Tribunal Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

Page 14324

1 Friday, 24 August 2007

2 [Open session]

3 [The accused entered court]

4 --- Upon commencing at 2.15 p.m.

5 [The witness entered court]

6 WITNESS: ANDREJA MILOSAVLJEVIC [Resumed]

7 [Witness answered through interpreter]

8 JUDGE BONOMY: Good afternoon, Mr. Milosavljevic.

9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Good afternoon.

10 JUDGE BONOMY: The cross-examination by Mr. Hannis will now

11 continue. Please bear in mind that the solemn declaration to speak the

12 truth which you gave at the beginning of your evidence continues to apply

13 to that evidence today.

14 Mr. Hannis.

15 MR. HANNIS: Thank you, Your Honour.

16 Cross-examination by Mr. Hannis: [Continued]

17 Q. Good afternoon, Mr. Milosavljevic.

18 A. Good afternoon.

19 Q. I want to go back to one thing I spoke about with you yesterday

20 just to complete the matter, and the first time this came up was when

21 Mr. Fila was asking you about the delivery of humanitarian aid in Kosovo

22 and whether or not there had been any discrimination in its distribution,

23 and you told us that you didn't see any discrimination. And this was at

24 page 14281, line 1. The very next question he asked you was: "Were you a

25 member of the SPS?" And your answer was: "No, I was not a member of any

Page 14325

1 party."

2 Do you recall that?

3 A. Yes, I do. And I wasn't, not when I was appointed to the cabinet

4 of Serbia. I said yesterday that I had been a member of the League of

5 Communists until 1989 when I was expelled after what happened at the

6 eighth session. As for your question, whether I was a member of any party

7 afterwards, I did say that I joined the Yugoslav Left and I was a member

8 of that party.

9 Q. That's what I wanted to clarify. I did ask you about that, and

10 you told me that you were not a member of any party when you were chosen

11 to become a government minister, and I understand that you became a

12 minister on the 21st of March, 1994. Is that right?

13 A. That's right. I became a minister after the national assembly

14 election on the 21st of March, and as I said, I remained in that position

15 until 1998, but at that point in time I was not a member of any party. I

16 was elected as a non-party candidate.

17 Q. Okay. And you told us that you didn't become a member of the

18 Yugoslav Left until 1995 after you had already become a minister; correct?

19 A. Correct.

20 Q. If you were not a member of JUL before you became a minister were

21 you -- were you an affiliate or some kind of candidate on a JUL ticket?

22 A. No, not at the time. I was a candidate for the Yugoslav

23 Associated Left. The, I think, 1993 election there was a mixed bag, that

24 group of intellectuals and professors. We were on their list but we

25 didn't do anything. We didn't get past the election threshold and we

Page 14326

1 didn't make it into the national assembly, but that wasn't the JUL.

2 Q. Was that the predecessor for the JUL?

3 A. No. It was called the Yugoslav Associated Left. It wasn't a

4 party. If you really want to know, there were people involved who later

5 became members of the JUL, but there were many people involved in that

6 group who never became members of the JUL.

7 Q. Okay. Let me show you Exhibit P2910, and I have a hard copy for

8 the witness, Your Honour. If the usher could help me.

9 Mr. Milosavljevic I'm going to show you a document this is from

10 the Official Gazette of Serbia for I think it's the 8th of December, 1993.

11 Do you see that date highlighted at the top of the page? I've

12 highlighted it in pink on your copy.

13 A. Yes.

14 Q. And if you would go to the second page in your document. In

15 e-court it is page 34.

16 MR. HANNIS: I only have the original, Your Honour. I don't have

17 an English translation, but just a couple things I'll have the witness

18 read for us and I think that will suffice.

19 Q. On that next page, sir, at the bottom left, item number 2114.

20 I've highlighted the title. Could you -- could you go back to the second

21 page and read what I've highlighted on that second page? Not the one you

22 have in front of you right now, sir. Yes. Not that. Can you go back one

23 page for me, please. Yes. And that highlighted portion, item number

24 2114. Could you read the title of that for us, please.

25 A. "Decision to appoint a collective electoral list for the

Page 14327

1 appointment of national delegates to the national assembly of the Republic

2 of Serbia and the electoral unit 8 Smederevo list Socialist Party of

3 Serbia list headed by Slobodan Milosevic. Is that sufficient for your

4 purposes, sir?

5 Q. Yes. And then if you can go to the next page and this is page 35

6 in e-court on the bottom right item number 9 I've highlighted. Could you

7 read those two highlighted sections for us, sir?

8 A. "Number 9, the associated left (League of Communists movement for

9 Yugoslavia. Association of Serbia's Workers, Yugoslavia's national

10 fronts, the youth league movement for Yugoslavia list, headed by Professor

11 Mira Markovic." There follows a list of candidates. The first candidate

12 is Dragan Kostic; followed by doctor of medicine Prvoslav Markovic;

13 followed by Andreja Milosavljevic, a lawyer; a factory manager and so on

14 and so forth. Am I supposed to go on reading those names out for you?

15 Q. That's fine you can stop there thank you. So is your testimony

16 you were not a member any party at this time?

17 A. Absolutely. I wasn't a member of any party. This is an

18 association, as you see, and it combines all sorts of things, the League

19 of Communists, the Movement for Yugoslavia, Serbia's Workers Association,

20 the National Front, the Youth Association, and the Movement for

21 Yugoslavia. So this is a broad front so to speak containing candidates

22 from all sorts of different bodies and groups. Our intention being to

23 make it into parliament as a parliamentary group such as the Associated

24 Left. That was the intention behind this grouping. There are many

25 persons here on this list who were not members of any party at the time.

Page 14328

1 Q. Okay. And this -- this group was headed by Mira Markovic;

2 correct?

3 A. No. At the time I was in contact with the president of the

4 Movement for Yugoslavia. As for Mira Markovic, I only attended a single

5 rally in a village somewhere. Three days before the election I myself

6 came forward. It wasn't Mira Markovic who did. I think it was the

7 president of the Movement for Yugoslavia, a professor whose name I can't

8 remember right now. Another person who spoke at that rally on behalf of

9 the Workers Party. Again I can't remember the name. Another person on

10 behalf of the Workers Association. I was a non-party candidate and my

11 task at this final pre-election meeting was to speak about agriculture and

12 what developments we envisaged for agriculture as well as the objectives

13 that we would be advocating once we became members of the National

14 Assembly. Professor Mira Markovic was not present at this gathering. And

15 the same goes for other gatherings. This was our pre-electoral complain

16 and most frequently I've --

17 Q. You've answered the question. The document itself though says

18 that she heads the list; correct? Isn't that what that document says?

19 A. Yes. That's what the document says. However, we acted based on

20 agreements that we had.

21 Q. Let me move on to something else then. Yesterday you were talking

22 about the -- your task when you were appointed to coordinate the state

23 organs in Kosovo, and you mentioned that one of the things you did, this

24 is at page 14259, you said:

25 "I was especially tasked with establishing the reasons for the

Page 14329

1 setting up of municipal councils in the municipalities where elections had

2 not been held or had been held but were irregular, and then the government

3 of the Republic of Serbia established municipal councils whose task was to

4 replace the work of the Municipal Assembly and its Executive Committee."

5 Why was it necessary to replace municipal assemblies and Executive

6 Committees by these other bodies called municipal councils?

7 A. It's true that I spoke about this. I do have to express one

8 reservation. I didn't say municipal wards, I said municipal councils, but

9 that is essentially the same. There was a legal basis for setting up

10 these municipal councils. This was the law on territorial organisation of

11 the Republic of Serbia and the law on self-government, Article 45 and

12 Article 64(A) of this law specifically, and I can't quote these texts from

13 the Official Gazette just off the bat, but the regulations are there,

14 envisage that in such municipalities where no elections can be held which

15 means the voters don't participate cannot continue to function in the

16 absence of proper organs.

17 They don't have a Municipal Assembly which was the supreme body of

18 government within any municipality and they don't have executive boards as

19 the supreme bodies of the executive in any municipality. There were

20 the -- eight such municipalities, as I said, and the government of the

21 Republic of Serbia, based on their legal powers, passed appropriate

22 decisions to establish municipal councils for those municipalities. Those

23 decisions stated, in clear and precise terms, that the municipal councils

24 were now there to stand in for the municipal assembly and for the

25 executive, a board of the municipal assembly as its executive body. At

Page 14330

1 the same time, the government made proposals for individual appointments

2 to these municipal councils. These normally numbered between 7 and 13

3 members. Also --

4 Q. I'm sorry --

5 JUDGE BONOMY: Have we not got the answer a little while ago,

6 Mr. Hannis.

7 MR. HANNIS: Well, we had -- we also got an answer to the next two

8 questions I was going to ask so I just let him go on a bit.

9 Q. So one of the differences between municipal assemblies and these

10 municipal councils is that municipal assemblies members were elected by

11 the citizens in the municipality; correct? And the Municipal Council

12 members were appointed from outside by the government; correct?

13 A. That's correct. However, I must say this by way of clarification.

14 There were municipal councils that were introduced in other parts of

15 Serbia in a total of 11 other municipalities. But there is a difference,

16 the Municipal Council is elected by secret vote by all the citizens of a

17 certain municipality whereas the councils are appointed by the government.

18 It is envisaged that these municipal councils would be re-elected after,

19 for example, a year if a new election is scheduled. Or if no election is

20 held, the same measures continue to apply by appointing municipal councils

21 and their individual members.

22 MR. HANNIS: I think you said -- I see Mr. Zecevic on his feet.

23 MR. ZECEVIC: I'm sorry, Your Honours, I believe the witness said

24 11 municipalities in other parts of Serbia.

25 MR. HANNIS: I thought that's what I heard too.

Page 14331

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

2 MR. HANNIS:

3 Q. In your earlier answer, sir, I think you said there were -- there

4 were eight municipalities where this happened. You mean eight

5 municipalities in Kosovo where municipal councils were set up?

6 A. Yes.

7 Q. Do you recall which eight municipalities by name?

8 A. I'll do my best. Stimlje, Decani, Djakovica, I will remember

9 eventually, it's just that it's too many things at once. Glogovac,

10 Kacanik, Orahovac, elections were held there at a later stage, and regular

11 bodies were set up as a result. At one point in time the situation

12 occurred in Srbica as well.

13 Q. That's -- that's pretty good. I -- I don't need you to carry on

14 unless you think of it later. And were these municipal councils all set

15 up during your time as coordinator or did they happen before you went down

16 there?

17 A. The municipal councils that I'm talking about were set up during

18 my time as a member of Serbia's cabinet. For your information, they were

19 around even before that time in some of the municipalities. As for

20 Kosovo, the situation was quite peculiar since in those municipalities the

21 elections had failed, with the exception of Djakovica municipality where

22 measures were applied, although the Socialist Party was in power at the

23 time. Because of the fact that it wasn't operational I went there, I took

24 in the situation and I proposed that special measures be taken although

25 there were members of the Socialist Party in power. President of the

Page 14332

1 municipality, a young man, was a socialist himself and most of the local

2 set-up were socialists. They just didn't do their job well. There were a

3 number other problems occurring so this was all under Article 45, the law

4 on territorial organisation of the Republic of Serbia and self-government.

