Page 47927
1 Thursday, 2 October 2014
2 [Defence Closing Statement]
3 [Open session]
4 [The accused entered court]
5 --- Upon commencing at 9.02 a.m.
6 JUDGE KWON: Good morning, everyone.
7 Yes, Ms. Pack.
8 MS. PACK: Your Honours, if I may, I wanted to correct a matter
9 on the transcript for the 30th of September. At transcript pages 47797
10 to 98, in answering Your Honour's question concerning the Defence brief
11 paragraph 2549, I said the only individual -- that only individual C on
12 Karadzic's list had been included in Dusan Janc's figure of 5977
13 identified individuals in the Srebrenica graves. In fact, individual D
14 is also included in that figure. And for that I refer you to P4771,
15 page 119, entry 132, and page 279, entry 20. And also Janc's testimony
16 at T26949 to 51 and 26965, and P4771, page 6. And, Your Honours, similar
17 to C, KDZ045 only heard but did not see that D was killed in the woods.
18 And the cite is KDZ045, and the transcript reference is 22678.
19 I'm very grateful. That's the only matter.
20 JUDGE KWON: Thank you, Ms. Pack.
21 Yes, Mr. Karadzic -- oh, yes, Mr. Robinson.
22 MR. ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. President, I'll be addressing you at the
23 beginning of this session.
24 So first of all, let me first answer the Trial Chamber's
25 questions that were communicated to us last Friday by your Legal Officer.
Page 47928
1 Most of the questions were directed to the Prosecution and I'll only
2 address those that were expressly directed to us. But should the
3 Trial Chamber wish to hear our position on any of the questions posed to
4 the Prosecution, please let us know and Dr. Karadzic or I would be happy
5 to address those questions.
6 I think that Dr. Karadzic has already addressed your question
7 number 2 at least twice yesterday concerning efforts by Bosnian Serb
8 authorities to control paramilitaries.
9 With respect to question 7 concerning two victims from Brcko, you
10 addressed your question to the Prosecution but you asked us on Tuesday
11 whether we had any issue with the Prosecution's explanation. We do.
12 Now, here's your question. You asked with respect to Brcko that
13 the Chamber had received death certificates for P4411, P4412, from the
14 bar table, which in the Prosecution's submission were linked to incident
15 B5.1. But there appears to be no other evidence linking these persons to
16 the killing incident. And you asked does the Prosecution have any
17 submission in this regard. And Mr. Tieger conceded that there was no
18 evidence that the first victim died at Luka camp as charged in scheduled
19 incident B5.1, but this is what he said with respect to the second
20 victim. He said that the victim was among the victims buried in a mass
21 grave in Brcko which is listed in Avlijas's 22 October report, P1607.
22 And he said that Ristanic had agreed and testified that the victims in
23 that report were non-Serb civilians who were killed in Brcko, including
24 at Luka camp and similar places. And he cited P3023, paragraphs 220 to
25 223. But let's look at those exhibits.
Page 47929
1 P1607, the report from Avlijas, says simply that these people
2 died during combat activities in Brcko. P3023 is the amalgamated
3 statement of the Prosecution witness Mr. Ristanic. At paragraph 221, he
4 stated that:
5 "Those were people who were killed by Jelesic and that sort of
6 people and some of those people actually died in combat activity."
7 Then in paragraph 222 he was asked:
8 "It's true, though, isn't it that they have been killed and
9 executed in and around Brcko including places like camp Luka, places in
10 and around the police station and other notorious killing sites?"
11 And he said: "Yes."
12 Now, your question was about schedule B5.1, which charges the
13 killing of a number of men in Luka camp between the 8th of May and the
14 6th of June, 1992. So do these two exhibits prove that the second victim
15 was killed in Luka camp? Absolutely not. There's clearly insufficient
16 evidence to conclude that the victims died at Luka prison which is the
17 only scheduled incident for Brcko.
18 Now, for question number 9, you've asked us in essence whether
19 our submissions on Counts 9 and 10 were intended to apply to alleged
20 murders in Sarajevo charged in Counts 5 and 6. And the answer is yes.
21 Finally, in question 14, you've asked us about the impact of the
22 Prosecution's disclosure violations on any sentence that might be imposed
23 upon Dr. Karadzic if he's convicted. As you know, on 73 occasions so far
24 in this case you've made a finding that the Prosecution has violated its
25 disclosure obligations. On some occasions you recessed the trial for
Page 47930
1 several months to give the Defence time to prepare based upon the late
2 disclosure. And you've asked us whether -- you've asked us why those
3 delays in Dr. Karadzic's trial ought to result in a reduction of his
4 sentence when he would be given credit for the time he's served during
5 such delays in any event. However, it's our position that there is no
6 correlation between the two. In those cases in which the Appeals Chamber
7 or Trial Chamber have reduced a sentence for undue delay, the defendant
8 has been given credit for the time served in any event. This includes
9 the Barayagwiza case, known as the Prosecutor versus Nahimana at the
10 ICTR, involving a delay in bringing the accused before a judge after his
11 arrest in Cameroon, and the Kajelijeli case, also from the ICTR,
12 involving a delay in bringing the accused before a judge after his arrest
13 in Benin. Both received significant sentence reductions for the
14 violation of their rights in addition to the credit for the time that
15 they'd served. We say that it's important for the Trial Chamber to
16 provide a remedy for the massive violations of the Prosecution's
17 disclosure obligations, not only to benefit Dr. Karadzic, but to send a
18 clear message to this and future Prosecution teams that such violations
19 will not be tolerated.
20 I would like now to talk to you about genocide. It's my
21 respectful submission that Dr. Karadzic is not guilty of the genocide
22 charges in Count 1 and 2 of the indictment. Let's look at the definition
23 of genocide. It's Article 4 of the ICTY Statute. And it means "any of
24 the following acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in
25 part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group, as such ..."
Page 47931
1 And the pertinent acts for our case is:
2 "Killing members of the group";
3 Causing them serious bodily or mental harm; or
4 "Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life
5 calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part."
6 But it's the special intent to destroy the group that
7 distinguishes genocide from other serious crimes such as extermination
8 and persecution.
9 The Appeals Chamber has held that genocide is one of the worst
10 crimes known to humankind and its gravity is reflected in the stringent
11 requirement of specific intent. Convictions for genocide can be entered
12 only when that intent has been unequivocally established. And that's the
13 Krstic appeals judgement at paragraph 134.
14 Now, Count 1 charges Dr. Karadzic with genocide in seven
15 municipalities during 1992: Bratunac, Foca, Kljuc, Prijedor,
16 Sanski Most, Vlasenica, and Zvornik.
17 After the Prosecution had presented all of its evidence, this
18 Trial Chamber ruled that there was no evidence upon which a reasonable
19 trier of fact could find that the acts of killing, serious bodily or
20 mental harm, and conditions of life inflicted on the Bosnian Muslims
21 and/or the Bosnian Croats in the municipalities were perpetrated with the
22 intent to destroy required for genocide. And it's our submission that
23 nothing has occurred which would cause the Chamber to change its mind
24 about the Prosecution's evidence.
25 One thing that did occur was that the Appeals Chamber reversed
Page 47932
1 the decision of the Trial Chamber and held that there was some evidence
2 on the record which, taken at its highest, could support a finding of an
3 intent to destroy on behalf of Dr. Karadzic and other members of the
4 alleged joint criminal enterprise.
5 The first question then is: What is the impact of the Appeals
6 Chamber's judgement on the decision to be made by the Trial Chamber at
7 the end of the case? The Appeals Chamber itself emphasised that a
8 judgement of acquittal --
9 JUDGE KWON: Just a second.
10 [Trial Chamber confers]
11 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Robinson, bearing in mind the translation, if
12 you could slow down a bit.
13 MR. ROBINSON: Yes.
14 JUDGE KWON: Please continue.
15 MR. ROBINSON: The Appeals Chamber itself emphasised that a
16 judgement of acquittal at the end of the Prosecution case should only be
17 entered when there was no evidence capable of supporting a conviction,
18 that its conclusions regarding evidence before the Trial Chamber are
19 taken at the highest, and that the question of whether the evidence would
20 meet the standard of beyond a reasonable doubt remained open.
21 It's our submission that the Prosecutor's evidence, while
22 sufficient to overcome a motion for judgement of acquittal at the end of
23 its own case, is insufficient to sustain a conviction requiring proof
24 beyond a reasonable doubt.
25 And it's useful to look briefly at the evidence that the
Page 47933
1 Appeals Chamber cited as examples of possible genocidal intent. It
2 specifically referred to evidence of Prosecution Witness KDZ051, a
3 Bosnian Muslim detained in Veljko Vlahovic school in Rogatica, who
4 claimed that he was told by Sveto Veselinovic, a Bosnian Serb municipal
5 leader, that during meetings with Dr. Karadzic it had been decided that
6 one-third of the Muslims would be killed, one-third would be converted to
7 the Orthodox religion, and one-third would leave on their own. Now,
8 understandably in its final brief, the Prosecution no longer relies on
9 this hearsay evidence to establish genocidal intent.
10 This is Sveto Veselinovic. He came and testified during the
11 defence case. He said that he was never at the Veljko Vlahovic school,
12 he never made such a statement, and that he never heard Dr. Karadzic make
13 such a statement. Therefore, the evidence from Witness KDZ051 cannot
14 support a finding of genocidal intent beyond a reasonable doubt.
15 The Appeals Chamber also relied upon a statement made at the
16 Bosnian Serb Assembly on the 24th-26th of July, 1992, by Dr. Karadzic
17 that there was some truth to what had been said presumably by a deputy
18 named Miladin Nedic. Mr. Nedic had said that "the Muslims have been
19 planted to us as a people whose executioners we are to be."
20 Now, while one reasonable inference from this evidence is that
21 Dr. Karadzic found some truth in the idea that European governments were
22 trying to manipulate the Serbs, which was the thrust of Nedic's remarks,
23 in fact Mr. Nedic came and testified during the Defence case. He
24 testified that he in no way advocated genocide against the Muslims. If
25 he didn't understand it that way, how could Dr. Karadzic?
Page 47934
1 The Appeals Chamber also cited to statements made by Dr. Karadzic
2 about what would happen if the war started in Bosnia. These statements
3 are now what the Prosecution relies on to prove his genocidal intent.
4 They include intercepted conversations in September and October 1991 with
5 Momcilo Krajisnik, Gojko Dogo, and an unknown person from the Krajina,
6 where Dr. Karadzic says that if the war starts in Bosnia, the Muslims
7 would disappear. Dr. Karadzic made a similar statement at the Bosnian
8 Assembly session of 15 October 1991, where he said that the Muslims were
9 inviting a highway of hell and possible extinction because the Muslim
10 people would not be able to defend itself if war broke out.
11 It's our submission that it's a more reasonable inference from
12 the context of these statements that Dr. Karadzic was trying to convince
13 the Muslims not to start a war and to reach a peaceful solution, not
14 making a public and private call for the extermination of the Bosnian
15 Muslims as such. You alluded to this interpretation in your decision at
16 the end of the Prosecution's case, when you found that notwithstanding
17 these statements, there was no evidence of genocidal intent. And you
18 were not alone. These very same statements were admitted into evidence
19 in the Brdjanin and Krajisnik cases.
20 This is a table showing the exhibit numbers of these statements
21 in our case, the Krajisnik case, and the Brdjanin case. And the
22 Trial Chambers in those cases unanimously held that these statements were
23 not indicative of genocidal intent.
24 This same evidence was also considered by the International Court
25 of Justice in the case of Bosnia versus Serbia. That court, too, found
Page 47935
1 that a pattern of conduct on the part of the leadership of
2 Republika Srpska from which genocidal intent could be inferred had not
3 been established.
4 As you know, at this stage of the case the Prosecution has the
5 burden of proving that an intention to destroy the Bosnian Muslims or
6 Croats is the only reasonable inference that can be drawn from the
7 evidence. And while the Trial Chamber is not bound by the decisions in
8 these other cases, although based on the same evidence, they demonstrate
9 that one reasonable inference from the evidence before this Trial Chamber
10 is that Dr. Karadzic's remarks were made to avoid war and not to promote
11 genocide.
12 In fact, you took judicial notice of 625 adjudicated facts from
13 the Krajisnik case and 301 adjudicated facts from the Brdjanin case. You
14 had sufficient confidence in the conclusions of those Chambers to
15 reliably import those findings into our case. Would it not be
16 incongruous, if not incomprehensible, for you to now find that their
17 conclusion on the same evidence that Dr. Karadzic and the Bosnian Serb
18 leadership had no genocidal intent was not even a reasonable one?
19 For all of those reasons, I respectfully submit that Dr. Karadzic
20 is not guilty of genocide, as charged in Count 1 of the indictment.
21 You can find a more detailed analysis of the evidence,
22 municipality by municipality, witness by witness, in the respondent's
23 brief that we filed before the Appeals Chamber on the 5th of November,
24 2012.
25 Now, that filing also acknowledges that crimes such as murder and
Page 47936
1 infliction of serious harm, were committed during the 1992 events in
2 the municipalities of Bosnia. And I would be remiss in concluding this
3 submission if I did not at the same time acknowledge that there were
4 indeed many innocent victims of these crimes. A finding by the
5 Trial Chamber, like the findings of the Trial Chambers in Stakic,
6 Brdjanin, and Krajisnik cases, and the International Court of Justice,
7 that genocide was not committed in the municipalities of Bosnia in 1992
8 in no way diminishes the suffering of the victims or what they or their
9 families endured during that terrible time. It simply reflects that the
10 legal requirements for this very specific crime, requiring a very
11 specific intent to destroy the group as such, have not been met. Even
12 after what happened to the Jews in the Holocaust, the Supreme Court of
13 Israel found Adolf Eichmann not guilty of genocide for crimes in the
14 two-year period where the Jews were deported, rather than exterminated.
15 What happened in Bosnia in 1992, while awful, was not genocide and
16 Dr. Karadzic should likewise be found not guilty of Count 1.
17 I would like to now turn to Count 2 and Dr. Karadzic's individual
18 responsibility for genocide in connection with the July 1995 Srebrenica
19 events. And this is a matter of life or death.
20 If you're convinced that Dr. Karadzic planned or ordered the
21 execution of thousands of prisoners from Srebrenica as part of some joint
22 criminal enterprise with General Mladic, as the Prosecution claims, then
23 you should give him a sentence that ensures that he too dies as a
24 prisoner --
25 THE INTERPRETER: Kindly slow down for the interpreters, please.
Page 47937
1 MR. ROBINSON: -- like those who died on the fields of Branjevo
2 Farm, Petkovci dam, or near the Orahovac school.
3 But you would be doing a great injustice. Because the truth is
4 that Radovan Karadzic never planned or ordered these executions. And if
5 you agree to the legal lynching of Radovan Karadzic urged upon you by the
6 Prosecution, an innocent man will have been convicted of a crime he did
7 not commit.
8 And I am here to try to convince you, with all of the force that
9 I can muster while speaking slowly for the interpreters, not to do that.
10 I am passionate in this. We have put everything into our final
11 brief that could possibly explain and deal with the issue of
12 Dr. Karadzic's responsibility for genocide at Srebrenica as charged in
13 Count 2. And I stand here to implore you, as I plead Dr. Karadzic's case
14 and for his life, to ask me any and all questions you have so I can clear
15 out the smoke that the Prosecution has created to mask the weakness of
16 its case on this count.
17 Let's start with something that's not in dispute. Not a single
18 witness has testified that Radovan Karadzic planned, ordered, or was even
19 informed about the execution of prisoners from Srebrenica. Think about
20 that. And you have to ask yourselves why. Maybe one reason is that it
21 simply isn't true. Radovan Karadzic never planned, ordered, or was even
22 informed about the execution of prisoners from Srebrenica. Despite
23 having unprecedented access to thousands of intercepted, private
24 conversations, thousands of written communications of the
25 Republika Srpska military, police, and political organs, and hundreds of
Page 47938
1 speeches and interviews of Dr. Karadzic, there is not a single piece of
2 evidence that Dr. Karadzic planned, ordered, or even was informed about
3 the execution of prisoners from Srebrenica.
4 Srebrenica is the most well-documented crime in any war crimes
5 tribunal since Nuremberg. You can follow the events of July 1995 minute
6 by minute, place by place, through intercepts, satellite imagery, written
7 reports, orders, and log-book entries. Yet there's not a single piece of
8 evidence that shows that Dr. Karadzic planned or ordered the execution of
9 prisoners from Srebrenica or that he even knew that they would be, were
10 being, or had been executed. The Prosecution's case relies solely on
11 inference.
12 Dr. Karadzic was the president of Republika Srpska and
13 Commander-in-Chief of the Bosnian army. He was closely following the
14 Srebrenica events and he issued orders during those events to the army,
15 to the police, and to the civilian authorities of Srebrenica. Therefore,
16 he must have planned and ordered the execution which followed. But we
17 submit to you that that is not the only reasonable inference that can be
18 drawn from this evidence. Another more reasonable inference is that
19 Dr. Karadzic never planned or ordered those executions and that, in fact,
20 they were concealed from him and that he is not guilty of genocide.
21 The Appeals Chamber has repeatedly held that when the Prosecution
22 relies upon proof of the state of mind of an accused by inference, that
23 inference must be the only reasonable inference available on the
24 evidence. And they said that the benefit of the doubt must always go to
25 the accused.
Page 47939
1 The Defence case doesn't rely on inference. We brought everybody
2 who could possibly speak to Dr. Karadzic's actions and knowledge of the
3 Srebrenica events to come and testify at this trial. People who worked
4 for him in his office, held meetings with him, and even those convicted
5 of participating in the crimes themselves were brought to this courtroom,
6 sometimes willingly, sometimes kicking and screaming by subpoena. But to
7 a man, they testified that Dr. Karadzic was not informed of those
8 executions and played no role in their commission.
9 The scales of justice on this issue are unbalanced. The
10 Prosecutor's case is supported solely by inference. The Defence case is
11 supported by hard evidence. Now, I'm sorry to have to do this orally in
12 such detail, but since we didn't have the right to file a written reply
13 to the Prosecutor's final brief, let me take some minutes to deconstruct,
14 brick by brick, the Prosecution's house of inferences that comprises its
15 case for genocide against Dr. Karadzic in connection with Srebrenica.
16 Fact: On the 9th of --
17 JUDGE KWON: Now, you can please continue.
18 MR. ROBINSON: Very well.
19 Fact: On the 9th of July, 1995, Dr. Karadzic ordered the VRS to
20 take the town of Srebrenica and ordered them to offer maximum protection
21 and safety to the civilian population and to treat the civilian members
22 of the population and war prisoners in accordance with the Geneva
23 Conventions. The Prosecution's inference is that this order facilitated
24 the plan to execute the men of Srebrenica and was part of repeated
25 efforts to cloak written orders implementing illegal objectives with
Page 47940
1 simulated adherence to international law.
