Tribunal Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

Page 4785

1 Wednesday, 28June 2000

2 [Open session]

3 [The witness entered court]

4 --- Upon commencing at 9.35 a.m.

5 [The accused entered court]

6 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Good morning, ladies and

7 gentlemen; good morning to the technical booth, to the interpreters. I

8 see they're all there. Good morning to the court reporters, legal

9 assistants, Madam Lawyer, Mr. Harmon, Mr. McCloskey, Mr. Cayley; good

10 morning, Mr. Petrusic and Mr. Visnjic; good morning, General Krstic; good

11 morning, Witness. Mr. Richard Butler, good morning to you.

12 We are all assembled to continue with the proceedings. Let me

13 remind you are continuing under oath. You will still be answering

14 questions put to you by Mr. McCloskey.

15 Mr. McCloskey, your witness. You may continue.

16 MR. McCLOSKEY: Thank you, Mr. President.

17 WITNESS: RICHARD BUTLER [Resumed]

18 Examined by Mr. McCloskey: [Cont'd]

19 MR. McCLOSKEY: I will start off by reminding myself and

20 Mr. Butler about the pace, that we need to keep it slow and steady. I

21 believe we left off -- if you could put OTP Exhibit 424 on the ELMO. That

22 is the list of some of the main players from the VRS Main Staff, some of

23 the units of the Main Staff, and some of the Ministry of Interior people.

24 Q. And if you could just start from the top and give us, like you did

25 yesterday, just a little background on each of the folks and where they

Page 4786

1 fit in but brief, thank you.

2 A. The first name on the list, General Ratko Mladic, of course, is

3 the Commander of the Main Staff of the VRS. We see him in that context.

4 He shows up at the Srebrenica area on 10 July 1995. We see his presence

5 in Potocari. We see his presence up and around the road along the

6 Bratunac-Konjevic Polje highway through 12 July and 13 July.

7 The next person, Lieutenant Colonel General Milan Gvero.

8 He is the Main Staff Assistant Commander for Morale, Legal, and Religious

9 Affairs. He is referred to in several messages on both the 8th of July,

10 1995 and on the 10th of July, 1995 related to Srebrenica. We don't have

11 any physical sightings of him in and around the area.

12 Colonel Radislav Jankovic is an officer assigned to the Main

13 Intelligence Administration of the Main Staff of the VRS. We note his

14 presence in the meetings between the VRS, the Dutch, and Muslim

15 representatives in Potocari on the 11th and the 12th. We further note his

16 involvement dealing with the issue of the transportation of the Muslim

17 population from Potocari, and we'll see his involvement also in the

18 following days, the 13th and the 14th, in dealing with issues pertaining

19 to wounded Muslims held or at the Bratunac military -- or at the medical

20 facility. I'm sorry.

21 The next individual is Colonel Ljubisa Beara. He is the head of

22 the Main Staff, Main Security Administration. We see his involvement

23 starting as early as the 13th and the 14th and subsequent days. He's

24 responsible for many of the aspects of the movements of male Muslims out

25 of the Bratunac area where they were held to the main execution sites in

Page 4787

1 the zone of the Zvornik Infantry Brigade. Of note, he is involved in a

2 rather important conversation with General Krstic pertaining to that issue

3 on the morning of 15 July.

4 General-Major Miletic is the chief of operations during this

5 period of the Main Staff. We don't see him physically noted in

6 Srebrenica. However, his name comes up in several references as the Main

7 Staff in the Drina Corps deal with the Muslim column which is now fighting

8 its way from Srebrenica towards the Tuzla area, and in several instances

9 on the 12th, 13th, and 14th, he will be in contact with those units to

10 determine what the military situation is.

11 Turning to the next name, Milorad Pelemis, he is the Commander of

12 the 10th Sabotage Unit or 10th Diversionary Unit. As you're aware from

13 previous testimony, that unit was involved with the executions at the

14 Branjevo Military Farm.

15 The next unit, the 65th Protection Regiment -- the Military Police

16 Battalion is the sub-unit -- there are two names. The first one is

17 Lieutenant Colonel Milomir Savcic. He is the Commander of the 65th

18 Protection Regiment, which is not in and of itself subordinate to the

19 Drina Corps but is directly subordinate to the VRS Main Staff. He -- one

20 of his units is the Military Police Battalion, which we'll talk about

21 next, but his physical presence is noted on the 13th by one survivor who

22 notes that he was interviewed or interrogated by a man named Cica, which

23 is the nickname for Colonel Savcic.

24 The next individual is Major Zoran Milanovic. He is the Commander

25 of the Military Police Battalion of the 65th Protection Regiment. So he

Page 4788

1 is directly subordinate to Colonel Savcic. That Military Police

2 Battalion, in general, and Major Malanic, in particular, show up on the

3 12th and the 13th of July, 1995, first involved in the apprehension or

4 detention of Dutch UN soldiers escorting the convoys out past Nova Kasaba,

5 and later his units are responsible for guarding collected Muslim

6 prisoners from the column on the football field at Nova Kasaba.

7 The next series of individuals belong to the Ministry of the

8 Interior or what we call the Ministry of the Interior Special Police

9 Units.

10 The first individual is named Dusko Jevtic, nickname of Stalin.

11 He is seen in Potocari on 12 July 1995. We believe he's one of the

12 company commanders of the MUP Reserve Battalion that deployed to that area

13 initially as part of the Drina Corps operation.

14 The next name is Lieutenant Colonel Ljubisa Borovcanin. He is the

15 Deputy Commander of the MUP Special Police Brigade headquartered in Janja,

16 just south of Bijeljina. His physical presence is noted in Potocari on

17 the 13th of July, and we see him frequently in the Petrusic video as he

18 filmed the scenes there in Potocari on 13 July. He's also further

19 referenced in an interview with Petrovic, who wrote an interview with a

20 Belgrade magazine pertaining to that long video stretch.

21 We also see Colonel Borovcanin active that same day, on the 13th,

22 up and down the road from Bratunac to Konjevic Polje as he's essentially

23 visiting the army troops and his MUP troops that are along that road.

24 The last name from the MUP is Mandeljev Mane Dzuric who is a

25 Battalion Commander in that same special police brigade. His physical

Page 4789

1 presence is noted in many aspects accompanying Colonel Borovcanin on the

2 13th of July. We also see several references in the intercepts to

3 operations with MUP units which we believe are under his command.

4 Q. Mr. Butler, I just want to correct one thing for the record.

5 Under Mandeljev Mane Dzuric, I believe we have spelled his name

6 incorrectly. We have left out the diacritic on the "D" there. There

7 should be a slash across that "D", just for the record.

8 A. The last two individuals, also members of the Ministry of the

9 Interior, however, they're municipal police individuals. They're not

10 associated with the Special Police Brigade. The first one is Dragomir

11 Vasic, who is the chief of the Zvornik police department. And when I say

12 that, as the police department, that is not just encompassing the actual

13 city of Zvornik, but it's the general CSB of Zvornik. It's a regional

14 police area which includes Srebrenica.

15 And the final name is Mane Dzuric who is the Deputy Police Chief

16 of that same area.

17 Q. Can you tell us a little bit more about the difference between the

18 MUP Special Police and the MUP Municipal Police, especially as it may

19 regard to that law we reviewed yesterday about using MUP outfits in

20 combat?

21 A. Dealing with the municipal police aspect first, their functions

22 and roles are traditional police and law enforcement type of functions:

23 investigations, traffic control, criminal protection, those type of

24 aspects. At times, those municipal police officers are involved in combat

25 operations, but very rarely and not as very large, organised units per

Page 4790

1 se. We will actually see as the heart of this operation, in the context

2 of it we will see municipal police units in the combat operations on the

3 14th and 15th in the zone of the Zvornik Brigade as the units tried to get

4 every available man who could carry a gun into the battlefield.

5 The MUP Special Police Brigade is more organised as a military

6 fighting unit in the form of regional battalions. Again, while they have

7 traditional police functions, it is a higher-level organisation that

8 operates more as a paramilitary or military force. And when you look back

9 at the historical context of the war, in many aspects during major

10 military operations, these battalions were involved to supplement the army

11 forces on the ground at critical points in the battlefield. So the

12 Special Police Brigade as organised fought more as a military force than

13 as a law enforcement entity.

14 Q. You mentioned the term paramilitary. Now, there is perhaps an

15 historical Bosnian connotation to this term, paramilitary. Does that

16 apply, can you tell us -- clear up that issue for us about how

17 paramilitary is used in Bosnia and whether the MUP units resemble that in

18 any way?

19 A. The MUP units that we're talking about, the Special Police

20 Brigade, are bona fide members of the armed forces of the Republika

21 Srpska. They are not in any way a paramilitary irregular formation that

22 is normally associated within the Bosnian context. This is a codified

23 legal unit established under the command of the government, the Ministry

24 of the Interior to be exact, and by law it is a part of the armed forces.

25 So it is an organisation that operates within the framework of the RS law.

Page 4791

1 JUDGE RIAD: Excuse me. So what do you call a codified legal

2 unit?

3 A. In my sense when I discussed the issue of a paramilitary, that is

4 a unit that is operating outside the legal framework of the laws which

5 establish the army, the laws which establish the military interior units,

6 and things of that nature. Paramilitaries within that context of the

7 Bosnian conflict were operating outside of that law and outside of

8 military control. In this aspect, in 1995, with the Ministry of the

9 Interior units, they're operating within the context of the legal

10 framework of the government of Republika Srpska.

11 JUDGE RIAD: Which means that the paramilitary are not under

12 military control, they're on their own?

13 A. In the period context of 1995, sir, there were no paramilitaries

14 as we understand them in the previous course of the years. I don't feel

15 I'm qualified to be able to answer the issue of paramilitaries in 1992 and

16 1993. That's not necessarily my field of expertise, sir.

17 JUDGE RIAD: 1995?

18 A. In 1995, sir, relative to Srebrenica, we see no activity which in

19 any way, shape, or form we can say belongs to any paramilitary formation.

20 All of the formations that were involved in that operation were under the

21 command and control of either the army forces or other entities of the

22 Republika Srpska government. We don't see any formations of that nature

23 operating outside of that control.

24 JUDGE RIAD: Thank you very much.

25 MR. McCLOSKEY:

Page 4792

1 Q. You've reviewed many of the statements in this case, and some of

2 the witnesses make reference to Arkan's Tigers and other paramilitaries

3 that became infamous in 1992 and 1993. In your view of the materials,

4 were you able to substantiate the presence of any of these infamous

5 outfits?

6 A. No, sir. Looking at the volumes of material, documents, orders,

7 things of that nature, I'm not able to substantiate any presence of any of

8 those criminal organisations or paramilitaries at Srebrenica in 1995.

9 Q. Okay. Let's go on to a different area now that we've set the

10 scene. Let's go to the period of time between March of 1995 and July,

11 early July right before the operation at the enclave occurred. Can you

12 give us a brief background of the military situation of those months, and

13 then we'll get into some of the particular documents that you have

14 referred to.

15 A. In the larger context of early 1995, to set the framework for the

16 military operation, the general military strategy of the Republika Srpska

17 at this point in time is best described as being on the strategic

18 defence. The government of the entity for the most part had achieved all

19 of the territorial gains that it had wanted and was, for the most part,

20 conducting military operations, not for the gaining of additional

21 territory, but to set the framework for a negotiated peace which would

22 allow them to achieve their war aims.

23 They realised in the context of looking at the material that came

24 out at that time, that 1995 would be for them a decisive year in the

25 conflict. They were just coming off of, in the January and February time

Page 4793

1 frame, a regional cease-fire, and from the military and political context

2 of the Republika Srpska, they realised that the Muslim and Croat

3 federation forces that were operating in conjunction at the time were

4 gaining in strength and getting stronger, while their own ability within

5 the Republika Srpska to get stronger from a military perspective was

6 limited. They had essentially reached the end of their manpower pool.

7 And one of the consistent things throughout the war with the Republika

8 Srpska that you will note is because of this manpower shortage, units were

9 rushed from various points on the battlefield, essentially robbing other

10 units, because they did not have enough manpower to meet their military

11 requirements.

12 The enclaves as they existed, particularly in Eastern Bosnia,

13 played into this because of the military forces required to surround and

14 guard the enclaves, because while they existed, they were in no way

15 demilitarised per se, and Muslim forces continued to operate militarily

16 out of the enclave. As such, the Serbs, or the Republika Srpska army,

17 felt a compelling need to continue to have to maintain units around the

18 perimeters of the enclave, those units that were needed in other places on

19 the battlefield.

20 Coupled with these events, in the spring of 1995, the Republika

21 Srpska army received very clear indications that the HV, the Croatian

22 army, and Croatia proper would enter the war sometime that summer, and

23 again we see the early manifestations of that with Croatian military

24 operations in Western Slovenia.

25 So it is within this framework of knowing that 1995 will be a

Page 4794

1 decisive year, and that they need to be able to get more forces on the

2 battlefield, that the Republika Srpska Supreme Command issues a series of

3 military policy documents which outline the war aims and goals of the

4 Republika Srpska through the end -- or through the fall, at least, of

5 1995.

6 Q. All right. Well, let's go to that very interesting document.

7 It's Exhibit 425. If you could put the front of that on the ELMO.

8 Tell us just briefly about this front page and then -- and how we

9 got the document.

10 A. The front page of this document is the cover letter or memorandum

11 passing it down from the Main Staff to, in this case, the command of the

12 1st Krajina Corps. This document and many of the other corps-level

13 documents that we'll see in the next few days were obtained when the

14 Office of the Prosecutor searched the offices or searched the headquarters

15 of the 1st Corps of the army of the Republika Srpska pursuant to a search

16 warrant in January of 1998.

17 Q. All right. Let's go to the next page then, the -- what is marked

18 as page 2 in the English translation, but it's the first page of this

19 document which is referred to as "Operations Number 7," dated March 8th.

20 Who signs this document?

21 A. At the end, this document is signed by President Radovan Karadzic

22 as the President of the republic and the Commander-in-Chief of the armed

23 forces.

24 Q. And before I get into some of the specifics of the document, this

25 is -- Karadzic is doing what in sending out this document and who is he

Page 4795

1 sending it to?

2 A. This document, as you can tell from the paragraph, is essentially

3 sent out to the major army commands, and within this framework, this is

4 the political guidance to the army for the broad conduct of the war for

5 the next series of months.

6 Q. All right. Then I would like to take the Court and counsel to the

7 section that is specifically addressed to the Drina Corps, and I want to

8 read briefly a section here because I think it's a very important session,

9 and I will try to keep it slow. It's page 10 of the English translation,

10 but it's under the "Drina Corps" heading. In any other translation you

11 will see that each of the corps has a various heading on it.

12 I will go down to the Drina Corps section:

13 "Enemy breakthroughs along selected operative tactical lines

14 should be prevented by extremely persistent and active defence in

15 cooperation with part of the forces of the SRK on the north-west part of

16 the war front and around the enclaves. As many enemy forces as possible

17 should be tied down by diversionary and active combat operations on the

18 north-west part of the front using operational and tactical camouflage

19 measures."

20 Now, that part of it, Mr. Butler, that sounds like a military

21 directive in nature; is that correct?

22 A. That is correct, sir.

23 Q. Let me continue reading:

24 "While in the direction of the Srebrenica and Zepa enclaves,

25 complete physical separation of Srebrenica from Zepa should be carried out

Page 4796

1 as soon as possible, preventing even communication between individuals in

2 the two enclaves. By planned and well thought out combat operations,

3 create an unbearable situation of total insecurity with no hope of further

4 survival or life for the inhabitants of Srebrenica and Zepa."