5 Q. Thank you. Moving to another topic. You told us that in March of

6 1998 you were chosen to be part of the -- the government delegation that

7 was tasked with trying to conduct negotiations with the Albanian leaders

8 and you referred to, I think, Exhibit 1D78, which was a document saying

9 that this had taken place on the 10th of March, 1998. This was a

10 delegation headed by Professor Markovic.

11 Who -- who picked you to be part of that delegation?

12 A. I was picked by the government of Serbia. If you look at the

13 statement you will see that. I'm talking about the exhibit that you just

14 mentioned. The delegation was headed by Professor Ratko Markovic and it

15 also comprise the two other ministers in addition to myself.

16 Q. When you say the government though, was there a particular

17 individual who picked you? Who told you you were going to be on that

18 delegation or were you asked ahead of time if you were willing to serve?

19 How did that happen?

20 A. It happened I had been consulted by the prime minister in a way,

21 and then he made a proposal to the cabinet. It was said that I should be

22 a member of that delegation because I had been in charge of the matters to

23 do with self-government over there and I was quite privy to what was going

24 on in Kosovo and Metohija.

25 Q. Did the prime minister give you any briefing about what you and

Page 14333

1 this group were supposed to do as far as your specific task?

2 A. We certainly knew ourselves that this was about organising

3 dialogue and about looking for a solution for Kosovo and Metohija to get

4 on as usual, but we didn't have a chance to prepare for long. I just went

5 through some documents myself to freshen up a little. I read the UN

6 charter. I read the Paris charter of the OSCE framework convention on

7 dealing with general issues by the Council of Europe, all the

8 international and world standards that applied and were well-known. I

9 read the government programme and the constitution of the Republic of

10 Serbia. I just tried to bear all of this in mind, and then one afternoon

11 and I had been given only a very brief time to prepare, I met with

12 Professor Ratko Markovic. A plan was drawn up for him to be in charge. I

13 can say that what I was doing down there was within the usual set-up that

14 prevailed. I spoke about local self-government, how it worked, and then

15 of course people raised issues because you see, it is the majority that

16 decides over there and since in most of the municipalities --

17 Q. You've gone beyond my question. My next question has to do with

18 the timing of the setting up of this delegation. The 10th of March was, I

19 think, just about five days after a MUP operation in the Decani area that

20 led to the death of Adem Jashari and several members of his family and

21 relatives, including women and children. Were you -- were you aware of

22 that incident? There was a lot of publicity about that in the area, I

23 understand.

24 A. Of course I read about this in the press. There was a lot written

25 about this. It was published on TV. Therefore, it wasn't something that

Page 14334

1 went unnoticed.

2 Q. Okay. And in answer to Mr. Fila's question yesterday, you said

3 the reason for the cabinet deciding to send your group there was because

4 "we wanted to have a dialogue. And the cabinet was in favour of that."

5 And I suggest to you the reason that you wanted to have a dialogue at that

6 time was because the Jashari incident had generated a lot of international

7 attention from the media and the diplomatic corps, and that was why this

8 body was created at that time. Would you agree with me?

9 A. No, I wouldn't. We had been persistently trying to get in touch

10 with the leaders of the Albanian parties. However, it just wouldn't

11 happen. But that was not the reason for this negotiating team to be

12 established, and it certainly wasn't the only reason. The chief reason

13 was our good intentions to hold talks in a bid to find solutions for the

14 problems that were there.

15 Q. You said it certainly wasn't the only reason. Are you allowing

16 for the possibility that it was one of the reasons?

17 A. I know that even earlier on we tried to deal with this in that

18 way. I can say that efforts were made to achieve just that. When I was

19 in the area, I toured the municipalities in a bid to come to grips with

20 this problem. I tried to establish some form of contact. I tried to

21 organise talks. I tried to get everybody to talk their way to a solution

22 and to keep everything in keeping -- in line with the regulations that

23 prevailed at the time and that remain to prevail. It was a problem that

24 one had to deal with because the functioning of the local government

25 wasn't smooth. In those municipalities the Albanians simply refused to

Page 14335

1 take part in the elections and we could not hold elections without the

2 Albanians.

3 Q. Let me stop you there. You've answered my previous question. You

4 told us that you stopped being a member of this negotiating team when the

5 new cabinet was formed, and I think you told us that was late March 1998.

6 Is that correct?

7 A. Yes, that's correct. When the new cabinet was appointed I was no

8 longer a member of this delegation. This negotiating team was established

9 sometime just after this at the very outset. I can't be certain now. I

10 think I was there once or twice in April but this is of no consequence

11 since nothing was achieved. At least what we had expected was not

12 achieved.

13 Q. So if this group was formed on the 10th of March and you were off

14 by late March, you were really part of this group for three weeks or less?

15 A. I took part in the work of the team, and these were government

16 representatives. The negotiators could only be from the government of

17 Serbia. That is why I was relieved of this duty and not just I, but also

18 Ratomir Vico who also was not a minister later on. Professor Ratko

19 Markovic remained because he was deputy prime minister at the time of the

20 elections and when there were new elections he was elected again, and that

21 is why he remained a member of the team.

22 Q. During those three weeks that we -- that you were on the team, you

23 told us that you recall you tried to have meetings with the Albanians

24 about seven or eight times. Do you personally know whether or not notices

25 about those meetings were delivered and received by the Kosovo Albanians

Page 14336

1 you wanted to meet with? Do you have any personal knowledge of that?

2 A. I do. I do have personal knowledge, because the head of our

3 delegation, Mr. Ratko Markovic, checked this out. And I know on one

4 occasion, we were at a cabinet meeting, he telephoned the chief of the

5 Kosovo district and he asked whether the notice had been delivered, that

6 negotiations would be conducted on such-and-such a date. The answer was

7 yes. And on one occasion, when we were in Pristina, Professor Ratko

8 Markovic said again that this invitation was compulsory and that it had to

9 be handed to the leaders of the Albanian parties.

10 Q. Okay. But that again is -- is not your personal knowledge. This

11 is something that was told to you by somebody else; correct?

12 A. I think that I could not give better information except if I

13 personally had handed in the invitation. I heard him say to the head of

14 the Kosovo district that he should do this. I didn't check. I didn't get

15 a feedback whether the invitation was signed or not. That is a fact.

16 Q. You described your -- your job as being to coordinate the work of

17 all state organs, state bodies, and to work in line with the constitution

18 and all the positive laws and any decrees. Was -- did you have any

19 further job description than what I've just read out or was that basically

20 your job?

21 A. I think I need to clarify what my job was. I coordinated the work

22 of civilian bodies. I had no jurisdiction when it comes to the military

23 and the Ministry of the Interior. And of course the political

24 relationships that were in evidence over there, that didn't interest me.

25 I acted exclusively as a person responsible for the civilian sector, and I

Page 14337

1 tried yesterday to explain what I actually did over there, and that is

2 what I did right up until the moment when I left. Not of my own free well

3 but -- but, rather, because I fell ill, as you told you yesterday.

4 Q. Thank you. I understand that. And one of the -- one of the

5 things that's set forth in the decision appointing you to this position of

6 coordinator is that you were to be report directly to the prime minister

7 at least once a week, and I think you told us that you did do that. You

8 reported to him at least once a week; is that correct?

9 A. That's correct. At least once a week. I would go to see him to

10 brief him, and sometimes during the week we would have telephone contacts

11 and I would inform him of things that I considered to be important to

12 speed things up.

13 Q. In addition to the personal contacts and telephone calls did you

14 send him any written reports about your work?

15 A. On several occasions I did send written reports, but let me be

16 more specific. On three occasions. One was a lengthier one as far as

17 written reports are concerned. As for orally, we had these personal

18 contacts. I would go to Belgrade as a rule once a week. Now, whether it

19 was Saturday or Sunday or a Monday I can't remember now. I believe that

20 not to be very important. But I did inform him, that is quite true. And

21 it would usually be in the morning. I would take advantage of the

22 occasion to talk to certain ministers when I needed their assistance.

23 JUDGE BONOMY: I think we're off -- we're off the subject again

24 because what Mr. Hannis wants to know is about the written reports.

25 MR. HANNIS:

Page 14338

1 Q. And my next question is about that. Do you know where those

2 reports would be now, where they're archived, or do you have a copy of the

3 three reports you sent?

4 A. I assume that the written reports are in the government of the

5 Republic of Serbia. I did have my own copies, but when I came from

6 Kosovo, because I suddenly left Kosovo, my driver carried those reports to

7 the government of the Republic of Serbia where I had an office, but

8 because of the bombing a bomb fell there and destroyed not just those

9 reports but other documents that I had. One written report, if I need to

10 point this out as well, during the trial of Mr. Milosevic I handed to him.

11 Now, where that ended up I don't know.

12 Q. Do you know which one of your three reports you gave to

13 Mr. Milosevic? Was that the lengthy one you mentioned?

14 A. I think it was the first report.

15 Q. Is the first report the lengthy one?

16 A. The first report was on two typed pages listing exactly all the

17 activities I engaged in. I think it was at the end of July.

18 Q. Let me ask you about something else. In Exhibit 2D356 -- this was

19 a document from the Ministry of Finance, and you told us that this was a

20 document you received similar to ones you received from most of the

21 ministries advising you of who was going to be your contact person in

22 connection with your work. You say most of the ministries. Can you tell

23 us which other ministries besides finance that you got letters like this

24 from? Or if it's easier can you tell us which ministries you did not get

25 letters from, whichever list is shorter.

Page 14339

1 A. Reports of this kind, similar reports, I received from the

2 ministry of agriculture, the ministry of civil engineering, the ministry

3 for local self-government, the Ministry of Health, and a similar one from

4 the commodity reserves because supplies were needed from that source. So

5 I think those are all the ministries I received such reports from.

6 Q. You mentioned that in your work as the coordinator this meant

7 coordinating the work of the ministries of the Republic of Serbia. The

8 presidents of the municipalities and also it goes without saying you

9 worked with the special organs such as the cadaster office and revenue

10 office. What's the cadaster office? Can you explain briefly what that is

11 and what it does?

12 A. The cadaster service is a service which keeps a register of the

13 entire property in a particular area within the framework of its rights

14 and duties. I believe in Kosovo all the municipalities had such a

15 cadaster service. These are measurements of property. Ownership is

16 registered. What property is socially owned, what is state owned, what is

17 privately owned, what is cooperative property. So that is the service

18 that was established virtually in all the municipalities. I would even go

19 so far as to say that all the municipalities had to. I didn't check each

20 and every one, but I do know that all the municipalities were obliged by

21 the law, even the smallest once, to have such a cadaster service which

22 functioned very well. The employees of that service were surveyors,

23 engineers, maybe technicians who were trained in the field, in that area.

24 All the property, land, buildings, factories, water supply systems,

25 electricity piles, and everything else that existed in Kosovo was

Page 14340

1 registered in that service.

