in number 7, the second sentence:
11 "This finding is against the possibility that the
12 shooting was random." This is an affirmation: "And
13 suggests deliberate killing at a fairly short range,"
14 which the counsel for the Defence asked you to, let's
15 say, change into or question whether it could be at a
16 rather longer range.
17 Now, whether it was at a rather longer range
18 or at a shorter range, the fact is that it was not at
19 random, it was some kind of execution.
20 A. That was my opinion, Your Honour. I think
21 what I was trying to say to the Defence was that in a
22 particular instance one can't say that the range is
23 such, but when one takes the whole picture together,
24 it's remarkable that you would have been able to
25 achieve these results by firing at a distance.
1
1 JUDGE RIAD: So the distance here does not
2 exclude the fact that it's an execution?
3 A. I would go further and say that taking the
4 whole picture of all the cases together, it does
5 suggest that, overall, most of them must have been
6 executions in the sense that they were deliberately
7 killed, if you define execution in that way.
8 JUDGE RIAD: Thank you very much, Dr. Hunt.
9 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Judge
10 Rodrigues?
11 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Good
12 afternoon, Professor Hunt. I should like to go back to
13 the question of age of that group.
14 The Defence asked you --
15 A. Could you repeat the question?
16 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] I should
17 like to go back to the question of the age of the
18 individuals found in this common grave.
19 You said that they were of a military age.
20 Could it also be the age of procreation or the working
21 age?
22 A. Of course that is another interpretation and
23 there are probably other interpretations.
24 JUDGE RODRIGUES: Another question: So the
25 direction of bullets, of shots, which we see on
1
1 pages 11 to 11B and 11C, if there were sniper shots,
2 could one say if it was one sniper only or several
3 snipers?
4 A. In some cases, if a sniper had shot the
5 person so that they fell, other injuries could have
6 occurred. But in other cases, the body would have to
7 have kept moving to achieve this result, because once
8 they fell on the ground, all the injuries would have to
9 come from the same direction, roughly, as the shot in
10 the head.
11 So I must say, none of us ever considered the
12 possibility of sniper fire, and I find it difficult to
13 think that that is so.
14 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Another
15 question: If there were wounds made by bullets of
16 different calibre, did they come from the same
17 direction? Do you think these bullets came from the
18 same direction or from different directions?
19 A. I don't think we -- in fact we were not able
20 to tell, because in ordinary practice, you find the
21 wound in the skin, and then you find the bullet, and
22 you can say roughly the direction it came; because in
23 these bodies, you could seldom see the exact -- you
24 couldn't see the entry wound at all, because of
25 decomposition. So you found the bullet, and it could
1
1 have come, sometimes, from anywhere. In that
2 particular case, no one was prepared to say from which
3 direction.
4 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Those
5 bullet wounds in the head which you noted, in the back
6 of the head, were they made by one and the same
7 calibre, all of them, or by different bullet calibres?
8 A. The ones in the head always appeared to be of
9 the same calibre. But as I said before, one would need
10 to have a ballistics opinion to say whether it was the
11 same weapon or not.
12 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Those are
13 all the questions I had. Thank you very much.
14 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you,
15 Professor. I believe you have time to catch your
16 plane. You are not a ballistics expert; you come from
17 the scientific community, however, too, but you have
18 really addressed this properly.
19 I also have a question. We know the
20 difference between fire at close range and at a
21 distance, but the entrance wound of a bullet fired from
22 a -- would the entrance wound, would the crater made by
23 the wound inflicted by a bullet coming from close range
24 or from a greater distance be the same? Would both
25 such bullets make the same crater?
1
1 A. They probably wouldn't, but we wouldn't be
2 able to tell. It is not possible to say that a bullet
3 was at 400 metres or 1 metre, from studying the
4 injuries. It can only really be done by ballistic
5 examination, because the muzzle velocity of modern
6 weapons is such that even at a distance of, say, three
7 or four hundred metres, the velocity of the bullet when
8 it hits the head is the same as if it's fired from
9 there [indicates], and I don't think you could tell the
10 difference.