5 There were many thousands of non-military inhabitants of

6 Srebrenica at the time that this was written, were there not, Mr. Butler?

7 A. Yes, sir.

8 Q. Now, I want to direct the Court's attention to what is now page

9 4. It's under paragraph 6, "Support for Combat Operations". It's page

10 14 on the English version, paragraph 6.1, "Moral and Psychological

11 Support."

12 Again, I would direct your attention, Mr. Butler, to the fourth

13 paragraph, which should be highlighted. Can you tell us what this

14 paragraph is basically saying?

15 A. Essentially what this paragraph is doing is directing the relevant

16 state and military organs, most probably in this aspect the security and

17 intelligence organs, to put together and basically execute a plan to block

18 the UNPROFOR and to block the International Community from adequately

19 supplying the enclaves, to restrict the UN's movement, to essentially

20 create all of the conditions for not supplying the enclaves and to cutting

21 off all physical communication, but more so doing it in a way where it's

22 not seen as obviously obstructing the process. It's just to tie it up to

23 such a point where -- through almost a bureaucratic process to achieve the

24 military goals.

25 JUDGE WALD: Could I ask you one question, Mr. Butler?

Page 4797

1 A. Yes, ma'am.

2 JUDGE WALD: Sorry to interrupt. I won't do it very often, but it

3 would help me at this point in light of what you said previously, that is

4 that the impetus in early 1995 was a shortage on the part of the VRS of

5 military manpower, as it were, and they didn't -- they were worried about

6 what was necessary to keep the enclaves -- to keep the military aspects of

7 the Muslim population in the enclaves. What would have been the strategic

8 advantage to them at this point of getting rid of all the civilians by

9 evacuation or any other possible means? I mean how would that have fitted

10 into this strategic -- of just getting as happened, just getting rid of

11 all the inhabitants as opposed to just, you know, cutting down the need

12 for military?

13 A. In theory, if you were to remove the military threat, I couldn't

14 envision a strategic advantage or disadvantage for the RS. What happens

15 after the fact is by depopulating Srebrenica, in turn, as part of the

16 Dayton agreements, many Serbs displaced from Sarajevo move there, but at

17 this point in time, they don't know that yet.

18 JUDGE WALD: All right. Thanks.

19 MR. McCLOSKEY:

20 Q. Just briefly on that same vein, did Muslim civilians pose a great

21 threat to the Serb army?

22 A. Muslim civilians per se should not have posed a great threat to

23 the Serb army or the army of Republika Srpska, to be more accurate.

24 Q. Thank you. All right. Let's go to the last page of that document

25 where we have the signature of the Supreme Commander, and I note the point

Page 4798

1 that says "submit reports as follows."

2 Now, can you tell us a bit about the reporting requirements that

3 were in place at the time both in the Main Staff units, the corps units,

4 and the brigade units, and how seriously that was taken by the VRS?

5 A. Just like every military organisation, for the most part there's a

6 standard reporting process, which is the mechanism by which senior

7 commanders use to ensure two things. The first that their orders and

8 directives are, in fact, being carried out; and second, to keep them aware

9 of the status of all of their subordinate formations. Not just from an

10 operational point of view per se, but even for routine administrative

11 things such as fuel usage, logistics, casualties, things of that nature.

12 So when you look at these reporting requirements, they are, in

13 fact, codified throughout the entire VRS. Battalions had a fixed

14 reporting chain to the brigade levels; the brigade level had a fixed

15 reporting chain up to the corps command; the corps command had a fixed

16 reporting chain to the Main Staff; and the Main Staff had a fixed

17 reporting chain and network to the supreme command, the Ministry of

18 Defence. So this was more or less an unbroken chain where information is

19 passed from lower to higher so the decision-makers in the army at the

20 political level could make, you know, the best informed decisions that

21 they had to.

22 Q. All right. Let's go on to the implementation of this directive,

23 and our next exhibit, 426. Could you just tell us what this is and what

24 it's about?

25 A. This is Main Staff -- this is, of course, the cover letter, but

Page 4799

1 this is, in fact, Main Staff directive 7-1, again to the command of the

2 1st Krajina Corps, a document that we had when we seized the documents

3 from the corps.

4 This document, for the most part, provides amplifying and, in some

5 cases, more specific information based on the strategic vision as outlined

6 in operations directive 7. In effect, this is amplifying instructions.

7 Q. And this is signed by General Mladic.

8 A. In this instance, the cover letter is signed by General

9 Milovanovic, the Deputy Chief of the Main Staff.

10 Q. But at the end of the --

11 A. At the end of the document it is, in fact, signed by

12 General Mladic.

13 Q. Okay. What's the first -- can you tell us briefly how the Drina

14 Corps is responding, how you can tell they're responding from the

15 documents to these two directives?

16 A. As based on these broad directives and the more specified ones

17 coming from the Main Staff, the next series of that is at the point of

18 time of execution, the Drina Corps itself will put together the series of

19 operations orders and operations plans to do that.

20 The first manifestation that we see in that is a series of

21 military operations which occur in early June of 1995, one of them that

22 results in the capture of a UN checkpoint south of Srebrenica and the

23 takeover of Zeleni Jadar. Those military operations in June create the

24 conditions for the next stage, which will be larger scale military

25 operations against the Srebrenica enclave in July.

Page 4800

1 Q. And could you tell us the first document that you have that helps

2 us actually see this process happening?

3 A. The first document that we have is a 2 July preparatory order from

4 the command of the Drina Corps to units of the Drina Corps, instructing

5 them to start conducting the planning aspects and the gathering of the

6 necessary military forces for military operations in the zone of the Drina

7 Corps.

8 Q. Could you take that July 2nd document, Exhibit 427, and put it on

9 the ELMO.

10 This is a document that is by Major General Milenko Zivanovic as

11 Commander of the Drina Corps; is that correct?

12 A. Yes, sir.

13 Q. And paragraph 2 on the front page it says:

14 "Based on directives OP number 7 and 7/1 of the RS army."

15 A. Yes, sir.

16 Q. Those are the two directives that we've just heard about. Now,

17 since this is the first document we have from the Drina Corps, can you

18 tell us about, up in the left-hand corner, the numbering system? We see a

19 numbering system that says "Strictly confidential, 01/04-156." What

20 significance is that number as you've been able to make out in your

21 study?

22 A. In this aspect, the way that the series of numbers worked was that

23 the first series of numbers, in this case 01/04, designated the staff

24 organ that was primarily responsible for the creation of the document.

25 The second number, -156, is a broad category of documents or orders which

Page 4801

1 it is related to.

2 Based on that 156 number, it's rather -- since we don't have a

3 complete set, obviously, it's hard to go back and determine what the

4 parent document is, whether there's something or whether 156 is, in fact,

5 the operations directive 7-1.

6 The last number, the suffix number, indicates that it is the first

7 order or directive of that series. Going back to the prefix number, and

8 again based on a very limited amount of documents, the 01 through 04

9 categorisations generally refer to documents that come out of the

10 commander shop, the Chief of Staff shop, or the operations division.

11 Q. Can you, by knowing that specific prefix number 01, identify

12 whether or not the Commander -- the person was a Commander at the time or

13 Chief of Staff or some other job?

14 A. Because we have so few of the documents and the documents that we

15 do have with this aspect on the signature don't show a pattern, I can't

16 say that 01, in fact, equals Commander in the sense of the documents or

17 that 02 equals the Chief of Staff or 03 equals somebody else. It is

18 close, but by virtue of the lack of number of documents, I can't say that

19 definitively.

20 Q. All right. We'll get to that issue again when we get to some

21 other documents.

22 Now, this document 427, where would the Chief of Staff -- what

23 kind of role would he be playing in these initial planning stages?

24 A. Clearly by position as the Chief of Staff, being the individual

25 who manages and coordinates the entire planning process, he would be

Page 4802

1 deeply involved in this process, first with respect to the Drina Corps

2 staff process of putting together the order; and secondly, in the act of

3 querying of the units involved to determine whether they would be able to

4 fulfil the requirements of the order. Within a staff and planning

5 context, it doesn't make sense to issue orders to units without first

6 ensuring that they're able to comply with those directives. And as you

7 look down through the preparatory order here, they're starting to alert

8 units to have resources and personnel made available.

9 Q. And on page 2 of that document, paragraph 4, the deadline for

10 forming all above-mentioned units is 2 July 1995?

11 A. That is correct, sir.

12 Q. And the forward command post is to be in operation on 4 July

13 1995. That's in paragraph 5.

14 A. Yes, sir.

15 Q. Okay. Now can we get to Exhibit 428, the actual formal operation

16 plan for the takedown of the Srebrenica enclave, and can you tell us about

17 that, and what role you would expect General Krstic to have played in that

18 development of this plan?

19 A. As the preparatory order alerts units to be prepared to conduct

20 combat operations and to make moves accordingly, this is what I refer to

21 as the base operations plan, that being, this is the order which lays out

22 in detail the actual military operation, code named Krivaja-95, against

23 the Srebrenica enclave. As in the case of the planning or preparatory

24 order, as the Chief of Staff, General Krstic would have been very deeply

25 involved in the actual production of this operations order. I mean, this

Page 4803

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Page 4804

1 is the manifestation of the entire work of the corps staff.

2 Q. In developing this order, would General Krstic and his staff and

3 General Zivanovic make specific reference to the directive 7, and 7/1?

4 A. I don't believe in this order they did specifically. It might be

5 in here. I don't recall at the moment.

6 Q. Okay. Well, let me direct you to page 3 and paragraph 2.

7 A. Clearly it, in fact, references both of those orders, yes, sir.

8 Q. And does it basically lay out the objective of the plan?

9 A. The order does lay out the objective of the plan very clearly.

10 Q. And what is that?

11 A. The objective of the plan as written is to reduce the Srebrenica

12 enclave to the physical area of the urban city of Srebrenica.

13 Q. Okay. And for the record, I'll just read briefly, beginning in

14 the middle of paragraph 2. "The task of carrying out offensive activities

15 with free forces deep in the Drina Corps zone as soon as possible in order

16 to split apart the enclaves of Zepa and Srebrenica and to reduce them to

17 their urban areas."

18 Now, in your opinion, what does the term "reduce the enclaves to

19 their urban areas" mean?

20 A. Essentially to push the boundaries of the enclaves to the town of

21 Srebrenica -- or in this case for Srebrenica, to push it into Srebrenica

22 proper, the physical boundaries of the city or town.

23 Q. And what would that mean where the people of the outer -- of the

24 enclave would be?

25 A. Essentially for many of the people living in the surrounding area,

Page 4805

1 they would have either lived under then the occupation of the Republika

2 Srpska, or they would have been forced to move into the urban area of

3 Srebrenica.

4 Q. And you've seen the July 10th video of all the many hundreds and

5 hundreds of people crowded into the urban area of Srebrenica on July 10th?

6 A. Yes, sir.

7 Q. So in your view, do the objectives in this Krivaja-95 plan mirror

8 any of the objectives of Radovan Karadzic in his directive number 7?

9 A. They follow well into sequence essentially what the plan is, is to

10 create the conditions for the UN and the international community to

11 evacuate the enclave.

12 Q. And I would point out middle of paragraph 4, page 3, under

13 "objective": "By a surprise attack, to separate and reduce in size the

14 Srebrenica and Zepa enclaves, to improve the tactical position of the

15 forces in the depth of the area, and to create conditions for the

16 elimination of the enclaves."

17 Now, let's go further on in this report. Does the report

18 designate the various units that are to take part in this plan?

19 A. Yes, sir, it does.

20 Q. And could you go to page 5, which is sort of the end of the list

21 after it lists various Drina Corps Brigades such as the Milici Brigade and

22 the Bratunac Brigade and the Zvornik Brigade, there's a section about

23 reserves in the middle of the page, and let me read this. "Reserve forces

24 of a size of two or three companies of the MUP and one company from the

25 first Vlasenica Light Infantry Brigade."

Page 4806

1 Can you first tell us what a reserve force is, what its purpose

2 is, and then tell us what you think this means in this particular order?

3 A. By doctrine, and in this sense not just the doctrine of the former

4 JNA and VRS, but by most military doctrines a reserve force is an

5 established and dedicated force for the Commander to use to, one, deal

6 with any unanticipated military situation, or for a lesser role, to be

7 able to deal with an unanticipated success like a breakthrough or an

8 exploitation.

9 Generally speaking, though, the primary role is they're,

10 they're -- in a sense they belong directly to the Commander for him to use

11 for any unanticipated requirement. No other person within the corps, per

12 se, can deploy them without the Commander's approval.

13 Q. Okay, that's generally to reserve forces. Now specifically, what

14 are the reserve forces for the Drina Corps operation Krivaja-95 as you

15 understand it?

16 A. Based on this operations order, the reserve forces are identified

17 as two or three companies of the MUP and one company of the Vlasenica

18 Light Infantry Brigade.

19 Q. Are you able to make out whether this is a MUP Special Police or

20 MUP Municipal Police from this order?

21 A. I would say that clearly in this case we're referring to the MUP

22 Special Police forces.

23 Q. Why?

24 A. For the most part, the municipal police aren't organised in

25 traditional combat company sense. It wouldn't make sense to refer to the

Page 4807

1 MUP Municipal Police unit as a company, and it wouldn't be the right type

2 of formation to use as a military infantry company, which is essentially

3 what we're doing here.

4 Q. What do you make of this, this phrase, "reserve forces of a size

5 of two or three companies"? That's not very specific. It doesn't seem to

6 be finalised. What do you make of that?

7 A. Looking at this in context, what we're seeing here is at a

8 minimum, at the time this order is published, that the command of the

9 Drina Corps understands that at a minimum, there are now two companies of

10 the MUP Special Forces that have been resubordinated to them and that will

11 operate under their control. They're anticipating perhaps getting a third

12 company, but they don't know that yet, for whatever reason. Either it's

13 not available or there are other commitments.

14 So essentially, they're designating these units as their reserve.

15 They know, of course, they have the company of the Vlasenica Brigade.

16 Q. So based on Krivaja-95, this order in front of us, who would these

17 MUP units be under the command of?

18 A. In this case, they'd be directly under the command of the Corps

19 Commander, the Drina Corps Commander.

20 Q. And at this time that would have been --

21 A. General Zivanovic.

22 Q. And in your opinion, would the rule regarding using MUP Special

23 Police in combat operations had to have been invoked in order to use MUP

24 in the way that it's anticipated in this order?

25 A. Yes. And in fact, we know that in mid-June of 1995, President

Page 4808

1 Kardic did in fact declare an imminent state of war which would have

2 further made all of that possible.

3 Q. Now, let's go to page 7 and to the highlighted section mentioning

4 that, "Security organs and military police will indicate the areas for

5 gathering and securing prisoners of war and war booty." Is that usual?

6 A. Yes, sir. That is a standard security organ and military police

7 function.

8 Q. And I would also note the order mentions that they will be dealing

9 with prisoners of war in the civilian population, to behave in every way

10 in accordance with the Geneva Conventions.

11 Now, we have seen the Main Staff directives -- excuse me, the

12 President Kardic directives, the Main Staff implementing orders, a Drina

13 Corps orders implementing it. Do we have a brigade order to show us that

14 you can talk about also implementing this plan?

15 And if you could go to Exhibit 429, and we don't need to go

16 through this in detail, but if you could just tell us briefly what this

17 is.

18 A. What this document is, again, based off of the preparatory order

19 of the Drina Corps, this is the order of the Zvornik Infantry Brigade that

20 it issued to its own formations to organise itself for combat operations.