2 Q. That ownership information contained in the cadaster records, does

3 it also indicate the ethnicity of the owners or is that something that

4 would only be inferred from the name?

5 A. It was specifically indicated Janko Jankovic, owner of land plot

6 such-and-such. Salih Berisha, owner of a house, land plot such-and-such.

7 In those records, cadaster records, because I had to go and take a copy

8 for myself. I never saw that it said what my ethnicity was. Janko

9 Jankovic, a Montenegrin -- I don't know what. But for your information

10 let me also add that the cadaster service was under the supervision of the

11 republic. Sometimes it was attached to districts. This varied in the

12 course of history.

13 Q. Well, the reason I ask is after special measures were imposed in

14 Kosovo after 1989, weren't there some laws passed at certain restrictions

15 on -- on the sale of property within Kosovo in terms about whether a Serb

16 could sell property or to whom they could sell their property? Were you

17 aware of any such prohibitions or limitations on the conveyance of private

18 property?

19 A. Such a legal provision or any decree to that effect did not exist

20 with regard to Kosovo and Metohija. There was a decree at the level of

21 the Republic of Serbia as a whole. I think it was a decree. I'm not

22 quite sure. I think it was not a law, which simply required that records

23 be kept at the level of the of Finance Ministry in Serbia, in the

24 government, in the ministry of finance.

25 Q. Now, you mentioned in page 14270 some of the ministers and deputy

Page 14341

1 ministers who -- who came to Kosovo during your time as coordinator, and

2 you mentioned those who were permanently stationed and were in my

3 headquarters or, rather, in my team." You referred to three men who had

4 been assigned to you. I just want to be sure these are the same three

5 persons. You mentioned the Assistant Minister for Labour and Social

6 Matters, Mr. Kujundzic; the Assistant Minister for Agriculture, Slobodan

7 Ilic; and someone from health. Were those the three persons that were

8 assigned permanently to you in your job as coordinator? Or were you

9 talking about someone else?

10 A. No. These three persons were directly under my control and they

11 helped me in the technical respect and every other. Only with respect to

12 the health ministry they changed. It wasn't always the same person, but

13 Kujundzic and Ilic were always with me. Maybe on a day they may go to

14 Belgrade. Kujundzic was permanently there but Slobodan Ilic left on and

15 off, but there was a lot of livestock in Kosovo that needed to be taken

16 care of then the danger existed of various infectious disease carried by

17 livestock and so on. I don't want to waste more of your time.

18 Q. Thank you. Mr. Fila asked you about the kinds of problems you

19 were dealing with. You mentioned that they were different and varied from

20 municipality to municipality. You mentioned that sometimes it was health

21 services and then you said there were problems in education. The problem

22 with education was Kosovo-wide, wasn't it? Not just one municipality but

23 that was a problem throughout the province of Kosovo; correct?

24 A. That is partly true. Education was functioning, but it wasn't

25 regulated in the best possible way because Albanians did not attend the

Page 14342

1 schools that the state had normally through its regulations established

2 there, but instead they had a parallel educational system with their own

3 curricula and that was the problem. And when speaking yesterday, I had in

4 mind rather the preparations for the month of September, that is the new

5 academic year, when after the talks of 3 plus 3 it was agreed that

6 elementary and secondary schools should start work on the 1st of

7 September, whereas the university should gradually start working in view

8 of the repairs that had to be carried out with resources from the

9 international community, but all this was agreed. And I can tell you that

10 on the 1st of September in more than 90 per cent of the schools and

11 kindergartens tuition started on the 1st of September.

12 Q. Throughout Kosovo, the entire province?

13 A. You mean that schools were working throughout Kosovo. Yes, yes.

14 The necessary conditions were ensured because until then secondary school

15 pupils in certain municipalities went to separate premises. They wouldn't

16 go to the schools that were in existence there.

17 Q. Well, I'm a little confused because yesterday you were telling us

18 about some of the problems in Kosovo when you went there in the summer of

19 1998, and one of the problems you talked about was several of the main

20 roads that were -- were blocked and controlled by the KLA. If that's the

21 case, how -- how were you able to open 90 per cent of the of schools in

22 September?

23 A. In the general view the situation in September was calming down,

24 and it appeared that the problems would be settled in a satisfactory

25 manner. It is normal that intensified efforts were made in that direction

Page 14343

1 in the hope that things would move in a positive direction, and they did

2 in many municipalities. I didn't do just this. Electricity did not exist

3 in certain villages and municipalities. We regulated that. Telephone

4 lines were also down in many municipalities. Then bus transport, et

5 cetera, et cetera. So these vital daily problems were addressed, and

6 during the summer after I left in July the schools were about to go on

7 summer holiday and measures were taken for them to start working with the

8 beginning of the academic year. There are documents to corroborate this

9 and other sources. There was not my special area of responsibility. It

10 was when problems arose in that area that I had some insight there. On

11 behalf of the Ministry of Education, as a member of the negotiating team

12 was the deputy or assistant minister, Mr. Milivoje.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: Are we talking here about schools mainly for

14 Albanian children or are we talking about something else?

15 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] We are talking about all the

16 schools, both for Albanian children and for Serb and other ethnic groups.

17 JUDGE BONOMY: Before July were Serb children and those from other

18 non-Albanian ethnic groups attending school regularly?

19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. Until the end of the school

20 year and the preparations for the next year. It is possible that in view

21 of terrorist actions which started at the end of March, it is possible

22 that in some environments there was a risk, but mostly in all the other

23 places the school year was completed normally.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Hannis.

25 MR. HANNIS:

Page 14344

1 Q. Well, sir, we've heard a lot of evidence in this case about the

2 so-called education agreement which I think was signed in September 1996,

3 but do you have any knowledge about whether that was ever implemented? I

4 was of the understanding that that actually never got implemented. That's

5 correct, isn't it?

6 A. I am not familiar with that agreement. I'm familiar with the

7 agreement 3 plus 3, which with the involvement of the international

8 community and work on it was throughout the summer and which was supposed

9 to come into force in September, I'm not familiar with the details, but it

10 envisaged the repairs of certain buildings in Pristina to accommodate

11 student of both ethnicities and a process was initiated then which was

12 about to be implemented. After I left as the university starts working in

13 October, I'm not familiar as to what happened with the implementation of

14 that agreement later.

15 Q. Your answer was translated as certain buildings in Pristina to

16 accommodate students of both ethnicities. By both ethnicities did you

17 just mean Serbs and Albanians?

18 A. No, no. I meant the languages in which the universities were

19 operating, but in practical terms that is what it was. But I think one

20 needs a look at the agreement. It was signed. There was Balja [phoen]

21 and some other people. Ratomir Vico, I remember. Percevic, Andjelkovic,

22 et cetera.

23 Q. You've answered my question?

24 JUDGE BONOMY: This is a different agreement from the 1996 one I

25 take it Mr. Hannis.

Page 14345

1 MR. HANNIS: It is, Your Honour.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Right. The -- well, the witness doesn't

3 presumably know the relationship. Thank you.

4 MR. HANNIS:

5 Q. You talked also about problems in the work of the courts and you

6 agreed with Mr. Fila that there were many unresolved cases and you talked

7 about priorities to be given cases. Which cases were given priority, if

8 you know?

9 A. Personal and property cases.

10 Q. And do you know who decided what -- or which cases would be given

11 priority? Whose job was that?

12 A. The Judges and the courts and the presiding judges. And there

13 were reinforcements from Serbia with judges because there was a shortage

14 of judges in the territory of Kosovo and Metohija so from other district

15 courts from the rest of Serbia, let me put it to you that way, judges were

16 delegated to go there for a period of several months and they worked there

17 in Kosovo and Metohija. This is common knowledge.

18 Q. Where was your office when you were working as the coordinator?

19 Was it in Pristina?

20 A. My office when I was working as a coordinator was in Pristina, in

21 the provisional administrative building. I think my office previously had

22 been occupied by the president of the Executive Council of Kosovo and

23 Metohija.

24 Q. I understand from your testimony or I gather from your testimony

25 that you also went out in the field and visited several of the

Page 14346

1 municipalities; correct?

2 A. That's correct. Not several, most municipalities in Kosovo and

3 Metohija. I visited Kosovska Kamenica, Novo Brdo, Gracanik, Lipjan,

4 Pristina, Vucitrn, Kosovska Mitrovica, Srbica, Pec, Decani, Dzakovica,

5 Glogovac many times, Stimlje, Orahovac, Suha Reka, and so on and so forth.

6 A total of 29.

7 Q. I know there are 29, but you didn't visit all 29, did you? You

8 said you visited several?

9 A. No, I visited the ones that I mentioned and I'm certain of that.

10 I can specify the ones that I didn't visit, that I possibly didn't visit.

11 Q. No, that's okay. But from your answer I take it then that not all

12 of main roads were closed all of the time because you were able to visit

13 most municipalities that you mentioned.

14 A. From time to time the roads were blocked in one direction, for

15 example, and then I couldn't travel. However, as soon as the roads were

16 cleared I would go immediately to check what the situation was. This is

17 the case of Decani, of Djakovica, of Orahovac, and so on and so forth.

18 Srbica, for example.

19 Q. Okay. Now, Mr. Fila asked you about if you were aware of some of

20 the activities of the KLA and the -- during the time period that you were

21 there in 1998, and your answer at page 14273 was:

22 "I did not deal with that particular subject, but since I was

23 there I have eyes and ears so I heard things and I even saw things. They,

24 the KLA, carried out attacks here and there in different places. They

25 kidnapped and even killed people."

Page 14347

1 So you told us that wasn't your job. Did you have any regular

2 contacts or briefings from the Ministry of Interior or the VJ about KLA

3 activities? Just yes or no.

4 A. No.

5 Q. You mentioned that you had received a letter, and this Exhibit

6 2D372, which is a letter from Mr. Andjelko Kolasinac, Kolasinac, in

7 Orahovac describing the situation there and asking for help from the

8 security forces. You told us that you informed the prime minister about

9 that letter, and he told you that he'd received the letter and that all

10 measures would be taken. Do you recall that?

11 A. I do. Of course I do. I recall other things too that happened

12 after that letter. I remember everything and everything that

13 Mr. Kolasinac said eventually came true.

14 Q. Well, let me ask you some questions about that. After the prime

15 minister told you this were you aware that the -- that the MUP and the VJ

16 took certain actions and carried out operations in the area of Orahovac

17 later that month of July 1998?