2 We submit that another reasonable inference is that the order
3 meant what it said, that Dr. Karadzic had no intention that civilians or
4 prisoners be mistreated, let alone murdered.
5 Fact: In the late evening of 11 July, Dr. Karadzic issued an
6 order appointing Miroslav Deronjic civilian commissioner. His order
7 provided that the commissioner shall ensure that all civilian and
8 military organs treat all citizens who participated in combat against the
9 Army of Republika Srpska as prisoners of war and ensure that the civilian
10 population can freely choose where they will live or move to.
11 Fact: At the same time, Dr. Karadzic issued an order for the
12 establishment of a public security station in Srebrenica. His order
13 provided that all citizens who participated in combat activities against
14 the Serb army will be treated as prisoners of war and in accordance with
15 the law and with international conventions. Others will be free to
16 choose their place of residence or place of emigration.
17 The Prosecution wants you to infer that this was another
18 simulation of adherence to law that belied Karadzic's true intent that
19 the men from Srebrenica be executed. We say there's another reasonable
20 inference, that the order meant what it said, that Dr. Karadzic had no
21 intention that civilians or prisoners be mistreated, let alone murdered.
22 Fact: On the evening of 11 July 1995, Dr. Karadzic issued an
23 order concerning the passage of humanitarian convoys through the
24 territory of Republika Srpska. That's P5183 and I ask you to study that.
25 The aim stated in the order was to eliminate problems in the passage of
Page 47941
1 UN convoys.
2 The Prosecution would like you to infer that this order became a
3 means by which Karadzic controlled access to the enclave by international
4 organisations, including UNHCR and ICRC, allowing the murder operation to
5 proceed unchecked. We say that another reasonable inference is clear
6 that the purpose of the order was to improve the passage of convoys, not
7 to hinder them, as evidenced by the reference to the danger of
8 international intervention because of the need to get humanitarian aid to
9 affected civilians and the threat of punishment for anyone obstructing
10 the convoys. The order loosened restrictions by prohibiting inspections
11 and providing an escort between the border and the front line. Having
12 taken the drastic action of overrunning a UN safe area, Dr. Karadzic
13 wanted to make sure that there were no reasons for NATO to use force on
14 the grounds that humanitarian aid could not reach the affected people.
15 Fact: Dr. Karadzic met with Deputy Minister of Interior
16 Tomo Kovac from 1550 to 1610 on the 13th of July and again on 14 July
17 from 2245 to 2310. The Prosecution inference is that Karadzic met with
18 Kovac on the 13th of July, sent him to arrange the logistics of the
19 murder operation with General Mladic, and then Kovac reported back to him
20 on the 14th of July. We say that another reasonable inference is that
21 Kovac never received instructions from Dr. Karadzic concerning the murder
22 of Muslim prisoners and never informed Dr. Karadzic of any executions.
23 And we point out that there is no written order or intercepted
24 communication indicating that Kovac had anything to do with arranging the
25 logistics of the murder operation. Kovac's testimony was unequivocal
Page 47942
1 that he had not participated in the murder operation nor discussed any
2 killings with Dr. Karadzic. If Kovac was supposed to arrange the
3 logistics of the murder operation with Mladic, how does that explain his
4 order on the 14th of July, that the police were to have nothing to do
5 with the prisoners? And we have testimony of that not only from Kovac
6 but from Borovcanin and from Mane Djuric. Borovcanin is paragraph 41 of
7 his amalgamated statement at D3659; and Mane Djuric's testimony is at
8 page 35043 and 44 of the transcript.
9 But most important, what about that intercepted call between
10 Beara and Krstic on the morning of the 15th of July, P5074, when
11 Colonel Beara complained that MUP "won't do anything."
12 Fact: Dr. Karadzic spoke with Miroslav Deronjic on 13 July at
13 2010. Deronjic informed him that they had 2.000 and that there would be
14 more during the night. Dr. Karadzic said that "all goods must be placed
15 in the warehouses by 12.00 tomorrow - not in warehouses there but
16 somewhere else." Deronjic said he understood. The Prosecution's
17 inference that they would like you to draw is that Karadzic's phone call
18 with Deronjic, telling him that the prisoners had to be placed somewhere
19 else referred to Zvornik. We think there's another reasonable inference,
20 that Dr. Karadzic was referring to Batkovici prison which was the normal
21 place for prisoners to be taken. How could Deronjic possibly understand
22 from this conversation that prisoners were to be sent to Zvornik? It's a
23 more reasonable inference that if Dr. Karadzic was referring to any
24 specific location at all, he was referring to Batkovici prison, a place
25 to which the ICRC had regular access. And Milenko Todorovic testified
Page 47943
1 that they received instructions at one point to prepare Batkovici prison
2 to receive prisoners from Srebrenica. You can find that at D4124 at
3 pages 12934, 38, 39, and 41.
4 The use of code on unsecured lines when referring to the location
5 of prisoners was likewise not nefarious, but so that the enemy would not
6 know where they were being held and mount a rescue operation, in our
7 submission.
8 Fact: On 14 July, Dr. Karadzic issued a decision proclaiming a
9 state of war in Srebrenica-Skelani municipality. The decision indicates
10 that the aim of proclaiming a state of war is to enable the full
11 engagement of human and material resources in the defence of the republic
12 and final victory over the enemy. It further provided that the armed
13 forces and government organs shall observe the provisions of
14 international law and international conventions regulating the conduct of
15 a state during a state of war. The Prosecution wants you to infer that
16 Karadzic issued this decision to give Deronjic extraordinary powers and
17 to facilitate the use of civilian personnel and equipment for the murder
18 and burial operations, and they claim that the column no longer posed
19 such a threat to Srebrenica and Skelani so as to justify this decision.
20 We say that another reasonable inference is the aim of the
21 decision was as it is stated, to mobilise resources to defend the
22 municipality. Exhibit P2803 at line 340, the republic communications
23 centre log, indicates that this decision was issued at 11.55 a.m. on the
24 14th of July. On the morning of the 14th of July, the chaos in the woods
25 around Srebrenica still existed and the VRS reported that its units were
Page 47944
1 scouring the terrain around Srebrenica. That's the daily combat report
2 received early that morning, P4464 at page 3.
3 Robert Djurdjevic testified that when he met with
4 President Karadzic in the afternoon of the 14th of July, the army was
5 reporting that there was a lot of fighting between Konjevic Polje and
6 Kasaba. This had nothing to do with murders and burials. If
7 Dr. Karadzic had indeed ordered the transport of the prisoners to Zvornik
8 on the evening of the 13th of July to kill them, as the Prosecution
9 claims, and wanted to conceal murders and burials, the order would have
10 included Zvornik municipality.
11 Fact: On the 16th -- and this deals with the corridor, the
12 opening of the corridor. On the 16th of July at 1529, someone from the
13 VRS Main Staff called the duty officer of the Drina Corps and said:
14 "I have to get permission from the main boss, from the main head
15 of state," and he asked him to "have Vinko tell you what happened and
16 send it right away."
17 Fact: On 1615 of the same day, less than an hour later, the VRS
18 Main Staff duty officer informed General Mladic that the president had
19 called a short while ago and said that he had been informed by Karisik
20 that Pandurevic arranged passage for the Muslims over to that territory.
21 And those are Exhibits P5076 and D2002.
22 The Prosecution's inference is that Karadzic's call to the VRS
23 about opening a corridor reveal that he was concerned about Muslims
24 getting away, while the killing and burial operations in Zvornik were
25 proceeding as planned. And yesterday they told us that the Main Staff
Page 47945
1 had to get permission because the opening of a corridor was a variation
2 from the plan to kill all the Muslims of Srebrenica.
3 We think that another reasonable inference from these
4 conversations was that Dr. Karadzic was in favour of opening the
5 corridor. His inquiry was prompted by a call from Karisik. As you've
6 heard from a protected witness - and you can find this at P4563,
7 page 3 - Dragomir Vasic, Karisik's subordinate, was in favour of opening
8 the corridor. Karisik himself was personally engaged in trying to get
9 the captured policemen returned safely across the line. His call to
10 Karadzic would likely have been to encourage him to support Pandurevic's
11 opening of the corridor. Karadzic spoke favourably about opening the
12 corridor during his 17 July interview with David Frost. You saw that
13 yesterday. And that's P5235, pages 2 and 3 of the transcript.
14 President Karadzic's discussion about opening the corridor at the
15 6th August 1995 Assembly session was made in the context of trying to
16 fire General Mladic. He complained about combat tactics, spending time
17 in Zepa without leaving sufficient troops to battle the forces from
18 Srebrenica and taking many losses of life as a result. And that's P1412
19 at page 17.
20 But even if President Karadzic was opposed to opening of the
21 corridor from the beginning, so what? The Prosecution has conceded that
22 the column was a legitimate military target and could be attacked.
23 There's nothing genocidal in inflicting as many losses on combatants as
24 possible. This had nothing to do with the fate of the prisoners. Just
25 another straw that the Prosecution is grasping at.
Page 47946
1 Fact: As reported by the Bratunac Brigade on 18 July,
2 Dr. Karadzic had pardoned all the local staff who worked for UNPROFOR and
3 they were not detained. The Prosecution's inference is that without
4 Karadzic's amnesty, the UN local staff would have been killed and
5 Karadzic's control over the murder operation was such that he had the
6 power of life or death over the Muslim men and boys of Srebrenica.
7 We think another reasonable inference is that Karadzic did not
8 favour or condone any killings and did not have the intent to destroy the
9 Bosnian Muslim group. This is an example that no good deed goes
10 unpunished in the eyes of the Prosecution.
11 Fact: The ICRC gained access to Batkovici camp on the
12 26th of July and the Srebrenica-Bratunac area on the 27th of July. And
13 this is P2284, the UN report on Srebrenica at paragraph 409. The
14 Prosecution wants you to infer that Karadzic either ignored or rejected
15 requests by the UN or international organisations for access to the
16 Srebrenica and Bratunac areas. Another reasonable inference is that the
17 first letter requesting such access from Mr. Mazowiecki was sent to
18 Dr. Karadzic on the 25th of July - that's P6396 - and they got access the
19 next day.
20 Fact: On the 2nd of August, Beara and Stevo from the Main Staff
21 discussed getting the Muslims who were detained in Srebrenica back to
22 Republika Srpska. Stevo said that the ICRC was registering them and
23 Beara said:
24 "We had no plans to kill them, just exchange them ... you think
25 it would be no good if Karadzic or someone else," and then it trailed
Page 47947
1 off.
2 This is P4972 at page 4.
3 The Prosecution's inference is that Karadzic approved efforts to
4 retrieve Muslims from Syria to make up for a lack of prisoners to
5 exchange and they say Beara referred to Karadzic in this conversation.
6 JUDGE KWON: I think you meant Serbia, not Syria.
7 MR. ROBINSON: Yes, if I said "Syria," I'm mistaken. I'm sorry
8 about that.
9 We say that another reasonable inference is that there is no
10 evidence that Karadzic had anything to do with retrieving Muslims from
11 Serbia or had any knowledge of a shortage of prisoners from Srebrenica.
12 Beara may well have been saying that it would be no good if Karadzic
13 agreed to exchanges and then the lack of prisoners from Srebrenica became
14 known. We think that this shows that Karadzic had no knowledge that the
15 prisoners would be executed or had been executed.
16 And there were reasons for people in the VRS to have concealed
17 executions from President Karadzic. He had held them back from taking
18 Srebrenica in 1993, and he had insisted that they withdraw from
19 Mount Igman in August of 1993 in the sharpest of terms, as you've heard
20 from those intercepts in that period. And he held them back from taking
21 Gorazde in April 1994. He had issued dozens of orders, insisting that
22 they comply with international law. They knew he would never approve of
23 executing prisoners and that he would view such a thing as treason
24 against Republika Srpska, which he does.
25 Fact: On the 12th of August, 1995, the Republika Srpska
Page 47948
1 Commission for Exchange of Prisoners reported that a large number of
2 Muslim soldiers had now been captured across Republika Srpska and
3 proposed a one-for-one exchange, and this is Exhibit P4975.
4 They said that the Muslims detained in Batkovici could be freed
5 in exchange for 170 Serbs held prisoner in the Tuzla area. They proposed
6 to get Serbs held captive in Sarajevo by exchanging even more Muslim
7 prisoners "captured during the activities of liberation of Srebrenica and
8 Zepa." And finally, they proposed to get Serbs held in the Zenica area
9 by exchanging Muslims held by the 1st Krajina Corps, supplemented by
10 prisoners from other areas of Republika Srpska. And I ask you to look at
11 that document carefully.
12 The Prosecution's inference is that Karadzic received a report
13 from the state commission, which said that there were no more than a few
14 hundred Muslim men from Srebrenica at Batkovici camp. But we say that
15 the other reasonable inference to be drawn from this evidence is that
16 there were a large number of Muslim prisoners available for exchange.
17 There was nothing in this report that would lead Dr. Karadzic to believe
18 that there was a shortage of prisoners from Srebrenica; quite the
19 contrary.
20 And that's it. That's the Prosecution's case against
21 Dr. Karadzic for Srebrenica. And as thin as it is to begin with, it
22 simply falls apart when separating fact from inference and when
23 determining whether the inferences that the Prosecution seeks to draw are
24 the only reasonable inferences from the evidence. Taken individually
25 and collectively, the Prosecution's case is insufficient to establish
Page 47949
1 beyond a reasonable doubt that Dr. Karadzic was part of a joint criminal
2 enterprise to eliminate the men of Srebrenica or even had knowledge of
3 their execution.
4 Contrast that with the Defence case. You know how difficult it
5 is to prove a negative, yet 28 witnesses testified that Dr. Karadzic was
6 not informed of the Srebrenica executions. Those witnesses included
7 high-ranking officials in the army, the police, the secret services, and
8 the Assembly. They included a Canadian intelligence officer,
9 Witness KW554, who went looking through intelligence reports to see what
10 involvement Dr. Karadzic had in the executions and found that he had
11 none. As you know from litigation before this Chamber, Dr. Karadzic, at
12 his own initiative, requested from a number of countries, including the
13 United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Canada, any
14 evidence they had reflecting his knowledge of the executions at
15 Srebrenica. He did that because he knew the truth, that he had no
16 knowledge of those executions. And his position is confirmed by the fact
17 that not a single country produced even a scrap of evidence showing that
18 Dr. Karadzic had knowledge of the executions, much less planned or
19 ordered them.
20 If Dr. Karadzic were truly guilty of the Srebrenica killings, you
21 would have heard something more than what the Prosecution has presented
22 in five years of trial, and you certainly would not have heard the
23 massive evidence presented by the Defence on this issue.
24 The Prosecution has never explained why, if Dr. Karadzic had
25 planned, ordered, or even had knowledge of the Srebrenica executions, he
Page 47950
1 went out of his way to take credit for the Srebrenica operation, both on
2 national television on the 4th of August, when he said General Krstic had
3 planned the Srebrenica operation in front of him, and at the Assembly on
4 the 16th of October, 1995, when he had said that he personally supervised
5 the plan and personally ordered General Krstic to take Srebrenica.
6 A lot of bad things have been said about Dr. Karadzic, but nobody
7 ever said that he's stupid. But even if you somehow believe that
8 Dr. Karadzic had knowledge that the men of Srebrenica were executed, you
9 must still find him not guilty of genocide because genocide requires
10 something more, that general -- that Dr. Karadzic had the intent to
11 destroy the Bosnian Muslims as such. And as we saw with Count 1, there
12 is no evidence that Dr. Karadzic had that intent, not in 1992, not in
13 1995. For aiding and abetting genocide, Dr. Karadzic would have to have
14 known of the genocidal intent of others, yet the evidence that has been
15 found in other cases at this Tribunal to support a finding that genocide
16 was committed at Srebrenica was unknown to Dr. Karadzic.
17 In the Krstic case, the Trial Chamber found that the fact that
18 the VRS sought to kill every Muslim man it could find, civilian or
19 military, was indicative of an intent to destroy the group. There is no
20 evidence from which it can be inferred that President Karadzic knew that
21 the VRS had sought to kill every man from Srebrenica. In fact, he was
22 informed that the VRS had opened a corridor so that men from Srebrenica
23 could proceed to Muslim territory, and he himself ordered the local
24 Muslim UN staff from Srebrenica to be allowed to leave.
25 The Krstic Trial Chamber also based its finding of an intent to
Page 47951
1 destroy on the concealment of the bodies and the prevention of proper
2 burials for those who were killed. There's no evidence of any of this
3 being brought to President Karadzic's attention.
4 The Appeals Chamber found that General Krstic's knowledge of
5 genocide could not be inferred from his contacts with General Mladic,
6 which were substantial; his participation in the Hotel Fontana meeting;
7 his presence in Potocari; his order to secure the road where men were
8 removed from buses; and the participation of members of the Drina Corps
9 in the executions. President Karadzic did not have any of these contacts
10 in Srebrenica and therefore had even less reason to know of the genocidal
11 intent of some VRS officers, if that intent existed.
12 In the Blagojevic case, the Trial Chamber inferred that
13 Blagojevic knew of the genocidal intent of those participating in the
14 executions, primarily from his knowledge of the transfer of women and
15 children, the executions in Bratunac town, and that his forces were
16 trying to capture Muslim men and prevent them from reaching Muslim
17 territory. But the Appeals Chamber reversed this finding, concluding
18 that without knowledge of the mass killings, Blagojevic did not have
19 knowledge of the perpetrators' genocidal intent.
20 President Karadzic had even less information than
21 Colonel Blagojevic, therefore the Blagojevic case supports a finding that
22 the evidence is insufficient to infer knowledge of genocide by
23 President Karadzic.
24 In the Popovic case, the Trial Chamber found that despite
25 commander Vinko Pandurevic's direct knowledge of the murder operation,
Page 47952
1 there was no evidence that he knew of the key features of the operation
2 indicating genocidal intent, the indiscriminate separations in Potocari,
3 the vigorous pursuit of every last Muslim male along the
4 Bratunac-Konjevic Polje road, the large component of civilians amongst
5 the prisoners, the details of the executions, or the systematic nature of
6 the operation.
7 Likewise, President Karadzic did not know Colonel Beara or
8 Lieutenant-Colonel Popovic, nor did he have any contact with them. None
9 of the information he received indicated that there had been any
10 indiscriminate separations in Potocari, vigorous pursuit of every last
11 Muslim male, or failure to distinguish between civilians and soldiers.
12 Therefore, he had no reason to know of any of the facts indicating that
13 the killings had been perpetrated with genocidal intent.