21 It, again, references the Drina Corps order, and in very specific detail

22 designates all of the military things which have to occur, when they have

23 to occur by, and very clearly designates the command chain for the

24 military organisation as it deploys to Srebrenica.

25 Q. And do these series of orders show a normal chain of command

Page 4809

1 working the way it ought to?

2 A. In a broad sense, the series -- the last four series of orders or

3 the last five series of orders we've seen demonstrates a standard practice

4 within almost any army where you see orders coming from the political

5 leadership, and how they manifest themselves down from the highest levels

6 to the lowest levels, from the strategic echelon to the tactical echelon.

7 MR. McCLOSKEY: And at this point I would direct the Court to

8 another exhibit that was originally a video, but I believe you've seen

9 that video, so I don't think we need to play it. I will just briefly give

10 you the very short transcript of it, and I can read that. It's an

11 interview of President Kardic we believe in August of 1995.

12 THE REGISTRAR: Can we have the number of the exhibit of this

13 video, please?

14 MR. McCLOSKEY: I've just been informed that that video has not

15 been played, but it's number 99, but I don't think we need to see

16 President Kardic's face. Let me just read you what he said and we'll

17 provide that video as an exhibit if you need to see it. It's also being

18 undertitled at the moment, so we hope to give you some videos for your

19 review with subtitling.

20 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Mr. McCloskey, I think it is

21 Exhibit 430, is it not?

22 MR. McCLOSKEY: That is the transcript is 430, and the video is

23 99. And as you have that in front of you, I'll just, for the record, read

24 it. It's very short. And this, again, is President Kardic on a news

25 interview on RSTV. "We wanted to turn Mladic into a legend and we did for

Page 4810

1 we know that our people want legends. We failed, however, to bring up the

2 successes of individual corps commanders. Now Krstic, for instance, who

3 planned it in front of me and I approved that task for Srebrenica, who did

4 it exceptionally well. Of course, the Main Staff, Mladic and all others

5 help, but it should be known that Krstic is a great army commander."

6 Now, Mr. President, we're going on to our next chapter, the attack

7 and the fall of Srebrenica. If we could take a break, or we could get

8 right into it. It may be a good time to take a break.

9 JUDGE WALD: I just have one question, I'm sorry.

10 Mr. Butler, I'm still having trouble -- this is sort of a

11 follow-up of the last question. Within the limits of your report and the

12 information that you analyse, you said that, at least in reading parts of

13 Exhibit 328, that reducing the size which they said was there of the

14 enclaves, and reducing the communication between them or reducing the size

15 of them, would end up making the UN either evacuate its role there or stop

16 making it a safe enclave, and I haven't figured out what the logic of that

17 is.

18 I mean, in other words, if they got them down, and I know that

19 meant they might attack or engage some of the outlying DutchBat posts, but

20 why would reducing them, the enclave to a smaller size, necessarily mean

21 the UN would get out of making it a safe enclave?

22 A. In that respect, what you have to do is go back to the situation

23 which first created the enclave.

24 JUDGE WALD: Yes, I'm familiar with that.

25 A. Again, in this sense, the VRS looked at the Srebrenica enclave and

Page 4811

1 the ensuing population that was in it for the most part, at a military

2 perspective alone, as an unacceptable drain to them.

3 JUDGE WALD: I understand.

4 A. What they wanted to do, in essence, is by compressing all of the

5 people into the urban area, essentially force, because of a humanitarian

6 crisis similar to what occurred in 1993, the UN to give up on the concept

7 of the safe area, in particular that one, and evacuate the population.

8 JUDGE WALD: Okay, thank you.

9 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] So we're going to have a break

10 of 20 minutes.

11 --- Recess taken at 10:39 a.m.

12 --- On resuming at 11.03 a.m.

13 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Yes, Mr. McCloskey. You may

14 continue, please.

15 MR. McCLOSKEY: Thank you, Mr. President.

16 Q. Mr. Butler, before we get to the attack on Srebrenica, I want you

17 to make one point very clear. Was the objective, the initial objective of

18 Krivaja-95, to take the entire enclave or just reduce it to its urban

19 areas?

20 A. Based on the operations order for Krivaja-95 and the preceding

21 documents, it's clear that the objective was not to take the city of

22 Srebrenica as the initial objective.

23 Q. Now, could you briefly summarise the situation, beginning with the

24 attack on Srebrenica and how that led to the fall and the deportation.

25 Again, very briefly so we just get the high points, and then we'll go

Page 4812

1 through some of the documents and materials that tell the military story

2 of the fall and the removal of the Muslim citizens.

3 A. I think the easiest way to do this is if I could use the map,

4 sir. Thank you.

5 The operation, as it is specified in the operations order for

6 Krivaja-95, kicked off on schedule with the major effort of the army of

7 the Republika Srpska coming in from the south along the road towards

8 Srebrenica. The units of the Drina Corps that we saw involved there, both

9 as part of the operations plan and in the subsequent videos, reflect the

10 fact that the Drina Wolves, subordinate to 1st Zvornik Brigade, were

11 present, as well as other Zvornik Brigade assets, specifically tanks and

12 armoured personnel carriers.

13 We see elements of at least company light battalion strength from

14 the 2nd Romanija Motorised Brigade, another Drina Corps asset. In that

15 case, also tanks. We see elements of the 1st Birac Brigade, another Drina

16 Corps asset involved. We see elements of the 1st Milici Light Infantry

17 Brigade. And the main thrust of the attack for most of the units is

18 pushing up south towards -- from the south towards the north towards the

19 Jadar River in an effort to push the Muslims out of this area right here

20 within the enclave, known as the Bandera Triangle. The army of Republika

21 Srpska views this area as the stronghold reserve of the 28th Division and

22 the area where they believe that the division will try to defend from the

23 most. It is very hilly and rugged terrain.

24 Q. And for the record, we need to point out that the area you pointed

25 to was in the south-western of the enclave. Thank you. Continue.

Page 4813

1 A. The main effort of the attack along the road past the

2 UN checkpoints was conducted by the battle groups or the battalion of the

3 Zvornik Brigade, those outlined in the previous order. And their job,

4 essentially, was to push through and beyond the UN outposts whereas much

5 as possible not engaging the UN but surrounding them and forcing them into

6 a position where they felt compelled to evacuate the outpost and either

7 return back to Srebrenica or place themselves in the custody of the army

8 of the Republika Srpska. And without going into the actual tactical

9 detail of that, over the course of the 6th through the evening of the

10 8th and through the 9th, they successfully accomplished that.

11 Sometime in the afternoon-early evening hours of 9 July, based on

12 the successes of all the units pushing towards Srebrenica from the south,

13 the supreme command of the Republika Srpska re-evaluated the operation and

14 decided, at that point, to expand the goal of the operation to include the

15 actual capture of Srebrenica town. At that point, from the 10th of July

16 to the 11th of July, a few additional forces come in, and we see some of

17 the changes in the planning in order to accommodate now the new

18 objective. The previous objective being just to force them into the area;

19 now they're having to restructure the plan in order to take the urban area

20 itself.

21 We see the successful conclusion of that with the capture of

22 Srebrenica on the afternoon of 11 July. At the same time, we see the

23 evacuation of the Muslim population, first those who resided in

24 Srebrenica, as well as the considerable number of Muslim refugees who were

25 residing south, in this area, under the sponsorship of the Swedish Shelter

Page 4814

1 Project. Those refugees trek, under UN escort, up the road to the UN main

2 base at Potocari, where they are arriving through the evening of the

3 11th.

4 The next subsequent series of events that we see that the army is

5 involved in are along two separate axes, if you will. As the 28th

6 Infantry Division, the Muslim force inside the enclave, was ordered to

7 break through the lines and trek towards free territory in Tuzla, as they

8 called it free territory, the first thing that happened was, from a

9 military perspective, they broke contact with the VRS forces in this area

10 south of Srebrenica where they were defending.

11 So essentially from that period until the early morning hours of

12 the 12th, from approximately the evening of the 10th to the early morning

13 hours of the 12th of July, the army of Republika Srpska did not have a

14 good idea where the Muslim military was. And we see that manifested both

15 in the activities of the army and at the meetings with both the Dutch and

16 the Muslim representatives where the VRS officials, specifically

17 General Mladic, are asking for representatives of the army, and the Dutch

18 and the civilians are replying that they don't know where they are.

19 What is happening at that time frame is the army column is

20 starting to assemble at Jaglici and Susnjari starting the evening of the

21 10th. For the VRS's perspective, they don't know this at this time.

22 Their assumption is that the army is heading into the southern part of the

23 enclave, to the south-east -- south-west, I'm sorry, of Srebrenica into

24 the Bandera Triangle, and when you look at the military operations that

25 occur on the 12th, you see most of the combat formations of the Drina

Page 4815

1 Corps pushing into the Bandera Triangle, looking for the 28th Division

2 which is not there.

3 So on the 12th, most of the combat formations of the Drina Corps

4 are conducting sweep operations south of Srebrenica. Very few of the

5 actual combat formations make it up to Potocari. The only combat

6 formations that do make it to Potocari are those first of the 3rd Bratunac

7 Brigade, which had the mission of cutting off the north of Srebrenica and

8 moving up, and the 2nd Battalion of the Bratunac Brigade, which was

9 deployed to the north and then pushed south.

10 As we see the operation unfold into the 13th or the 12th and 13th,

11 by the early morning hours of the 12th of July, the lead elements of the

12 Muslim military civilian mixed column at this point is pushing past army

13 and police checkpoints and ambush sites at the road. Some of our first

14 occurrences occur as early as 0300 in the morning on 12 July.

15 So throughout the morning hours of 12 July, first at the lower

16 levels and then as the information travels up the chain of command to the

17 higher levels, there is a growing awareness that the Muslim 28th Division

18 is not here where it was expected to be, it is not surrendering, which is

19 what the army of Republika Srpska wanted, but is instead attempting to

20 make a mass breakthrough on the other end of the enclave, and from a

21 tactical perspective, doing something that the army of Republika Srpska

22 did not anticipate. Certainly not in the scale and strength that we see

23 later.

24 So throughout the day of the 12th, while we see a lot of activity

25 related to the evacuation of the women and children who had assembled at

Page 4816

1 Potocari, the Muslim women and children, we also see a series of military

2 directives as the Drina Corps command and staff start to put together a

3 defensive line, if you will, or perimeter running from the Glogova,

4 Kravica, Sandici, Konjevic Polje, Nova Kasaba, and as far south as Milici

5 area to try and contain this large column of men.

6 At the same time that all of these events are occurring, the Main

7 Staff, taking advantage now of the successful capture of Srebrenica, is

8 starting to put together the pieces of another plan which entails the

9 capture of the Muslim enclave at Zepa. So while all of this is going on,

10 at the same time you start to see also the planning aspects of military

11 forces being moved to the absolute southern part of the enclave here in

12 small numbers to begin advancing from the north towards the enclave of

13 Zepa, which is unfortunately off this map.

14 So over that period of days, you have a variety of military and

15 militarily-related civilian aspects which the command and staff of the

16 Drina Corps have to keep fully apprised of and coordinate.

17 Q. Can you point as best as you can where the enclave of Zepa would

18 be if there was a map there?

19 A. I believe the enclave of Zepa would be in this area right here

20 [indicates].

21 Q. Okay.

22 A. Because when you look at the main access of advance, one, from

23 Krivace down, and the smaller access from this area known as Bracan

24 towards this direction.

25 Q. Would that be within 10 to 20 kilometers of the southern part of

Page 4817

1 that map?

2 A. I think it roughly comes out about 10 to 15 kilometers, yes, sir.

3 Q. And Krivace was the initial forward command post for the Drina

4 Corps for the Zepa operation?

5 A. Yes, sir, it was.

6 Q. Can you give us a little summary of the commanders, where they

7 were, and then we'll go over the documents that help us show that, from

8 the early period as we work into the Potocari deportation?

9 A. At the beginning of the operation, the Drina Corps forward command

10 post overseeing the operation was established in the village of

11 Pribicevac, which when you look at -- it doesn't show on the map, but when

12 you look at the mountainous terrain, it offers a fairly down-the-valley,

13 clear line of sight to most of the operation. It was an established

14 command post for several years; it was a logical place to put it. That is

15 where during the conduct of the operation, the actual takedown of the

16 enclave, General Krstic and the command staff of the Drina Corps in that

17 case, or the command group would be a better word, not command staff,

18 operated and coordinated the entire operation.

19 The other commanders involved, Lieutenant Colonel Vinko

20 Pandurevic, the Commander of the elements of the Zvornik Brigade; Colonel

21 Mirko Trivic, the Commander of the elements of the Romanija Brigade;

22 Colonel Svetozar Andric, the Commander of the 1st Birac Infantry Brigade,

23 all were operating generally along this road and as evidenced, would come

24 from time to time either to the command post at Pribicevac, or would

25 receive instructions from the command post down to their units. But for

Page 4818

1 the most part, these three commanders did in fact remain with their units

2 through the period up to the capture of Srebrenica.

3 Once the enclave or once Srebrenica fell, in many cases we saw

4 many commanders, to include General Krstic, move from the forward command

5 post at Pribicevac to another forward command post which had been

6 established in Bratunac in the headquarters of the first Bratunac Light

7 Infantry Brigade.

8 So these people were operating out of Bratunac, which for tactical

9 reasons, one, gave them better access to Potocari; and it certainly gave

10 them better communications with the rest of the Drina Corps; and third,

11 allowed them to coordinate and manage the evacuation and the military

12 operations that were occurring to the north here.

13 Q. Mr. Butler, aside from the testimony of Drazen Erdemovic, do you

14 have any credible indications of the 10th Diversionary Unit, the Main

15 Staff unit, taking part in this operation at some point?

16 A. When we look at the video coverage that was done by the both

17 military and Republika Srpska civil news authorities, particularly one

18 clip showing General Mladic, General Zivanovic, and General Krstic

19 entering the town of Srebrenica on the 11th of July, one of the first

20 checkpoints that they pass at the beginning of the town is, in fact,

21 manned by soldiers of the 10th Diversionary Unit.

22 Q. Okay, if you could have a seat. I think we'll go over some of the

23 documents upon which your briefing was based, and at least in the initial

24 documents and material, I want to focus your attention on the roles of

25 General Krstic and the other high command.

Page 4819

1 And let's now go to the first document, number 431, and that is a

2 communication from General Zivanovic dated July 8th, urgent, to

3 Pribicevac, forward command post, to Major General Radislav Krstic

4 personally, and Main Staff General Tolimir. Now, can you explain what

5 this document is? What's it saying?

6 A. Essentially, this order or document is in response to complaints

7 made by UNPROFOR Command over combat activities in which Dutch members of

8 the UN were being shot at. Clearly they had complained, that complaint

9 had gone through the Main Staff, and this is the manifestation of that

10 back to the command -- or the forward command post of the Drina Corps.

11 Q. And from this document, can you conclude or provide your opinion

12 where you believe General Krstic is, where General Zivanovic is when he

13 sends this, or where he ought to be?

14 A. Looking at the header information at the top of the document, I

15 conclude that General Zivanovic is at the main command post in Vlasenica

16 at the time that this document is authored, and that General Krstic is at

17 the forward command post in Pribicevac.

18 Q. Can you make out anything on the role of General Gvero in this,

19 where he might be?

20 A. In this specific document, General Gvero is not mentioned.

21 Q. Okay. We'll be getting to General Gvero.

22 A. Okay.

23 Q. Now, if you could go up into the left-hand corner again, and I

24 just want to go to these numbers again. Can you make out from this

25 numbering, 04, whether that tells us anything about who wrote this

Page 4820

1 document or what command position they had?