18 A. At the time nobody informed me about what would be done and what

19 steps would be taken. Mr. Kolasinac alone informed me on the 17th or

20 possibly the 18th of July that there had been an incursion by the

21 terrorists, the Kosovo Liberation Army, that they made their way into

22 Orahovac and took the health station there. Of course we all know what

23 happened. There was a severe crisis. Those forces captured a hundred

24 citizens. 61 of those, mostly elderly people and children, were released,

25 but 39 of those were taken away and never returned. As far as I know,

Page 14348

1 afterwards when I read reports and when I spoke to the parents of those

2 kidnapped or abducted, those persons were never returned. I later read in

3 the press that those persons were never sent back. And this was the

4 subject of my conversations with foreign diplomats and humanitarian

5 organisations such as International Red Cross, UNHCR, various committees

6 for human rights and so on and so forth. I was informed by him, but other

7 municipality presidents would also tell me things like these despite the

8 fact that we would normally meet for other matters. I didn't really have

9 time to go into these things, to delve deeper into these things but it

10 really wasn't my job, nor was I authorised to deal with these matters. I

11 do know a little more about Orahovac and I know that soon after we sent

12 out an appeal the municipality itself sent out an appeal, Mr. Kolasinac,

13 for the displaced persons following the operation that was carried out by

14 the security forces to be sent back to Orahovac and the other four

15 villages populated by Serbs and indeed this soon materialised.

16 We took measures for Orahovac municipalities specifically the town

17 of Orahovac and the surrounding villages to function properly and indeed

18 this was the case. We made sure they had sufficient supplies, all those

19 who were returning and all those who were at risk. I know that the supply

20 centre in Orahovac functioned properly. Even Albanians got their supplies

21 there. There was an Albanian person who was a part of the team actually

22 distributing aid.

23 Q. Were you aware of the operations carried out by the MUP and the VJ

24 in late July in Orahovac area? Yes or no?

25 A. I know about the MUP. I was informed a day or two later but I

Page 14349

1 don't know about the VJ. No one ever told me.

2 Q. Who told you about the MUP?

3 A. Kolasinac, the security forces in line with their rules of

4 service. It was just Kolasinac. Orahovac is not really that far from

5 Pristina, about 56 kilometres, not even that much.

6 Q. I'd like to show you now a document that's Exhibit P1468 in

7 evidence. And if we can look at page 1 first. This is a lengthy

8 document, sir, and I don't have a hard copy for you. Well, actually I can

9 -- I do have a hard copy I can give you.

10 A. It would be helpful.

11 Q. You see the cover page is titled "Meetings of the Joint Command

12 for Kosovo and Metohija." If you would go to the second page, and I think

13 you've got two-sided copies there. Yeah. If you could look at that page.

14 There the first page is a meeting of the Joint Command for Kosovo and

15 Metohija, 22nd July 1998. And further down can you see the list of those

16 attending? Mr. Minic, Mr. Sainovic, Mr. Andjelkovic, General Pavkovic,

17 Mr. Djordjevic from the MUP, General Lukic, David Gajic, and a Milan

18 Djakobic [phoen]. Now, I know you know Mr. Minic, Mr. Sainovic, General

19 Pavkovic. Did you know General Lukic?

20 A. Yes, you mean Sreten Lukic?

21 Q. Yes.

22 A. Number 6, yes.

23 Q. Did you know the other 3, number 5, 7 and 8 on that list?

24 A. Djakovic I think he was a colonel. I'd see him every once in a

25 while, but not that often. As for Gajic, assistant chief for state

Page 14350

1 security, I did see him once or twice or two or three times. As for

2 Djordjevic, number 6, Djordjevic I don't believe I know that person, but I

3 know all of these other persons on the list.

4 Q. Okay. And regarding actions taken in Orahovac, you'll see under

5 Mr. Gajic on that page a second item. It mentions measures are taken in

6 Prizren against eight persons from the territory of the villages Ratkovac,

7 Orahovac, and Krusa for participation in terrorist actions. Is that what

8 it says? It's the second bullet point under his name.

9 A. I don't know about that.

10 Q. You can't see it or you can't read it?

11 A. No, no. That's not what I'm saying. I see it. It says in

12 Prizren also measures are being taken against eight persons from Ratkovac

13 village, et cetera.

14 Q. Okay.

15 A. Because of -- I don't know. I've never seen this before. I'm not

16 familiar with this. I said yesterday --

17 Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

18 A. -- That I wasn't familiar with this topic of Joint Command except

19 for at a later stage when the Milosevic trial first began I did hear of

20 it, yes.

21 Q. I understand that I'm just trying now to point to you references

22 in these minutes regarding actions taken in Orahovac in late July. If you

23 could go down after the one you just looked at go down one, two, three,

24 four more and in English it's translated as after the blockade was lifted

25 of the village of Orahovac the propaganda activities of Siptars is

Page 14351

1 intensifying. Do you recall that around the 22nd of July the blockade of

2 Orahovac had been lifted?

3 A. According to Mr. Kolasinac's report I'm not sure about the exact

4 date, but the gist was the security forces succeeded in driving the KLA

5 forces back from Orahovac. So certainly the siege was lifted and Orahovac

6 was now back in the hands of the regular forces, in the hands of the

7 state, if you like.

8 Q. Okay. And if you could go on down to Mr. Minic. I think he's the

9 third name after that entry you just read, and he has a comment about

10 Orahovac. I think it's near the --

11 A. That's on the next page; right?

12 Q. Yes. And it's the second item under his name he says in Orahovac

13 we need to resolve the issue of water and electricity and revive the civil

14 life. Aid from prison will be on the way tomorrow. That sounds like the

15 kind of work you were doing. Did Mr. Minic or any of these gentlemen

16 attending this Joint Command meeting talk to you about the issue of water

17 and electricity for Orahovac?

18 A. As for the issue of water and electricity and other supplies in

19 Orahovac I was addressed by the local authorities. I did everything I

20 could within my jurisdiction. They did have a electricity problem and a

21 water problem as well as other things there was a problem with their

22 health unit too. Everything had been pulled apart. But it soon went back

23 to normal. Mr. Minic didn't speak to me about this problem at all on the

24 occasion that you mentioned.

25 Q. Nor -- nor anybody else attending this meeting correct? None of

Page 14352

1 these guys told you about it?

2 A. No, none of them. I had my own channels, channels through which I

3 operated. Municipality presidents and other municipality bodies. I did

4 speak to Krsta about those early activities.

5 Q. Okay.

6 A. Those early measures that were taken.

7 Q. Let me ask you, can you read the next entry under Mr. Minic's

8 name? I want to be sure this translation is correct. It doesn't read

9 well in English.

10 A. We shall deal with the electricity and water problem in Orahovac

11 and bring the village back to life. Probably they're seeking assistance

12 from Prizren.

13 Q. I'm sorry. It's the next entry after that. One the last one

14 under Mr. Minic's name. Yes, that one.

15 A. "The military factor --" I can't read the last word. "The

16 military factor is --" I can't know for sure. I don't know if this is an

17 official document. It's difficult to read. I'm having difficulty finding

18 my way around this document, and I don't quite understand. I'm not

19 familiar with this. I'm not sure why you expect me to comment on it.

20 Q. I'm just seeking your help in --

21 A. I don't as a matter of principle oppose an attempt to go through

22 this, but it's difficult. I'd love to help, but apparently I'm unable to

23 simply because I'm not familiar with it.

24 Q. Well, I --

25 A. This Joint Command, as far as I know, this is not really a legal

Page 14353

1 term, is it.

2 Q. That's something that the Judges will be considering later on, but

3 the copy you have in front of you is a typewritten copy, I believe; is

4 that correct? It's handwritten. Is that handwritten?

5 A. This? Handwritten as far as I can tell.

6 Q. I'm looking -- I'm looking at my handwritten copy and can you --

7 can you read the last word? Can you spell it out? On the copy I have it

8 appears to be o-s-v-e, and I don't know if the next letter is a t or a j,

9 and then a u. Osveju or osvetu. Isn't that what it is? And in e-court

10 this is page 3. I don't know if we can put it on e-court and perhaps the

11 interpreters can perhaps have a look. And it's near the --

12 A. It doesn't strike me as very logical. "The military factor is

13 approaching revenge," or something like that, but it doesn't make sense in

14 terms language.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: Wait until the translation is finished. Thank you.

16 Now, Mr. Fila. Yes?

17 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Your Honour, what is this witness

18 supposed to be doing? Is he supposed to now read something that he's

19 never seen before? I don't see the purpose of this exercise. First he's

20 being made to read something and then he says he can't and then again he's

21 being forced to read it.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila, Mr. Hannis made it clear that he was

23 anxious to ensure that this had been properly translated, and he was

24 asking him to read the Serbian so that the interpreter would translate it

25 because it doesn't make sense as translated in the document before us.

Page 14354

1 Now, there's nothing wrong with that in the context of our work,

2 which raises this type of problem from time to time. So he's asking us to

3 read the Serb and then let's hear what the English translation is. So we

4 will allow him to do that.

5 MR. HANNIS: Well, and I --

6 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] So what, the interpreters cannot read

7 the Serbian. Is he supposed to read it back for them? That's one thing I

8 can't understand and one thing I try to point out.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila, this is often how to deal with this sort

10 of problem to get someone to read the document from the Serbian so that we

11 can hear exactly what these -- how these words are translated in case

12 there's been a mistake made at another stage. So please continue,

13 Mr. Hannis.

14 MR. HANNIS: Thank you, Your Honour.

15 Q. Before the break I have just a couple of more of these that I want

16 to ask you about, sir, and the next one is on, I think, page 8 -- or the

17 eighth page of that document for you. And if you can see the printed

18 numbers at the top of the pages it's a page number K0228419. They're in

19 sequence, and if that helps you find it. Yeah, I think -- I think you

20 have it now.

21 A. Yes, yes, I've got it.

22 Q. Okay this is page 8 of the B/C/S in e-court and page 9 of the

23 English and I want to direct you to -- first of all this is a meeting

24 apparently from the 24th of July and the first person speaking is listed

25 as Mr. Gajo, who from other evidence I would suggest to you is probably

Page 14355

1 Mr. Gajic. And the next to the last item under his name says: "After

2 Orahovac uncontrollable robbing of Albanian houses started."

3 Were you aware of that? Was that reported to you by the

4 municipality president?

5 A. Municipality president informed me that cases of looting had

6 occurred and misappropriation of property, but he didn't specify who this

7 had been done by. He said these were village gangs trying to grab hold of

8 some goods, some property. It wasn't on a massive scale because the

9 authorities tried to deal with it to reduce it to as little as possible.

10 He did say that these things were occurring, but that's all he said. And

11 he said that people were taking advantage of this kind of situation to do

12 that sort of thing, but he also said that measures were being taken to put

13 a stop to this. He also said quite naturally that they would press

14 charges against certain persons through appropriate bodies, and as far as

15 I know at a later stage this was eventually done. Sometimes a

16 misdemeanour judge could be called upon to prosecute these people or

17 perhaps other bodies.

18 Q. Let me ask you then to go to General Lukic which is just right

19 below that and the second entry under his name --

20 JUDGE BONOMY: Just before you do.

21 MR. HANNIS: I see Mr. Zecevic.

22 MR. ZECEVIC: I'm sorry, Your Honours, 32, 13, I believe the

23 witness says the misdemeanour court can act promptly.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: That makes sense. Thank you, Mr. Hannis.

25 MR. HANNIS: Thank you.

Page 14356

1 Q. And under General Lukic's name, this is page 9 of the English and

2 page 8 of the B/C/S on e-court, the second item says: "25 members of MUP

3 were sent from Prizren to Orahovac to secure the peace and order." Did

4 the municipality president tell you about that?