11 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you,
12 Professor. You invested a great deal of good will and
13 all your competence and qualifications, and I should
14 like to thank you on behalf of our colleagues. And I
15 wish to thank both the Prosecution and the Defence for
16 being able to focus, really, on the most important
17 elements, aspects of your testimony.
18 Now we shall thank you, and goodbye,
19 Professor. Thank you very much once again.
20 And I should like now to ask the Prosecution
21 to call in the next witness.
22 THE WITNESS: Thank you for your kind
23 remarks, sir.
24 [The witness withdrew]
25 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] We shall work
1
1 until quarter to 6.00. I believe we should really make
2 the most of our precious time. I believe it is a
3 protected witness; that is what the registrar tells
4 me. So do you have something to tell us?
5 Meanwhile, I suggest that we adjourn for five
6 minutes so that the courtroom could be prepared for the
7 next witness.
8 MR. NICE: Yes, as far as I know, the next
9 witness is available; yes, he seeks protection. I'm
10 confident that we can conclude him --
11 JUDGE JORDA: Very well.
12 MR. NICE: -- tomorrow morning, and indeed
13 move beyond him to one of the remaining two bits of
14 evidence before the case for the Prosecution
15 concludes.
16 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Very good. All
17 right. In that case, we shall adjourn for five
18 minutes.
19 --- Recess taken at 5.18 p.m.
20 --- On resuming at 5.25 p.m.
21 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] The session is
22 resumed. The accused is here; we can now resume.
23 You are a protected witness. Can you hear
24 me, Witness? I'd like to say good afternoon to you.
25 You're first of all going to check that it is your name
1
1 written on the piece of paper that we're going to hand
2 to you. Don't pronounce your name, because we don't
3 want it heard in the public gallery. Just verify that
4 it is your name.
5 Have you shown the witness the piece of
6 paper? Yes? Give us a sign.
7 THE WITNESS: Yes.
8 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] And now, please
9 take the oath, according to the formula that is going
10 to be handed to you.
11 THE WITNESS: Respected Tribunal, I solemnly
12 declare that I will speak the truth, the whole truth,
13 and nothing but the truth.
14 WITNESS: WITNESS R
15 [Witness answers through interpreter]
16 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you,
17 Witness R. You may be seated. Thank you for coming.
18 Sit down, please.
19 You are in front of a Tribunal, in front of
20 Judges. It is the International Tribunal. The
21 Prosecutor has asked you to come, and it is the case
22 against Mr. Goran Jelisic, who is sitting to your left
23 in the box of the accused. And we're going to ask you
24 some questions.
25 Please feel relaxed; feel calm and serene.
1
1 In doing so, if you become tired at any point, we shall
2 interrupt. We won't be going on for very long this
3 afternoon, just for a quarter of an hour, and we're
4 going to continue tomorrow morning.
5 I give the floor to Mr. Nice.
6 Examined by Mr. Nice:
7 (redacted)
8 (redacted)
9 (redacted)
10 (redacted)
11 (redacted)
12 (redacted)
13 (redacted)
14 (redacted)
15 (redacted)
16 (redacted)
17 Q. What date was that?
18 A. It was the 15th of May, 1992.
19 Q. On arrival home, did you find some other
20 people there?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. How many, and tell us who they were, by
23 composition.
24 A. There were five people. I did not know
25 them. They were all men, and there was one woman, a
1
1 young girl.
2 Q. Her name, as you subsequently discovered it?
3 A. I subsequently learnt her name, although I
4 did not know any of the people there at the time.
5 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] I should like
6 to ask that a certain -- some information be deleted by
7 the registrar.
8 THE REGISTRAR: Yes, Mr. President.
9 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Please
10 continue, Mr. Nice.
11 MR. NICE:
12 Q. Of the men, did you get to know the name of
13 one of them in due course?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. He was, by name?
16 A. Goran.
17 Q. And his last name? Did you get to know that?
18 A. Later on.
19 Q. And the name was ... ?
20 A. Jelisic.
21 Q. How was he dressed? What, if any, arms was
22 he carrying?
23 A. He was wearing a uniform which seemed to me
24 to be a policeman's uniform. He had a weapon, but at
25 the time I did not know what kind of weapon.