2 A. Again, in the series of numbers, it's unclear. Certainly when you

3 read the actual context of this document, it would read in context that

4 this was something or a document directly authored by the Commander of the

5 Drina Corps to his Chief of Staff. However, in the prefix number again,

6 04, that would not link up to the number that we would expect to see based

7 on a pattern of 01. So again, this is the difficulty that -- I have in

8 being able to conclude that 01 is definitively from the Commander, 02 from

9 somebody else, 03 from somebody else within that context of 01 to 04. I

10 can conclude what it came out of somewhere involved with either the

11 operations or the command organs, but I can't say specifically.

12 The second number, the 156, middle series, as described before,

13 the 156 series were those orders and directives related to the Krivaja-95

14 and, initially, preparatory order number 1.

15 And the last suffix again, 5, indicates it is the fifth order or

16 fifth document produced related to the 156 series.

17 Q. General Krstic, he's present at the forward command post. What

18 would you expect his leadership role as Chief of Staff would be? What

19 would be involved in here on this day of July 8th, two days after the

20 attack had started on Srebrenica?

21 A. At this point in time, based on his rank and based on his

22 position, he is, in effect, commanding the military operation against the

23 Srebrenica enclave. He is controlling the tactical forces on the ground.

24 Q. Okay. Let's go to the next exhibit, 432, which is from the Main

25 Staff of the army, dated July 9th, authored by Tolimir, Zdravko Tolimir.

Page 4821

1 I'll briefly read the relevant sections. First paragraph:

2 "President of the Republika Srpska has been informed of the

3 successful combat operations around Srebrenica by units of the Drina Corps

4 and that they have achieved results which enable them to occupy the very

5 town of Srebrenica. The president of the republic is satisfied with the

6 results of combat operations around Srebrenica and has agreed with the

7 continuation of operations for the takeover of Srebrenica, disarming of

8 Muslim terrorist gangs, and complete demilitarisation of the Srebrenica

9 enclave."

10 And various other things including taking care of the civilian

11 population in accordance with the Geneva Conventions.

12 All right. Mr. Butler, what does that mean?

13 A. As I indicated earlier, and going back to the theme that the

14 original objective was not the actual takeover of Srebrenica, what this

15 demonstrates is that based on the success of the military operation to

16 date, that the president of the republic, as the Supreme Commander, has

17 authorised the goals to be further set to now take over the town of

18 Srebrenica.

19 Q. And from this document are you able to glean anything about the

20 role of General Krstic?

21 A. Again looking at who the message is addressed to, understanding

22 that the message comes directly from the Main Staff, General-Major

23 Tolimir, again the awareness that as far as the Main Staff is concerned,

24 the individual on the ground running the operation is General Krstic.

25 Q. How do you tell that from the document?

Page 4822

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8

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13 Blank page inserted to ensure pagination corresponds between the French

14 and English transcripts.

15

16

17

18

19

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22

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25

Page 4823

1 A. It is, in fact, directed to him at the forward command post

2 personally.

3 Q. Now we have General Gvero. What can you make of his presence, on

4 this document?

5 A. This part is, for me, analytically speaking, an unanswered

6 question. We have no physical evidence or we have no other information

7 either from sightings or from any other aspect of our information that

8 indicates that General Gvero was physically on the ground at Srebrenica or

9 at the forward command post.

10 There are a lot of ways to read this. I mean, he could, in fact,

11 be there and this is the only indication that we have of it, and I cannot

12 confirm that, or that this message was sent to him at the Main Staff for

13 his benefit as well. But the short answer is, relative to General Gvero,

14 I don't know.

15 Q. All right. Let's continue and go to the next document, 433, which

16 is from the command of the Bratunac Brigade and dated 10 July, the next

17 day. It's called a daily combat report.

18 Before getting into the substance of this, can you tell us about

19 what a daily combat report is for the brigade level?

20 A. As we discussed earlier relative to the aspect of a formalised

21 reporting process, these daily combat reports represent how the brigades

22 passed the relevant information to the next higher level for them, their

23 superior command, the command of the Drina Corps. Every unit published

24 one of these reports every day as a minimum. That is called the daily

25 one. Should situations or circumstances dictate additional reports, we'll

Page 4824

1 see those manifested in what's known as an interim combat report for those

2 pieces of information that the brigade level -- the Brigade Commander

3 deemed that the corps command and Commander need to be aware of

4 immediately and can not wait for the next day's report.

5 Q. Okay. What's the essence of what this report tells us about the

6 command group?

7 A. What this report tells us is that in relation to the three at the

8 brigade command, that the Brigade Commander physically locates him in the

9 area of the 3rd Battalion, the Chief of Staff in the area of the

10 1st Battalion, the rest of the commanding officers of the Bratunac

11 Brigade, you know, are where they're supposed to be in accordance with the

12 plan. It further notes the physical presence of General Mladic for the

13 first time; General Zivanovic, also for the first time; and General Krstic

14 in the zone in the area of the 1st Bratunac Infantry Brigade.

15 So from a chronological perspective, 10 July 1995 is the first

16 indication that both General Mladic and General Zivanovic show up in the

17 zone of the Bratunac Brigade specifically related to the conduct of the

18 military operations ongoing.

19 MR. McCLOSKEY: All right. And I would note for the Judges,

20 paragraph 5, just to highlight this to you, this says:

21 "Streten Petrovic, son of Ilija, Deputy Commander of the" -- I

22 believe that's the "3rd Battalion" --

23 A. 3rd Infantry Batallion.

24 MR. McCLOSKEY: -- "suffered serious injuries in the thigh and the

25 forearm."

Page 4825

1 You'll be hearing more about Streten Petrovic. You have heard a

2 bit about him already from some of the witnesses, including his father

3 Ilija, who is known for having a very long moustache and being from the

4 village of Spat. This is an important person to keep aware of because he

5 is a Commander that is identified in Potocari and the Bratunac area, and

6 that's, of course, an important fact for the case. So I highlight that

7 for you; remember the name of Streten Petrovic, because it will come up

8 again.

9 Q. All right. Now, to continue the story, we now have an exhibit, a

10 video exhibit, which is number 145. You've seen it before, but I'm told

11 we now have a subtitled version of it. It's very short, and it will show

12 the Commanders coming in to Srebrenica.

13 MR. McCLOSKEY: If we could play that exhibit. I don't know. Is

14 there is a transcript to go along with it?

15 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Yes.

16 MR. McCLOSKEY: You've got it. Okay. And that is exhibit -- the

17 transcript and the video are 145A, and B. I believe it should be in the

18 booth and be ready to go. If we could play that. Thanks.

19 Q. Mr. Butler, while we're waiting, you've seen this before. Could

20 you give us a preview? Here, it looks like it's coming.

21 [Videotape played]

22 MR. McCLOSKEY: Mr. President, I'm advised that should have been

23 Exhibit 145 bis.

24 Q. Mr. Butler, what date did that scene play out?

25 A. That scene played out the late afternoon hours of 11 July 1995.

Page 4826

1 Q. Did you see Vujadin Popovic on the film?

2 A. Yes, sir, I did.

3 Q. And was Popovic with General Mladic and General Krstic?

4 A. Yes, sir, he was.

5 Q. Who else can you recognise there?

6 A. Going through the film chronologically, Colonel Vinko Pandurevic,

7 Commander of the elements of the Zvornik Brigade that were deployed. We

8 had, of course, General Mladic, General Krstic, General Zivanovic.

9 Colonel Popovic, already discussed. They pass through the checkpoint.

10 Those were members of the 10th Diversionary Unit. Coming again through

11 the town, Colonel Mirko Trivic, Commander of the 2nd Romanija Brigade

12 assets, 2nd Romanija Motorised Brigade assets. Later in series of the

13 town, Colonel Svetozar Andric, Commander of the deployed assets of the 1st

14 Birac Brigade. Further towards the end, Lieutenant Miso Pelemis,

15 Commander of the 10th Diversionary Unit, who was in the middle of the

16 town.

17 I think those are all the major players. There are probably more

18 out there.

19 Q. All right. Now we have a series of exhibits that help us identify

20 some of the players and some of the goings on, and they go

21 chronologically. So if you could just start with Exhibit 434, which is an

22 intercept, and just place it on the ELMO, and if you could just summarise

23 briefly, and just use your best judgement to get through this.

24 A. In the case of this intercept, very quickly, it's one part of a

25 discussion between General Gvero, the Main Staff Assistant Commander for

Page 4827

1 Moral, Legal, and Religious Affairs, back briefing the president of the

2 Republic on a conversation that he has just had with Dutch General Nicoli

3 of UNPROFOR.

4 Q. And this is an 11 July intercept, and again, we have Gvero coming

5 in on the scene again. And let's go to the next exhibit. This was an

6 exhibit that's been seen; it's Exhibit 45.

7 A. I'm sorry, wrong --

8 Q. It should be a video still of General Krstic.

9 A. This video still of General Krstic is taken at what we call the

10 second meeting between the VRS, the UN Dutch Battalion, and Muslim

11 representatives that occurred in the late evening hours of 11 July, 1995,

12 in the Hotel Fontana in Bratunac.

13 Q. Okay. Let's go to the next -- and that was Exhibit 45. Let's go

14 to the next exhibit, 435. It's an intercept from 12 July in the morning

15 at 0735 hours. Tell us about this.

16 A. What this intercept represents, and the next series of exhibits

17 that will also come in to play, are the series of actions that occurred

18 sometime after that second meeting when the decision was made to evacuate

19 or to move out, transport, the entire civilian population of Potocari

20 out. Again, that being an event that was not anticipated, it started a

21 flurry of orders, both verbal ones that were picked up over the telephone

22 and written orders, to military units and to civilian state-owned

23 companies to start assembling the large amount of buses that would be

24 needed to carry out the movement.

25 Q. And General Krstic as Chief of Staff at this point for this tricky

Page 4828

1 operation, would you expect him to be involved in it?

2 A. Clearly I would expect him to be one of the primary people

3 involved in it. And the other personality noted, Lieutenant Colonel

4 Krsmanovic, is in fact the Drina Corps Chief of Transportation Services,

5 another person who should be very involved in the programme.

6 Q. So this -- it's fair to say this is an intercept with Krstic and

7 Krsmanovic dealing with buses and getting buses from various places?

8 A. Yes, sir.

9 Q. Okay, let's go to the next exhibit, 436. Now, this is a

10 communication from General Zivanovic dated 12 July as Commander of the

11 Drina Corps. How does this fit in?

12 A. Again, this is another manifestation of the process of going out

13 and assembling all of the buses and other transportation assets necessary

14 to move the Muslim population out of Potocari. In this aspect, they're

15 specifically ordering all of the Drina Corps subordinate units to provide

16 the buses. The order is dated 12 July, 1995. And again reflecting when

17 that decision might have been made, when you look at the translation of

18 the communication centre received stamp at the bottom, what that indicates

19 is that that order was received by the command of the Zvornik Brigade at

20 0835, the morning of 12 July. The inference there is, clearly the order

21 was given earlier that morning.

22 Q. Now, if the Main Staff had taken over direct command of the

23 brigades leaving out the normal authority of the Drina Corps, would there

24 have been any need or any point for General Zivanovic to send this order

25 to his brigades?

Page 4829

1 A. No, sir.

2 Q. Let's go to the next exhibit, 437. This is a new kind of document

3 from the Defence Ministry. What is this?

4 A. Within the context of the laws of the army and the laws of the

5 defence -- on laws on defence, it is the responsibility of the Ministry of

6 the Defence to deal with those issues having to deal with other aspects of

7 the government or the state of the Republika Srpska. What you have here

8 is, again, referencing a Main Staff order or directive to the Minister of

9 Defence or Ministry of Defence, for the Ministry of Defence then turning

10 that around and ordering the various civilian agencies and assets under

11 the control of the Ministry of Defence to mobilise buses and send them to

12 Bratunac.

13 Q. And this is one of many such orders; we didn't put all the other

14 ones on there.

15 A. We have a total of -- sorry, we have a total of six of these

16 orders: three dated 12 July, 1995, three dated 13 July, 1995.

17 Q. Is there anything about this that indicates the chain of command

18 involving the various ministries and armies is working anything but

19 normally?

20 A. This order at face value is consistent with all of the other

21 series that we have of this.

22 Q. Let's go to the next exhibit which is an intercept, 12 July, still

23 in the morning, 0915, and if you could just tell us about this.

24 A. This clearly is not a verbatim translation of the conversation.

25 It represents notations of one of the operators as to what the context of

Page 4830

1 the order was. Again, it demonstrates the involvement of Lieutenant

2 Colonel Krsmanovic, the Drina Corps Chief of Transportation, dealing with

3 the issue from various agencies of getting buses assembled. The

4 interesting piece here to note is the fact that fuel for all aspects in

5 July of 1995 in East Bosnia was a very, very precious commodity and

6 difficult to come by.

7 Q. In your review of the various documents, have you seen the

8 allocation of fuel being dealt with in a certain way?

9 A. What they did in order to get past the fuel issue, particularly in

10 the situation in Bratunac -- a light infantry brigade it had very few

11 vehicles therefore very little fuel holdings -- was the buses that arrived

12 on the 12th and the 13th, the fuel was essentially requisitioned from the

13 state-owned Vihor Transportation Company in Bratunac. And we have

14 detailed lists that are included in the supporting materials where as the

15 buses arrived, buses were given 50 or 100 litres of diesel fuel, D2 as

16 it's referred to; the license plate numbers of the buses were written

17 down; and those buses were then sent to Potocari to start picking up the

18 members of the population.

19 And when you look at the gross count, 60, 70 buses, as well as

20 other military vehicles that were requisitioned into the process, when

21 fuel subsequently was allowed into Potocari from the UN, in order to

22 basically compensate the Vihor Transportation Company and, in effect, the

23 state of Republika Srpska for the fuel, that fuel was reallocated to the

24 Vihor Transportation Company.

25 Q. All right. Let's go on to what was Exhibit 55. It should be a

Page 4831

1 still of General Krstic at the Hotel Fontana on the morning of the 12th.

2 We're still going in a chronology now. And what does this represent?

3 A. Again, represents the presence, the physical presence of General

4 Krstic at what we call the third meeting between the VRS commanders, in

5 this case now members of the Republika Srpska civilian authorities, Muslim

6 authorities, and the Dutch Battalion representatives.

7 Q. And without getting into the details of this meeting, General

8 Krstic is the highest ranking officer aside from General Mladic there?

9 A. Highest ranking officer of the Drina Corps present, yes, sir.

10 Q. Let's go to the next exhibit, which is an intercept from 12 July,

11 1200 hours, perhaps by the chronology, shortly after the meeting ended or

12 right about that time.

13 A. Can you give me the exhibit number, sir?

14 Q. I'm sorry, it's 359A. And if you don't see it there, I can just

15 read it briefly, and we can go on to the next.

16 A. I don't have that exhibit here.

17 Q. We have a copy which we should be able to deliver. Just before

18 you put it on the ELMO, could you check for initials and just fold it down

19 so those initials can't be seen?

20 A. This exhibit again discusses the issue of buses being assembled.

21 It further specifies the requests for fuel being forwarded to Krstic.

22 Q. Now, is there another Krstic that may be involved in fuel issues?

23 My recollection is that there are other documents. Who do you think this

24 Krstic may be?

25 A. In this instance, the Krstic that we're referring to is, in fact,

Page 4832

1 General Krstic.

2 Q. Why do you say that?

3 A. The only other Krstic that comes up in relation to the military

4 documents and the fuel-related issue is a Private Krstic functioning as a

5 Captain Krstic in logistics in the Zvornik Brigade. It's unlikely that

6 this conversation would have involved him.