5 A. No. We didn't discuss that sort of detail.

6 Q. And right below that it says: "15, 16 Siptar bodies were found

7 buried." Did he tell you about that?

8 A. He told me that there had been victims. My comment would be that

9 these reinforcements and reinforcements from the security forces were

10 quite a normal occurrence. It's not that he told me about this. What I'm

11 saying now is my own comment.

12 Q. Well, when you say he told you there had been victims, can you be

13 more specific? Victims of what? By whom, and any other details he told

14 you about victims? Not victims of the looting.

15 A. Victims of those clashes. He spoke about victims. I didn't dwell

16 on that. I know that people had been killed. Some persons had been

17 killed and had been buried. That's about that.

18 Q. Did you tell the prime minister about that?

19 A. Yes, yes. That goes without saying. Not in detail, in general

20 terms. I told him about the situation and about what had happened, to the

21 extent that I was aware. I always believed that there were appropriate

22 bodies doing their job, and this certainly wasn't my job.

23 Q. All right. You can set that document to one side. I'm finished

24 with that for now.

25 MR. HANNIS: Your Honours, I know I'm a minute early, but this

Page 14357

1 would be a good point it take a break for me.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Very well.

3 Mr. Milosavljevic, we have to have a break at this stage for 20

4 minutes. Could you please leave the courtroom with the usher.

5 [The witness stands down]

6 JUDGE BONOMY: And we shall resume at five minutes past 4.00.

7 --- Recess taken at 3.44 p.m.

8 --- On resuming at 4.05 p.m.

9 [The witness takes the stand]

10 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Hannis.

11 MR. HANNIS: Thank you, Your Honour.

12 Q. Mr. Milosavljevic, you told us yesterday when Mr. Fila was asking

13 you about contacts with foreign diplomats and representatives of the NGOs,

14 et cetera, that the prime minister had instructed you to -- to talk to

15 them, and you started actually meeting with some of them as early as

16 mid-June of 1998. Can you tell us briefly what direction or what did the

17 prime minister tell you to do or to say when talking with those

18 individuals, the foreign diplomats and NGO representatives?

19 A. That is correct that the prime minister called me and told me to

20 see foreign diplomats, ambassadors, and representatives of

21 non-governmental and humanitarian organisations and to talk to them. He

22 also told me to pay attention to informing them about my own activities,

23 that is to focus on humanitarian aid, to secure conditions for the free

24 movement of humanitarian aid and diplomats, also the activities of the

25 government in taking adequate measures for the return of displaced persons

Page 14358

1 to their homes. Also what specifically we're doing to ensure supplies for

2 the population, how we were doing this, in what way, activities to repair

3 houses, the provision of construction materials of various kinds for this

4 to be done, and to provide other information that I was familiar with.

5 I also later used the consultations I had with Mr. Sainovic for

6 these talks.

7 Q. And as I understand it, was it Mr. Sainovic's job, was he the one

8 with the primary responsibility to deal with talking with foreign

9 diplomats about Kosovo?

10 A. Mr. Sainovic came to Kosovo and Metohija at the beginning of July,

11 and as the vice-president of the federal government he was in charge of

12 foreign policy, and it was his main task to coordinate and to talk to

13 foreign representatives, diplomats, et cetera, and he did so at the higher

14 level, if I may put it like that, with Hill and other personages there in

15 Kosovo and Metohija. And with respect to us, he had a guiding role. This

16 applied not just to me, because the diplomatic representatives wanted to

17 talk to not just me but to everyone else, heads of districts, municipality

18 presidents and I don't know who else. And people were not sometimes

19 properly trained. This was their first opportunity to have such talks, so

20 that we availed ourselves of assistance and instructions when we needed

21 them.

22 Q. You were aware of the -- the three persons from the SPS who had

23 been sent down in June 1998, Mr. Minic, Mr. Matkovic, and Mr. Andjelkovic.

24 Did they have a role in talking with the foreign diplomats and the NGO

25 representatives or do you know?

Page 14359

1 A. While I was there they did not have talks with diplomats. Maybe

2 an individual one here or there. Zoran Andjelkovic was a minister in the

3 government of the Republic of Serbia. He was in charge of sports. So

4 maybe he may have taken part in certain political talks. Mr. Minic could

5 have conducted those talks. Mr. Matkovic was more interested in economic

6 matters, as I said yesterday. That was his job. In view of the

7 situation, the very difficult economic situation, some enterprises were

8 not working at all. Others needed aid, et cetera.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Milosavljevic, that's not the question. The

10 question is whether they spoke to foreign diplomats, and it sounds --

11 well, you've made it clear you don't know, so let's move on. Mr. Hannis.

12 MR. HANNIS: Thank you, Your Honour.

13 Q. Sir, in a question to you about these talks, Mr. Fila said there

14 were three or four delegations a day, and I don't think you really

15 answered that. How many -- how many of these people did you talk to

16 during your time there between June and the end of September 1998? Do you

17 have any idea? Was it 20 or 200? How many of these kinds of meetings and

18 discussions did you have?

19 A. I cannot be precise, but on a daily basis, on some days there

20 would be talks with three or four delegations. Now, there may be

21 diplomats or humanitarian organisations or journalists, on some days, but

22 on the whole I think that this figure for the three-month period, and I

23 also kept notes, I'm sure that that number would not be less than 50,

24 because usually we didn't work Saturdays and Sundays. So that would be a

25 minimum number. With many of them I had talks several times. For

Page 14360

1 example, with the Red Cross representatives, or the UNHCR representatives.

2 Sometimes I had to talk to them twice a day.

3 Q. You mentioned that one of the things that you talked with them

4 about were measures that were being taken to repair houses that had been

5 damaged or destroyed. Can you tell us what was actually being done about

6 that? What measures were being taken to repair houses?

7 A. On the basis of the requests of the government of the Republic of

8 Serbia, in all municipalities which were exposed to such damage there were

9 commissions formed to evaluate the extent of the damage and see how much

10 material was required, and these commissions did their work. The

11 government of the Republic of Serbia via the directorate for the

12 development of Kosovo ensured the necessary construction material at

13 several different locations; bricks, cement, windows, glass, and other

14 necessities. This was stored in Orahovac, Decani, Klina, and Djakovica.

15 These are the locations, Klina, Decani, Orahovac that I toured on a

16 regular basis and also construction blocks, and there was an enormous

17 quantity of building material of this kind stored there. I know

18 specifically that in the village of Lade [phoen] windows were being

19 glassed up. Citizens would come to pick up the glass and to repair the

20 windowpanes. Minor repairs were done, and some houses started to be built

21 in Klina. In other locations this was not possible. It was difficult to

22 build new houses except in Klina and maybe some other settlements.

23 Q. Do you have any -- do you have any concrete evidence, no pun

24 intended, do you have any evidence in terms of photographs or documents

25 showing actual houses that were rebuilt or repaired as a part of this

Page 14361

1 programme? Are there any records about that that we can look at?

2 A. Probably there are. I don't have them, but I do know that in

3 Orahovac and in the village of Ade, I went there with representatives of

4 the UNHCR and it was our common view that things were happening in these

5 two locations. Mr. Arboledo from the UNHCR was with me, and it was said

6 that more glass was needed. As for Orahovac, there are photographs.

7 There are photographs, because I went there to see that this was being

8 done and it was done. I know that there were difficulties in Decani in

9 that respect because there was a lack of interest. Even though there was

10 an open invitation, the building material was piled in the middle of the

11 settlement. And in Klina these activities were quite satisfactory and

12 some houses were repaired there, and there was a programme for the

13 construction of new ones. Now, the question was how much should be given

14 in the form of material --

15 JUDGE BONOMY: You've long since answered that question. If

16 Mr. Hannis wants the additional information he can ask for it.

17 Mr. Hannis.

18 MR. HANNIS: Thank you.

19 Q. Do you know -- can you give us an approximate number of houses

20 that were rebuilt, if you know? Was it 10, 50, a hundred?

21 A. I don't know that.

22 Q. Thank you. In one of your answers to a question from Mr. Fila

23 about people being kidnapped by the KLA --

24 JUDGE BONOMY: Are you finished with the question of the damaged

25 houses?

Page 14362

1 MR. HANNIS: I am, Your Honour.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, I have one or two questions about that.

3 You -- you said, Mr. Milosavljevic, that houses had been damaged

4 and destroyed, and these are the houses we've been talking about in the

5 last few questions. Who did these houses belong to?

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] These houses belonged to both

7 Albanians and Serbs. There were destroyed houses, damaged houses on both

8 sides.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: And do you know how the Albanian homes were

10 damaged?

11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Like all other houses, they were

12 damaged during the operations, the terrorist and anti-terrorist

13 operations. There may have been some other causes. I heard a report that

14 there was some -- there were some acts of revenge by individuals in

15 villages, because this mostly happened in villages. Houses were

16 destroyed, damaged in the villages, outside the towns. In those days the

17 towns were safe in that respect.

18 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

19 MR. HANNIS: Now, Your Honour, I do have another question or two

20 about that.

21 Q. Mr. Milosavljevic, did you ever meet a press officer for the

22 United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees names Mons Nimberg?

23 A. I can remember because there was so many. It is quite possible,

24 but I can't be explicit.

25 Q. Okay. He is reported as having said regarding the programme to

Page 14363

1 build houses or furnish building material: "There's absolutely no

2 evidence of the programme they've announced. I don't see how the

3 government would have the resources to do the amount of repair necessary."

4 Were you aware that that statement was being made about your

5 programme to repair houses? This was being said in August of 1998.

6 A. No, I am not aware of the statement.

7 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila.

8 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Could I be given a reference? Could I

9 see this statement and --

10 JUDGE BONOMY: I'm sure you can get that from Mr. Hannis, but the

11 question's been answered in a way that makes it not necessary immediately,

12 so we can continue.

13 MR. HANNIS: It's contained in Exhibit P2911 for Mr. Fila.

14 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

15 MR. HANNIS: Okay.

16 Q. Let me -- let me move on to something else. You mentioned that

17 you had a number of meetings with -- with families and relatives of

18 persons who had been kidnapped, and you said there were 2 or 300 such

19 cases while you were there in Kosovo. Between June and September of 1998,

20 I take it. What was your source of information for that number of 2 to

21 300?

22 A. The source are the municipal reports which I received mostly

23 because relatives and family of the kidnapped wanted to talk to me, and

24 talking at these various locations I made this estimate. I think that

25 the number was close to 300 or just over 300. I'm not quite sure, or

Page 14364

1 maybe 229. I can't remember exactly the figure, just as I couldn't

2 remember the names of the municipalities a moment ago, though I could

3 enumerate them now. And talking to those parents and relatives I learned

4 about these things, but there were also official reports in the

5 municipalities. They were their citizens. It was not only Serbs that

6 were being kidnapped but also Albanians and other ethnic groups, the Roma

7 and others. This started on the 12th of May already when a worker in

8 Bilacevac was kidnapped. Then on the 22nd of June, 8 persons were

9 kidnapped, and then in Orahovac 39, et cetera.