14 The Popovic Trial Chamber also found that Ljubomir Borovcanin had
15 no reason to know of the genocidal intent with which the crimes were
16 committed, despite his being on the scene and having actual knowledge of
17 the Kravica warehouse killings, and acquitted him of genocide. The
18 information brought to President Karadzic's attention after the fact was
19 not as encompassing or specific as that possessed by Borovcanin;
20 therefore he too must be acquitted of genocide even if you find that he
21 had some information about murders.
22 Let me once again make it clear that unspeakable crimes were
23 committed after the fall of Srebrenica in July 1995. Thousands of
24 Bosnian Muslim prisoners were executed and the victims of those crimes
25 never had any chance for justice. They were summarily executed by the
Page 47953
1 likes of Franz Kos and Drazen Erdemovic, without a lawyer, without a
2 trial, and without a verdict. Dr. Karadzic has had a Defence team, a
3 five-year trial, and will have a verdict from three learned international
4 Judges. That is a testament to the humanity of mankind and I'm proud to
5 have been part of these proceedings. This trial has already established
6 the principle that as a society, no matter how heinous the crime, we
7 value justice over barbarity. But just as it was a grave injustice to
8 condemn the victims of Srebrenica, it would be a grave injustice to
9 condemn Dr. Karadzic for crimes he did not commit, and genocide is one of
10 those crimes.
11 Therefore, I ask you to find Dr. Karadzic not guilty on Count 2.
12 Thank you.
13 JUDGE KWON: Thank you, Mr. Robinson.
14 We'll have a break for an hour and resume -- a break for
15 20 minutes and we'll continue at 10.20.
16 --- Recess taken at 10.01 a.m.
17 --- On resuming at 10.22 a.m.
18 JUDGE KWON: Yes, Mr. Karadzic, please continue.
19 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you. Good morning,
20 Excellencies. Good morning to all.
21 As the Defence, I feel handicapped after the plea made by
22 Mr. Robinson. I shall appear even more as an amateur, but of course I
23 shall be adducing the facts and you will appreciate the lack of form. I
24 should like to turn to what the Prosecutor is saying about Sarajevo in
25 its final brief as having been established in Sarajevo.
Page 47954
1 The Prosecution bases its case about Sarajevo on the theory that
2 there existed a Serbian policy of producing terror, intimidating the
3 citizens of Sarajevo, and it infers such conclusions from a number of
4 sources, from several reporters, and from an insider. The first and most
5 often quoted sources are international observers, journalists, UNPROFOR
6 members, and members of other organisations. The second source are
7 Muslim investigators of the police of Bosnia-Herzegovina who investigated
8 the various incidents. And the third source are several witnesses who
9 lived in Sarajevo at that time. (redacted)
10 (redacted)
11 The first three sources, international observers, Muslim
12 investigators, and the inhabitants of Sarajevo, during the trial and
13 cross-examination have proven to be exceptionally unreliable. Sometimes
14 so into their obvious partiality and their effort to accommodate the
15 expectations of the Prosecution and at other times because of their
16 obvious ignorance and lack of knowledge of the situation. And all these
17 three sources, globally speaking, contested the very existence of units
18 of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the existence of heavy weaponry of
19 the 1st Corps of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina in the city itself or
20 the strength and numbers of those forces. Representing the 1st Corps of
21 the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina which had 80.000 combatants of whom
22 about 40- or 50.000, the 12th Division, which was always in the city, and
23 the rest are on the outer ring is something inconsequential and
24 negligible and unimportant. This made it possible for the Prosecution to
25 create the impression that there was no war, as if there were no army
Page 47955
1 there, as if war had not been declared on Serbs, and as if the Serbs had
2 come from somewhere and laid siege to Sarajevo with forces that had
3 nothing to do whatsoever with Sarajevo; whereas it was quite simple and
4 easy to establish that that was not the case, that both the inhabitants
5 of Sarajevo, everybody, was just guarding their own neighbourhoods, their
6 own settlements, whereas -- and the Serbs did not have any ambitions of
7 taking the city, taking the Muslim section of the city. And the Muslims
8 did have that ambition, to capture the Serbian part of the city.
9 And when one reads or hears what the Prosecution holds against
10 the Serbs -- charges the Serbs with in terms of their conduct surrounding
11 Sarajevo, that is more like an ideological and political [indiscernible]:
12 Shame on you, you opened fire, you were shooting while neglecting the
13 laws of war, the legitimate and customs of war, the legitimate rights of
14 peoples, creating an impression that everything was just one-sided. One
15 was unmotivated and everything was unjustified.
16 International representatives invoked -- the statements of which
17 the Prosecution invokes, actually ventured to characterised the Serbian
18 strategy, plans, and other confidential information which they could not
19 even dream of. They were nowhere near the decision-making of the Army of
20 Republika Srpska or the local or state and municipal organs of
21 Republika Srpska. Nowhere where decisions were made were they present or
22 knew anything about it, but they drew their superficial conclusions
23 mainly on the basis of some superficial observation of the battle-front
24 in Sarajevo, very limited views with distorted -- and they --
25 conclusions. And they sat in their shelters and wherever they were,
Page 47956
1 their positions, receiving information from their Muslim interpreters and
2 in other ways.
3 As a rule, they never saw the heavy weaponry in Sarajevo. As a
4 rule, they never registered the thousands of shells which the units of
5 the 1st Corps of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina fired from the city,
6 targeting the Serbian section of the city. As a rule, they observed
7 everything which was done from hill to hill, across Sarajevo valley.
8 That was always the Serb fire, although not a single foot was there where
9 there was only a Serbian soldier without having a Croat or a Muslim Croat
10 opposite him, trench opposite trench. Everything which came from the
11 hill was fired by the Serbs, although a number of salient features which
12 are near, the elevations which are near to Sarajevo were held by the Army
13 of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Serbs held those which were farther
14 away. They would just register fire in response which the Serbs were
15 firing to respond, and they characterised it as they saw fit. You will
16 see one witness said: I know, I concluded that it was random fire
17 because it was not concentrated fire, it was just one or two shells.
18 Another witness again said: I know that the purpose was to terrorise
19 because the fire was concentrated.
20 However, we have even as many as two daily reports of the
21 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps to the Main Staff, these are all coded documents,
22 confidential, secret documents, in which no one from the
23 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps would actually dare lie to the Main Staff. And
24 certainly not intend any of its content for any propaganda purposes. The
25 question of the response of the conduct in firing, the expenditure of
Page 47957
1 ammunition lists in the reports of the SRK, begs possible just a single
2 and one conclusion which is that the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps comported
3 itself with maximum degree of responsibility up to the level, the limits
4 of sustainability of endurance and refrain from responding.
5 Here we have heard that there was a contradiction in the
6 testimony and documents of General Milosevic. Allegedly he said that
7 these were uncontrolled elements and that must have been the SRK. If
8 they were uncontrolled elements, that just could not have been the
9 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps. It simply was not, is not the Sarajevo-Romanija
10 Corps.
11 Thus, international observers simply did not know at a single
12 point in time the disposition of forces of the respective forces in
13 Sarajevo and their respective strengths, their numbers, their fire-power.
14 They never counted the shells that fell on Serbian territory. They never
15 observed or noticed who started first, but they did, in fact. And
16 Harland says that in a certain period, the Muslims violated the truce,
17 the cease-fire agreement 318 times. If someone of them was asked, like
18 Mr. Doyle, if they knew where the disposition was of the Muslim forces,
19 how did they know who opened fire. He said: I don't know, I didn't
20 know, it was not my obligation to know where the respective armies were
21 because his role was a different, diplomatic one. Then he should not
22 have been asked about these matters. Someone else, in fact, should have
23 been asked about that.
24 To briefly touch upon the Muslim investigators and policemen as
25 the second source of information and of documents for the Prosecution
Page 47958
1 case in respect of the Sarajevo segment. In addition to their purported
2 lack of information of the Muslim investigators and policemen about the
3 strength and the disposition of the 1st Corps, their own army, in
4 Sarajevo, during the investigation they demonstrated exceptional lack of
5 objectivity and lack of professionalism in their work when they conducted
6 on-site investigations of alleged incidents. The witnesses avoided
7 direct and compromising questions and they -- the excuse was that this
8 was not within their remit, evidence was distorted. The maps of Sarajevo
9 were shown upside down and they were turned. The azimuth, the north
10 direction would be changed by 90 degrees in order to show that a specific
11 projectile had been fired from the Serbian side.
12 We remember the sniping incidents in Nehru Street where a girl, a
13 young woman was killed through a darkened window at night and the
14 investigator said: We did not do the deflection according to the
15 horizontal plane, but it was quite obvious by the vertical plane that the
16 bullet actually went up by 70 centimetres from 2.5 metres. So the upward
17 trajectory was easy to determine, and on that basis they determined that
18 this was fired by the Serbs.
19 Namely, these investigators according -- in their own admission,
20 actually, did not work the way they worked in peace time. They did not
21 prepare and conduct their investigations and complete the documentation
22 as they would have done otherwise.
23 I must have spoken very quickly because the transcript does not
24 reflect my words faithfully.
25 So lines 17 and on. This girl was shot but she was not visible.
Page 47959
1 It was night and the window was shut. The blinds were down. She was not
2 visible. This bullet which hit her had an upwards trajectory, and we
3 know that an upward trajectory by vertical -- along the vertical line we
4 do know but not along the horizontal plane. The deflection should have
5 been along the horizontal plane, if it had been fired from the Serbian
6 side, at least 45 degrees or more because the Serbian positions were
7 obliquely positioned vis-à-vis that window. One investigates by coming
8 to that window and looking at the Serbian positions and just saying that
9 is where the bullet came from.
10 The witnesses who were inhabitants of Sarajevo, identically as
11 other groups of prosecutorial witnesses, alleged that they did not know
12 anything about the hundreds and thousands of soldiers that passed by them
13 daily going to their shifts, conducting manoeuvres, hauling weapons,
14 shooting. They did not know, they did not see them shooting from the
15 skyscrapers, from the hospitals, museums, schools. They did not see
16 275 staffs of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina in this very narrow
17 urban core strip of Sarajevo. So many brigades, battalions, companies.
18 How many can there be that they have 275 staffs and command posts? And
19 they created the impression and actually testified as if it had only been
20 a unilateral barbarian assault of the Serbs, of the Serbian army, which
21 was composed of their fellow citizens, without any reason, without any
22 cause.
23 This is how the international representatives comported
24 themselves. General Michael Rose, on page 7308, line 2 -- 23 and
25 page 7309, confirmed that the identification of the firing point, the
Page 47960
1 position from which the mortar is fired was very imprecise, a very
2 imprecise science, generally speaking, in a very large majority of cases,
3 and that different views, different possibilities, have to be taken into
4 consideration for any further investigation to be conducted.
5 General Rose testified in the Karadzic case on transcript
6 page 7335, saying that Ganic organised his secret police to open sniper
7 fire at a tram. I'm going to read this out in English:
8 [In English] "His sniper units sniped so that the angle of the
9 shot matched the direction from the Serb lines."
10 [Interpretation] The witness says that UNPROFOR did not have its
11 own intelligence service and an information-gathering service and
12 therefore they did not carry out investigations. Also, he said that they
13 received reports from Sector South of UNPROFOR, and he confirms that it
14 is his conviction that at that time Ganic organised his secret police and
15 sniped at the tram.
16 As for this situation, every incident that is ascribed to the
17 Serb army is something that the Prosecution has to prove. It's not the
18 Defence that has to prove whose sniper shooter that was. It is the
19 Prosecution that has to prove what happened, if there is such a
20 possibility; and if this possibility was established, that that is what
21 they were doing. And we heard that from other witnesses too that the
22 Seve, larks, and others did that. General Rose, in response to the
23 question put by this Defence, answered that the only way in which it can
24 be established with certainty what the source of mortar fire was was a
25 radar and there wasn't one there at the time.
Page 47961
1 The witness said that on page 3755 to 76.
2 General Rose rejected all allegations that the United Nations
3 allowed the Muslim army to use their positions in order to fire at the
4 Serbs. However, there is an UNPROFOR document of the 8th of November,
5 1994, that is D696, registers the fact that the Muslim forces were
6 observed as they used or abused UN insignia, helmets, white vehicles, in
7 order to create an impression -- or, rather, to operate more easily and
8 to pass off as the UN. This testimony is on page 7464.
9 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Karadzic, could you give us again the reference
10 of General Rose testifying that Ganic's -- in relation to Ganic's
11 sniping.
12 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Excellency, with
13 pleasure. The reference I have is numbers 2 and 3, so that is the
14 testimony in the Karadzic case, page 7335, lines 6 through 19; and
15 page 7335, line 24; and on page -36 to line 17.
16 JUDGE KWON: What I have in front of me is this, it is your
17 question saying:
18 "Do you remember that Ejub Ganic had organised secret police that
19 sniped the trams in Sarajevo and all those incidents were supposed to be
20 assigned to the Serbian side, the Serbs were to be blamed for all those?"
21 That was your question. And I have his answer which says:
22 "Well, as I explained before, we had no intelligence-gathering
23 capability, so I wouldn't be -- have been at the time able to confirm or
24 deny such an allegation and I certainly can't do so today."
25 Do you have more than that?
Page 47962
1 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] We'll check that until the break,
2 but we are convinced that it was confirmed by General Rose, that he
3 confirmed this about the tricks that we asked him about. Maybe he didn't
4 know at that point in time, but later on he learned about that.
5 JUDGE KWON: Very well. Please continue.
6 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Prosecutor Gustafson said that
7 General Rose did not confirm, as we said in our paragraph 2313 of our
8 final brief, that UNPROFOR smuggled weapons for the Army of
9 Bosnia-Herzegovina. In that paragraph we relied on document D688,
10 page 4, which was shown to Rose on page 7425 and 26. And we didn't even
11 say that it was Rose who said that; however, we proved to him and to the
12 Prosecution that UNPROFOR, the UNHCR, and the other so-called
13 humanitarian organisations smuggled - of course it was individuals but
14 that doesn't change the fact - smuggled weapons and in other ways helped
15 the Army of Bosnia-Herzegovina. They were therefore partial and they
16 took part in the conflict in that way.
17 This is also proven in other paragraphs of our final brief. For
18 example, paragraph 1329, 2335, 2986, and the documents that our final
19 brief relies on, that is, D2168, D2170, D3575, D3302, D3303, D2122,
20 D2123, D3307, D3286, D2123, D3308, D4145 on page 3, D2336, D2512, D2513,
21 D2605, D2606.
22 These are but a few examples; to be more specific, 18 examples of
23 different cases during the war that show that what General Rose said was
24 not accurate. He either did not know about it or he could not allow
25 himself to say the truth. So this document was put to the witness, a
Page 47963
1 document that shows that the Muslim soldiers were masked in UNPROFOR
2 uniforms, that they used UNPROFOR insignia, that they painted their
3 vehicles white, and they wore UNPROFOR helmets. The testimony of
4 General Rose -- I mean what I said about them asking, that was on
5 page 7466 from line 21 to 7466 line 13. The Bosnian government, it says
6 there in the documents, would stop that when protests were lodged.
7 General Rose claimed that UNPROFOR did not know whether there
8 were any violations of the arms embargo in Bosnia-Herzegovina because
9 they did not have an intelligence service. 15 years after that, it was
10 clear that there was an active programme of violating the arms embargo
11 and this was done by various countries throughout the world. And
12 General Rose confirmed that on page 7476, lines 3 to 15. In response to
13 a question put by the Defence, the witness confirmed that the Western
14 countries had a total lack of understanding of the nature of the
15 conflict, also that they had a strategy of confusion in terms of having
16 the situation resolved. That is on pages 7322, lines 16 through 19.
17 The Trial Chamber can draw its own conclusions as to what the
18 consequences are for the warring parties, especially the Serb side, and
19 how important the testimony of officials from these countries is, these
20 countries that did not have enough knowledge or enough understanding,
21 that did not understand the nature of the conflict sufficiently.
22 In response to Karadzic's question, the witness, General Rose,
23 stated that his view of UNMOs, UN Military Observers, whose reports or
24 testimony are a significant stronghold of the Prosecution case against
25 Karadzic and the generals and soldiers of the Serb army, on page 7294
Page 47964
1 from line 5 to 19, he confirmed that they did not have the necessary
2 experience to view and understand the fighting from a tactical point of
3 view. Their reports were often unreliable and they had a direct line of
4 communication with New York. And they could be susceptible to propaganda
5 of international institutions and the international media. His own
6 interview was shown to Rose in which he said that he believed that Ganic
7 had organised his secret police to snipe at trams. He stated that on
8 page T ...
9 [Defence counsel confer]
10 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] That interview was shown to
11 General Rose, and 7335 is the page where this is referred to and the
12 interview was 1D2475. It hadn't been admitted but General Rose did not
13 deny giving that interview.
14 Your Excellency, that is an answer to your question as to what
15 the reference pertains to, the reference concerning Ganic and his
16 snipers.
17 JUDGE KWON: Please continue.
18 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] In response to Dr. Karadzic's
19 question, the witness, General Rose, said that it could not be
20 established beyond any doubt or with precision from where the sniper
21 shots had come because proper investigations were not carried out and it
22 was impossible to establish beyond a reasonable doubt who it was that was
23 shooting.
24 Francis Roy Thomas, yet another representative of the UN force,
25 on page 6832, confirmed that it was impossible to establish from where a
Page 47965
1 shell arrived in Markale on the 5th of February, 1994. D634 describes
2 the activity of the 101st Motorised Brigade of the 1st Corps of the Army
3 of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Later on, there is another description that near
4 that platoon there were a few other platoons, mortar platoons, then the
5 2nd Viteska Motorised Brigade. Mr. Thomas, Francis Roy Thomas, spoke
6 about that on page 6909. And a brigade artillery group of the
7 5th Motorised Brigade existed as well; 6910 is the page where he refers
8 to that, and that is also recorded in document D634. However, Mr. Thomas
9 was not aware of the kind of fire that the 102nd Motorised Brigade could
10 have used; 6912 is the page reference, again in relation to the same
11 document, D634.
12 The 2nd Motorised Brigade was around the PTT building where the
13 UN headquarters was and it was visible to one and all. Each and every
14 piece of weaponry could be seen as well. Mr. Thomas testified on
15 page 6835, stating that mortar projectiles at that time in Sarajevo could
16 have been fired from any side. And then he claims that any larger
17 calibre would have to be fired from the Serb side allegedly because the
18 Muslims did not have large calibres in town.
19 First of all, in town the Muslims did indeed have large calibres
20 and that can be seen in document D634. Secondly, the Muslim army could
21 reach the Serb part of Sarajevo from other positions as well by firing
22 large calibres from Igman and from the positions of the 16th Division, on
23 the outer ring around Sarajevo, the outer confrontation line.