7 Q. Is fuel important enough to have the Major General, the Chief of

8 Staff, involved in it like this?

9 A. In the context of Eastern Bosnia in July of 1995, it would be safe

10 to say that diesel fuel was the equivalent of liquid gold. It was one of

11 the embargoed items that had to be smuggled in, and the fuel records were

12 very meticulously kept from the individual operator level all the way

13 through the major commands. Fuel usage was a mandatory reporting

14 requirement as part of every brigade's daily combat report to the corps.

15 Q. All right. Could we go to the next exhibit, 440, another 12 July

16 at 1210 hours.

17 A. I'm sorry, this is the wrong exhibit. 440.

18 Q. Tell us about this.

19 A. Clearly this is not a verbatim transcript of an intercept. It's

20 the synopsis notes of the individual collector noting that Krstic wants

21 the buses to start moving right away.

22 Q. In your opinion, who should this be in the context of the overall

23 situation?

24 A. Again, in the context of who the conversation correspondents are,

25 this would be General-Major Krstic.

Page 4833

1 Q. We have Krsmanovic again, who you've already described.

2 A. Yes.

3 Q. Let's go to the next one, 441, 12 July, 1212 hours. Is it fair to

4 say this is Krsmanovic involved with trailer trucks, the same issue?

5 A. Yes, sir.

6 Q. Let's go on to 442. Sorry, that's the same one. Let's go to 443,

7 12 July, and we see -- what do you make of this conversation?

8 A. Again, what we're seeing here is between two unidentified

9 correspondents, the discussion pertaining to the movements of large

10 scale -- or large numbers of trucks. Miletic. The name, I believe, is

11 General-Major Miletic, the Chief of Operations of the VRS on the Main

12 Staff, and clearly they're discussing the movements of vehicles from the

13 major municipalities. He's also noting one of the correspondents, "X",

14 that he's received an order from Krsto, a nickname of General Krstic, and

15 he's ordered it directly, and again we're talking the issue here of fuel.

16 Q. We've heard the name Krle. In fact, General Mladic just used it

17 coming into Srebrenica, but we have not seen Krsto before. Why do you

18 believe this is a reference to General Krstic?

19 A. Looking through the context of the intercepts that we have, we see

20 other high-ranking Serbian officers, at least at his level, will call him

21 that as a nickname, and again, in correspondence between the lower

22 subscribers, where the presence of the General isn't there, they'll, of

23 course, call him by his slang nickname as well.

24 Q. Let's go to the next exhibit, 444, 12 July, 1240 hours. And

25 Panorama is one of the participants. What's Panorama?

Page 4834

1 A. Panorama is the radio telephone, which is the network that we're

2 seeing intercepted here, nickname or code name for the Main Staff

3 headquarters.

4 Q. So this --

5 JUDGE RIAD: Excuse me just again. The nickname of General Krstic

6 did not appear on the transcript. Could you repeat it, please,

7 Mr. Butler, the nickname of Mr. Krstic?

8 A. In the intercept it's referred to as "Krsto." K-i-r -- I believe

9 it's K-r-s-t-o.

10 JUDGE RIAD: Krsto, yes, but there is another one. If you look

11 here, "called him by his nickname," the other one.

12 A. Krle, K-r-l-e.

13 JUDGE RIAD: So "Krle" and "Kristo" are both used?

14 A. Are nicknames we have associated with Major-General Krstic, yes,

15 sir.

16 MR. McCLOSKEY:

17 Q. While we're on the nickname topic, we hear Krsmanovic also

18 referred to as Krle in one intercept, don't we?

19 A. That is correct. And again, as part of what I did in analysing

20 the intercepts, part of that clearly is not going and taking names at face

21 value, it's looking within the context of the intercepts, the context of

22 the conversation and the correspondence, to make those assessments whether

23 we're talking about Krle, the Chief of Transportation, and Krle, the Chief

24 of Staff at this time of the Drina Corps. So it's not a face value

25 judgement of a name equals a person.

Page 4835

1 Q. Back to Exhibit 444. This is another discussion about buses, but

2 this time the Main Staff Panorama seems to be interested. So the Main

3 Staff is now involved. Is there anything unusual about that?

4 A. Nothing unusual at all. It would be expected that the Main Staff

5 would be very involved in this, particularly in the acquiring of assets

6 outside of the zone of the Drina Corps, which the Drina Corps would not

7 normally be empowered to do on its own.

8 Q. Okay. Let's go the next intercept, 445, 12 July, 1250 hours,

9 General Mladic and unidentified person talking about buses and trucks.

10 What can you make of this?

11 A. Again, General Mladic, as the Commander of the Main Staff,

12 querying an unidentified correspondent as to whether or not the trucks and

13 buses are on their way as directed. Further, when you go into the text,

14 he's telling that unidentified correspondent to continue to monitor the

15 situation; "Don't let small groups of them sneak in." I would be very

16 hesitant, at that point, to try and speculate what that meant in relation

17 to the overall context.

18 Going further into that, again General Mladic makes the point that

19 they've all capitulated and surrendered and, "We'll evacuate them all,

20 those who want to and those who don't want to." Clearly, in this case,

21 we're discussing the civilian population at Potocari.

22 Q. Now we just saw on the video General Mladic ordering people to

23 take flags, to take Bratunac, to do this, to do that. We've seen him try

24 to pull a Dutch APC out of a ditch in a former video. Now we see him

25 involved in some detail with the buses. Are those indications that

Page 4836

1 General Mladic has taken over command of the brigades directly and has

2 pushed out the Drina Corps' authority?

3 A. No, sir.

4 Q. Why not?

5 A. Taken in context, General Mladic, as the Commander of the Main

6 Staff of the VRS, will be making the major decisions, clearly. In the

7 cases where he's on camera, he'll make them very publicly. And in the

8 sense of dealing with Generals, one of the facets of command and

9 leadership is to be publicly seen being in command and leading, and a lot

10 of what General Mladic does, clearly, is for the benefit of the cameras

11 and for the benefit of all of his soldiers to be seen being in command.

12 Commanders at all levels, Generals, be it brigade Commanders, even

13 battalion Commanders, they don't have -- I mean, one of the most precious

14 resources is time. They don't have the time to do everything themselves.

15 That's why, within a military context, they have staffs to perform all

16 these functions and subordinate Commanders to perform all of these

17 functions.

18 For General Mladic to issue an order and then exercise that order

19 outside of the chain of command when there is a perfectly functional staff

20 at his disposal, the Drina Corps command and the Drina Corps staff, does

21 not make military sense per se. The normal portion of that or the normal

22 way that would occur would be for General Mladic to give the orders to his

23 subordinate commanders. And in the case we saw that in Potocari, him

24 informing his subordinate commanders that he wanted to go from -- I'm

25 sorry -- from Srebrenica to Potocari, informing them what he wanted to

Page 4837

1 do. It's the responsibility of the staff and the subordinate commanders

2 to figure out how to do that, how to put all of the hundreds and hundreds

3 of pieces together which are implied and inferred in a single order in

4 order to make something happen.

5 So it doesn't make very much military sense for things like that

6 to happen where you would have a Commander lopping off elements of the

7 chain of command and dealing with units directly in that sense.

8 Specifically when you look at the JNA regulations pertaining to command

9 and staff, it very clearly articulates that things like that are abnormal

10 and, in effect, represent a very poor and undisciplined army.

11 Q. Do you get the impression that the VRS was a poor and

12 undisciplined army?

13 A. No, sir. They are a very well-organised army.

14 Q. Thank you.

15 MR. McCLOSKEY: Mr. President, this would probably be a good time

16 to take a break.

17 JUDGE WALD: Can I ask one question? Sorry. Between Exhibit 444,

18 which was Panorama, although we don't have the identified participants,

19 they're only "X" and "Y", but it's clear between them they're saying -- Y

20 is saying: "We'll accept all the civilians who want to stay. Those who

21 don't want to can choose where to go," and approximately an hour later

22 we've got 445 which says they're going to go whether they want to or not.

23 I mean, evacuated. Is there something out of your analysis that can

24 bridge that gap?

25 A. Clearly in the context, that falls out of the general chain of

Page 4838

1 events that we see. One of the parts, when you analyse communications

2 intelligence information, which this is, especially when you deal with

3 issues of reliability, well, obviously the processing of the product is a

4 reliability issue. The one thing that an analyst has to be aware of is

5 the fact that while you may have a perfectly good intercept, there's no

6 guarantee that the correspondents know what they're talking about or are

7 as informed of the situation as anybody else. It does fit out of context,

8 it does not go in sequence, and I cannot explain it.

9 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] So we're going to have a

10 20-minute break now.

11 --- Recess taken at 12.18 p.m.

12 --- On resuming at 12.44 p.m.

13 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Mr. McCloskey, we may continue.

14 MR. McCLOSKEY: Thank you, Mr. President.

15 Q. Mr. Butler, if we could go to Exhibit 446, it should be an

16 intercept 12 July, 1305 hours, and I want to ask you a few questions about

17 this, and I want to read a bit of it. And "K" appears to be Krstic where

18 it says:

19 "Put me back to the switchboard. Miss, put me through to the

20 Vlasenica Brigade."

21 And there's an answer "yes". And then,

22 "This is Krstic.

23 Can I help you General?

24 Give me Kosoric."

25 Who is Kosoric again?

Page 4839

1 A. Lieutenant Colonel Kosoric is the Chief of Intelligence for the

2 Drina Corps.

3 Q. And can you point to the map where the Vlasenica Brigade should

4 be?

5 A. The Vlasenica Brigade is located, almost physically located with

6 the headquarters of the Drina Corps in Vlasenica.

7 Q. Okay. Now, I'll continue to read. General Krstic is told,

8 "He's not in. He went somewhere.

9 Give me Savo, put me through to Savo.

10 How are you general? This is Savo.

11 Srpski!, fuck it, how else?

12 Congratulations."

13 Then Krstic:

14 "Get in touch with these guys from the MUP. That means you,

15 your brigade and them."

16 What do you make of this sentence, who is he talking about, "Get

17 in touch with these guys from the MUP, that means your brigade"?

18 A. To start with, first I'm not yet able to identify who Savo is;

19 however, clearly from the context of the conversation, the correspondent

20 Savo is someone with the Vlasenica Light Infantry Brigade, again, a Drina

21 Corps asset. And what he -- what General Krstic at this time is

22 instructing him to do is coordinate with the Ministry of the Interior

23 police units, as well as with people in his own brigade, to accomplish

24 something.

25 Q. Okay. And then Savo responds: "I gave everything there is." And

Page 4840

1 then Krstic:

2 "Wait, slow down, man, secure the road first, from the

3 crossroad below from where you are, 12 kilometres/?Drava/, and

4 up to the tunnel."

5 Geographically, can you make out anything from that sentence?

6 A. The crossroad intersection I'm presuming to be the major crossroad

7 from the road south from Vlasenica. Drava is the radio telephone callsign

8 for the Birac Infantry Brigade headquartered up in Sekovici, which is not

9 located on the map but is in this area right here. So putting that

10 together, what they're being instructed to do is secure the road from

11 Vlasenica up past Tisca -- or up towards Tisca in the direction of Drava,

12 the Sekovici Brigade, or Birac Brigade it's known alternatively.

13 Q. Now, do you know of a tunnel that exists just west of Luke?

14 A. There is a tunnel along the road from Luke to Kladanj which the

15 survivors of the transportation out of Potocari discuss having gone

16 through as part of their trek where they were let off at Luke towards

17 Kladanj.

18 Q. So if we start off in Vlasenica, assuming that's where this guy is

19 from, and we go 12 kilometers in the direction of Drava but then over

20 towards the tunnel, where does that roughly put us?

21 A. That puts us along the road from Vlasenica through Tisca to Luke.

22 Q. And then we have another line that says "To the tunnel," and then

23 Krstic says, "Of Course." And then "S" says "okay". And then Krstic

24 says, "That's where they'll be disembarking."

25 Now, on 12 July at about 1301 hours, who would be disembarking

Page 4841

1

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3

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5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13 Blank page inserted to ensure pagination corresponds between the French

14 and English transcripts.

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

Page 4842

1 around that area on that day?

2 A. That would clearly, by the timing of when the first convoy left

3 Potocari, that would be the lead elements of the buses that were moving

4 the people out of Potocari to Luke.

5 Q. That would have been the women and children mostly?

6 A. That is correct, sir.

7 Q. And then the next line, "okay" by "S", and then Krstic says, "Take

8 care, nothing must happen to any of them." Who do you think Krstic is

9 referring to when he says, "Nothing must happen to any of them"?

10 A. Presumably he's talking about the women and children on the buses.

11 Q. And then he says "Is that clear," so he's making a point of it?

12 A. Emphasising that, yes, sir.

13 Q. What do we know, militarily speaking, what happens at that

14 disembarking place in the afternoon of July 12th? Do we have any military

15 officers there that you recall from previous testimony?

16 A. One of the witnesses identifies a Drina Corps officer, Major

17 Sarkic, who he had previously identified as being a member of the Milici

18 Light Infantry Brigade at that location doing the physical separations in

19 the event of the Muslim men who had managed to sneak on the buses. As

20 other witnesses testify, those Muslim men were then placed in a school at

21 the Tisca facility, and were later taken to an execution site.

22 MR. McCLOSKEY: And to clarify, the testimony of the protected

23 witness who we referred to as the Tisca survivor, to give you

24 recollection, he was separated, as best I recall, on the 13th of July in

25 the early morning and was -- sat all day at that school, and then was

Page 4843

1 taken out in the evening hours where he survived an execution.

2 And one other piece of information that may be relevant is that

3 that witness recalls hearing that one of the soldiers that he was with ask

4 where should they be taken and was told to take them the same place they

5 took the others.

6 All right. I think that fills us in on the situation at the

7 disembarking.

8 Q. Mr. Butler, aside from the obvious difficulty the women and the

9 children had surviving in the heat and without water and food, is there

10 anything in the record that it's part of the command or any orders that

11 there was any hostility directed towards the women and children during

12 this process?

13 A. Within the framework of the orders and other documents, there is

14 not.

15 Q. All right. Let's go to the next exhibit, number 58. We are still

16 in a chronology in the afternoon of 12 July. It should be a photo of

17 General Krstic leading Popovic in the background. Exhibit 58.

18 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Excuse me for interrupting you,

19 Mr. McCloskey. We don't seem to have Exhibit 447.

20 MR. McCLOSKEY: Mr. President, 447 should be a photograph of --

21 and you should have it -- of a Bratunac Brigade officer, with a video

22 attached to it. We're not quite there yet. I hope that's not a problem

23 we have. The exhibit immediately right in front of it is the one that

24 is -- I now see it on the ELMO.

25 It's my understanding that prior court exhibits, I'd asked them to

Page 4844

1 be put in the binders. However, I was told that since they are part of

2 the court, we couldn't just take them and put them in the binders and that

3 they would have to get them from the Registry. So if that's the rule,

4 that's ...

5 Q. Mr. Butler, this is from a previous -- a still from a previous

6 video exhibit that was an interview of, the Court will recall,

7 General Krstic in the afternoon of July 12th in Potocari, and can you

8 identify the people that you know in that photo?