10 Q. You said these were municipal reports. Did they come from the

11 police or from the president? Where were you receiving these reports

12 from?

13 A. I didn't receive reports from the police but from the municipal

14 bodies, and sometimes from the chief of district, collective reports,

15 because of these talks that I had, and there were between 10 and 12 such

16 interviews with family members of the kidnapped and arrested persons.

17 Q. You mentioned the republican commission for refugees. Who was the

18 head of that commission in 1998? If you know.

19 A. It was headed by Buba Morina, the Commission for Refugees.

20 Q. Is Buba a nickname?

21 A. No, it's her first and last name. At least that's how I knew her.

22 It's possible that she had another name, but I know her as Buba Morina.

23 Q. You mentioned the -- how the distribution of humanitarian aid was

24 done, and you told us that at the level of the Republic of Serbia

25 headquarters were set up for distributing supplies to people in Kosovo.

Page 14365

1 So there was a headquarters set up in Belgrade? Is -- is that right?

2 A. I don't know how you understood what I said yesterday. I said

3 that the government of the Republic of Serbia with its resources which

4 were set aside for that purpose by appropriate decisions, and there are

5 documents to that effect, decided that aid in the form of food supplies,

6 medicines, and building material be distributed in Kosovo among displaced

7 persons, returnees, and those in need of aid.

8 In addition to humanitarian aid that went through the Red Cross of

9 Yugoslavia, Serbia, and the province, and all the humanitarian

10 organisations from abroad which provided very significant aid, the

11 government of the Republic of Serbia also formed a central headquarters

12 for supplying the population.

13 When talking about the central headquarters, its task was to

14 procure all the foodstuffs --

15 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Milosavljevic, the question was whether the

16 headquarters were in Belgrade. Yes or no?

17 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The central headquarters had its

18 leadership in Belgrade.

19 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] But it was working in Pristina.

21 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you. If Mr. Hannis wants that additional

22 information, he will ask for it.

23 Mr. Hannis.

24 MR. HANNIS:

25 Q. I will. I'm trying to clear this up. So this is at page 14285,

Page 14366

1 and you said: "In parallel with this republic headquarters a province

2 centre was set up as well." So I'm trying to figure out at the republican

3 headquarters, is it just people in an office or were there actual

4 warehouses and goods and humanitarian aid kinds of things sitting in

5 Belgrade that were eventually distributed in Kosovo, or is it only the

6 administrative personnel that you're talking about at the headquarters in

7 Belgrade?

8 A. The central headquarters in Belgrade had the task of distributing

9 all necessary goods in Kosovo according to needs. It did so out of the

10 commodity reserves which existed in Serbia and in the Federal Republic of

11 Yugoslavia. And for instance, oil from the diamond factory in Vrbas and

12 from other manufacturers, and sugar from I don't know which enterprises,

13 had to channel these supplies to Kosovo.

14 When the central headquarters decided about this humanitarian aid

15 was free. There was a deficiency of goods, of certain goods, that went to

16 all the population. And then there was a commercial basis also, because

17 there was a danger of individuals forming surpluses and reserves, and this

18 could cause problems down there, and that is why there was strict

19 inspection to control this and these headquarters at the various levels.

20 Q. Do you know who the people were that were in charge of the

21 headquarters? Are we talking about one person or is this a group of 10?

22 And who -- who appointed them or put them in that job?

23 A. This headquarters consisted of about 10 people, and heading the

24 headquarters was the Minister for Agriculture, Mr. Babovic. Members were

25 Minister of Internal Trade, Mr. Viskovic, people from the commodity

Page 14367

1 reserves, and from various ministries. The -- this headquarters was

2 formed by the government of the Republic of Serbia.

3 I took part in its work. I said there were one or two meetings in

4 Belgrade. The rest were always held in Pristina and also in the various

5 districts when necessary. I remember meeting in the district of Kosovska

6 Mitrovica and Pec.

7 Q. And you told us that the humanitarian aid was distributed free of

8 charge; correct?

9 A. Yes.

10 Q. At page 14287, you said in one of your answers that:

11 "The state took matters into its own hands in order to avoid shady

12 situations which sometimes occur in this sort of context. There were

13 companies that were in charge of this and these companies were closely

14 watched."

15 Sir, would you agree with me that sometimes activities run by the

16 state can be shady as well?

17 A. I don't agree that it is possible for this to happen when the

18 state is in charge, because every effort was made to make sure that the

19 rules are respected and the decisions taken. Humanitarian aid was free of

20 charge for displaced people, people in need, and at a later stage this

21 went through humanitarian centres that were formed in the most afflicted

22 areas. I said there were 14 such areas during the time I was there.

23 Q. Well, sir, you're -- you're an education the fellow. You're a

24 young fellow about my age, and you've been active in many -- many levels

25 of the government. Are you telling me that human beings who work in -- in

Page 14368

1 the state are not just as subject to the foibles of non-state employees

2 when it comes to shady activity? I'm not saying it happened in your

3 commission or in this case, I'm just saying as a general principle.

4 You're not aware of any instances of graft or corruption in your

5 government in the last 20 years?

6 A. It's not just the last 20 years, but anything is possible where

7 human beings are concern. What else can I say? As for any specific

8 situations occurring, my knowledge would suggest a negative answer.

9 Q. Okay. I'm just asking you about the general principle right now.

10 Who decided who got aid? I mean, was there -- was there more than

11 enough humanitarian aid to go around for everybody who needed it, or -- or

12 was it necessary sometimes to make choices between recipients of aid?

13 A. Certainly one needed to prioritise, but every effort was being

14 made for aid to reach those most in need, or everybody in need. What the

15 specific destinations would be for humanitarian aid was dictated by the

16 situation on the ground.

17 I'm convinced that the assistance provided by the various

18 humanitarian organisations was outstanding.

19 Q. Okay. I want to ask you about your contacts with foreign

20 diplomats.

21 JUDGE BONOMY: How are we doing with your cross in general, Mr.

22 Hannis?

23 MR. HANNIS: Your Honour, I've just been alerted by my case

24 manager that I'm running up on the time that Mr. Fila used. I probably

25 need half an hour.

Page 14369

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Give us a moment.

2 [Trial Chamber confers]

3 JUDGE BONOMY: We don't intend to stop you proceeding, Mr. Hannis,

4 but it's -- we have a fairly strong feeling that this has not been a

5 terribly productive exercise. It lacks some focus, and we would be

6 grateful if you could perhaps focus it a bit more directly for us.

7 MR. HANNIS: I will, Your Honour. Thank you.

8 Q. Mr. Milosavljevic, Mr. Fila asked you yesterday at page 14289:

9 "What about these foreign diplomats. When they come to speak to

10 you did they ever underline any concerns they may have had about possible

11 crimes in Kosovo?"

12 And your, and your answer at line 21:

13 "It is true that these problems, the problems of looting on all

14 sides, were mentioned. And this was happening throughout Kosovo and

15 Metohija, and this is one of the concerns that were being underlined."

16 Now, you mentioned that they were talking about looting and

17 punch-ups and threats and incidents. Weren't they concerned about more

18 serious matters like displaced persons, women and children in the woods,

19 and killings by the Serb security forces? Isn't that what they were

20 talking to you about rather than looting?

21 A. Foreign diplomats particularly wanted to know about the return of

22 displaced persons to their hearths and homes. They also required us to

23 take appropriate measures to that effect, and this was exactly what we

24 did. It wasn't just because of what the government said should be done

25 but also at the local level. We invited people to go back to their homes.

Page 14370

1 Generally speaking, I believe the results were quite good. Needless to

2 say, they wanted to know about other things, too, but more in order to get

3 some information, at least to the extent that I could satisfy that need.

4 They were asking questions about that, yes. There were other sorts of

5 questions being asked as well.

6 Questions from the security sphere were not so frequent. They

7 knew that that was not my sphere of activity. Needless to say, it was

8 necessary to stop the operations, but that cut both ways. It wasn't

9 enough for me to ask one of the sides to stop. The other side was

10 supposed to stop, too, for this to be a meaningful exercise. Of course

11 they shared this view. They expressed concern about the entire situation.

12 There were all sorts of people from all sorts of different levels

13 talking to me.

14 I remember a specific request by Mr. Satak [phoen], who was the US

15 Deputy Foreign Minister. For example, if you look at the issue of

16 humanitarian organisations, their interest was about one thing alone, how

17 the aid issue was working, how displaced persons were being helped, and

18 those arrested, and of course everybody wanted to know how the whole thing

19 was going and what the state was doing about all these issues. What I did

20 was inform them about all this.

21 Q. And I understand security was not your issue, but the foreign

22 diplomats that talked to you, including Ambassador Petritsch and others,

23 even though you were dealing with humanitarian aid and displaced persons,

24 they expressed the concern to you about the disproportionate use of force

25 by the Serb police and the army, didn't they? Weren't they talking to you

Page 14371

1 about that and complaining about that?

2 A. There were complaints like that being made, what is normally

3 termed disproportionate use. I didn't really understand that, so I

4 provided some clarification as well.

5 Q. Okay. Do you remember being visited by a special representative

6 of the UN Secretary-General for Children in Armed Conflict between

7 September 10th and 12th 1998? The name of the person was Olara;

8 O-L-A-R-A; Otunnu, O-T-U-N-N-U. She said she met with you, among other

9 persons. Do you recall her, or him?

10 A. Yes, I do. There was sometime in early September, I believe. I

11 can't any details, but I do recall that this person who was in charge of

12 -- in charge of children's rights came to see me about something.

13 Q. And this is Exhibit 2905. I'm sorry, I only have it in English.

14 I want to read a couple paragraphs from her report. In her report she

15 indicated:

16 "Today it is estimated that some 300.000 people have been

17 displaced by the fighting in Kosovo. Over 60 per cent of whom are

18 children around over 20 per cent are women. About 50.000 of the displaced

19 persons are stranded in the open in the mountains, in the woods."

20 Were you aware that that's what the UN special representative was

21 reporting about the situation in September 1998?

22 A. No. I was not aware with these specific figures in particular. I

23 do know that talks were held and the concern was voiced that this should

24 be closely monitored. The figures concerning the number of displaced

25 persons were quite high at one point, 300.000. I don't know. I don't

Page 14372

1 think there were that many. The usual estimate was between 200.000 and

2 230.000. It really depended on your source, where the figures came from

3 and who provided the specific figures.

4 I can say that I had a pretty realistic view of each and every one

5 of these various situation. When I toured the municipalities I would ask

6 questions about these matters. We had our own method of dealing with

7 this. We knew the number of inhabitants in each and every one of the

8 villages. People on the ground could tell us how many persons had left,

9 and that's how we got our figures. But we always --

10 Q. You've answered my question. Let me stop you there because I'm

11 running short on time. Let me move to Pristina now, and if we could have

12 Exhibit P615 at page 31 on screen. Can you tell us where you stayed when

13 you were in Pristina? I think yesterday you told us you were living in

14 the army corps building. Do you know where that was in Pristina? If we

15 put the map up in front of you can you point it out for us? Hopefully it

16 will be on your screen in a moment.