24 Thomas identified the victims of the incidents that were shown to
25 him in morgues and medical institutions. He was not able to
Page 47966
1 differentiate among people who were killed on the front line and people
2 who died in other ways, and he had no sources that would have enabled him
3 to do so. We will direct the Chamber to a document that shows how many
4 soldiers were killed in Sarajevo. That is -- first of all, concerning
5 the medical institutions and mortuaries, that was said on page 6860. And
6 when he said that he was not able to differentiate between people who
7 died in different ways, that was on page 6861. Using the services of
8 regular military observers they established a cause of death. He said
9 that on page 6861. The military observers of the United Nations made
10 their judgements and conclusions interpreting from the context. They
11 erred and their errors were in the differentiation between combatants and
12 civilians. They were not able to distinguish even among the living
13 people who was a soldier and who was a civilian, that's on page 6863.
14 His testimony, therefore, is flawed and lacks weight, not because it was
15 intentional but because his knowledge was limited.
16 Another witness described random, indiscriminate fire from
17 large-calibre weapons as fire that was not concentrated on a particular
18 zone with the intent of targeting a particular military objective. That
19 witness was Richard Mole. All this is to be found on page 5818 and 5819,
20 lines 1 to 19; and on the previous page it was lines 20 to 25.
21 The fire was indirect, imprecise, and as such it was not
22 concentrated from that type of weapon and it was impossible to determine
23 a pattern of targeting so this fire can be qualified as indiscriminate,
24 but we've heard testimony of commanders from Ozrenska Street and
25 documents where they report to the corps command, saying: We are under
Page 47967
1 fire, we are suffering great losses, but we then fired a shell to shut
2 them down.
3 Every military prosecutor and every military judge knows how
4 artillery is used. In this Office of the Prosecutor, I have not seen any
5 person of that profile. In these circumstances, fire can be used.
6 General Karavelic said - and I thought he would come to testify - said
7 that the SRK used artillery fire just as the 1st Corps of the BiH. To
8 neutralise a firing position, you can use artillery to shut down, to
9 destroy, to harass a firing position of the enemy. It all depends on
10 whether the fire is proportionate.
11 We will equally see that another witness, cited by Ms. Gustafson,
12 said that he could recognise random fire intended to terrorise by the
13 fact that it was concentrated, which is completely contrary to what Mole
14 says. So we see there are two criteria for determining wrong use of
15 artillery by the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps. Such indirect conclusions were
16 used by the Prosecution to contend that there had been indiscriminate and
17 terrorising artillery fire against the city. Maybe for ordinary purposes
18 this can be done, but in every judicial system, including in our country,
19 higher standards would apply.
20 The Defence has also shown that the Muslims targeted their own
21 section of the city and they put it to the witness, Mole, and Mole
22 responded that the observers felt that could have been the case but they
23 did not have enough evidence. And he says on page 5886, lines 3 through
24 11, that they did not have the capability to carry out a satisfactory
25 forensic investigation.
Page 47968
1 Concerning the Muslims, the Prosecution does not even require a
2 satisfactory forensic investigation, but when they deal with chitchat on
3 the telephone that can be used against the Serbs, that is useful and it
4 is used.
5 Ms. Gustafson contended there was no evidence in the reports of
6 the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps that the Army of Bosnia-Herzegovina fired at
7 their own civilians. Maybe the Defence referred to the wrong documents,
8 but the following documents speak to this. D2796 states:
9 "The Army of Bosnia-Herzegovina is firing with RPGs and infantry
10 weapons from positions above Breka at Bascarsija and their own positions
11 with the intention of blaming the Serbs."
12 In document 2797 -- all these are D documents, D2797 and D2796.
13 In a report of the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps to the higher command, it is
14 said that the BH army is opening artillery fire [as interpreted] at the
15 city and the UN command in order to ascribe that fire to the Serbs.
16 I said "machine-gun fire." It was wrongly recorded as "artillery
17 fire."
18 This report refers to machine-gun fire. In addition, the
19 Prosecution did not mention a word about KW586, who was part of the
20 presidential security detail, and he heard and saw with his own eyes when
21 Izetbegovic and his leadership were making plans for massacres of their
22 own population, as described in our final brief paragraph 1977 and 29 --
23 sorry, 2099. And there is evidence of that and this evidence was
24 available to the Prosecution.
25 To continue with Lieutenant-Colonel Mole, on page 5886 he
Page 47969
1 confirmed his statement from 1997 when he said that the Muslim side was
2 using Sarajevo in order to maintain their victim status. On page 5887 he
3 confirmed that in cross-examination. Officer Banbury, in his testimony
4 in the Galic case, shared the same views and that was confirmed on
5 page 5886, lines 18 through 25.
6 There were common areas where Muslims could assemble, such as
7 market-places or lines or queues for humanitarian aid were a frequent
8 target that the Muslims used to fire at their own people. That was said
9 on page 5889, lines 1 through 15.
10 Lieutenant-Colonel Mole in his evidence said he believed that
11 Muslims gained advantage by causing suffering in Sarajevo which won them
12 sympathy from others and that is why they kept their own civilians locked
13 in Sarajevo. It was for that purpose. He said that on page 5889 from
14 line 17 through 22. He also confirmed on page 5890 that there were not
15 enough groups of UNMOs to investigate all the shells, all possible fire,
16 all incidents in that area, nor was it their mission to judge what was
17 proper and what was not around the confrontation line. That's on
18 page 5852.
19 Lieutenant-Colonel Mole confirmed that they did not conduct
20 investigations in the police sense of the word nor did they investigate
21 responsibility for individual incidents. That was because cease-fires
22 never held and it was very difficult under the circumstances of such
23 military activity to establish anything. So their reports cannot be used
24 as evidence in a criminal trial. His testimony is to be found on
25 page 5852. It's confirmed, thus, that they did not conduct
Page 47970
1 investigations that would be usable in a criminal trial and they did not
2 investigate responsibility for particular incidents of fire.
3 There were things that Lieutenant-Colonel Mole heard about only
4 and things that never found their way into UNMO reports. He confirmed
5 that on page 5884. He says on page 5895 and 5896 that it was impossible
6 to record all activity of heavy weapons. It was irrelevant, he says, and
7 useless to try to concentrate on a particular incident such as targeting
8 of UN vehicles or to determine the origin of fire. And the material
9 provided by military observers are a source of many charges concerning
10 Sarajevo.
11 As for observation posts, their number was limited by the number
12 of officers and the UNMOs complain they did not have enough personnel,
13 that's on page 5810. In a certain number of daily entries, there were
14 large differences between the number of shells incoming and outgoing from
15 Sarajevo on one hand and the number of outgoing shells from Sarajevo
16 falling on the Serbian side on the other. That was on page 5815.
17 In cross-examination, Lieutenant-Colonel Mole confirmed that they
18 were not in a position to place their observers on Mount Igman, and the
19 imprecision and inaccuracy in recording the number of shells is due
20 partly to the fact that there was no observation of outgoing fire from
21 Mount Igman. Lieutenant-Colonel Mole admitted that Mount Igman was
22 important geographically and militarily. And he agreed that the Muslim
23 artillery at Mount Igman had Serbian zones in Sarajevo, Nedzarici, Otes,
24 Ilidza, within their range, together with Butmir, Sokolovic Kolonija, and
25 Hrasnica which were Muslim-controlled areas in Sarajevo. That was
Page 47971
1 confirmed on page 5846.
2 So as a result of the majority of the reports -- 5846 is the
3 reference.
4 As a result of the majority of reports which contain
5 qualifications to the effect that in analysing these reports, one must
6 bear in mind that all heavy weapons of both sides were not observed.
7 This he confirmed on page 5847. And that these reports were actually
8 defective or flawed precisely because not all sources of fire were
9 observed.
10 When asked further about the accuracy of the reporting,
11 Lieutenant-Colonel Mole said that the statistics which were seen in the
12 reports was an incorrect representation of the events. It was an attempt
13 to initiate a level of activity. The observers -- the observers were
14 preparing this for the -- or actually, this is in respect of the UN
15 observers. They were just observing a limited, limited number of events
16 and had a limited number of observation posts. So from the testimony of
17 Lieutenant-Colonel Mole we can see for what purposes their reports could
18 be used. They could be only used to actually have a hint of the level of
19 the activity that they performed. They can say nothing about the
20 justification or the activity or the sources of fire or the proportions
21 of the respective activities of heavy weaponry in Sarajevo. This, he
22 says on page 5850.
23 And if it is time for our break, Your Honours. I do have to
24 apologise because I am obviously -- for the accuracy of the
25 interpretation I should speak more slowly, but that of course consumes
Page 47972
1 much of my time.
2 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Karadzic, can you scroll back your transcript?
3 If yes, if you could take a look at page 41, line 15. "KV86" should read
4 "KW586"; correct?
5 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Yes, you're quite right,
6 Your Honour. This is a protected witness and the number is correct.
7 JUDGE KWON: We'll have a break for 20 minutes and resume at
8 11.43.
9 --- Recess taken at 11.23 a.m.
10 --- On resuming at 11.43 a.m.
11 JUDGE KWON: Please continue, Mr. Karadzic.
12 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you.
13 At this pace, I would not be able to actually say everything that
14 I wish to say. So for the needs of the record, first of all, I should
15 like to identify the references so that that is properly recorded and
16 accurately so that I could move on. And I will have to condense my
17 presentation because of time constraints. And of course I wish to be
18 precise in respect of the references. And it slows me down generally
19 when I refer to the references.
20 General Fraser also testified, and that was on page 8034, and he
21 agreed that the reliability of UNMO reports depended on from what country
22 the specific provider of that information came. The gathering of
23 information was difficult. On page 8033 and 8036, General Fraser was not
24 consistent and was not certain in respect of the fact of how Zagreb was
25 informed or what was usable of the information which was provided. And
Page 47973
1 General Fraser confirmed that the French wrote their reports without him
2 having had an occasion to see them.
3 General Wilson, on pages 4074-4075, 4116, he testified and stated
4 that he did not have information about the strength of each of the
5 warring parties in respect of their infantries, but he had -- he
6 suspected that the Muslim army had the more numerous troops. He also
7 confirmed that he had never heard of the Patriotic League.
8 Mr. Tucker stated that the Bosnian Presidency had for its
9 objective the re-establishment of territorial integrity and
10 multi-ethnic -- a multi-ethnic community in Bosnia-Herzegovina as a
11 unitary state that had already been recognised, and that is on page --
12 excuse me --
13 THE INTERPRETER: The interpreter didn't catch the numbers,
14 sorry.
15 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Karadzic, could you repeat the number.
16 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] 23240 and 23241 are the pages.
17 However, when cross-examined, on page 23276, he admitted that he
18 drew his information about that when the Prosecutor presented to him,
19 showed to him documents of the army of the Bosnian Serbs and that at that
20 time he had no first-hand knowledge which actually reduces his testimony
21 to just a presentation of his thoughts and his conclusions.
22 Recently, in the case -- in the Mladic case, the Trial Chamber
23 reprimanded or warned several times the Defence not to ask their
24 witnesses questions to which they would reply with their beliefs or their
25 thoughts and that was done in several instances. In this particular
Page 47974
1 case, this Prosecution is basing everything on the beliefs and opinions
2 of witnesses, especially foreign witnesses who were not at all called as
3 expert witnesses but as fact witnesses, and everything that they said
4 were mostly their own convictions.
5 Mr. Banbury, who has been quoted frequently, on pages 13369 and
6 in respect to D1140 also on page 13370 and 13369, he admitted that he did
7 not -- that he had testified to many things which are contrary to his
8 convictions and beliefs; namely, that the Muslim side had actually
9 carried out tricks in order to deceive the international community. And
10 when he was asked, he said that he himself had written such reports.
11 This he admitted on pages 13369 and 70. But of course he failed to put
12 that in his original statement.
13 And as for Banbury, a lot could be said about him and if I have
14 the time I will do so. Banbury does not have an inkling about the
15 mandate of the United Nations. He should have actually trained and
16 instructed the newly arrived officers about the mandate of UNPROFOR. He
17 claimed that the Serbian side had nothing to do with their presence, that
18 there was no approval or consent needed from the Serbian side, but
19 Banbury said that they had come to save the government of
20 Bosnia-Herzegovina, that when demilitarisation is carried out, all forces
21 are to be withdrawn except government forces. And these are very harmful
22 consequences in the field, and these witnesses were total unusable
23 because they didn't have an idea what they were supposed to do. How can
24 they assess the acts of the Serbs when they always thought that the
25 government, the so-called government, was always right and that the Serbs
Page 47975
1 were the aggressors. This is how things stand.
2 The first ones who came, they knew much more about their mandate;
3 the very next generation didn't know anything about it. For instance,
4 Harland, Harland says, on pages 2058 and 020 -- 206 and so on, that he
5 was the political eyes and ears for the leadership of UNPROFOR which
6 focused on more political than on military issues because, in his own
7 admission, he had no military education to speak of. But he's testifying
8 about imminently military issues although he was not in charge of that
9 nor was duly qualified, competent, for that.
10 His sources of information in respect of military issues were his
11 mere presence where people talked about those issues. So he hears what
12 officers who are experts, who are professionals, say about some military
13 topics or matters and then he testifies about such matters. For
14 instance, he never exchanged a single word with me. He sat in the third
15 row and he took notes; whereas here he speaks about my political views,
16 the objectives of my conference and how much territory I was demanding
17 for the Bosnian Serbs. And this is something he has no way of knowing
18 because he was not at any of the peace conferences. Only Akashi or
19 Cutileiro or Owen can be asked about those things, those people who were
20 given my requests in that respect and were presented our positions
21 vis-à-vis these matters.
22 The Prosecution uses Banbury and Harland to state views on
23 matters which they do not know anything about nor could have known
24 anything about nor should have testified about. He collected information
25 from a number of sources, including the UNMOs, the value of which we have
Page 47976
1 already seen demonstrated and which is seriously challenged by the
2 commanders of the United Nations, Rose, Briquemont as well, I believe. I
3 believe that all of them said that they were good for nothing.
4 And he also ventured to characterise the events, he drew up
5 reports, daily -- drafts of daily and weekly reports, and the final
6 conclusions depended not exclusively on what had happened in reality to
7 the highest degree, but on the balance of influences of the nations which
8 actually provided the observers. And he speaks about this on page 20 --
9 2067. And on 2066, he admitted that he believed that the logs, the
10 diaries, of his superiors were, after all, more reliable than his own
11 views and than his own testimonies.
12 He also testified that his reports created day after day were
13 based -- as well as his weekly reports were based on seven-day
14 compilations from different sources, from a variety of sources without a
15 uniform methodology, so it was accumulated without a single methodology,
16 so one piece of information could feature a number of times in a single
17 report. There were no investigations, particularly not in the criminal
18 law sense.
19 But the testimony of Mr. Harland was even of lesser importance
20 and lesser utility because in his reports he manifestly showed himself to
21 be partial. As he said in his own words, he was there to defend the
22 government and the measures and the agreements did not apply to the
23 government forces. So there you have it. That is on page 2066, as well
24 as in his amalgamated statements, paragraphs 31 through 33.
25 The most dubious segment of his theory of shelling Sarajevo
Page 47977
1 emanates from -- which would have no military purpose and would represent
2 actually the base of terror, his sweeping statements are not based on a
3 single investigation, not even on superficial knowledge of legitimate
4 military targets and the disposition of forces in Sarajevo, in particular
5 the disposition of the forces of the 1st Corps which outnumbered the SRK
6 forces three times. Harland admitted that he only had some general
7 knowledge, and this he did on page -- that is in the Krstic case on
8 page 2351 and 2304 where he said -- in our case it was 2352. And 2352 is
9 the page reference in our case. He says that he had only general
10 knowledge, and on page 2304 he admitted that it was correct. I'll read
11 out his sentence.
12 [In English] "It is true that there were Bosnian gun positions
13 rather close. The city of Sarajevo is highly compact."
14 [Interpretation] Similar testimony was provided by
15 General Dzambasovic, that they could not remove their artillery pieces
16 from the residential area because the city was small. Well, they could
17 have accepted demilitarisation and then there wouldn't have been any
18 problem whatsoever. Also, it would have sufficed if they had not fired,
19 opened fire, then nothing would have happened.
20 Corwin, another representative of the UN, was threatened, he
21 received death threats because of his reporting in his own way. And that
22 is D1169. It was the Muslim side that was issuing these threats because
23 they were not happy with his reporting. When we recall that
24 General Morillon explained why he was not reporting on Muslim crimes, he
25 said: Well, we have to live here.
Page 47978
1 D717, the Memorandum of Understanding between UNPROFOR and
2 Republika Srpska in respect of the total exclusion zone, D717. It
3 confirms the right of the Serb side to use their weapons when they're
4 attacked.
5 Van Lynden, a journalist, he testified on 2422, that's the page
6 reference. He said that it was possible that the Army of
7 Bosnia-Herzegovina had sniper positions on the Holiday Inn, on government
8 buildings, and the museum. Further on he testified that when the war
9 started - this is page 2342 - that there were no Muslim troops in
10 Sarajevo. However, as Sefer Halilovic, a general of the Muslim army,
11 said, the forces of the Territorial Defence included 16 municipal centres
12 of the Territorial Defence, 16 units of the Territorial Defence, about
13 500 independent units, 450 independent groups, and 100 anti-sabotage
14 units. In response to a question that was put to him, Witness Van Lynden
15 continued to deny such a military presence in Sarajevo. 2454 is the page
16 reference. General Halilovic confirmed that the Muslim soldiers wore
17 civilian clothes, that they started conflicts. That is 2465-7, that's
18 the page reference.
19 Van Lynden on page 2461, 62, says that -- the previous reference,
20 General Halilovic, when he confirmed that civilians -- or rather, his
21 soldiers were wearing civilian clothes and they started attacks, that is
22 2456, 57.
23 Van Lynden confirmed that he did not receive information
24 concerning active operations of the Army of Bosnia-Herzegovina, 2461 and
25 62 are the page references for that. 2461 to 2462. And the previous one
Page 47979
1 was 2456 to 57. Also on page 2467 he confirmed that he was aware, that
2 he knew, that the number of troops had a 2:1 ratio in favour of the
3 Muslim side. On page 2461 he said that he never saw a tank in Sarajevo.
4 Under Muslim control, that is. On page 2472 through 73, Van Lynden
5 agreed that, generally speaking, there were legitimate targets in town
6 located on the hill of Hum at least. Van Lynden, on page 2473 through
7 74, confirmed that the buildings of Unis, the government buildings,
8 Treska, et cetera, were used for military purposes.
9 We saw what he presented as evidence here, that is to say, his
10 very own montage on the television that he worked for as if it were live
11 coverage. These strange tracer shells are seen in the background and he
12 admitted to us that this was edited, that it was a montage, although he
13 presented it differently to his viewers. That poor guy, he had exposed
14 himself to danger, that he was under fire as he was reporting. He had to
15 agree -- actually, notes were shown to him -- no, state security from
16 1992, stating that the Green Berets had taken over the Hotel Evropa in
17 the old town, then the Zagreb Hotel and so on.