9 A. Clearly General Krstic is the main subject of the still

10 photograph. Behind him, and if I can use the pointer, this individual

11 here is Lieutenant Colonel Vujadin Popovic, the Assistant Commander for

12 Security of the Drina Corps.

13 Q. Now, this exhibit, it's a bit fuzzy and his face on this

14 particular exhibit is not exactly clear. Have you had a chance to see

15 this video and play it several times to get a good look at who this fellow

16 is behind General Krstic?

17 A. Yes, sir, I have. It is Lieutenant Colonel Popovic.

18 Q. Popovic who we also just saw on the video coming through

19 Srebrenica on the 11th with General Krstic, and General Zivanovic and

20 others?

21 A. That is correct, sir.

22 Q. All right. Let's go on to the next exhibit, which is 447, the

23 still. If you could -- it should be a still of the Bratunac -- well,

24 there's also a video, which is 136.

25 A. I don't have that.

Page 4845

1 Q. Let's not worry about the still. We've got the video. Thanks.

2 MR. McCLOSKEY: If we could play the video 136. Again, this is an

3 interview of a Bratunac Brigade officer, shot, we believe, about the same

4 time as the interview with General Krstic, and it should be subtitled.

5 [Videotape played]

6 MR. McCLOSKEY: Could we play that back, and could you try to see

7 if you can try to catch the man with the moustache that comes behind him?

8 We'll just give it one try. If not, we'll go on. For the booth, there's

9 a fellow with a bald head and a big moustache that comes up for a second

10 or two behind the person giving the interview.

11 [Videotape played]

12 MR. McCLOSKEY: Okay. Thank you. If you can go slowly, I'll let

13 you know where he is.

14 [Videotape played]

15 MR. McCLOSKEY: Sorry, we passed it. I didn't see it. There he

16 is. Stop. That's the back of his head. If you can follow the fellow on

17 the right-hand side of the screen very slowly, he'll give us a facial

18 shot, I think, unless he's already done it. Okay. Keep going.

19 [Videotape played]

20 MR. McCLOSKEY: Okay. Right there. Stop.

21 Q. All right. Mr. Butler, this fellow that appears to be behind a

22 rifle at the moment, do you recognise that fellow?

23 A. That individual is Lieutenant Colonel Svetozar Kosoric, the Chief

24 of Intelligence for the Drina Corps. The primary subject of the video is

25 identified as Zoran Kovacevic who is further noted in Bratunac Brigade

Page 4846

1 records as a Lieutenant and the Commander of the 4th Infantry Company,

2 2nd Battalion of the Bratunac Light Infantry Brigade.

3 Q. Okay. We can leave the video. How does the presence of that

4 Bratunac officer fit in with what you know about the plan and who should

5 be where at the time?

6 A. As discussed within the context of the military units that we

7 physically see entering Potocari on the 12th and 13th of July, the

8 Bratunac Brigade units involved from the south and from the north the

9 3rd Battalion of the Bratunac Brigade and the 2nd Battalion of the

10 Bratunac Brigade. So his physical presence in Potocari on the 12 July

11 would be consistent with that.

12 Q. Now, I want to ...

13 MR. McCLOSKEY: I think it should fit right over that. It looks

14 like there's enough room. I'm sorry. If we could put that right over the

15 top.

16 Q. Now, the presence of Lieutenant Colonel Vujadin Popovic and the

17 presence of Colonel Kosoric in Potocari at that time, and again, could you

18 point out where they are on the command chart?

19 A. Lieutenant Colonel Popovic, again, Assistant Commander for

20 Security of the Drina Corps. Lieutenant Colonel Kosoric, the Chief of

21 Intelligence of the Drina Corps.

22 Q. And what is going on in Potocari on that day that would involve

23 their job descriptions, if anything?

24 A. On that day, you have the physical process of the transportation

25 of the Muslim population from Potocari through or out to the Muslim free

Page 4847

1 territory. Considering the large civilian and suspected male military

2 members who were there, it's a logical function for both the Chief of

3 Security and the Chief of Intelligence for the Drina Corps to be present

4 there as part of the organisational and oversight function.

5 Q. Where would they fit, if anywhere, into the planning on what to do

6 with the inhabitants of Srebrenica?

7 A. Clearly in an aspect from the security role, the planning for the

8 aspects or the security aspect of moving them for the chief -- you know,

9 the security aspect, I guess, for moving them and securing them, making

10 sure that none of them pose a threat to the Drina Corps. Further, from a

11 security aspect, you have the function of screening people who are accused

12 by the VRS or by the Republika Srpska for war crimes.

13 Q. So you're now talking about the male population of Potocari would

14 be a specific security situation.

15 A. In one aspect it would be a security situation. Further, an

16 intelligence perspective, clearly members of the male population of

17 Potocari would presumably have information which would be of value for the

18 command of the Drina Corps relative to the location, the identities, and

19 the personalities of members of the Muslim 28th Infantry Division, and it

20 would be a logical function for the Chief of Intelligence and his people

21 to be involved in identifying Muslims who would have such information and

22 to interrogate them accordingly.

23 Q. Okay. Let's continue with our chronology and getting back to an

24 intercept. It's Exhibit 448, 12 July, at 1648 [sic] hours. Panorama is

25 noted as one of the participants.

Page 4848

1 A. Exhibit 448?

2 Q. Yes. Make sure there's no initials or anything on that. And if

3 I'd said 1648, I should have said 1848 hours is the time of this.

4 What can you tell us about this conversation and how it fits in

5 your analysis, if at all? And I would note that on the bottom of page 2

6 there is a mention of Krle, but is there anything specifically you can

7 glean from this?

8 A. The conversation as depicted, clearly the primary correspondents

9 are between two people of the Main Staff, Panorama and an individual going

10 by the code name of Panorama-03. They're looking for the big boss, who we

11 presume to be General Mladic. They're unable to find him, and they pass

12 him to an individual named Rajko. We believe, but I'm not sure, that

13 Rajko, is the name of a military officer who serves the function as the

14 aide to General Mladic.

15 What is happening is that the individual identified as 03 is

16 discussing back and forth with this individual what steps both the Main

17 Staff and the forward command are taking, and essentially Rajko is passing

18 on the instructions or the intent of his superior.

19 Q. Now, on the bottom of page 2. Is there enough information to

20 determine Krle, who that may be?

21 A. Again, in the context of knowing who is in the discussion being at

22 the level of the Main Staff, Krle, in this context, is referring to who --

23 I believe General Major Krstic.

24 Q. Do you know who this Kocic might be who is referred to also?

25 A. No, I do not, sir.

Page 4849

1 Q. All right. Let's go to now Exhibit 449 -- excuse me -- 450. That

2 is a July 13th conversation. Now we've come over onto the early morning

3 of the 13th at 0700 a.m. What can you tell us about this conversation?

4 A. This conversation occurs, again, early morning hours of 13 July.

5 The correspondent "X" is looking for whom I believe, the first indication

6 of the name Nikolic, as Captain First Class Momir Nikolic, the Chief of

7 Intelligence and Security for the Bratunac Light Infantry Brigade.

8 Q. Why do you think that? Nikolic is a fairly common name.

9 A. Well, again going into the aspects of the rest of the

10 conversation, we know that Captain First Class Nikolic is, in fact,

11 involved in dealing with the aspects of Muslim people in Potocari on both

12 the 12th and 13th. Additionally, he's specifically dealing with issues of

13 Muslim wounded males in Bratunac on the 13th.

14 Q. And how about the reference to the other people there?

15 A. Jankovic, I believe when we look at it in context with other

16 material, the individual referred to is Colonel Radislav Jankovic, the

17 chief or a member of the Intelligence Administration of the VRS Main

18 Staff. We make that conclusion -- I make that conclusion in so much as we

19 have his involvement on the meetings with the 11th and the 12th, and we

20 have other messages and orders by him showing his dealing with the actual

21 movement of the population from Potocari out through to Kladanj. So we

22 know that Colonel Jankovic is extremely well involved in this.

23 Q. I note in the middle of the page on this conversation that he is

24 introduced as: "Here's Police Commander Jankovic." Would that be a MUP

25 guy and not the Main Staff Jankovic?

Page 4850

1 A. It is a possibility, yes, sir.

2 Q. Okay. Now, getting closer down to the bottom of the page, maybe a

3 third down, there's a discussion about:

4 "About one-third of them have probably been transferred,

5 about as many as there are."

6 One-third have been transferred, around about 70 vehicles have

7 left."

8 Then:

9 "Around 5.000?

10 Yes.

11 And you'd say there's another ten?

12 Two-thirds more.

13 10.000."

14 Is that roughly consistent with the numbers and the times and the

15 dates of the people being sent out of Potocari?

16 A. Certainly within the context of the times it is consistent. We

17 know that the bus movement stopped in the evening hours of the 12th of

18 July to the hours of darkness and resumed at about 0700 on the morning on

19 the 13th.

20 As for the numbers, I'm not sure that anyone's ever been able to

21 come up with an accurate number of just how many people who were at

22 Potocari and who went through the evacuation or movement process, so I

23 don't know if that's an accurate number or a reflection of the numbers or

24 not.

25 Q. All right. Going to page 2 of that conversation, there's more

Page 4851

1 references to: "Where's Nikolic," on the third line, and a response is:

2 "Nikolic went home this morning at half past 3.00."

3 Does that still appear to be consistent with Momir Nikolic from

4 the Bratunac Brigade?

5 A. Considering the work load and his function, that would be

6 consistent.

7 Q. Now, there's also a general talking in this. After a while it

8 says, "Anything else, General?" And the "Y", who is perhaps the general,

9 says, "Where is my squad commander?" Then the conversation goes on, and

10 the person that is the general says, "All right, Jankovic, send me what

11 you have up here since the Main Staff has been to me every six minutes."

12 That is a General. Who might that be, or what can you tell us, if

13 anything, about that?

14 A. Clearly on something like this there are many interpretations that

15 could be given. Looking at this one in context, I believe that the

16 General in question that we're discussing is one of two possibilities.

17 The first one would be General Krstic, and again, the reference to the

18 Main Staff has been bothering "him". The second would be General Miletic

19 of the Main Staff, who would use the phrase the colloquial phrase "Main

20 Staff" to refer to other individuals of the Main Staff or beyond. It is

21 very unclear who the General is.

22 Q. This is the morning of the 13th under your -- by your opinion,

23 General Zivanovic is still the corps commander. Could this not be General

24 Zivanovic?

25 A. Again, that is a possibility.

Page 4852

1 Q. Sometimes you just can't tell from these things?

2 A. That is correct, sir.

3 Q. Let's go to 452, 13 July conversation at 1110 hours. What can you

4 tell us about this?

5 A. In this conversation, clearly Lieutenant Colonel Krsmanovic is one

6 of the subscribers, we see where we've discussed earlier the aspect of

7 Krsmanovic having the same nickname as General Krstic did, that nickname

8 being Krle, K-r-l-e.

9 Going beyond that, clearly you see Colonel Krsmanovic is the Chief

10 of Transportation deeply involved in the staff work and in the monitoring

11 of the movement of the transportation and the bus fleet for movement from

12 Potocari out.

13 JUDGE RIAD: Excuse me, Mr. McCloskey, you said the 13th July

14 conversation?

15 MR. McCLOSKEY: That's correct.

16 JUDGE RIAD: Is there no indication? There's no indication of

17 that. It says 11 -- is it written down?

18 MR. McCLOSKEY: I believe, while I know I missed out on that week

19 of intercepts, I believe you should have a binder of the two or three

20 volumes of intercepts that are organised by date and by time and with a

21 large reference sheet. As you recall from your week with intercepts, many

22 of these intercepts did not have the actual date on them, and so we did

23 not write in the date as we go over the exhibits; but I have my notations

24 from the final conclusions that the operators made, so that's what I'm

25 referring to, but you should have a record of that.

Page 4853

1 JUDGE RIAD: Thank you very much.

2 MR. McCLOSKEY:

3 Q. So looking at the bottom of the page, "Listen, we'll ask UNPROFOR

4 for fuel, you can count on that." So they're still low on fuel?

5 A. That is correct, sir.

6 Q. All right. Now, that ends the intercept section of Potocari, and

7 I would like for you to go to Exhibit 453. And if you could --

8 MR. McCLOSKEY: This exhibit has been, Your Honours, has been

9 developed by the Prosecution as just a wrap-up to help make it clear who

10 some of the main players were that we're seeing in Potocari at the various

11 times on the 12th and 13th, and I would just ask Mr. Butler to make some

12 brief comments on any military aspects of their presence.

13 Q. So, Mr. Butler, from your review of the videos and witness

14 statements, what can you tell us briefly about the first person that's

15 seen, General Ratko Mladic?

16 A. Clearly with respect to his presence in Potocari, he is identified

17 by numerous witness [sic] and video as being present in Potocari those

18 dates.

19 Q. And you've already mentioned General Mladic's -- seemingly his

20 habits with the camera. Aside from that, can you tell anything from the

21 military command and control function about what his presence on those two

22 days means?

23 A. Clearly his physical presence there and his engagement there

24 lends, lends the position that this is done under his direction. Of all

25 the events that are occurring, he is still in command. He is in command

Page 4854

1 of the army. Everything that is happening is happening on the basis of

2 his instructions.

3 Q. And how about Colonel Radislav Jankovic?

4 A. Colonel Jankovic, we don't have a physical presence of him in

5 Potocari on the 12th and 13th. His physical presence is noted by a

6 witness, and I'm not sure if he's a protected witness or not, so I won't

7 identify him. But he is noted on the 14th by a witness as being involved

8 with dealing with the UNPROFOR members in diverting fuel that had arrived

9 and essentially taking the fuel from UNPROFOR.

10 Q. Perhaps related to the previous intercept where the participants

11 in the conversation said that they would get fuel from UNPROFOR?

12 A. Yes, sir.

13 Q. Now, the Drina Corps, and if you could just -- we have five senior

14 officers from the Drina Corps. If you could go over briefly each one, and

15 could you, again, circle for us on the exhibit that's up there where they

16 are, and then tell us a bit about what their presence there means in a

17 military command context.

18 A. Again, with the case of General-Major Krstic functioning at that

19 time as the Drina Corps Chief of Staff/Deputy Commander, it would have

20 been his role to essentially coordinate and control and manage the entire

21 process of the assembly of the buses, the movement of the personnel from

22 Potocari all the way up through and out. And again, all of those duties

23 would have been consistent with his functions as the corps Chief of

24 Staff.

25 General-Major Zivanovic, still performing as the corps commander,

Page 4855

1 again, his physical presence noted by a witness on the 12th, again giving

2 guidance and direction but not getting involved in the absolute details of

3 that. So again, the corps commander there, the primary two people in

4 charge of the Drina Corps.

5 Colonel Svetozar Kosoric, his physical presence noted again on the

6 12th related to the intelligence collection functions that would be

7 normally associated with a capture of a large amount of prisoners.

8 Lieutenant Colonel Popovic as the assistant commander for

9 security, again, his presence physically noted on the 12th, again

10 performing in his role with the security aspects, management of prisoners,

11 and also further, dealing with the issues of war crimes.

12 Lazar Acimovic as the head or the Assistant Commander for Rear

13 Services, his physical presence noted on 13 July. The transportation

14 people, who we've discussed earlier, worked directly for him within the

15 confines of that staff, and it's logical, certainly, that he would have

16 been very much involved in the process of the assembly of the buses and

17 all of the other logistical related aspects to make that movement

18 operation of 15.000 people occur.