17 A. I'm afraid I don't understand your question. Where I was working

18 or where I was sleeping?

19 Q. Both.

20 A. All right. I can answer your question. I'm not sure if there's a

21 map, but the building that I was working in was the building belonging to

22 the provincial authorities, and I --

23 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Milosavljevic, there should be a map on the

24 screen in front of you, and you'll be able to mark it in a moment. If the

25 usher could assist you with that.

Page 14373

1 MR. HANNIS:

2 Q. I know it's been a while, sir, and I don't know if you can recall.

3 A. Of course I can, but I'm having some difficulty getting my

4 bearings. It's to the right here. As for the street --

5 Q. As far as landmarks go, I know number 93 is the Grand Hotel. I

6 don't know if that helps orient you in Pristina.

7 A. 93.

8 Q. Number 93 --

9 A. Yes, this way. The provincial authorities were right here at 40,

10 40 something, 46. In that area. And then you take the street that goes

11 past the Grand Hotel.

12 Q. Can you draw -- can --

13 A. The corps was down that street and to the right from the Grand

14 Hotel. You said 93; right?

15 Q. Yes. Can you draw a circle around the approximate location of

16 your office, please? Using that pen.

17 A. I can describe it for you, but this is Pristina, the city of

18 Pristina, and -- 93. I can mark the location roughly for you, the general

19 location. It was like this.

20 Q. Okay.

21 A. The corps. Roughly speaking.

22 Q. If you could put a 1 in the first circle where your office was,

23 roughly, and a 2 in the circle where the corps was?

24 A. [Marks]

25 Q. And can you do two more for me. Do you know where the MUP was

Page 14374

1 located approximately?

2 A. It was to the right, this way from the corps and it should be

3 around here.

4 Q. Put a 3 in that one, please.

5 A. [Marks]

6 Q. And finally where Mr. Minic, Andjelkovic, and Matkovic were during

7 their time down there. Was that a different location?

8 A. They were in the SPS building, and I think it was in this

9 direction.

10 Q. And can you put a 4 in that circle.

11 A. [Marks]

12 Q. Thank you, sir.

13 A. This is only defined in very rough terms.

14 Q. I understand.

15 A. But I'm looking at these locations in relation to the city.

16 MR. HANNIS: Can we give that an IC number, Your Honour? Thank

17 you.

18 THE REGISTRAR: That will be IC 138, Your Honours.

19 MR. HANNIS:

20 Q. You mentioned that these complaints that the foreign diplomats

21 were giving to you, that you passed that information on to the prime

22 minister even though it involved to some extent subject matter that was

23 not your job to do, and you told us that Mr. Marjanovic told you that you

24 should pay attention to the work that you were in charge of. Did he do

25 anything to follow up on information you passed on to him about these

Page 14375

1 complaints from the internationals, that you're aware of?

2 A. I didn't ask, and he never said -- or, rather, he did say that,

3 objectively speaking, even had I been willing to do that I couldn't have

4 managed because I had my other job and I was spending a lot of time

5 elsewhere touring the area; and I would always drive back to Pristina in

6 the evening. I had no security, although I was in actual fact entitled to

7 a security detail. I felt safer while driving around without security.

8 There was my driver and two other persons with me as a rule.

9 Q. All right. You mentioned seeing Mr. Sainovic during your time in

10 Kosovo in 1998, and Mr. Fila asked you what you knew about Mr. Sainovic's

11 task while he was there. At page 14305 your answer was:

12 "He told me this himself, and I also learned it from the prime

13 minister. He was in charge of foreign policy, of talks with foreign

14 diplomatic representatives, and he was in charge of coordinating all

15 that."

16 Did you tell Mr. Sainovic about what the internationals were

17 telling you during your talks with them?

18 A. I would meet Sainovic from time to time, and I would inform him

19 about my job. Also, I would tell him about everything in quite informal

20 terms. I would tell him about other observations that had reached me. So

21 I probably shared this with him too.

22 Q. Okay. You've said that you asked -- you asked him to help you

23 concerning certain issues. This is at page 14306. What issues did you

24 ask Mr. Sainovic to assist you with?

25 A. Quite simply, I had no experience in meeting diplomats. I asked

Page 14376

1 him about subjects that might be raised, that were likely to be raised,

2 and how to talk to them. Understandably, if I may say, I wasn't trained

3 for that sort of thing. I had met with foreign officials two or three

4 times before, and what he told me was to do my best to keep foreign

5 diplomats up-to-date in as much detail as possible as to my activities and

6 any results that I was achieving. He also said that I should closely

7 study possible effects and consequences, and he told me to take a thorough

8 approach to all of this, to all of the explanations I was providing and to

9 all these talks and contacts in general.

10 Q. You told us that you had not heard of a body called the Joint

11 Command before. I guess, you read about it in the papers after the

12 Milosevic trial began. Is that correct?

13 A. Correct. I'd never heard that term before.

14 Q. Did you ever ask Mr. Sainovic about the Joint Command after you

15 heard of it?

16 A. I'd never heard of it, as I said, so I never asked him. No, not

17 even after. Having learned about the Joint Command did I ask him? No, I

18 didn't. We didn't meet much throughout that period. If we'd met, perhaps

19 I would have raised the issue; but we just didn't see that much of each

20 other throughout that period of time.

21 Q. When was the last time you spoke with him?

22 A. With Mr. Sainovic. Well, I can't quite pinpoint the exact point

23 in time, but I think the last time we actually spoke was before the trial

24 of Mr. Milosevic.

25 Q. All right.

Page 14377

1 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] No objections, but there's one thing I

2 want to know. How many hours has the Prosecutor used up? I will have a

3 chance of examining my next witness today?

4 JUDGE BONOMY: It depends on the length of your re-examination,

5 but the plan is that you will have the whole of the final session, and

6 that may be a bit longer than otherwise would be the case for your next

7 witness. And if you sit quietly there, you may get longer.

8 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Very well, Your Honour. Thank you.

9 MR. HANNIS: Thank you.

10 Q. You did not hear of the Joint Command, but were you aware that

11 Mr. Sainovic was meeting frequently in Kosovo in that summer of 1998 with

12 Mr. Minic, Mr. Andjelkovic, and Mr. Metkovic, among others? Were you

13 aware of that?

14 A. It's true that I was meeting them. That's a fact.

15 Q. Maybe that's a translation. It says you were meeting with

16 Andjelkovic, Metkovic and Minic. You personally?

17 A. Yes, me personally too. And we would talk, keep each other posted

18 as it were, what was being done, how far we had got. Andjelkovic spoke a

19 lot to people in the specific areas and he would provide me with

20 information that was helpful in my work. Minic spent most of his time in

21 the party --

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Hannis, if you don't take control of this, then

23 really we will have to bring it to an end.

24 MR. HANNIS: Okay. All right.

25 Q. Let me stop you there. My question was were you aware that

Page 14378

1 Mr. Sainovic was meeting with those three individuals? Yes or no?

2 A. Yes.

3 Q. And were you aware that in addition to those three he was also

4 meeting with General Pavkovic and General Lukic?

5 A. Occasionally I was meeting them. Maybe on two or three occasions.

6 Q. That's not my question though. Were you aware that Mr. Sainovic,

7 in addition to meeting with those three, was meeting with General Pavkovic

8 and General Lukic? He was meeting with the five of them at the same time.

9 Were you aware of that?

10 A. Well, I did say that. I met them two or three times.

11 Q. No.

12 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila?

13 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Two questions were asked, and now what

14 we got was half an answer. The last question asked by Mr. Hannis is

15 different from the previous one. It actually contains two questions.

16 Were I to repeat it, I might come across as trying to influence the

17 witness. Could he just repeat? There is no problem other than that. One

18 by one.

19 JUDGE BONOMY: I don't have much problem with this but maybe the

20 witness has, Mr. Hannis, so could you put the question again.

21 MR. HANNIS: Sure.

22 Q. First question: Were you aware that Mr. Sainovic, in addition to

23 meeting with Minic, Matkovic, and Andjelkovic, was also meeting with

24 General Lukic and General Pavkovic? Did you know that?

25 A. I don't know about that.

Page 14379

1 MR. HANNIS: Your Honour, I have no further questions. Thank you.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you, Mr. Hannis.

3 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] I -- I will take advantage of your

4 guidance, Your Honour, but I have no further questions. There is one

5 thing I would like to share with Mr. Hannis. The last exhibit where the

6 drawing was made, it doesn't quite work, but if it means something to Mr.

7 Hannis I don't oppose him going through that exercise again where the

8 drawing was made, where the map was marked a while again. Other than that

9 as far as I'm concerned this story is now over.

10 JUDGE BONOMY: If you wish, you can go through the exercise and

11 clarify it by re-examining the witness, but it's matter for you.

12 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] What is the problem? The problem is

13 this is a poor copy. It's difficult to see the numbers on it. And each

14 of the buildings that Mr. Hannis asked the witness about was marked with a

15 number. If you look what he's marked as number 1, you will see that the

16 witness referred to that. If you look at what he's marked as number 93,

17 77, 70, and that's that. But that is not consistent with the locations

18 marked by the witness, and I'm not sure how I should deal with this, but I

19 would like to give the Chamber a fair warning.

20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I didn't really understand the map.

21 As far as I can tell, it was incomplete, and also it's -- it's poorly

22 visible because I'm sitting too far from the screen.

23 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila, Mr. Hannis chose to do it his way but you

24 have the witness's answers marked on the map. You can also in due course

25 rely, I think, on the marks -- the original map with its numbers, and that

Page 14380

1 may be plenty of food for you when you make your ultimate submissions, but

2 if you want the map to be improved, you can only do that now by

3 re-examining the witness, and if you don't want to do that it's a matter

4 for you. But let's make --

5 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] I don't have the map. This can't be

6 done on the map on the screen. We need to have an original map for the

7 witness to see properly. What is shown on the screen is not good. He's

8 an elderly gentleman and he can't see it properly. I don't see how I can

9 correct it.

10 JUDGE BONOMY: You look at it now on the screen and tell me if you

11 don't think he can see it correctly.

12 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] I can't see either. I'm an elderly man

13 too. As I'm in a hurry for the next witness, I prefer to believe

14 Mr. Hannis is right than to cause a lot of trouble with this problem.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, what you know is the actual buildings that

16 the witness was trying to locate, and you will have other witnesses to

17 whom you may be able to put the point that would clarify where these

18 buildings actually are, and if you take the two lots of evidence together

19 you will have the answer.

20 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] I agree, Your Honour, but the map that

21 is being shown to the witness, there are markings of the buildings that he

22 asked the witness about, and you can see the buildings clearly.

23 Thank you. I apologise for the interruption.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

25 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Milosavljevic, that brings your evidence to an

Page 14381

1 end. Thank you for coming to the Tribunal to give it. You're now free to

2 leave.

3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you.

4 [The witness withdrew]

5 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila.