18 In his reports, Van Lynden did not say who it was that was firing
19 at who. However, he left the impression that it was Serbs that were
20 firing at town and that is the impression he wanted to create. Although
21 there was gun-fire right in front of the military hospital where he was.
22 Around the military hospital there were Muslim mortars, there was a
23 howitzer above the military hospital, and he did not report about and he
24 confirmed that on 2494. He did not say who was firing at who, but the
25 context clearly suggested that it was the wild Serbs who were firing at
Page 47980
1 the tame Sarajevo.
2 On page 2501 and 2511, he confirmed that the Green Berets made
3 Van Lynden's stay at the hotel or at hotels impossible because their
4 presence at the Bristol Hotel at the square of Pero Kosoric made it
5 unpleasant, so that's probably why he was at the military hospital. I
6 want to save time so that will do as far as Van Lynden is concerned. And
7 then on all these pages up until 2619, Van Lynden is contradictory. He's
8 more of a propagandist and the most that he could do was to say -- not to
9 say who was firing at who because the conclusion would be that it was the
10 Serbs.
11 Jeremy Bowen is one of the reporters who said that snipers were
12 probably Serb and that they fired at a bus that was coming from the
13 direction of the Bosnian government building and that fire was opened
14 then, on page 10150. He came to that conclusion through a process of
15 elimination because of the weight of indirect evidence, 10151 is the page
16 reference. He admits that he was lying about the position of the Serb
17 gunners, the Bosnian Serb gunners, on the Oslobodjenje building because
18 he did not know that at the time -- because physically -- actually, he
19 admitted that he was not there physically and that he -- or rather, that
20 it was impossible to fire from there.
21 Jeremy Bowen deduces that the Bosnian Serbs are responsible for
22 the shelling of the cemetery Lav because that was regular shelling of
23 that cemetery and he said that that was within the range of Serb
24 weaponry. 10182 is the page reference.
25 Also he says that it was not in the range of the Muslim weapons.
Page 47981
1 Martin Bell testified as well, on the 22nd of April, paramilitary
2 groups, the Green Berets, attacked the headquarters of the 2nd Military
3 District in Sarajevo. 9815 and 16 are the page references. On Serb
4 territory in Ilidza, Muslim groups attacked the Serbs at the same time,
5 around the 22nd of April, that is, 9818-19. Bell agreed that that Muslim
6 armed groups did exist in town. Martin Bell agreed that secret
7 directives were issued to Muslim soldiers, that they should momentarily
8 take weapons from the arms depot in order to cut off the barracks there,
9 to take them prisoner throughout Bosnia-Herzegovina. That is on
10 page 9829 through 30. Armed groups of Muslims were also present at Vrace
11 in the Serb neighbourhood.
12 Martin Bell was aware that the Muslims were very skilful in
13 concealing their weapons as UN weapons. Sometimes he would come across
14 mortars or he would see mortars, and that was a very sensitive question
15 on the ground. 9863 is the page reference, when he said that journalists
16 saw this for themselves, they saw this mortar fire, and had they reported
17 about that they would have suffered consequences. The Muslim forces did
18 have heavy weapons in and around Sarajevo. The Bosnian forces -- no, the
19 Serb forces clashed at two fronts with the Muslim forces. That is 9864.
20 He confirmed that Mojmilo is dominant on 9865, that's a dominant position
21 in Muslim hands. He confirmed that the forces of the Presidency
22 discovered how wide-ranging this Muslim operation was, about 500
23 independent platoons and squads were concealed from the media and the UN.
24 9869 through 70, that's the page reference.
25 On page 9898 he confirmed that there were military installations,
Page 47982
1 military infrastructure in town, and that they manufactured weapons and
2 ammunition, and that, ironically, the Serbs were in a subordinate
3 position with the heavy weapons because the Muslim forces were carrying
4 out attacks with the intention of causing a reaction. 9902 is the page
5 reference.
6 All this information that is objective and that is favourable for
7 the Defence was received only in cross-examination. The Prosecution did
8 not make an effort, was not interested in painting the entire picture for
9 the Trial Chamber. They only portrayed a partial picture to the
10 detriment of the Serbs.
11 Also, that was not reflected in their reports to their media
12 companies, although there were some indications of editors cutting it out
13 even if they did include it in their reports.
14 Martin Bell was aware that in Hrasnica there were 4.500 Muslim
15 soldiers in the 4th Motorised Brigade on page 9903. On page 9909, he was
16 not surprised that command posts of the Army of Bosnia-Herzegovina were
17 deployed in residential areas so as not to be targeted, whereas they
18 could fire from there. Bell was aware of that, he knew that the forces
19 of the Bosnian Muslims, of the Bosnian government as he says, such as the
20 14th and 16th Divisions were part of the 1st Corps and that they were
21 located in Tarcin, or rather, in the northern part of Sarajevo. He
22 speaks about that on page 9910 and 991 -- no, 9910 through 12.
23 He confirms that the balance of power was shifting in the
24 territory of Sarajevo, that the Muslims had enormous forces in a
25 relatively small territory. He also confirmed that Izetbegovic declared
Page 47983
1 general mobilisation on the 4th of April.
2 Martin Bell confirmed a few things that have to do with
3 Karadzic's conduct that work in favour of the Defence. Again, this was
4 stated in response to questions put by the Defence. If I have enough
5 time, I'm going to show that as well.
6 The Muslim forces are also a significant source of information
7 for the OTP, for building up their case in relation to Sarajevo.
8 Ekrem Suljevic testified and quite a bit of the Prosecution case is based
9 on his testimony and his findings that projectiles mostly came from the
10 positions on the Serb side. When he was asked about the reasons
11 concerning shells coming from the Serb side, he simply said the Army of
12 Bosnia-Herzegovina would not shoot at its own people. So that would not
13 have been possible, it couldn't be ascribed to them that they were
14 shelling their own people. 5788 is the page reference, 290, and that is
15 the page reference where he determined the source or origin of fire on
16 the base of this analogy, this inference, that the Muslim side would not
17 fire.
18 He was asked to determine the type of shell and calibre in his
19 investigations and the direction from which the shell came. What he
20 established was not conducive to any exact information. During the
21 trial, Suljevic testified about the procedures employed in these
22 investigations on page 5741 to 5742, and he said that he relied on
23 ballistics reports as to whether a bomb was detonated on page 5744, and
24 the velocity of projectile and other information was included in these
25 reports. The witness based his findings on a balance of probabilities
Page 47984
1 and he testified about that on page 5755 to 57.
2 A photograph of Safet Hadzic Street is one of the exhibits and
3 that exhibit is D533. This photograph does not depict either the impact
4 or the damage. There are no traces of detonation. Page 5790 to 97.
5 Further on, on pages 6151 and on, the witness claims that projectiles
6 came from the aggressor, that is to say, the Serb side, without any
7 efforts to determine the origin or any references to the confrontation
8 line in that zone, and he did not in any way rule out the possibility
9 that the shell came from Muslim positions. Crucial information such as
10 the angle of impact, angle of descent, and exact location are totally
11 absent from his reports. Irregularities regarding fragments are constant
12 and they remain for the most part outside of the scope of his report and
13 the witness provided no further explanation. That's page 6180 to 6195,
14 and 6206. There are no reports on fragments. There is no indication
15 that fragments were investigated and analysed. That's pages 5723 to 24,
16 5733, 5739, 5746 and 47.
17 The witness testified that he was not a ballistics expert.
18 Referring to "our" reports, not his own report, he confirmed that he
19 never participated in drafting reports done by his section. Instead, it
20 was his colleagues who drafted them but he came to testify instead of
21 these colleagues. Asked about a particular report on page 6217 to 6219
22 and 6158 to 6159, in several cases the witness said he was totally not
23 responsible for any flaws in the report, saying that he did not write it,
24 saying that he was an ordinary member of the team, despite the fact that
25 he had been involved in these investigations.
Page 47985
1 Mirsad Agic [as interpreted], another investigator, together with
2 his team leader, Dragan Jokovic, on page T7752, the report was submitted
3 without a ballistics report. And Mirza Sabljica confirmed that the
4 information in the report was unreliable. In addition, the
5 investigations did not reveal the exact location of the origin of fire or
6 the distance or the direction of fire with any accuracy. So the findings
7 do not enable any conclusions. On pages 7745 to 46, regarding reports on
8 trams, the tram was put back in the position where it was hit, according
9 to the witness, in order to determine where the projectile came into
10 contact with the vehicle. The witness said it was crucial and could give
11 a totally different picture of the incident.
12 Regarding incident F14, on page 7887, his crime investigation
13 department was not able to determine where automatic fire came from on
14 the Serbian side without referring to ballistics reports; however, that's
15 precisely what they did, they made conclusions without consulting
16 ballistics reports. Furthermore, because the tram was not in its
17 original position as when it was hit, they did not determine the exact
18 location, and he says that on page 7889.
19 Regarding the incident on Livanjska Street, which is not part of
20 this case, Sabljica agreed that it was not investigated by an
21 investigating judge; page 7748 and 49. None of the directions discussed
22 with this witness regarding G6 is the location from which a projectile
23 was fired at the institute in Butmir. Regarding incident G6, applying
24 the method that was available to them, one could only determine in
25 general terms that it was fired from the west. This location, the
Page 47986
1 Institute for Blind Children that Sabljica marked, is not south-west
2 from -- no, it is south-west to the place of impact, not north-west. And
3 it is more likely that it came from different locations such as the
4 students' hostels; that's pages 7808 and 09.
5 Regarding G9, the direction of fire was determined during the
6 investigation but the angle of descent was not. Mirza Sabljica was asked
7 not to investigate on the following day despite the need for a ballistics
8 finding. That's on page 7915. Sabljica also claims, on pages 7752 and
9 53, 7762 and 7106, that he was totally unaware that his team leader
10 denied access to the UNPROFOR, and that without the knowledge of this
11 witness he submitted his report the very same day and that report did not
12 include the findings of Mirza Sabljica. That's on pages 7752 and 53,
13 pages 7762 and 7106. Ballistics report reveal that the azimuth was to
14 the south-east rather -- correction, to the north-east rather than north.
15 And that was not standard practice according to the evidence of this
16 witness. He shifted responsibility to forensic technicians who,
17 according to him, made a mistake. That's pages 7763 and 64.
18 On page T8224, Bogdan Vidovic testified that the origin of fire
19 was never determined. Nothing, save for a general direction. The angle
20 of descent was possible to determine but it was not determined and it was
21 not included in the report. Regarding incident F8, this witness,
22 Bogdan Vidovic, has no clue about which direction the fire came and the
23 investigation only determined a general direction from which it could
24 have come. The assumption was that it was on the Bosnian Serb side, and
25 based on that assumption they determined the trajectory, instead of first
Page 47987
1 determining the trajectory and then the rest. It's on pages 8174 to 76
2 and 8191. Concerning the distance from the confrontation line,
3 Bogdan Vidovic said he knew nothing about that zone and he could only
4 speculate. But despite that, despite the fact that he had only general
5 knowledge about the direction of fire, his report does state which side
6 is to blame.
7 In one of the incidents, a photograph used as evidence reveals
8 where the bullet impacted on the tram and where it hit the seats.
9 Judging by the height of impact and the angle at which it travelled,
10 these indicators were not taken into account. That was established on
11 page 8193.
12 The investigation did not establish whether fire was accidental
13 or deliberate. And during his testimony, the witness did not rule out
14 this possibility, that it was accidental. On page 8193 and 96, it was
15 established that traces were found in the tram and bullet casings were
16 found in the tram, but the witness didn't know which side used which type
17 of bullets. That's on page 8196.
18 THE INTERPRETER: Could Mr. Karadzic repeat the number of the
19 incident.
20 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Karadzic, could you repeat the number of that
21 incident.
22 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] The date of the incident is
23 14 February 1995. It is an F incident. I'll look up the number. It
24 could be 94. I'm not sure. It's not even in the indictment, although it
25 could be.
Page 47988
1 The witness failed to determine the height of the injury, the
2 level at which the bullet hit the victim, which is crucial for
3 determining the angle of descent of this projectile. It was possible to
4 determine the direction, but the witness said he did not determine the
5 angle of the incoming bullet and, as a result, he was not able to confirm
6 such findings. That's 8218.
7 There are many things in these investigative reports, none of
8 which can actually pass the test of a criminal case, the standard. These
9 reports are absolutely all general. It was sufficient for them to have
10 established the direction as if there were not both forces at the
11 position from which it was fired and at the impact site. So the
12 projectile could have come from any site. But in their own admission,
13 the investigating organs in Bosnia and Herzegovina - and this was
14 actually admitted by a witness in respect of the investigation in
15 Dobrinja on the 4th of February - so they did not conduct investigations
16 during the war the way they would have done and they did before the war
17 which they could present before a court of law.
18 Can we now take the break because I'll trying to abridge this, to
19 condense it, because I have very much to present yet.
20 JUDGE KWON: During the course of the closing argument of the
21 Prosecution, I asked the question to the Defence which building it refers
22 to by MiS building, which appears in paragraphs 1859, 2281, and 2288. So
23 if you could clarify after the break.
24 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I can clarify it right now,
25 Excellency. That is a red building which was on the one hand or on the
Page 47989
1 one side held by the Muslims and, on the other, the Serbs. So MiS --
2 M&S means Muslims and Serbs, there is a slash in between. This is the
3 red building behind the Metaljka building, partly held by Serbs, partly
4 by Muslims. On -- it is marked with the letter M on D2623, and in a
5 number of places it is marked as M&S, so the respectively held parts by
6 Muslims and Serbs.
7 JUDGE KWON: Thank you. We'll have a break for an hour and
8 resume at 1.43.
9 --- Luncheon recess taken at 12.43 p.m.
10 --- On resuming at 1.43 p.m.
11 JUDGE KWON: Yes, Mr. Karadzic.
12 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you.
13 Allow me, Your Excellencies and the Prosecution, to introduce
14 Ms. Melani Vranjes, from Iceland, a new member on our team, and she hails
15 from Knin and she's our collaborator here.
16 Allow me to point in condensed form to exhibits in the transcript
17 which manifestly show the cardinal mistakes committed by the
18 investigators on whom the Prosecution relies, and these mistakes, these
19 material -- these mistakes have rendered these materials totally
20 unusable.
21 For instance, KDZ166 committed such mistakes. That is evident on
22 pages 8295, 8311, T8307 to 09, T8316 to 17, T8320 to 8321, T8323 to 24,
23 T8325, T8339 to 8340, T8341 to 8342, T8344 to T8350 to 351 -- T8351 to
24 T8352. T8354, T8360, T8365 to 66, T8377 to 78. This is completely
25 worthless for criminal law purposes. Everything that this witness did.
Page 47990
1 Dragan Miokovic committed mistakes which disqualify everything
2 that he provided to this case. This is on pages T8572 to 8573; namely,
3 on those pages it has been shown what mistakes these witnesses committed.
4 8577 to 78, T8579, T8591, T8592, T8614, 8626 to 27, 8631 to 8633, 8635 to
5 36, 8638 to 39, and 8643.
6 In the cross-examination of -- by an amateur such as myself that
7 became evident. You can imagine what short work a proper professional
8 would have made of him in cross-examination.
9 KDZ485 also made such mistakes. This on pages 8899, 8809 to 01,
10 8916, 8922, 8923 to 24, 8917, 8922 again, 8927, 8929, 8935 to 36, 8938,
11 8930, 8933, 8937, 8911 to 12, 8968 to 9, 8958 to 59, 8959, and 8968.
12 These are -- this has proven to be absolutely unusable.
13 Emir Turkusic committed such mistakes. And this is seen in pages
14 9062 to 64, 9070 to 71, 9066 to 69, 9074 to 75, 9098, 9086 to 9094, 9100
15 to 9101, 9120 to 24, 9130 to 33, 9150 to 53, 9147 to 9150.
16 Sead Besic committed cardinal mistakes in his investigations.
17 And that is in evidence on pages 9439 to 40, 9458 to 64, 9470 to 1, 9482
18 to 83, 9505, 9501, 9522 to 25, 9523, 9517, 9519 to 9520, 9488, 9496, 9493
19 to 34, 9492, and 9494 to 95.
20 This cannot actually stand a single cross-examination. All these
21 findings actually foundered at the cross-examination by an inept
22 representative of the Defence.
23 Nedzib Djozo made such mistakes. And this is obvious at pages
24 9539 to 40, 9579, 9612, 9616 to 7, 9619 to 20, 9592, 9607 to 9, 9614 to
25 15, 9622 to 24, 9540, 9631, 9634 to 36, and 9639.
Page 47991
1 KDZ477 demonstrated the unusability of his findings in this
2 criminal case as evidenced on the following pages: 10944 to 945, 10946
3 to 47, 10977 to 78, 10984, 10987, 10989, 10985, 10984, and then 10987
4 again, 10993, 10994, 10998, 11007, 11015, 11020 to 21, 11018 to 019,
5 11036, 11038 to 40, 11047 to 8, 11054 to 55, 11058, 1156 to 58.
6 These are the investigators that the Prosecution relies on. In
7 our system, the investigating judge would do this rather than the defence
8 and he would actually either return it to them for additional processing
9 or dismiss it.
10 The following witnesses which the Prosecution relies on in
11 constructing this case, Sarajevo, against me are its inhabitants who used
12 to live in Sarajevo for a while or throughout the period under review.
13 For instance, Almir Begic, what is their not -- unusability as witnesses
14 reflected in? Most of them never saw any of the 45.000 of the combatants
15 of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina. They never heard about the units,
16 battalions, companies, brigades, of that army. They never heard about
17 the staffs of the army. Almir Begic, for instance, did hear that the
18 Deltas did have a staff in Velesici, and simply they are not of any use
19 as witnesses. Almir Begic demonstrated how unusable he is as a witness
20 on pages 9982 to 85, 9979 to 80, 9985, 9986, 9988 to 89, 9989, 11750,
21 11751, 11752, 11765, 11766, 11763, 11764, and 11771.
22 From Velesici to his unit in the centre of Sarajevo at Bjelave,
23 he passed via one route every day, and all the streets in Sarajevo were
24 available for the manoeuvring, coming and going, and supply of the units
25 for their rotation, for their shifts, and all these were legitimate
Page 47992
1 targets which were very infrequently targeted. And they were fired on,
2 according to the testimonies of the commanders of the Sarajevo brigades,
3 only in order to prevent, postpone, or discourage them from attacking.