1
1 Q. Subsequently you discovered the type of
2 weapon was a what?
3 A. A Scorpion.
4 Q. What did he say to you?
5 A. At the time, Goran asked me for my personal
6 identification papers, my ID card, my driver's
7 license. As I say, my driver's license, and my car
8 keys.
9 Q. At the time he spoke to you, were you inside
10 your house, or was it before you got into your house?
11 A. Before I got into the house.
12 Q. So what was the result of the request for
13 these items from you?
14 A. I said that I was coming back from a dzenaza,
15 a funeral, and that my things were in the house.
16 Q. Who went into the house?
17 A. Goran went in, and the rest went in after
18 him, but he stopped them. He told them to wait.
19 Q. What did he do inside the house?
20 A. I went in front.
21 Q. And Jelisic? What did he do?
22 A. Jelisic followed me in. I went into the
23 house, where my documents were located. I went into
24 the room, as I say, where my documents were.
25 Inside the house, he asked me if I had any
1
1 money. I said I did. I took my papers and I gave them
2 to him. I gave him my car keys as well.
3 Q. And how much money was there?
4 A. My personal money, about 15.600 German
5 marks. Some of the money was in German marks, some was
6 in Swiss francs, and some in dollars. All in all,
7 there was about 15.600 worth of German marks there.
8 And of the community that I worked for, their money was
9 460 marks -- not belonging to me, that is.
10 Q. Did you hand all that money over to him?
11 A. First of all I gave him the money belonging
12 to the religious community, and later on I gave him my
13 own money as well. That is to say, first of all I
14 showed him where the money belonging to the religious
15 community was located, and then I gave him my own
16 money.
17 Q. At the time that he was doing this, were the
18 other people he'd arrived with, Monika and the two men,
19 were they outside and out of sight?
20 A. Three men were outside, and Monika, and they
21 stayed outside. I couldn't see them because my flat is
22 on an upper storey.
23 Q. So the money having been handed over to
24 Jelisic, just explain this: Did he, in due course and
25 in your presence, reveal to the others that he had
1
1 taken this money from you, or not?
2 A. He offered me a receipt for the 410 marks,
3 but I didn't say anything, and he didn't give me any
4 receipt.
5 Q. Did he ever, in your presence and in the
6 presence of the other three people, reveal to them that
7 he had taken money from you?
8 A. No. He just mentioned the 410 marks; that is
9 to say, he mentioned the receipt for the money, but I
10 said no, and then he said, "Well, for this 410 marks,"
11 and I just kept quiet, and so he didn't give me a
12 receipt of any kind.
13 Q. After the search, were you ordered to go to
14 Brcko?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. Was your daughter present at the time?
17 A. My two daughters were present, and my wife,
18 and four refugees whom I had taken in from Brcko. They
19 were all females.
20 Q. Was one of your daughters disturbed and
21 emotional about what was happening?
22 A. Both of them were disturbed, but my younger
23 daughter grabbed Goran by his left hand and begged him
24 to let her father stay.
25 Q. Just tell me, by the time this happened, on
1
1 the 15th of May, had information about what was
2 happening at Brcko, and in particular at Luka, had that
3 reached you?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. I'll return to that later. It's not in the
6 summary, but I'll come back to that later.
7 Did you travel in your own car -- before I
8 come on to that, what was Jelisic's manner when he
9 spoke to you at this time? Excited or calm?
10 Aggressive or peaceful? Just tell us.
11 A. He was fairly calm at that particular moment,
12 although when my daughter took him by the hand and
13 begged him to leave me, with his right hand, in which
14 he held his pistol, the Scorpion pistol, it seemed to
15 me that he was going to hit her at that point, but he
16 didn't.
17 Q. You were taken to Luka; did you travel in
18 your own car? If so, by whom was it driven?
19 A. An individual who had come with him drove my
20 car. And Goran, when leaving the house, he said, "Here
21 you are, here's the house, here's the car; take it out
22 of the garage, Simo." And then I learned that his name
23 was Simo, and Simo drove us to Luka. I sat in front,
24 and two soldiers whom I didn't know, and the young
25 girl, whom I also didn't know, they sat behind.