19 So within the context of the Drina Corps staff, we see the

20 Commander, the Chief of Staff, and two of his three primary Assistant

21 Commanders physically on the ground during the actual movement of the

22 Muslim population from Potocari.

23 Q. How about Drina Corps units now?

24 A. Within the context of the Drina Corps units, we have witness

25 testimony that puts elements of the Drina Wolves sweeping through

Page 4856

1 Potocari, one of the first actions that occurs, on 12 July, from a

2 security aspect. And as previously discussed, the Drina Wolves are a

3 subordinate unit of the Zvornik Infantry Brigade. We further have

4 additional footage of elements of the Drina Wolves in Srebrenica on 13

5 July proper. Further, looking at the Bratunac Brigade --

6 Q. Let me interrupt you for one second. We'll go into more detail on

7 the Bratunac Brigade in a few exhibits, but if you could just make your

8 conclusions on them.

9 A. Clearly within the aspect of the Bratunac Brigade, we see the

10 elements of the 2nd and the 3rd Battalion of the Bratunac Brigade as well

11 as at least one member of the command of the Bratunac Brigade present in

12 Potocari on the 12th and 13th as well. Again, on the ground, considering

13 the military situation, that would have been where they would be expected

14 to be.

15 Q. And if you could now just talk briefly about the Ministry of

16 Interior people, and then we'll get into some of the exhibits that show

17 their presence and other soldiers in the area.

18 A. The first individual listed, Dusko Jevic, is identified as a MUP

19 individual by witnesses, and his role is amplified in the interview by

20 Zoran Petrovic pertaining to the move there as a Company Commander of one

21 of the MUP special police companies. His physical presence is noted on

22 12th July.

23 Lieutenant Colonel Ljubisa Borovcanin is identified as the Deputy

24 Commander of the special MUP Brigade, the Special Police Brigade at Janja,

25 and his physical presence is noted in the Petrovic video in Potocari and

Page 4857

1 along the road on 13 July.

2 The individual named Mendljev, nickname Mane, Dzuric, who is

3 identified as a battalion commander of that same police brigade,

4 subordinate to Colonel Borovcanin, and his physical presence is also noted

5 in Potocari on 13 July.

6 Q. Okay. Let's go to some of the video stills that will help

7 solidify some of this testimony. Could you go to Exhibit 74 which should

8 be a still of a fellow with a moustache, I believe to be Jevic.

9 Could you take your pointer and point out Mr. Jevic or --

10 A. This individual, Mr. Jevic, who's also nicknamed Stalin, and

11 identified as such by some of the witnesses.

12 Q. What date is that believed to be taken, that still from the video?

13 A. This still video was taken 12 July, 1995.

14 Q. All right. And do you have another exhibit of Jevic?

15 A. That would be Exhibit 73.

16 Q. Thank you. Same person with General Mladic, same general area,

17 same general time?

18 A. Yes.

19 Q. Okay. Let's go to the next exhibit, should be an Exhibit 185, and

20 it should be a still of Borovcanin?

21 A. That's marked as Exhibit 185.

22 Q. Okay, good.

23 A. This is Lieutenant Colonel Borovcanin. This is taken on 13 July

24 from the Petrovic video. It is, in fact, Potocari. You can see on the

25 extreme right-hand portion partial face of Colonel Kingori, one of the

Page 4858

1 UNMOs who was present.

2 Q. The patch on his left arm, what is that?

3 A. That is the very distinctive, we call it in the US army, a

4 brassard, shown the insignia of the special -- of the Ministry of the

5 Interior police.

6 Q. And has that helped -- that patch helped you identify other

7 soldiers of the Ministry of Interior in other parts of the video footage?

8 A. Yes.

9 Q. Okay. Could you go to the next exhibit which should be 71 and

10 perhaps 72?

11 A. Exhibit 71.

12 Q. Can you tell us, do you know who these people are?

13 A. The individual on the left is the individual identified as the

14 Battalion Commander subordinate, and I just confess his name has escaped

15 me. If I can go back and review my notes here. I'm sorry, yes, this is

16 Mendljev Dzuric, D-j or "D" with the diacritic across, who is identified

17 as a Battalion Commander. Witnesses have also identified that his

18 nickname is Mane.

19 Q. And that's --

20 A. I'm sorry.

21 Q. And that's the same name as the Deputy Municipal Police Commander

22 in Zvornik?

23 A. That is correct, sir.

24 Q. Mane Dzuric?

25 A. That's correct.

Page 4859

1 Q. All right. Do we have another exhibit, I think 72? Just another

2 quick shot, perhaps, of Mane the police person, special police person.

3 Okay, thank you.

4 Now, I want to take you back just briefly to Krivaja-95, the plan

5 that designated MUP -- special MUP units as reserves. You've described

6 what reserves were, and the Court has seen some of these people on the

7 stills working in Potocari involved in the deportation aspect of the

8 case. Is the work around Potocari that we see the military police -- the

9 MUP, excuse me, the MUP special police doing, is that consistent or

10 inconsistent with their reserve function?

11 A. Given the set of circumstances at the time, and as we previously

12 discussed, the issue of most of the army forces being deployed south of

13 Srebrenica on the 12th through the 13th, the fact that the MUP were

14 functioning as the corps reserve and were available to deal with this type

15 of issue, it's very logical to conclude that what this was was, in fact,

16 the use of the corps reserve, those MUP forces, to assist in the dealing

17 with the issues at Potocari.

18 Q. And again, under Krivaja-95, the Special Police reserves would

19 have been under the command of who on July 12th and 13th?

20 A. They would have been under the command of the Commander of the

21 Drina Corps.

22 MR. McCLOSKEY: Mr. President, this may be a good time to break,

23 because we'll be getting into some six soldiers from the Bratunac that

24 were identified by various witnesses.

25 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] So let's have a 20-minute

Page 4860

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5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13 Blank page inserted to ensure pagination corresponds between the French

14 and English transcripts.

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

Page 4861

1 break.

2 --- Recess taken at 1.39 p.m.

3 --- On resuming at 2.00 p.m.

4 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Yes, Mr. McCloskey. You may

5 continue.

6 MR. McCLOSKEY: Thank you, Mr. President.

7 Q. We were just about to get to the -- discussing the various

8 Bratunac Brigade officers and soldiers that were witnessed in and around

9 Potocari on the 12th and 13th of July. And if we could go to Exhibit 454,

10 which is basically a compilation of the witness testimony that have

11 identified various people.

12 Mr. Butler, if you could just start with the first person and tell

13 us about that person and what you can and what you know about him.

14 A. Streten Petrovic, according to the roster of the 1st Bratunac

15 Light Infantry Brigade in July of 1995, is the Deputy Commander of the

16 3rd Infantry Battalion.

17 As you will recall from earlier, he is identified on 10 July 1995

18 as being injured in the combat leading up to the capture of Srebrenica on

19 the 11th. Subsequent information that we have indicates that while on the

20 10th his injuries are described as severe, subsequent to that, information

21 indicates that they were not severe injuries at all and, in fact, they

22 were relatively minor injuries. He was observed by individuals, as well

23 as in the Petrovic interview he was discussed by name with Petrovic noting

24 his presence in Bratunac, walking around with a sling and a leg bandage.

25 Further to that, on the 17th, as part of what most militaries do

Page 4862

1 for wounded personnel, there is a medical review board. In this case, the

2 Bratunac Brigade one was held weekly, his injuries were not severe enough

3 to go before that board to determine whether or not he needed to be

4 medically evacuated to Serbia or needed medical convalescence, leave, or

5 anything else. So all of our information indicates the injuries were not

6 severe and the fact that he returned to duty or at least limited duty

7 almost immediately.

8 The second individual --

9 Q. Hold on one second. I want to ask you what, if anything, we can

10 conclude from the presence of a Deputy Commander being present in Potocari

11 on July 13th, militarily.

12 A. Militarily, his presence there certainly infers that members of

13 the 3rd Battalion, other members subordinate to him, are present as well.

14 Again, Commanders being wherever the bulk of their troops are.

15 Q. All right. Let's go to the next person then, Momir Nikolic.

16 A. Captain First Class Nikolic, again off of that same roster, is

17 identified as the Assistant Commander for Intelligence and Security for

18 the Bratunac Brigade command in the month of July of 1995. Again,

19 witnesses identify him in Potocari on that date, a representative of the

20 brigade Commander.

21 Q. Now, what military reason would the Security Intelligence Officer

22 have for being in Potocari on the 12th of July?

23 A. Essentially the same military applications that the presence of

24 Colonel Popovic and Colonel Kosoric would imply, those being security and

25 intelligence aspects related to the Muslim population there.

Page 4863

1 Q. All right. And how about the next person?

2 A. The next person is identified as Sergeant First Class Zoran

3 Milosavljevic. He is identified as a member of the Reconnaissance Unit of

4 the 2nd Battalion, and again as we've discussed earlier, the 2nd and the

5 3rd Battalions would be the units, based on their positions on the

6 battlefield, that we would most expect to see in the environment of

7 Potocari on those days.

8 Q. Okay. And how about the next person?

9 A. Individual Slavoljub Grujicic, again a member of the 3rd Infantry

10 Battalion.

11 Q. And the next one?

12 A. Soldier Goran Rakic, a member of the brigade Artillery Unit. A

13 very small unit but, nevertheless, he's identified on that list as a

14 member of the Artillery Unit. That falls under the brigade command. So

15 again, it's consistent with what units would be there.

16 Q. And the last person?

17 A. I lost my list. I'm still using it. The last person is Zoran

18 Spajic.

19 MR. McCLOSKEY: We're okay with that document. We've checked it.

20 JUDGE RIAD: Excuse me. Mr. Butler, you mentioned earlier that we

21 should remember carefully Streten Petrovic. You mentioned that his father

22 had the biggest moustache. That's the one?

23 MR. McCLOSKEY: Yes, sir.

24 JUDGE RIAD: Then why did you ask us to remember him carefully? I

25 took a note of that.

Page 4864

1 A. His physical presence as a member of the Command of the

2 3rd Battalion, particularly the Deputy Commander for the events that are

3 happening there, again as an individual soldier, what occurs, and further

4 for them as a Deputy Commander, his responsibility to control his

5 subordinate troops.

6 When we discussed the issue of remember him, it was in context of

7 his notation that he was injured on 10 July, as we went back to that

8 10 July 1995 daily combat report. The issue of remembering him was the

9 fact that he would show up again, despite his injuries, in Potocari on the

10 12th and the 13th.

11 JUDGE RIAD: Thank you very much.

12 A. Yes, sir.

13 MR. McCLOSKEY: And, Your Honour, in addition, proving Streten

14 Petrovic's presence in Potocari is putting together quite a few dots,

15 which I think we can probably do it in argument, but it depends on at

16 least two different witnesses that remember first names, names of fathers,

17 moustaches, this kind of thing, and I also bring that to your attention

18 because unlike the other identifications, this one relies on a fair amount

19 of circumstantial evidence being put together.

20 JUDGE RIAD: Thank you very much.

21 A. The last individual, Zoran Spajic, again, a member of the 2nd

22 Battalion, 2nd Infantry Battalion, consistent with who we would expect to

23 see there.

24 MR. McCLOSKEY:

25 Q. Now you've mentioned the roster for the July 1995 Bratunac Brigade

Page 4865

1 is how you've identified these people. Was that roster something that was

2 captured in one of the search warrants of the Bratunac Brigade?

3 A. Yes, sir, it was.

4 Q. And is that attached as supporting material to your narrative?

5 A. Yes.

6 MR. McCLOSKEY: I don't have that exhibit number for the

7 supporting material right now, Your Honours, but we can come up with it,

8 but it's there.

9 Q. Now, Mr. Butler, if -- we have some more exhibits about Potocari

10 and identifying military units. If you could go on to the next exhibit,

11 which should be 460. Put that on the ELMO, and tell us what that is.

12 A. This still is derived from the video, the Petrovic video taken in

13 Potocari on 13 July, 1995. It is a side shot of an armoured personnel

14 carrier, and what you can see from that number is what they call, the

15 army, the Republika Srpska army, called a Bort number, which essentially

16 is a vehicle identification number. That number, 10864, matches up from

17 records of the Bratunac Brigade as being -- belonging to their unit.

18 In addition, when you look at the Petrovic video segment of that,

19 one of the individuals on this armoured personnel carrier is, in fact,

20 engaged in a discussion with at least one of the members of the Muslim

21 population in Potocari at the time.

22 Q. Now, the records that identify this with the Bratunac Brigade, are

23 those, in addition, records captured in the search of the Bratunac

24 Brigade?

25 A. Yes, sir.

Page 4866

1 Q. And are those records also attached to your narrative?

2 A. Yes, sir.

3 Q. Let's go to the next exhibit; I believe it is 461. If you could

4 put that on the ELMO. What's this?

5 A. In time sequence, this is off of the same video, literally within

6 a few seconds as the vehicles pass. This vehicle is in front of the -- I

7 believe in front of the armoured personnel carrier. This is one of the

8 two TAM rocket launchers that is assigned to the Bratunac Light Infantry

9 Brigade.

10 Q. How do you know that?

11 A. The license plate, even on digital imaginary or digital show, is

12 unclear, but we know from, again, the Bratunac Brigade records that there

13 were two TAM rocket launchers assigned to the brigade.

14 Q. All right, let's go to the next exhibit. This should be Exhibit

15 455, and do you know the date of this still, and what it depicts?

16 A. As with the other two previous stills, this is an extract from the

17 Petrovic video taking in Srebrenica on 13 July, 1995. The individual in

18 the middle is clearly wearing that arm brassard of the Drina Wolves,

19 subordinate to the Zvornik Infantry Brigade.

20 Q. All right, let's go to the next exhibit, 456, and I believe this

21 exhibit is to be discussed in combination with 457 which appears to be a

22 patch. Can you tell us about these two exhibits?

23 A. Yes, sir. This still, again extracted from the Petrovic video in

24 Srebrenica on 13 July, the larger sequence seen is the filming of a T55

25 tank going through the town. As the tank rolls past, for a brief fraction

Page 4867

1 you are able to see the tank commander in the turret, and what we're

2 looking at here is the unit patch on his right shoulder. While it is a

3 fuzzy photograph and the video does not come in well, the patch design and

4 shape, particularly with the colouring, is consistent with the patch of

5 the 2nd Romanija Motorised Brigade of the Drina Corps.

6 Along a similar vein, going back to the Krivaja-1995 Op plan, the

7 July Op plan, two units were instructed to bring armoured personnel and

8 tanks. One of them was the Zvornik Infantry Brigade; one of them was the

9 2nd Romanija Motorised Brigade. On 13 July, 1995, we're able to account

10 for the tanks and the vehicles of the Zvornik Infantry Brigade. We do not

11 have the detailed records of the Romanija Brigade, so our ability to

12 actually track them on the ground is limited.

13 Q. Can you just point out where that patch is? The photo is a bit

14 fuzzy from here.

15 A. I'll just -- [indicates].

16 MR. McCLOSKEY: Indicating the right shoulder of the guy in the

17 vehicle.

18 Q. Let's go to the next exhibit, 457. It should be the patch.

19 A. Yes.

20 Q. Now, how does this fit in with the last photograph?

21 A. If I can put both of them up, the key visual indicator that I use

22 -- there are essentially two. One of them the white line -- or the black

23 line going up here consistent with the slope of the mountain or hill; and

24 the second, what I refer to as the Pacman phenomenon where you have this

25 pie-shaped slice here, again, consistent with this pie-shaped slice here

Page 4868

1 on the colouring.

2 Q. All right, thanks. Thank you.

3 Now, we've gone back to some intercepts on the 13th of July; we're

4 getting towards the evening. Exhibit 458, what do you -- what can you

5 tell us from this intercept, if anything?