4 Alen Gicevic, also a witness for the Prosecution, either did not
5 know about or he lied about facts associated with legitimate military
6 targets in Sarajevo as can be seen on the following pages: 7630, 7636,
7 7638, 7628 to 30, 7632 to 34, 7648, 7659 to 60, 7662 to 63, 7639 to 40,
8 7653, 7655.
9 Irrespective of the fact whether a witness doesn't know, didn't
10 know, when it was deliberately lying, the testimony of such a witness is
11 of no use. If he doesn't know where the forces are, if he doesn't know
12 who is shooting at whom or doesn't want to know, then such a witness --
13 the testimony of such a validity has to be taken into due consideration
14 without any moral condemnation whether he is a mendacious witness or not.
15 So Dr. Youssef Hajir, he said very nice things about the accused,
16 that he was proud that he knew him, et cetera, either didn't know or he
17 lied, and the Defence believes that he didn't know, he was not aware of
18 some facts related to legitimate military targets in Sarajevo as can be
19 seen on pages 8843, 8825, 8847, 8849, 8850, 8812 to 3, 8820, 8819, 8823.
20 Fahra Mujanovic either did not know or lied about facts related
21 to legitimate military targets that she could see. And that is in
22 evidence on the following pages: 8750, 8794, 8751, 8768, 8764 to 65,
23 8761 to 62, 8766, 8762. It is not probable - in fact, it is not
24 possible - that she didn't know that in her own hamlet that she testified
25 about as having come under fire, that there was a staff there and a
Page 47993
1 mortar battery located in that hamlet. That cannot be.
2 Bakir Nakas either didn't know or lied about facts associated
3 with legitimate military targets in Sarajevo as seen in the following
4 pages. It is hard to believe that somebody doesn't know that behind the
5 military hospital in which he was working there were mortar batteries
6 shooting or that at Gorica, above the military hospital, there was a
7 howitzer emplacement. Bakir Nakas is the witness.
8 This is in evidence that -- namely that his testimony was flawed,
9 and that can be seen on pages 6700 to 1, 6744, 6745, 6746, 6702 to 03,
10 6703, 6708, 6709, 6710, 6711, 6743.
11 Alma Mulaosmanovic either did not know or she lied about facts
12 related to legitimate military targets and events in Sarajevo. And that
13 can be seen on pages 6753, 6762, 6764, 6766 to 7, and 9779.
14 And another Trial Chamber in the General Milosevic case concluded
15 this, and I believe it was paragraph 352. UNPROFOR reported that there
16 was an exchange of fire around Vrbanja. The Army of Republika Srpska
17 claimed that there had been an exchange of fire and the observers also
18 confirmed that there was -- that there was an exchange of fire, but Alma
19 said that there was no exchange of fire. She was sitting in a tram and
20 she only passed through the zone in which fire was being opened for
21 20 seconds. And the Trial Chamber actually relied on what Alma said,
22 that there had been no exchange of fire. She was hit by a bullet from
23 another burst. We heard her, she testified here. So this bullet came
24 from another burst of fire. It was obvious that she had not been the
25 target and that it had not been sniper fire, but that paragraph remains
Page 47994
1 on account of which General Milosevic got a few years.
2 Fatima Zaimovic, one of the witnesses among the inhabitants of
3 Sarajevo, was not aware of or lied about facts associated with legitimate
4 military targets in Sarajevo and this is on the following pages. Let me
5 just remind you, this is the lady witness, she saw from Breka on Osmice a
6 cannon opening fire, she saw the shell coming out of the barrel and
7 travelling through air and such other hilarious things and she failed to
8 see a tank which was just 50 metres away from her house at Breka. She
9 didn't know that her son was a member of the 105th Brigade, which was a
10 very powerful, very well-equipped brigade in Sarajevo, and held Breka.
11 So Fatima Zaimovic, the wife of a friend of mine from my youth as
12 matter of fact, was shown not to tell the truth on pages 1898 to 9, 1891,
13 1904 to 05, 1908 to 10, 1963 to 4, 1966, 1975 to 81, 1989 to 90, 1990 to
14 1, so 1990 to 1, 2002 to 3, 1928 to 9, 1910, 1929 to 1930.
15 So many, many facts that discredit this witness, though her
16 testimony was short.
17 Milan Mandilovic either did not know or lied about facts related
18 to legitimate military targets in Sarajevo. He had to know about this,
19 and this became obvious on the following pages of the transcript: 5374,
20 5378, 5384, 5435, 5382, 5385, 5389, 5424, and 5440 through 3. So many
21 things, not knowing so many things and yet testifying. This shows how
22 useless all that testimony is in a criminal case.
23 Of course, none of that was obvious on the basis of amalgamated
24 statements. The Defence had to exert pressure and to squeeze this out of
25 them because of all the contradictions and all the ludicrous statements
Page 47995
1 that we heard. Not to mention other witnesses like Eset Muracevic, who
2 smuggled shells across the lines and when he was arrested he wondered why
3 he had been arrested.
4 Quite simply, it is to be expected, the Defence hopes that the
5 Trial Chamber is going to double-check each and every allegation made and
6 that they're not going to take anything at face value.
7 Since there is one more witness left, I'd like to ask that we
8 move into private session for a few minutes so that we can indicate the
9 essence of his testimony.
10 JUDGE KWON: Before we go into private session, line 15 an
11 previous page should read "Zaimovic" and line 20 should read
12 "Mandilovic."
13 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] That's right, Your Excellency.
14 JUDGE KWON: We'll go into private session.
15 [Private session]
16 (redacted)
17 (redacted)
18 (redacted)
19 (redacted)
20 (redacted)
21 (redacted)
22 (redacted)
23 (redacted)
24 (redacted)
25 (redacted)
Page 47996
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11 Pages 47996-47997 redacted. Private session.
12
13
14
15
16
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18
19
20
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22
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25
Page 47998
1 [Open session] 2 THE REGISTRAR: We are in open session, Your Honour.
3 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] We saw here that the Prosecutor
4 Ms. Gustafson is alleging once again, as in the indictment, as if nothing
5 had happened, as if all this evidence had not been called. She claims
6 that President Karadzic ordered the cessation of the alleged shelling of
7 Sarajevo only after Markale 1994 and because of pressure exerted by NATO,
8 and that it was only then that he ordered the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps to
9 respond to fire from the BH army, applying a 1:1 ratio. That is
10 absolutely incorrect as well, because already on the 14th of January,
11 1994, that is to say, three weeks before the incident at Markale,
12 President Karadzic at a meeting with the representatives of the army and
13 the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps, as noted down by General Mladic in his
14 notes, P1484 on page 149, he ordered that 1:1 should be the ratio of
15 responding to fire, irrespective of any NATO pressure.
16 I would like to remind the Chamber that the leadership and the
17 authorities of Republika Srpska had a very negative position regarding
18 the targeting of civilian areas in town. Even Djeric did that because
19 Karadzic did not have a command function at the time. There was this ban
20 on directing artillery fire at the city all the way up until the end of
21 the war. Many, many orders not to fire unless it is absolutely
22 necessary.
23 Ms. Gustafson also said that Gengo, Sladoje, and
24 General Milosevic as Defence witnesses confirmed that they did not take
25 any cautionary measures when they opened fire at the city. This is what
Page 47999
1 the witnesses actually said on transcript pages that were quoted by
2 Ms. Gustafson. Gengo on T29781. I'm going to read it out in English.
3 [In English] "First of all, fire was never opened if it was not a
4 response to enemy attack. When we were under attack I used 120- and
5 80-millimetre mortars. I did not need to use them at any other time. So
6 when we opened fire, it was in response to the enemy fire that had been
7 opened at us. If they had opened fire from a settlement, they knew what
8 we -- that we would respond, so they should have taken measures in order
9 to avoid civilian casualties. I could not see whether there were any
10 civilian people around that firing position or not. All I did was to
11 return fire on the firing position from which fire had been opened on
12 us."
13 [Interpretation] There were references made to the testimony of
14 certain witnesses to the effect that there was not an instant response.
15 Rather, a mortar would be moved and only then the Serbs would respond.
16 However, if the OTP had a proper military expert, I would tell them that
17 time was needed to calculate co-ordinates, and as for a firing point, it
18 had to be located and then the elements would have to be communicated,
19 and only then could a response follow.
20 As for Sladoje, Ms. Gustafson says that he said something that he
21 did not say, transcript page 30573. This is what he said:
22 [In English] "There were soldiers in each and every
23 neighbourhood. The civilian population lived in Nedzarici," Serbian
24 settlement. [Interpretation] I inserted that "Serbian settlement." [In
25 English] "There was the barracks there. There was this unity of the army
Page 48000
1 and the civilian population because impossible to live in any other way.
2 That is to say that not a single neighbourhood was civilian only. It is
3 a neighbourhood where people live, but also the military was stationed
4 there and that is practically the way it is in the all urban areas where
5 there was a military presence. How can you expect us not to open fire if
6 our positions are jeopardised? And the other side includes both
7 civilians and soldiers. They are both present there, so it is the
8 soldiers who are firing at us that are jeopardising the civilians on both
9 sides -- on that side" -- [Interpretation] I can add "on both sides."
10 Now, just look at how big Sarajevo is, look at its surface. And
11 it is very fortunate that the Trial Chamber visited Sarajevo. There are
12 civilians living throughout this urban area; however, not all points were
13 targeted. There were many neighbourhoods where a shell never fell. Why
14 did the OTP not make an effort to see why Bjelave was not fired at, why
15 different neighbourhoods were not fired at where Muslims and Serbs live
16 as well or predominantly Muslims. Why? Because nobody was shooting at
17 us from there.
18 We heard a Defence witness here who confirmed that there were
19 almost 300 mosques in Sarajevo and that they're full, especially on
20 Fridays, and no one ever targeted any one of them and I think that
21 somebody from the Trial Chamber asked why not. And they said because
22 they were not firing from there. I would like to remind the
23 Trial Chamber that there are many gasoline stations in Sarajevo. Not a
24 single one was ever targeted.
25 Witnesses of the United Nations spoke here -- actually, we saw a
Page 48001
1 document of the Muslim army. They were wondering how it was that people
2 lived in Sarajevo, that they were walking about, living that kind of life
3 although there was a war going on. That was possible, Excellencies,
4 because if they did not shoot, the Serbs would not respond. Witnesses
5 from the UN say Karadzic had all of that under his control. When an
6 agreement would be reached on a cease-fire or anti-sniping agreement, for
7 a long time there would be no fire. I'm going to tell you why. Because
8 once an agreement is reached and when somebody is observing the Muslim
9 side, they do not dare violate the cease-fire. And when appeals are
10 issued, the Serbs make promises and declare a unilateral cease-fire and
11 the Muslim side fires and forces Serbs into responding. So that was not
12 true about Sladoje.
13 General Milosevic on transcript page --
14 THE INTERPRETER: The interpreter did not hear the transcript
15 page.
16 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Said the following:
17 [In English] "We were not allowed to shell a civilian area" --
18 [Interpretation] The page is T32582.
19 [In English] "We were not allowed to shell a civilian area nor
20 indeed would we have chosen to shell a civilian area. The
21 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps didn't do that. Wherever there were civilians,
22 that meant that was not a target for us. We never fired at those areas."
23 [Interpretation] Towards the end of this session, I will show you
24 that close to 6.000 victims in Sarajevo were combatants. Only in
25 Stari Grad municipality - held 90 per cent by Serbs and Bascarsija held
Page 48002
1 10 per cent by the Muslims - had 680 combatants killed, mostly in 1992.
2 And there are about 1.002 cases where the same victims are shown in more
3 than one list, and about 4 per cent of them out of those 1.002 are
4 civilians, not the reverse, as was portrayed here.
5 On page T33123, General Milosevic clearly explained what
6 principles guided the SRK if there was a danger of civilian casualties
7 when responding to fire the army:
8 [In English] "If there is a civilian there, it is deemed a
9 civilian area. But if fire is opened from that area, then an assessment
10 will have to be made what to do with the -- with that target which then
11 constituted a military target. There would be a solution. There would
12 be a procedure put in place not to put civilians in danger when it's
13 possible. If it's not, then an absolute assessment will have to be made
14 if there would be collateral damage which would outweigh a military
15 mission to be accomplished, then this is abandoned."
16 [Interpretation] You have seen those officers. It is a sin
17 before God that Milosevic and Galic were convicted. You have seen their
18 subordinate commanders who are decent people and trained officers.
19 Ms. Gustafson, on page 24 on the second day of the closing
20 arguments, thought she had caught the Defence in a contradiction. It is
21 said that soldiers were trained in humanitarian law and she says -- or
22 rather, we claim that they were untrained. Trained in using weapons is
23 one thing and trained in humanitarian law is a different thing. Only
24 officers in our system were trained as officers, including humanitarian
25 law, not all the troops. Ms. Gustafson stated that only one document out
Page 48003
1 of the 100 mentioned in paragraphs 2392 to 2394 of our final brief
2 referred to fire opened from Kosevo Hospital by ABH; but in D2798, it
3 says that ABH fired six 82-millimetre mortar shells from Kosevo, or D507,
4 shown to General Razek, a video-clip of the statement of Lord Owen about
5 ABH opening fire from the Kosevo Hospital. And documents cited in
6 paragraph 1955 of our final brief mention mortar fire from many other
7 civilian buildings, not only the hospital. And such things happened
8 every time there would be a lull and Sarajevo disappeared from the front
9 pages and headlines in international media.
10 Ms. Gustafson stated that Defence witness Veljovic confirmed that
11 air bombs were imprecise but the same witness stated on page 2986:
12 [In English] "Thank you. Were you involved in the work that was
13 carried out on building the modified aerial bombs?
14 "A. I'm not competent for such things. I am an infantry
15 officer. I don't know anything about rocket mortars, metals, and so on
16 and so forth. I did not participate in that. I am not an expert on such
17 matters. I am not a technical expert by profession.
18 "Q. Thank you. And you are not a ballistics expert either, are
19 you? Do you have any ballistics training?
20 "A. No, I don't."
21 [Interpretation] The page was T29286.
22 Ms. Gustafson said that in order to develop a new piece of combat
23 equipment eight or ten years are required. This is not a new combat
24 asset. It's about changing the warhead on one rocket with another, using
25 four different engines with different performances, and it's all about
Page 48004
1 calculating the pressure of the engines to that warhead and its thrust,
2 and testing it on Zuc, or rather, testing ground, as one protected
3 witness of the Prosecution said here, that they were tried and tested
4 before being used at Zuc.
5 Speaking of imprecision, the imprecision of this weapon, in
6 another case which is still pending, the Judge told the witness not to
7 exaggerate when he said that these bombs were more precise when dropped
8 from an airplane than when they are launched from launchers with tested
9 engines. Regardless of that, let us see how many victims resulted from
10 the use of this weapon, how many times was it used in an urban area. It
11 was always a large military installation that was the target.
12 Andja Gotovac confirmed that her house was not targeted. It missed the
13 Miskin Crni weapon factory by a few centimetres and the bomb fell on the
14 road. Let alone the case of the school in Hrasnica, about which KDZ --
15 THE INTERPRETER: The interpreter didn't hear the number of the
16 witness.
17 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] He was the first one to get to the
18 school and the first time he didn't see either rocket motors, just an old
19 woman, no soldiers. And the next day he came, he was served completely
20 different evidence. That is an investigation that Berko Zecevic started
21 again 12 years later to establish that it was the way he said it was.
22 Berko Zecevic was -- Mile Poparic, expert witness, on page T32 -- 39042
23 to 43, said that such a weapon could be developed within eight months,
24 six to eight months, and perhaps six months is more realistic considering
25 that already-known assets were used to make that weapon.
Page 48005
1 First of all, neither Allsop or other UNPROFOR investigators were
2 able to establish the angle of descent and it's not possible for
3 Zecevic's deviations or error of margin to be acceptable. Zecevic
4 determined that at Markale, one angle of descent was 60 degrees,
5 plus/minus 5. If we accept that the angle of descent of a shell can be
6 determined based on the position of the stabiliser, as Berko Zecevic did
7 the next day, with a margin of error of 33 per cent and Allsop agreed, as
8 Ms. Gustafson said, and based on that, she claims that Allsop confirmed
9 Berko's finding, then the possible error of 33 per cent in a degree of
10 60 per cent would be 19.8. So the angle of descent of a shell could be
11 less than 19.8 degrees or even higher than 60 degrees by 19.8. It is a
12 huge range. It means practically that the shell could have been fired by
13 anybody but the Chinese. And it has a maximum angle of descent of 55.3
14 and the minimal 47.3, so that range is less than 30 degrees all in all.
15 In the record, it should be 85, line 11: [In English] The
16 maximum angle of descent is 55.3. [Interpretation] No. The maximal is
17 85.3, that's from a close range, and the minimal angle of descent is
18 47.3.
19 Luckily the Trial Chamber has been at Markale and they saw for
20 themselves. How probable is it that it was done without calculating the
21 target and without deliberate intent? I leave it to the Trial Chamber to
22 judge.
23 This Court, which is a UN Court, and this Office of the
24 Prosecutor, which was appointed by the United Nations, neglect several
25 official findings of the United Nations regarding Markale I and they take
Page 48006
1 into account and rely on the findings of Berko Zecevic, a high official
2 of the war industry of Bosnia-Herzegovina, who volunteered not to find
3 but to prove who had fired. And this is the same man who was denied
4 access to the UN investigation by Mr. Hamill, a high UN official. It is
5 not all right for the parties to the conflict to participate in the
6 investigation, especially if there is no third party. How can a Chamber
7 trust Berko Zecevic and convict General Galic for this incident and set
8 aside everything that UN officers found and reported about that incident?
9 I don't know when the break is. I don't have much more time and
10 I have a lot to present.
11 Let me just say that the Office of the Prosecutor withdrew from
12 the claims of Berko Zecevic that those were air bombs, although he claims
13 that those were aerosol bombs. He is either lying or he is -- [In
14 English] Fuel air bombs. [Interpretation] Fuel air bombs. They create
15 quite different destruction, different injuries. It's absolutely out of
16 the question that they were ever used. And the Office of the Prosecutor
17 accepts that this was a lie, that it cannot be believed, but they did
18 accept Berko Zecevic's claims in every other respect.
19 [Trial Chamber and Registrar confer]
20 JUDGE KWON: We'll have a break for 20 minutes and resume at
21 3.00.
22 --- Recess taken at 2.41 p.m.
23 --- On resuming at 3.03 p.m.
24 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Karadzic, I was informed that you have one hour
25 and ten minutes to conclude your closing arguments. Please continue.
Page 48007
1 THE ACCUSED: [Microphone not activated]
2 JUDGE KWON: Microphone, please.
3 THE ACCUSED: Sorry. I said I would be very happy if this ten
4 could be extended to 20 or something like that but I --
5 JUDGE KWON: I don't think so. Please conclude in the time
6 allotted.