1
1 Q. When you got to Luka, did you go into an
2 office?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. Who was in the office?
5 A. At the time, I came upon Dzevad Huseinovic,
6 whom I knew from Brezovo Polje, and I also found
7 another individual wearing a police uniform. Two other
8 men with Dzevad, and Goran himself.
9 Q. Did you get the names of any of the other
10 men?
11 A. I apologise, but I can't hear you very well.
12 Q. My mistake. Did you get the names of any of
13 the other men?
14 A. I just learnt about someone called Kole, the
15 one wearing the police uniform.
16 Q. And did you discover what his relationship
17 was to the woman, Monika?
18 A. No, I did not.
19 Q. In the office, was there a desk?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. And --
22 A. Two desks. One was -- that is to say, one
23 was a round table, and another was what square table,
24 at which Goran sat.
25 Q. Was there anything on the desk in front of
1
1 Jelisic?
2 A. A lot of papers, but I didn't pay attention
3 to the desk itself. But I do know that it was covered
4 with a lot of papers, documents, folders, and so on.
5 Q. What did Jelisic do? Did he do anything in
6 respect of the papers?
7 A. When I went in, no, he did not.
8 Q. Later?
9 A. Later on, yes, he did.
10 Q. We'll perhaps come to that a little later.
11 Was there a telephone there?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. Did he use it at all in your presence?
14 A. Yes, he did. Three or four times.
15 Q. Can you remember the detail of the phone
16 calls that he made, or not?
17 A. Well, he would just say briefly, "Yes, all
18 right, that's right"; a similar response.
19 Q. Were you obliged to stand, or were you
20 allowed to sit?
21 A. As soon as I went into the room, I was told
22 where I was to sit, and I sat down.
23 THE WITNESS: I apologise just for a moment,
24 but the headset is falling off my head. I have the
25 feeling that they're going to fall off. Could you
1
1 adjust them, please? I do apologise.
2 Thank you.
3 MR. NICE:
4 Q. Apart from Jelisic, the man Kole, and the
5 other man who was with them, was there also the man
6 Dzevad, whom you've already spoken of, in that room?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. Was he standing, or sitting?
9 A. He was sitting down. There were two chairs,
10 and he sat on one of them.
11 Q. And his hands, was there some particular
12 position so far as his hands were concerned?
13 A. Yes, he had handcuffs on them.
14 Q. Were people in the room trying to do
15 something about those handcuffs?
16 A. Well, they tried to take the handcuffs off,
17 to free his hands.
18 Q. Did they succeed, in your presence, in doing
19 that?
20 A. At that moment, no, they didn't.
21 Q. I think, then, the questioning of you began.
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. Before we come to the questioning -- and it
24 may be, with the Court's leave, that will be tomorrow
25 -- but before we come to that, from the manner of his
1
1 speaking on the telephone and from the way the other
2 two men who weren't being detained, like you and
3 Dzevad, were concerned, what authority or otherwise did
4 Jelisic appear to have?
5 A. That was the beginning, so I wasn't able to
6 assess this straightaway, but it seemed to me that --
7 that is to say, his behaviour was dominant, as if was
8 under his control.
9 MR. NICE: I don't know if that would be a
10 convenient moment to break. If it is, I would seek
11 leave, at least to ask the witness to adopt the
12 summary, which he has yet to do -- and I ought to have
13 done that right at the beginning of his evidence --
14 before I forget it. If the witness might have the
15 summary in front of him. He's already got it.
16 Q. That summary in front of you Witness R, is
17 that a document you've gone through paragraph by
18 paragraph? Not now but earlier today and yesterday and
19 so on?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. Do you adopt it as an accurate document?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. Thank you very much.
24 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Very well.
25 Well, we'll stop for today. I hope you have a pleasant
2 I'd like to remind you that tomorrow is
3 Friday, so we shall be starting at nine. I adjourn the
4 hearing until then.
5 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at
6 5.45 p.m., to be reconvened on Friday,
7 the 17th day of September, 1999
8 at 9 a.m.
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25