6 A. What this intercept discusses, and again, we don't know who the

7 correspondents are, is an issue where somebody is looking first for

8 Colonel Lazic, who we believe to be Colonel Milenko Lazic, an operations

9 officer of the Drina Corps. And further, that same correspondent is

10 asking if Krstic is there, and is being told, "He's in front of the

11 building." Later on in the conversation it's made clear by the person

12 talking to him that Krstic is here with Mladic.

13 Q. Sorry, it's not clear where Krstic and Mladic are, but you do

14 believe the message of this intercept is that they are together?

15 A. That is correct, sir.

16 Q. Let's go to the next exhibit, 459. This is a document authored by

17 Colonel Jankovic, the person we remember from the meetings, the Main Staff

18 Colonel. It's dated July 13th, and can you tell us who it's to and what

19 it's about?

20 A. This order or this report dated 13 July, 1995, is to both the

21 command -- it's to the command of the Drina Corps Intelligence Department,

22 identifying himself as, you know, from the Main Staff or intelligence

23 sector of the Main Staff. This report essentially is a wrap-up report

24 that discusses the conclusion of the evacuation, as they call it, of the

25 Muslim population; discusses the status of the wounded, and where they

Page 4869

1 are, and who is with them.

2 Q. Okay. I want to reference you specifically to near the bottom of

3 the paragraph where it says, "The MUP is stealing on a massive scale from

4 UNPROFOR. Today they openly stole their PUH. They wanted to participate

5 in the search of their base after the departure of the refugees which I

6 categorically refused." What do you take the meaning of that to be in a

7 military command sense?

8 A. In a military command sense, I take that statement to be

9 indicative of the fact that the MUP is under the command of the army

10 during this aspect.

11 Q. And this also points out in the beginning right at paragraph 1 the

12 actual time, 2000 hours, date, July 13th, when the evacuation or

13 deportation of the entire Muslim population was completed; is that right?

14 A. Yes, sir.

15 Q. All right. You have described today a bit about the plan that

16 went into the attack on the Srebrenica enclave, Krivaja-95, General

17 Krstic's -- what role he should have played in that as Chief of Staff, and

18 the continuing attack on July 9th of the overall enclave. What can you --

19 briefly tell us what role General Krstic as Chief of Staff should have

20 played in that.

21 A. As we previously noted when I gave that briefing at the map,

22 during the period of the operation, on or about the evening of 9 July, the

23 goal of the operation changed from the actual pushing of the Muslims back

24 into the urban area to the actual accomplishing of taking the urban area

25 of Srebrenica.

Page 4870

1 From a military aspect, while they had most of the base planning

2 finished, there would have been a planning operation that would have had

3 to occur to now take into account the actual capture of an urban area,

4 which is a little bit different militarily than operating over open or

5 mountainous terrain.

6 As the Commander on the ground, as General Krstic at the time was,

7 it would have been his responsibility to ensure that planning aspect took

8 place by the members of his deployed staff there. So he would have been

9 part of that actual operation going into the city.

10 Q. All right. And the next subject of the military operation,

11 dealing with all the men and women and children that have crowded around

12 the Potocari base, the period from the evening of the 11th to the 12th and

13 13th, General Krstic, as Chief of Staff, through the afternoon of the

14 13th, what planning role would you expect him to take in dealing with all

15 these people?

16 A. Certainly when you look at all of the military aspects of things

17 that we know happened or had to have happened to get to the things that we

18 know happened, and then when you put them across the staff functions of a

19 corps command, it is very evident, you know, the planning and the overall

20 coordination process which the Chief of Staff would have had in that

21 specific to the management and movement of the Muslim population, the

22 broad aspects of security and intelligence falling again directly as part

23 of his staff.

24 The physical assembly, the logistical refuelling, the movement,

25 the traffic planning, all of those things which militarily have to occur

Page 4871

1 to get from point A to point B taken care of by the Rear Services Command,

2 the Assistant Commander and staff of the Drina Corps, all of these things

3 have to occur in coordination and in conjunction with the guidance of the

4 Commander. So clearly within that process, that falls squarely within the

5 roles and functions of the responsibility of the corps Chief of Staff.

6 Q. From the intercepts that you've discussed today, is it consistent

7 or inconsistent with General Krstic taking part in the planning and the

8 execution of the movement or deportation of the people out of Potocari?

9 A. They are consistent, sir.

10 Q. Now, the next military objective on the screen of the Drina Corps

11 after or during the deportation process would be what?

12 A. In time sequence, the very next one would have been as the Army of

13 Republika Srpska and the Drina Corps command became aware of the 28th

14 Infantry Division moving from Sandici and Jaglici towards Tuzla, would

15 have been the military preparations and coordinations necessary to deal

16 with amounted to a significant military threat. That manifested itself in

17 many aspects with the coordination with all of the military units and the

18 Special Police Units deployed along those roads. And the coordination

19 particulary important in ensuring in a very confused military environment

20 like that, absolute criticality of knowing where the friendly soldiers

21 are, your soldiers are, to ensure you do not have incidences where your

22 forces are firing on forces which are yours as well.

23 And in the environment that you had here, moving up along the

24 road, you had units -- two battalions of one unit, you had Special Police

25 forces, you had a Drina Corps Engineer Battalion, you had elements of the

Page 4872

1 Military Police Battalion of the 65th Protection Regiment, which is

2 outside the scope of the command of the Drina Corps, going back around you

3 have elements of the Milici Light Infantry Brigade. And as the scope and

4 scale of the Muslim column and the threat became more evident to the VRS,

5 the additional resources now to include members of the municipal police

6 quickly being mobilised to deal with that threat.

7 Q. Mr. Butler, we'll get into some of the details of that tomorrow.

8 My question is: Could we expect General Krstic to have been involved in

9 the planning and dealing with that issue?

10 A. Absolutely he would have been.

11 Q. In addition, the VRS had their sights on other areas at this time,

12 did they not?

13 A. That is correct.

14 Q. What's that?

15 A. While all of this was occurring, they were also starting to plan

16 for now the operation against the UN enclave at Zepa.

17 MR. McCLOSKEY: Mr. President, I have one exhibit related to Zepa

18 and then we'll be into an a whole other topic.

19 Q. Would you have expected on -- well, the days perhaps preceding the

20 attack on Srebrenica or at least at the time of the attack and takedown of

21 Srebrenica, that General Krstic would have been thinking about Zepa and a

22 plan to take Zepa?

23 A. Yes, sir.

24 Q. Do we know whether he was involved in the planning aspect of that

25 Zepa operation?

Page 4873

1 A. Yes, sir, we do.

2 Q. Could you go to Exhibit 483. It should be the 13 July --

3 A. I'm sorry. Are we at --

4 Q. We've got --

5 A. Okay. That's the one.

6 Q. -- one that will work. What is this document?

7 A. This document is the Drina Corps command order pertaining to the

8 base OP planning for setting up of military operations against the Zepa

9 enclave.

10 Q. And it's dated 13 July 1995?

11 A. Yes, sir.

12 Q. And it's authored by Major-General Krstic, Chief of Staff?

13 A. Yes, sir.

14 Q. Are you able to determine anything related to the time that this

15 document was done on the 13th or received or shipped or anything?

16 A. This document, unlike a lot of the other documents, does not have

17 a date sent or date received stamp on it. What I've done in examining the

18 document in detail, tried to infer what time it would have been published,

19 and there are, in fact, several indicators in the context of the document

20 where there are clues as to when that could have occur.

21 The first one, if I can direct your attention, will be -- in

22 paragraph 10, command and communications, noted that it's establishing

23 that work at the command post at Krivajic shall begin at 1800 hours on

24 13 July, 1995. Using that as a start point, we can presume that the order

25 was not published after 1800.

Page 4874

1 Further, going back in time, if I can direct your attention to the

2 issue in paragraph 7 of page 3 of the English-language translation, it

3 discusses, as part of the task allocations, that the 1st Bratunac Light

4 Infantry Brigade shall allocate a company to join the Milici Infantry

5 Brigade along an axis of advance and when it was supposed to be available

6 at a given location.

7 What we have are documents dated 13 July, as early as 1500 hours,

8 of the Bratunac Light Infantry Brigade responding to that directive and

9 informing the command of the Drina Corps that those units will be moving

10 as of 1600 that day.

11 So again, in essence, putting it back in time when you look at the

12 units starting to respond to it and everything else, it is evident that

13 this order was probably published no earlier or, sorry, no later than

14 approximately noon on 13 July 1995.

15 Q. Do you have an opinion on when this document would have been first

16 begun and the work that went into it established? Could this have been a

17 last-minute thing? Does it look like there's planning involved? What's

18 your opinion on that?

19 A. There was, in fact, advance planning done on this document. We

20 start to see initial indications as early as 11 July 1995, as the Main

21 Staff, now aware that successful operations should be occurring in

22 Srebrenica, is starting to plan ahead to the next military operation being

23 Zepa, and we see a series of orders, starting 11 July, where the Main

24 Staff first and then later the command of the Drina Corps is issuing

25 orders to units surrounding Zepa, those primarily the 1st and 5th Podrinje

Page 4875

1 Light Infantry Brigades, that they should assume maximum combat readiness

2 to be able to take advantage of the situation now occurring at

3 Srebrenica.

4 Q. I note on page 3 of the document, paragraph 6, there's a mention

5 of "in coordination with the Protection Regiment," and then it talks about

6 other things. What is that about?

7 A. As -- when you look at the force layout on the ground, the actual

8 military or the UN enclave at Zepa is located very close physically to the

9 Main Staff headquarters in Han Pijesak. One of the primary functions of

10 the 65th Protection Regiment was the protection of facilities associated

11 with the Main Staff. Clearly what this order is doing at this stage is

12 it's directing the subordinate brigades of the Drina Corps to coordinate

13 their plans and operations with the battalions of the 65th Protection

14 Regiment that are also surrounding the enclave of Zepa.

15 Q. From this order, can you tell whether or not the Protection

16 Regiment that's mentioned here would be under the command of the Drina

17 Corps or would be under its own command?

18 A. Under the terminology of paragraph 6 where it says "in

19 coordination," I can't say that that would be a hard command link. In

20 fact, in the JNA doctrine in regulations, it discusses the issue of what

21 coordination is, and in this effect, coordination is not command.

22 Q. All right. Now if you could go to page 4, paragraph 9(C). In the

23 middle of it it mentions: "In coordination with the MUP, all units shall

24 be ready to control and search the field." So we get this term "in

25 coordination" again with the MUP.

Page 4876

1 Now, we've heard about the MUP regulations. Is that any

2 different, in your analysis? Does that -- where do you fit in the MUP in

3 your analysis of whether or not they're under the command of the Drina

4 Corps or themselves or someone else?

5 A. Again, in the context of this paragraph and looking at the

6 operation order in its entirety, again it's clear that they're discussing

7 coordinating the security issues with the MUP. It does not, in this

8 sense, envision the MUP forces at Zepa as being under the command of the

9 Zvornik or -- I'm sorry -- the Drina Corps.

10 Q. All right. So, finally, you've concluded that General Krstic was

11 obviously involved in the planning of the Zepa operation as well as all

12 the other details that you've talked about; is that correct?

13 A. Yes, sir.

14 MR. McCLOSKEY: Your Honour, this is a good time to close, I

15 believe, for the upcoming day tomorrow.

16 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Yes, we agree, Mr. McCloskey.

17 As you know, it would be convenient or at least we should seek to

18 finish with the examination-in-chief on Friday. In relation to this goal

19 and in your judgement and estimation, where do we stand?

20 MR. McCLOSKEY: Well, I'm a little worried, Your Honour. I wanted

21 to get through a book and a half a day, and I think we got through a half

22 a book, though I'm through a third of my outline. So perhaps there's some

23 hope, though, as you could tell today, these were some of the most

24 fundamental documents of the case. We'll see some more tomorrow. Then

25 we'll be getting into lots of records, but records that perhaps don't need

Page 4877

1 as much detailed discussion. So I'm hoping for Friday, but it's hard to

2 tell.

3 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] It's difficult to finish on

4 Friday?

5 MR. McCLOSKEY: It's difficult to give you a very good estimate.

6 I would love to finish by Friday, and we'll certainly give it our best

7 effort.

8 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] How much time would you need to

9 finish on Friday in order to be able to finish on Friday? How much more

10 time would you need? Perhaps I could go a little further. The Chamber

11 cannot sit on Friday after 2.00, which means, and I'm asking

12 Madam Registrar to take note of this, that we must sit as from 9.00 on

13 Friday to make up for the difference. Another possibility is to sit for

14 longer hours tomorrow afternoon, a little later tomorrow afternoon. So

15 the time that you need can be perhaps envisaged for tomorrow afternoon.

16 So I think it is really time -- it is really desirable for us to

17 finish on Friday because we're going on to another case. We are not going

18 on holiday; we're continuing to work. Therefore, perhaps we should really

19 do everything to finish with the examination-in-chief this week so that

20 the Defence can prepare for its cross-examination.

21 MR. McCLOSKEY: Yes, Mr. President. I absolutely agree with

22 that. I'm -- unfortunately, I think realistically and I know the

23 documents that we have to go through and I know how important they are in

24 the case, I think it's probably more realistic to look to finishing the

25 direct in our next session.

Page 4878

1 I know we don't have a real crowded next session, as far as I'm

2 aware, and so there'll be plenty of time to finish the direct, I believe,

3 and finish the entire case in that next two-week session. We have General

4 Danitt [phoen], and perhaps another citizen witness, but -- and perhaps

5 something I've forgotten.

6 [Prosecution counsel confer]

7 MR. McCLOSKEY: And some victim impact witnesses, as recall us

8 mentioning.

9 So it doesn't look like a real full two weeks. So I hate to

10 get -- I don't want to get the anticipation that we can finish on Friday.

11 I wish we could, but the documents that are here are so important that I

12 think we're going to have to go through them slowly. When I find myself

13 hurrying a bit, I find that I miss some things.

14 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] All right. You are quite

15 right. We will keep this objective in mind, and I will ask the registrar

16 to be ready to extend hearing time tomorrow if after re-evaluation we

17 consider there is a possibility of concluding on Friday. If we see that

18 that is not possible at all, then we will work according to regular

19 working hours.

20 But in any event, on Friday we will be sitting from 9.00 rather

21 than 9.30, and we will finish at 2.00 instead of 2.30.

22 Madam Registrar, is there any problem with these working hours?

23 THE REGISTRAR: A priori there will be no problem. We just need

24 to take rather strict measures to ensure the transfer of the accused to

25 the Tribunal at 9.00.

Page 4879

1 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Can we have your response

2 tomorrow?

3 THE REGISTRAR: [Interpretation] We have to know also until when

4 you intend to sit tomorrow. We'll see tomorrow.

5 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] No. For the moment, Friday is

6 sure that we want to sit from 9.00 to 2.00. Can we have the response from

7 you tomorrow?

8 THE REGISTRAR: [Interpretation] Yes. You will have the reply

9 tomorrow, Mr. President.

10 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Very well. Thank you very

11 much. We will do our best to make progress with this case. That is

12 always our concern, as you know. So we will meet again tomorrow at 9.30.

13 If we come to the conclusion that it is realistic to complete the direct

14 by Friday, then we can envisage the possibility of working a little longer

15 in the afternoon. If not, we will stick to our regular hours. Until

16 tomorrow.

17 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 2.37 p.m.

18 to be reconvened on Thursday, the 29th day of

19 June, 2000, at 9.30 a.m.

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