7 THE ACCUSED: Thank you.
8 [Interpretation] I shall try to condense our final brief, the
9 Defence final brief. Everything is in the final brief, Defence final
10 brief, but I have to refer to this incredible selectivity of the
11 Prosecution when they quote the entire document except for the last line
12 in a document which clearly defines its character. For instance, when
13 I'm asked what targets and I said "only military targets," this is
14 omitted, for instance, and a multitude of other things.
15 The Prosecution wants what they stated in paragraphs 608 and 609
16 and 614 to 616, they want that to stand which is that there was a policy
17 of terror in Sarajevo. Without any obligation on their part to ascertain
18 who created this policy of terror, what its components were, what proves
19 its existence. And they give a totally erroneous motive and cause. It
20 is quite clear that the only side which could benefit from the suffering
21 of Sarajevo and the citizens of Sarajevo, both Muslim and Serb ethnicity,
22 was the Muslim political side. They took advantage of this, they drew
23 benefits from it. The Serbian did not have any benefit from that.
24 Excellencies, in the exhibits you have ample evidence where you
25 can see from the beginning that initially I believed the foreigners very
Page 48008
1 much and I actually criticised the Army of Republika Srpska without
2 justification. Had there existed any agreement or any plan and policy of
3 terror, all of them would have told me, because they were not afraid of
4 me: Come on, don't play the fool, this is what we agreed upon. But
5 never in any intercept is there any insincerity in our efforts for
6 Sarajevo not to suffer. But this is just unsustainable, I mean the way
7 it is portrayed.
8 I should like to refer the Chamber's attention to 40 witnesses
9 from the SRK who talked here, who testified here, annulling everything
10 that the Prosecution charges me with. And the documents P1478 which are
11 mis-characterised by the Prosecution, that is pages 73 to 74, then P1 --
12 THE INTERPRETER: Could Mr. Karadzic please slow down with the
13 numbers. We cannot follow.
14 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Karadzic, please slow down when you refer to the
15 numbers.
16 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] So paragraphs of the Prosecution
17 final brief 608 and 609 and paragraphs from 614 to 616. The Prosecution
18 sustains this thesis about the existence of a policy of terror in
19 Sarajevo and it invokes selectively documents, omitting from those
20 documents the key elements which actually determine the nature, the
21 character, of such documents. The documents which I recommend to the
22 Chamber, so not to take their word for it but to see and to check, these
23 are the documents which have been misquoted: P1478, pages 173 to 174;
24 then P991; P5989; D4373, paragraphs 5 and 7; P1484, pages 140 and 141 and
25 149, all these are mis-characterisations. Then P1006, D324, P5065,
Page 48009
1 P6297. In all these documents, authentic documents, secret documents
2 between the commands, they all refer to the protection of civilians in
3 Sarajevo whenever action is carried out, and they clearly show that the
4 Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina is where it is and where the hideouts in
5 the city are and where action has to be taken.
6 So the Prosecution simply invokes documents that have not been
7 accepted, like P4800 and 4807, in footnotes 2291, 2294, and 2311. This
8 is what you have to resort to if you have to patch up some hollow proofs
9 and evidence.
10 Then in paragraph 619 they say that Karadzic received regular
11 reports on the situation in Sarajevo. So what? Did those reports
12 contain any proof that I was informed about crimes committed by Serbs and
13 then I was papering over that, I was keeping silent. These documents
14 refer exclusively to events, to developments, to attacks. The Army of
15 Bosnia and Herzegovina attacked here or there and we responded in this or
16 that way. These are secret reports, and all stories about how the Serbs
17 fired a shell would have been recorded there. And the observers of the
18 observation posts, the Limas would have been informed because they were
19 informed in advance of any intention and targets. The Prosecution failed
20 to demonstrate that any specific incidents were something Karadzic was
21 aware of or had been informed about. And in fact many of the incidents
22 that are in the indictment were incidents in respect to which UNPROFOR
23 did not protest with the Sarajevo government. Simply, there was no
24 protest for specific incidents because UNPROFOR was not satisfied that it
25 was so.
Page 48010
1 In paragraph 621, the document which the Prosecution erroneously
2 quotes, misquotes, is P2493, page 9. They leave out the key word which
3 is that retaliation shall be against military targets. You can see the
4 handwriting here, the annotation.
5 [In English] "Retaliation is productive. When they shell Doboj,
6 we retaliate. It is effective.
7 "Q. Civilian targets?
8 "Karadzic: No, military targets."
9 [Interpretation] There is not a single shred of evidence about
10 any reprisals taken against someone who was not opening fire, and there
11 is no proof about deliberate and intentional, conscious targeting of
12 civilian targets, and Karadzic did not direct terror as in paragraph 622
13 and as can be seen from evidence about humanitarian proof.
14 Our paragraphs 1324 and 1325 and 2984 and 2988 explain this
15 question. The Prosecutor's invoking some secondary sources of people who
16 are not in the know about how allegedly Karadzic had said something or
17 how they had understood something that Karadzic had said is of no
18 relevance. It cannot be of any importance in respect of the documents
19 having regard to the documents I sent to the army. I was the only
20 supreme commander who was restraining the army, and my conflicts with the
21 army were not because of some crimes which they committed or mine own; it
22 was actually a fight for them to let through humanitarian relief.
23 Here you say that Karadzic manages -- managed the crisis by
24 managing humanitarian relief. I interfered with humanitarian relief only
25 when so requested by the representatives of the international community,
Page 48011
1 and Sadako Ogata thanked me courteously many times. I personally went to
2 Bratunac to convince not the army, not the troops, but the people to let
3 humanitarian convoys through. Over 20.000 landings of humanitarian
4 aircraft at Sarajevo airport, which was our territory that we, of course,
5 handed over for that particular purpose, were carried out.
6 (redacted)
7 (redacted)
8 (redacted). Some of them, about 10 or 20 per cent, did encounter some
9 difficulties. But when we talk about Srebrenica, you will see that this
10 was not the way it was; namely, they did have enough food. Never did
11 Karadzic deal with that, except in the form of encouraging and ordering
12 that it be made possible. Of course this is falsified by the Prosecution
13 because they omit to say that I said when the airport is shut off, of
14 course humanitarian convoys can still use that route. This was omitted
15 from the account of the Prosecution.
16 And who is this supposed to deceive? Exclusively the
17 Trial Chamber and to lead the Trial Chamber to adopt an erroneous
18 decision.
19 This is document P859, where they say because of the abuse of
20 1st Corps of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina smuggling of arms,
21 et cetera, Karadzic states that humanitarian relief can still use
22 alternative routes, but the airport shall be shut down for these reasons.
23 [In English] "Of course, humanitarian convoys are free to utilise
24 the earlier routes across our territory."
25 [Interpretation] This is not in the presentation of Prosecution
Page 48012
1 in their brief.
2 In paragraph 628, it is claimed that I had been informed, that I
3 had agreed that the Serbian response was inadequate. I am not competent
4 there. I thought that the proportional response was 1:1. I always
5 quarrelled with the army and they were right. I was not right, because I
6 believed these foreigners and I spent more time with the foreigners than
7 doing my own presidential job. Foreigners were always visiting me or I
8 was abroad at conferences and I addressed these issues only when so
9 requested. I believed that our responses were inadequate, but they were
10 not inadequate. Under the law the president cannot order a unit that has
11 been attacked not to respond. No one can prevent a soldier from
12 defending himself. That just doesn't exist.
13 And with the support of the international community and the
14 media, it was easy for the Muslim army, not to say the Muslims, to
15 endure -- under pressure, to shoot at us, get firing response and then
16 they report us. I did think that there was some senseless shelling, but
17 when the army showed me what had actually happened, I was proven wrong.
18 Excellencies, it is [indiscernible] here, the contention of the
19 Prosecution is that there had existed a plan of terrorisation, a plan and
20 a decision to terrorise. Also a permit or perhaps order to snipe at
21 civilians. Look at what the Prosecution has charged me with. There is
22 not a single fatality which has been properly processed from sniping.
23 They question the credibility of Mile Poparic and Dr. Subotic. They are
24 actually academicians in respect of what the Prosecution experts did.
25 They have shown and demonstrated everything. It is absolutely impossible
Page 48013
1 to hit someone with a sniper from a thousand metres' distance.
2 They didn't show where Munira Zametica was, was she turned
3 towards the creek or facing away from the creek. They didn't show that.
4 Everything depends on that. They didn't demonstrate whether you could
5 shoot from the left bank by the church in the river Dobrinja.
6 Sanija Dzevlan herself saw ricochetted automatic fire bullets from the
7 asphalt and here it is claimed that she was hit in the lower end of
8 the -- lower part of the back, but this is nonsense. This is an insult
9 to the Trial Chamber first and foremost.
10 At Baba Stijena, between the place where the little Pita was
11 wounded and Baba Stijena, there is a hill. Whether there are houses or
12 woods, that's irrelevant, but there was a hill there. You cannot from a
13 pointed rock hit someone with a sniper with precision from a distance of
14 1.000 or 1500 metres. This is pure nonsense. And if the Prosecution
15 hopes that this will actually pass, we have nothing to say.
16 Mile Poparic, Zorica Subotic all stated facts here, and it is not
17 an isolated belief that there was a planned explosion at Markale. You
18 heard the investigator say: Let's go to the roof to see whether the
19 stabiliser is perhaps not on the roof, et cetera. But the facts which
20 were adduced here that is firm as a rocket cannot be refuted. It is an
21 exercise in futility.
22 Let me show you a couple of photographs at this point so that you
23 can see how things actually look. This is Dresden after the Second World
24 War.
25 This is Gaza --
Page 48014
1 JUDGE KWON: Just a second. Are they in our evidence,
2 Mr. Karadzic?
3 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] No, no. I would just like to
4 illustrate my point. I don't want to tender it.
5 I should like to illustrate --
6 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Karadzic, I don't see the point of your
7 presenting documents which are not in our evidence.
8 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Excellencies, this is Mostar after
9 three wars into -- three months into the war. And there is not a single
10 dent in Sarajevo. Just Unis buildings, government buildings,
11 Holiday Inn, and Rainbow building were mentioned, and we have proof that
12 they also opened fire from there. There is not a single dent on the
13 buildings. They say that we had a policy of terror and policy of killing
14 over 1260 days of the war. Where are these victims? 6.000 of them are
15 combatants and fighters, most of them. Where are the victims? The
16 victims which are impressive, or rather, the large numbers is the ones
17 that they caused at Markale and in the queue for humanitarian relief and
18 the queue for water.
19 These are -- in document, rather, D1115, which is a document of
20 the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina where they give the names of military
21 victims of combatants, casualties. They are in Sarajevo. The total is
22 between 10.000 to 74.000. It is about 60.000. The total number of cases
23 in Bosnia and Herzegovina is 98.000, and of that, Serbs account for about
24 30.000 and Muslim soldiers for about 60.000. And that is the real
25 figure. And when you do your deliberations, we will have a population
Page 48015
1 census result already.
2 On this list of the 5.800 combatants killed in Sarajevo proper,
3 there are overlaps, there are cases of same combatants reported twice or
4 sometimes even thrice or four times. And these overlaps or double --
5 figures reported twice, there are 1.002 such cases. Of the 5.800, 1.002
6 combatants are shown in two places in different times. So these are the
7 victims which were shown as civilian victims whenever it was required.
8 God will not forgive us such lies, and one should believe that God knows
9 all this, because the Serbian side tried to reduce the number of victims
10 to the minimum.
11 Document D1115 that we got from the Army of Bosnia-Herzegovina
12 was compared with document P5008. This is a document concerning the
13 number of victims in Sarajevo. There are only a few civilians there,
14 only a few. There are 19 civilians in all those overlaps, so that's
15 about 4 per cent if we look at the 1.002 as well. So that is how one
16 manipulates figures and that is how one manipulates accusations that I
17 can understand in times of war and for propaganda purposes, but one
18 should not appear before a distinguished court of law in that way.
19 Another thing, the most terrible weapon as far as civilians are
20 concerned is a multiple rocket-launcher. It would create chaos in
21 streets. It is the most catastrophic weapon. The Serb army never fired
22 multiple rocket-launchers at an urban area. You saw these officers and
23 generals, how properly they treated their work and also their fellow
24 citizens of any religious affiliation.
25 Your Excellencies, does this mean that -- well, actually although
Page 48016
1 these documents were admitted, this was done on the basis of documents.
2 Can I show the piece that has to do with the militarisation of Sarajevo
3 or not?
4 JUDGE KWON: I don't follow. It's up to you how to present the
5 documents during your closing argument. If it is in our evidence.
6 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Documents on the basis of which
7 this was done, they were admitted; however, this is visual, this is on a
8 map, Google Earth. It shows where these positions are and -- before
9 that, briefly, I would just like to present paragraph 634 of the
10 Prosecution brief to you as well as 621. There are extremely selective
11 quotations from a document as if Karadzic were supporting this.
12 [In English] "That maybe some of our gunners have bad eyes."
13 [Interpretation] This is the kind of cynicism that I have never
14 displayed in my life and I abhor that kind of thinking.
15 Please take a look at this document and see what it looks like.
16 Karadzic, in that document, on page 9, says civilians are not the target,
17 they're only military targets. When the Prosecution says they were
18 trained -- and I've already said that they were trained in the laws of
19 war but not how to handle artillery pieces that they perhaps handled when
20 doing their term in the military 15 years before that.
21 In paragraph 635, it says that Karadzic responded with threats,
22 for example, to General Smith in May 1995. It wasn't Karadzic that was
23 issuing the threats; it was Smith. And he asked for the bombing of the
24 Serbs, not the Muslims who had started the initiative -- the offensive.
25 I kindly ask the Trial Chamber to put all these documents in their proper
Page 48017
1 context. If something happened after July in Sarajevo --
2 JUDGE KWON: I'm sorry. Please bear in mind that this document,
3 i.e., visual aid, you are using to assist your closing argument is not
4 part of the documents. So bear in mind to make a correct reference for
5 the future purpose. For example, in relation to the previous paragraph,
6 the Prosecution final brief 634, you seem to have referred to Banbury's
7 handwritten note page 9, but in the transcript it appears that you said
8 "in that document on page 9." So later on when we read this document,
9 closing argument, we have no idea what document you were referring to.
10 THE ACCUSED: I was referring to P2493.
11 JUDGE KWON: Yes, which is Banbury's handwritten note; we saw it
12 before.
13 Please continue.
14 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you.
15 Very well. Then in P2264, it is not Karadzic that is threatening
16 General Smith; it's the other way around. Serbs, official, serious
17 Serbs, never issued any threats because they were not in a position to
18 threaten anyone. We're not that kind of power to be able to threaten
19 anyone. On the other hand, it was clear to UNPROFOR and everyone else
20 that NATO is one thing and that they were a different thing until they
21 united. When NATO started their strikes, upon their instructions, then
22 they became one and the same thing.
23 Allow me to show the degree of militarisation of Sarajevo. All
24 of that is based on the documents that have already been admitted. The
25 imagery would be a lot richer if we were to include all the documents
Page 48018
1 that were admitted later on because --
2 JUDGE KWON: Just a second.
3 Yes, Mr. Tieger.
4 MR. TIEGER: When we went through exercises such as this during
5 the course of trial, they were submitted to the Prosecution in advance so
6 efforts could be made to determine any responses we had vis-à-vis their
7 accuracy, reliability, and so on. It's not the time to create new
8 exhibits and present them to the Court during closing. If they're
9 grounded on evidence, as the Court noted, of course that's fine; but this
10 appears to be something quite new.
11 [Trial Chamber confers]
12 JUDGE KWON: The Chamber agrees with Mr. Tieger.
13 Mr. Karadzic, please proceed.
14 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you. I'm not going to
15 insist, but this is not a new exhibit. This is just a presentation of
16 evidence that has already been admitted.
17 JUDGE KWON: No, it's just a waste of time. Just please carry
18 on.
19 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you.
20 Mr. Robinson dealt with the question of Srebrenica better than I
21 would have. The Prosecution asserts that there was this kind of plan or
22 that kind of plan in terms of what would happen in Srebrenica. For an
23 entire year, the Serb side tolerated the existence of large areas in
24 Podrinje, the Drina Valley, under the control of the Muslim forces that
25 were mixed with the Muslim population and they are taking advantage of
Page 48019
1 the population and taking advantage of their homes. When our people
2 would advance, they would run away; and when our people would retreat,
3 then they would go back to these houses and they would fire at us. And
4 then they say that -- Zivanovic said that this was not the destruction of
5 property but of military facilities.
6 Ms. Gustafson said that I ordered, that we ordered, in the autumn
7 of 1992, that Srebrenica be taken. We were compelled to go for
8 Srebrenica in the spring of 1993. Why do we not do that earlier on?
9 Because we expected a map on the basis of which the Muslims would get a
10 significant part of Podrinje, the Drina Valley. So that is the reason
11 why Srebrenica was in 1993, not in 1992.
12 I've already said that I issued this order on the 16th of March
13 and they are overlooking the fact that it contains a lot of content that
14 no one asked me for and that is favourable for civilians, especially
15 Muslim civilians, because at that moment, all my orders about protecting
16 civilians exclusively pertain to Muslim civilians because at the moment
17 when Srebrenica fell, there were no Serb civilians in Srebrenica.
18 Just one more thing in relation to Sarajevo and everything else.
19 I would like to draw your attention to the following, the attention of
20 the Trial Chamber to the following, that many incidents, massive ones,
21 bloody incidents happened when I was attending international conferences,
22 and that's the only reason why I went abroad. That would happen, these
23 incidents were calculated, they wanted the conferences to be disrupted
24 and interrupted.
25 I just wonder about Koricanske Stijene, whether there was this
Page 48020
1 awareness that I was at the conference in London; however, the
2 Prosecution does know that the Minister of the Interior, Mico Stanisic,
3 who is an extremely honest man and very well-aware of the law and he was
4 acquitted on account of Koricanske Stijene, whereas the OTP insists that
5 I'm responsible for Koricanske Stijene. They say that I co-operated with
6 Momo Mandic. Momo Mandic, before the court of Bosnia-Herzegovina, a
7 court before which it is very hard for a Serb to fare well, he was set
8 free. He was acquitted. Gojko Klickovic was acquitted as well. There
9 is the prime minister, there is the ministers, the local leadership. How
10 can the president of the republic be responsible for that then? These
11 are things that a normal person cannot understand.
12 Most of these incidents from the 27th of March -- no, 27th of
13 May, when I was in Lisbon, that's when they interrupted our negotiations
14 because of this alleged mortar shell in the street of Vase Miskin, which
15 certainly could not have been a Serb shell because it is such a narrow
16 street that would have to hit one of the walls, I mean, of the buildings
17 in that street, that is.
18 As far as Srebrenica is concerned, Srebrenica and Zepa had lost
19 the status of safe areas already in May, the agreement was signed on the
20 8th of May, and according to all international agreements nobody was
21 supposed to fire from Srebrenica, nobody. And it's not only that they
22 were shooting but they were going out whenever they felt like it. They
23 made necklaces of Serb ears and they showed this to foreigners. They
24 would steal cattle, 100 sheep. They killed all the Serb civilians that
25 they would find in the villages around Srebrenica. And here it is being
Page 48021
1 asserted that Srebrenica was starved. KDZ45 said how big his farm was.
2 He's not the only one. They all had that much.
3 5- or 6.000 inhabitants lived in the town of Srebrenica itself
4 and several thousand refugees from neighbouring municipalities; whereas
5 Christine Schmitz testified in this case and stated that on the 25th or
6 27th of June, 1995, as an experienced humanitarian worker she entered
7 Srebrenica and she observed the children because she said that nothing
8 can be put falsely as far as children are concerned. Then she saw the
9 children playing in the street and they looked healthy and they looked
10 fine. So if children are playing in the street, that means that there is
11 no shooting; and if they're not malnourished, if they're healthy, that
12 means that there is enough food and there is enough medicine.
13 The Prosecution probably regretted the fact that they received
14 that answer.
15 So we tolerated these terrible losses that were inflicted upon us
16 by the 28th Division of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The
17 commanders of this division have blood up to their shoulders. They are
18 direct killers and some of them were acquitted before this court. And
19 ultimately we had to separate Zepa and Srebrenica and that was the main
20 task. It wasn't Karadzic who ordered on the 9th to attack Srebrenica;
21 rather, he agreed that Srebrenica be taken because Srebrenica had stopped
22 defending itself. On that day, in the morning, Suljic, the president of
23 the municipality, called Sarajevo and asked for permission to withdraw
24 because the army would not defend Srebrenica. Krstic, in the evening,
25 called the Main Staff and he said that the conditions were right for him
Page 48022
1 to enter Srebrenica and I agreed to that with many provisos, all the
2 things that they had to take care of and so on and so forth.
3 Also, most importantly, people did not think that the army would
4 enter. We have this intercept from the 10th and Muslims are saying: It
5 seems that the Chetniks do not wish to enter Srebrenica.
6 Now, what happened when they entered Srebrenica? I saw a few
7 killings of some people who happened to be there by members of that
8 well-known platoon and the members of this platoon took part in the
9 killing of POWs. The population had left earlier on. They left of their
10 own free will. They went to the base in Potocari. We have evidence to
11 the effect that Serb shells were falling around the area, not on them.
12 It was corroborated through testimony here that they had M-84, the best
13 tank in the world, the Serbs did. But it -- it's the best tank in the
14 world but it did not hit the hospital, the school, or the civilians.
15 They didn't want the civilian population to disperse in the woods. There
16 was no encounter between the army and the population. And then you have
17 all this evidence about me not believing, not knowing whether we had
18 taken it or not. And I'm asking Deronjic: Is it correct that we have
19 entered Srebrenica? Which is ridiculous that the supreme commander
20 should ask some civilian: Have we entered Srebrenica? But that's what
21 the situation was like.
22 And then there was this feverish activity in terms of providing
23 security for these civilians. No one had any idea of the remaining
24 people not surrendering. 10- to 15.000 people were scattered through the
25 forest -- actually, they had set out in this column. The Serb side was
Page 48023
1 the last one that agreed to the evacuation of civilians, the last one.
2 Mladic gave that only on the morning of the 12th. There is no way that
3 there was a deportation. It was understandable that those who were not
4 from Srebrenica would leave, but it did not cross our minds that the
5 local population would leave.
6 And then in the media there are reports saying 8.000 - I don't
7 know how many thousand - civilians in Srebrenica were shot dead. And of
8 course I'm calling Deronjic and asking him what all of that was about. I
9 did not install Deronjic or Brdjanin, as was stated here in these
10 arguments presented here orally, I did not install anyone. They were
11 elected there. If the people wanted them there, then they were elected
12 there and appointed there. Then I asked Deronjic: What's all this talk
13 about killings? And he says to me: Nothing, President, lies as always.
14 Just as he said to Vice-President Koljevic towards the end of August:
15 They're lying, nothing happened in Srebrenica.
16 Nothing did happen in Srebrenica. My attention is being drawn to
17 Srebrenica and to civilians, and whatever is happening happened 80 to 100
18 kilometres away from Srebrenica and it wasn't happening to civilians.
19 And of course when we got the first convincing evidence, these mortal
20 remains on the surface, when Madeleine Albright found this, then there
21 were orders to investigate that and the military prosecutor said no one
22 knows anything about this and no one wants to know anything about this.
23 There was an immediate response.
24 Why am I saying -- I don't want to go into the part why it is not
25 genocide. Mr. Robinson did that better.
Page 48024
1 Why am I saying that not everybody who was exhumed had been
2 executed.
3 For instance, P4841 is the list of those exhumed in Zvornik. We
4 received that from -- out of 4.415, 2.290 were exhumed in Zvornik. If
5 you analyse this, out of these 2.000-something, 79 were -- had died
6 before 1995, but they were all found together in one grave, not in
7 separate ones like Janc said. Out of the remaining number, who did go
8 missing in 1995, 1.500 have been established to have been killed in this
9 breakout by combat -- in fact, 1.200 were killed during the breakout.
10 And 3.000 were killed at locations that we know as locations of
11 surrender.
12 There are mistakes in the record but out of 2.299 exhumed in
13 Zvornik, 799 were -- died before 1995. And out of 1500 who were killed
14 in 1995, 1200 were killed during the breakout. And 3.000 went missing at
15 places that we know as locations of surrender or were last seen there.
16 I cannot show you other analyses now because the situation is not
17 right, but other analyses -- the previous figure is not 3.000, it is 300
18 went missing or were last seen at places that we know as locations of
19 surrender, surrender to the Army of Republika Srpska.
20 In a document from ICMP, I found thousands of people who are
21 recorded in ICMP documents and the BH army as having been killed either
22 before July 1995 or in other places. Thousands. In a sample of 300, a
23 random sample of 300, 16 per cent are false, 16 per cent at least were
24 not killed at that time. And we have evidence for that. If this work
25 were to be done properly, the figure should be higher. So that this
Page 48025
1 story and the leading of evidence about the number of those killed is far
2 from good and would certainly affect the qualification. What matters is
3 to establish the truth.
4 The OTP believes that the Trial Chamber will latch on to any
5 sentence that would enable them to convict. If they believe that, then
6 it's not about finding out the truth. But for the sake of international
7 sanity, we must be about establishing the truth. We must not mutilate
8 documents or put false evidence before the Court.
9 We don't know in which direction this world is heading, but I
10 believe in a very bad direction. All these trials, without us being
11 aware of it, are part of this bad direction in which we are heading.
12 It's a shame that this is not a trial by jury because the OTP would fare
13 better. Such courts do not judge the accused. They judge the skills of
14 the parties, whereas the accused sits there like a potted flower just
15 listening. So if this was a trial by jury, Mr. Tieger would easily win
16 against me. However, I'm interested in the truth, regardless of what my
17 fate will be and that truth frees me of every responsibility except for
18 the moral one and I do feel moral responsibility because I'm sorry for
19 everyone who was killed there. And you can find it in my documents when
20 I said I'm happy that we haven't been waging war for one year now with
21 the Croats. Can you imagine how many of our and their boys are still
22 alive thanks to that.
23 Now, speaking about the merits, the essence. None of my generals
24 or ministers should even have been indicted, let alone convicted and
25 sentenced to very long terms of imprisonment. It is justice that was
Page 48026
1 condemned. Out of those people, many of them were acquitted before a BH
2 court which is much harsher than this one. The number of victims is
3 exaggerated in this and many other courts and the military structure and
4 civilian structures were falsely represented. These things can be used
5 for propaganda but not before a court of law.
6 In these documents, for instance, we have several that show that.
7 Just for example they talk about Dusan Janc here. Dusan Janc himself
8 says that he excluded a large number of cases because he didn't know how
9 they came to be there, how they came to be included. Very renowned
10 experts of the Prosecution say: Well, nobody told us there was any
11 fighting before July 1995. One expert says: Well, I established they
12 had to be killed after the taking of Srebrenica because if they had been
13 killed before, then they would have been found dead in Srebrenica. That
14 is the extent of their ignorance. They believe that everybody who was
15 killed or exhumed was killed after Srebrenica. And over the four
16 years -- I will now read to you from a document that relates to
17 ten municipalities in the area of Podrinje, where a total of 8.000-plus
18 people were exhumed year by year. I believe it's 229 -- D2229.
19 You see, in this report we see the figure that the Muslim side
20 had made an overview of all those exhumed, all those killed throughout
21 the war in ten municipalities. And that shows that 1.313 corpses were in
22 individual graves. And it is highly unlikely they were victims of mass
23 executions. About 15 were found in group graves, which is the term when
24 the grave contains up to five persons; and the rest were found in mass
25 graves, which, as we saw clearly from other exhibits, were used for
Page 48027
1 multiple burials of people who died or were killed in 1992, in 1993,
2 1994, and 1995. And these things were built into the indictment against
3 me and against Serbs in general. So the number has not been established
4 and it should not find its way into any judgement as an established
5 number because it hasn't been. And there is convincing evidence that
6 people were killed between 1992 and 1995 and buried more or less in the
7 same places.
8 Erdemovic also testified that he had been informed that in
9 Branjevo there had been burials earlier during the war. So it's
10 perfectly clear this has to be subjected to a new analysis and
11 reconsideration.
12 If I could only show you now what is marked in a special colour
13 those who were not killed or died during -- I can read it to you. P4841
14 is the exhibit showing deaths in other places and there are other
15 documents, P4843. These exhibits are either in the documents of the
16 Army of Bosnia-Herzegovina and Janc himself says that the family reported
17 the man missing in 1992. How come he's in this grave? Well, the easy
18 answer is: Multiple burials. Or judgements from the courts of
19 Bosnia-Herzegovina in that area and district courts. D229. That's the
20 one I'm trying to open now. The number of persons found in other
21 locations or have been established to have been killed at a different
22 time is very high and coming close to 50 per cent of the number used by
23 the Prosecution and featuring in the indictment. And it's not a small
24 error. Even in the sample of 300 chosen randomly by the ICMP, almost
25 60 per cent are false and we can prove that. And we could prove much
Page 48028
1 more than that if we had the chance.
2 If it turns up in one list, 500 mortal remains, DNA identified
3 profiles, but nobody can identify the person because nobody's looking for
4 him, nobody reported him as missing, then it's more than clear that
5 person did not get killed in 1995. God knows when he died and was buried
6 wherever he died. And it's perfectly understandable that nobody will
7 bury him on his own property; they will take him to a known burial place.
8 JUDGE KWON: I'm afraid we are not getting any English
9 translation.
10 Yes, please repeat.
11 THE ACCUSED: [Microphone not activated].
12 THE INTERPRETER: The interpreters have not been hearing anything
13 since the last --
14 JUDGE KWON: Is your microphone on?
15 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, sometimes it's the bucket
16 missing, sometimes there's no water.
17 This whole evidence, if the documents are not mutilated, if they
18 are taking -- taken into account in its entirety and if they're ever
19 analysed by professionals, I have no doubt about the outcome of this
20 trial. No doubt at all. I will be acquitted and several other
21 judgements will be revised because some people should never have been
22 convicted, because Galic was convicted by a Chamber that neglected the
23 evidence of qualified UN officers and relied on an interested party,
24 Berko Zecevic. There is no evidence for the allegation of -- for the
25 alleged JCE.
Page 48029
1 When the war began, if we are offering everyone to establish
2 their own municipalities wherever possible, it's not possible for a joint
3 criminal enterprise to exist, it's not possible to dislocate these
4 people. The proof of that is that in Republika Srpska you will find more
5 places that are purely Muslim, such as Bosanski Dubocac, Bosanski Kobas,
6 Janja. Janja is not purely Muslim but it is overwhelmingly Muslim. Not
7 a single village like that can be found in the Federation of Bosnia and
8 Herzegovina in August 1995 or after 1992. We did not drive our Muslims
9 out and the Croats were involved in our army until the end of the war.
10 We never had a plan of any kind, nor did we ever think that any
11 removal would be permanent. The Prosecutor adds one sentence to what
12 Mladic says: They will stay there. Because Mladic says: What will
13 happen to a Muslim who goes to Germany? I say: They will remain. It
14 will be regulated by law. I meant he will remain in Republika Srpska
15 because I cannot provide him with residency in Germany. He will be
16 allowed to return. However, they added, the Prosecution added, the word
17 "there."
18 So what is the purpose of this? This would be the destruction of
19 international justice. I am in favour of international justice. There
20 must be courts that would make sure that a criminal who gets into power
21 does not kill people, but it would be a huge failure of that
22 international justice if wrong decisions were made by a court like that.
23 If the reputation of this court is destroyed in small and big nations and
24 among the presidents of those small nations who will one day maybe come
25 here and be in a position to defend themselves for things that they had
Page 48030
1 to do by law and did not commit any crimes. The -- all the documents
2 governing international law are absolutely on our side.
3 Let the Prosecution tell us what other outcome was possible. Did
4 we have any other way out or was it necessary defence? In criminal law,
5 necessary defence is a valid principle. If your safety is threatened,
6 you have to defend yourself. In Sarajevo, in three years, they can show
7 126 of sniping victims and charge me for that. No, they are showing
8 victims of stray bullets. Thomas Mole and I don't know which other UN
9 officers, all of them say that more people died from stray bullets than
10 from all the sniping. For instance, the 1st Sarajevo Brigade had
11 snipers, but that unit had a front line facing Gorazde, the outer ring,
12 and of course they had snipers. The question is who the snipers were
13 sniping at. They were sniping at other snipers, enemy snipers. To have
14 snipers in itself is not illegal. What's illegal is to shoot at
15 civilians and there is no evidence that they deliberately shot civilians.
16 A stray bullet that hits a tram cannot be viewed as targeting a
17 particular person, especially if the person is sitting behind a
18 not-really-transparent window.
19 To conclude, Your Excellencies, excuse me my amateur approach. I
20 care more about the truth than about the form. I know that justice and
21 law are not always the same thing, but I care more for justice and the
22 truth, and that's why I chose to represent myself, not because I'm such a
23 fool. However, I realised that nobody can defend themselves properly if
24 they are not defended by somebody else.
25 The Defence teams do not have resources to carry out their own
Page 48031
1 proper investigations. We showed you a document dated 4 April which was
2 not found in the case of General Milosevic, and General Fraser admitted
3 it was a document that was an integral part of the orders of the 6th
4 of April. If that document had been produced, Milosevic would not have
5 been convicted of the incident in Hrasnica of the modified air bomb.
6 However, his Defence team did not have sufficient resources to dig into
7 archives. My Defence team is also restricted in personnel and money, but
8 they have unlimited loyalty and dedication and commitment and they dug up
9 far more than any other Defence team before them.
10 I sincerely hope that my accidental improprieties be forgiven. I
11 have participated in this process without any wish to obstruct it, only
12 wishing to get to the truth. The truth will remain and whether the
13 judgement and what's on paper will be along the same lines matters less.
14 In the papers, however, there are enough elements for the truth to be
15 known. Thank you.
16 JUDGE KWON: Thank you, Mr. Karadzic.
17 We'll soon adjourn for the week. Before we resume next Tuesday
18 for rebuttal and rejoinder arguments there are several administrative
19 matters I would like to deal with now.
20 First, the Chamber notes for the purposes of the record its
21 instruction that the parties complete all pending issues related to
22 exhibits by 14th of October, 2014, as conveyed via e-mail from the
23 Chamber's Legal Officer on the 20th of September.
24 Next, the Chamber notes that there are six documents which remain
25 marked for identification in this case. They are: MFI D268, D3536,
Page 48032
1 D4264, D4284, D4288, and D4289. The Chamber recalls its order regarding
2 the close of the Defence case, issued on the 20th of February, 2014, in
3 which the Chamber ordered the parties to file submissions on any
4 exhibit-related matter, including on documents that remained marked for
5 identification, by 17th of March, 2014. Given that this dead-line has
6 passed, the Chamber instructs the Registry to mark those documents, i.e.,
7 MFI D268, D3536, D4264, D4284, D4288, and D4289, as marked as not
8 admitted in this case.
9 Finally, before we adjourn, I would like to raise a couple of
10 matters that I would like the Prosecution to address on Tuesday.
11 First, the Chamber noticed in respect of Srebrenica and the joint
12 criminal enterprise to eliminate, the Prosecution final brief refers to
13 the accused's responsibility for deportation under Count 7 as seen, for
14 example, in paragraph 1101 and footnote 3977.
15 On the other hand, in the Defence final brief, the accused notes,
16 relying on paragraph 75 of the indictment, that Count 7 is not charged in
17 relation to Srebrenica as seen in paragraph 3308, in particular footnote
18 6691.
19 Now, Mr. Tieger, the Chamber notes that this very question was
20 posed to you during the pre-trial proceedings by Lord Bonomy, the
21 then-Presiding Judge of the Pre-Trial Chamber, and that the Prosecution
22 addressed it in its submission on Rule 73 bis, filed on 31st of August,
23 2009. In paragraph 16 of that submission, the Prosecution explained that
24 deportation was omitted on purpose from paragraph 75 of the indictment
25 and explained that deportation is discussed in paragraph 74 of the
Page 48033
1 indictment only as a means discussed during the formulation of the plan
2 to eliminate the Muslim population from Srebrenica. The Prosecution also
3 crossed out Count 7 in relation to Srebrenica in appendix B of that
4 submission.
5 Thus, from that moment on, both the accused and the Chamber were
6 put on notice that Count 7 is not charged in relation to Srebrenica. I
7 would therefore like you to clarify for the Chamber the brief's reference
8 to Count 7 in relation to Srebrenica.
9 Second, on 10th of September, 2014, the Chamber received the
10 Prosecution's submission with respect to incidents and charges on which
11 no evidence was presented. In this submission, the Prosecution states
12 that after the delivery of the trial judgement, the Prosecution will
13 declare that it will not proceed further with the incidents and charges
14 against the accused which have been excluded pursuant to Rule 73 bis.
15 The Chamber would like to know why the Prosecution cannot make
16 this declaration now so that these charges are withdrawn after the
17 closing arguments but before the judgement is delivered.
18 The hearing is adjourned. We'll resume Tuesday next week.
19 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 4.16 p.m.,
20 to be reconvened on Tuesday, the 7th day of
21 October, 2014, at 9.00 a.m.
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