6 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Our next witness, Your Honour, is

7 Veljko Odalovic. He's waiting to be brought into the courtroom.

8 [The witness entered court]

9 WITNESS: VELJKO ODALOVIC

10 [Witness answered through interpreter]

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Good evening, Mr. Odalovic.

12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Good evening.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: Would you please make the solemn declaration to

14 speak the truth by reading out loud the document which will now be shown

15 to you.

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I solemnly declare that I will speak

17 the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

18 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you. Please be seated. You will now be

19 examined by Mr. Fila on behalf of Mr. Sainovic.

20 Mr. Fila.

21 Cross-examination by Mr. Fila:

22 Q. [Interpretation] Good evening, Mr. Odalovic. Tell us first of all

23 what is your name, where you were born, and what is your occupation.

24 A. My name is Veljko Odalovic. I was born in Kosovo and Metohija,

25 Velo municipality, of Lipjan, on the 26th of August, 1956. By education I

Page 14382

1 am a qualified lawyer.

2 Q. Tell us about your professional career and what positions you held

3 in the period since 1992.

4 A. I started my career in Kosovo Polje working in various sports

5 organisations. Later when Kosovo Polje municipality was formed I was

6 president of the commission to prevent the displacement and encourage the

7 return of the displaced. Later I became head of the legal department,

8 assistant chief of the district, deputy head of the district, and from

9 1998 I was head of the Kosovo district.

10 Q. Were you elected deputy -- were you elected as a deputy to the

11 Assembly of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia? It will be best if you

12 look at the transcript and when you see the letters stop then give us your

13 answer.

14 A. At the parliamentary elections in the year 2000, I was elected

15 deputy to the then Assembly of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, the

16 Chamber of Citizens.

17 Q. Did you head an assembly body as of 2004?

18 A. In 2004, upon the initiative of a group of deputies supported by

19 the parliament a board of inquiry was set up to establish the facts

20 regarding the kidnapped, killed, and missing persons of Kosovo and

21 Metohija. I headed that subcommittee for the inquiry.

22 Q. What institutions, organisations, and services did you cooperate

23 with in performing these duties?

24 A. In view of the fact that this was an issue that no one had dealt

25 with up until then fully and that full agreement was reached among all the

Page 14383

1 parties in the parliament of the then Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, we

2 decided as board of inquiry to address as many domestic and international

3 factors and individuals who could give us the facts about the kidnapped

4 and missing, to have interviews with them, to collect as much information

5 as possible, and to submit a report to parliament which would be the first

6 such document that would have been made public regarding all the victims

7 in the territory of Kosovo and Metohija regardless of any differences, all

8 the persons who were killed in Kosovo and Metohija since 1998.

9 Q. My question was which -- the names of the institutions you

10 cooperated with.

11 A. As for the institutions we talked to we addressed the

12 non-governmental sector, the fund for humanitarian right, the Helsinki

13 Board for Human Rights, representatives of state bodies, representatives

14 of the MUP, or the police, the army. We addressed the International Red

15 Cross Committee, the UNMIK offices that were in Belgrade, the Red Cross of

16 Serbia. We tried via UNMIK to get in touch with representatives of

17 Albanians, that is the Association of Kidnapped and Missing Persons, to

18 try to talk to them to collect as much reliable information as possible.

19 Q. What position do you hold now?

20 A. Currently I am in head -- the head of a Commission of the Republic

21 of Serbia for Missing Persons. This is a volunteer post. I am dealing

22 with missing persons from the territory of the former Yugoslavia, which

23 means in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Serbia, or Kosovo and

24 Metohija.

25 Q. What is the name of the commission?

Page 14384

1 A. It is the Commission for Missing Persons for the government of the

2 Republic of Serbia appointed by the government.

3 Q. Are you dealing in any other way with the destiny of the missing

4 persons?

5 A. As a result of the board of inquiry which has completed its work,

6 the initiative was taken to continue the dialogue that was started between

7 Belgrade and Pristina. This was started in Vienna in 2003. Covic Hekrup

8 [phoen] but because of the March events in Kosovo and Metohija it was

9 suspended. After that it was resumed and I am the head of the Belgrade

10 delegation with three other representatives. Pristina had it's delegation

11 headed by Mr. Bajazit Nushi who was also the head of the Department for

12 Human Rights, and Mr. Francois Stamm the chairman of this working group as

13 a representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

14 Q. Do you go to Kosovo and Metohija nowadays?

15 A. Yes, I go there regularly. Less than two months ago we had a

16 meeting of the working group in Pristina and a similar such meeting will

17 be held in Belgrade shortly. So irrespective of this working group I also

18 go there on private business. I have quite a number of relatives and

19 friends living there. And anyway, I still feel at home there.

20 Q. Do you still keep in touch with your acquaintances and colleagues

21 of Albanian ethnicity living down there?

22 A. Yes, I do. I have quite frequent encounters with them. When they

23 come to Belgrade I see them there, not to mention telephone communications

24 that we have. Friends are friends, and this lasts. Friendships last.

25 Q. What is your motive to devote your time to the destiny of the

Page 14385

1 killed and missing persons?

2 A. I believe that in the first place that this is a very important,

3 serious, and responsible job. It is a question -- a humanitarian issue,

4 because this is one of the most difficult issues which merits far greater

5 intention than -- than it has today throughout the former Yugoslavia, and

6 I hope that through my efforts I will contribute to discovering what

7 happened to some of those missing people. Many of them are my friends and

8 acquaintances. I am in touch with their relatives. Many reported that

9 their relatives had gone missing, when they went missing, and when I was

10 head of the district.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Odalovic, what is your principal occupation

12 today?

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Due to circumstances I am

14 unemployed. I am registered in the office of the unemployed, but as I

15 said, I'm heading a commission which has a lot of work to do. But that's

16 a different story, and I assume that doesn't interest you. If you're

17 interested, I can explain. I was a deputy. My term expired. Then for

18 six months we received our income according to our laws, and at the end of

19 that period I didn't find employment anywhere; and I hope I will soon, but

20 that is -- those are the facts.

21 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila.

22 MR. FILA: [Interpretation].

23 Q. What is a district that you were a head of?

24 A. A district is an administrative institution, a body formed by the

25 government of the Republic of Serbia, and all its activities, all its

Page 14386

1 responsibilities were carried out through the districts at the level of

2 the whole Republic of Serbia. These are administrative activities,

3 inspection, the things that have to be done on the ground and when

4 citizens have the closest contacts with the state. Various demands,

5 requests, complaints that they have. If you need more details, I can

6 explain.

7 Q. Does a district have any jurisdiction with respect to security?

8 A. No, absolutely not.

9 Q. Is the Kosovo district differ in any way from all the other

10 districts on the territory of Serbia?

11 A. As far as districts are concerned, all of them have a uniform

12 organisation throughout Serbia. In Kosovo and Metohija there were five,

13 and in the whole of Serbia there were 29. We had the same

14 responsibilities, the same tasks. We didn't all have the same territory

15 nor the number of municipalities, but we couldn't go beyond our terms of

16 reference which were identical for all.

17 Q. How many municipalities did the Kosovo district consist of?

18 A. The Kosovo district consisted of 10 municipalities and was one of

19 the largest in the Republic of Serbia in terms of territory, the number of

20 inhabitants, and the number of municipalities.

21 Q. And to whom was the district responsible.

22 A. Exclusively to the government of the Republic of Serbia.

23 Q. Will you make a short break between my questions and your answers

24 as we're speaking the same language.

25 What was the relationship between the district and the Provisional

Page 14387

1 Executive Council?

2 A. The districts were formed in 1992, and the Provisional Executive

3 Council at the end of September 1998. The Provisional Executive Council

4 and the district did not coincide in terms of responsibilities, because

5 the laws of the Republic of Serbia were implemented by the district,

6 whereas the Provisional Executive Council was an attempt -- or, rather,

7 the intention by forming it was to set up provincial institutions and

8 bodies, because this was needed on the ground, and those of us who were

9 directly involved in affairs of government felt that such bodies needed to

10 be set up in the province of Kosovo and Metohija so that the Albanians

11 would vote in the election, that they would take over part of the

12 executive powers; and the Provisional Executive Council was formed with

13 that aim in mind. And it is important to note that this was the body that

14 simply did not take over any of the responsibilities of the Kosovo

15 district. It was a separate body, and I have described what its purpose

16 was.

17 Q. And how long was it intended to last for?

18 A. Its name indicates that it was of a temporary nature, until it

19 achieves its mission. That is, until it ensures conditions for all the

20 people in Kosovo and Metohija to cast their votes and take over their

21 responsibilities. When Mr. Andjelkovic came and when we were discussing

22 this, we felt that all these activities could be completed within a period

23 of some nine months, and he asked for our full support. That is, we as

24 heads of districts and having authority over local self-government should

25 assist in the formation of those bodies and institutions.

Page 14388

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila, can you find a suitable place to

2 interrupt again.

3 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] We can break now. I forgot entirely

4 about the break. I'm sorry.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Odalovic, we have to break at this stage for

6 half an hour and then resume at 7.00 -- at 6.00, sorry. Meanwhile, could

7 you go with the usher from the courtroom, and we'll see you again at 6.00.

8 [The witness stands down]

9 --- Recess taken at 5.30 p.m.

10 --- On resuming at 6.00 p.m.

11 [The witness takes the stand]

12 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila.

13 MR. FILA: [Interpretation]

14 Q. Good afternoon again. I will repeat the question that I asked

15 before we left for the break. Between the district and the temporary

16 Executive Council or was there any overlap between those two bodies or was

17 dealt with in a different way?

18 A. There were no overlaps of jurisdiction between the two bodies.

19 Q. But there was some form of cooperation, wasn't there?

20 A. Of course there was. Cooperation, the simple reason being the

21 district happened to be in Kosovo and Metohija, the territory that the

22 temporary Executive Council arrived in with a particular mandate, the

23 mandate being to allow for normal life through the work of institutions,

24 and this had to do with the municipalities -- rather, those units of

25 self-government that existed in the district. Cooperation was necessary.

Page 14389

1 More often than not, cooperation was intense, especially when talks began

2 about a document that was supposed to regulate life in the area.

3 Q. What about the jurisdiction of the district? Was it changed in

4 1999 or 1998?

5 A. No. The jurisdiction of the district was not changed. It still

6 had the same powers and the same job. However, events in 1998 and 1999,

7 and above all, I mean the stepping up of terrorist activity and the many

8 problems that arose as a result of that in the Kosovo district and

9 throughout Kosovo and Metohija, certainly required even more intense

10 involvement on our part, and efforts were being made to stabilise and

11 normalise the situation.

12 On the other hand, there was an increasing influx of foreign

13 diplomats and journalists who, late in 1997 and throughout 1998, and this

14 is something that I mentioned in a report, came in their hundreds to

15 Kosovo and Metohija. There were all sorts of missions being set up.

16 Therefore, as a district or, rather, as a group of districts we had to

17 deal with that. That was part of our job. But, and I must repeat this,

18 nobody took over any of our jurisdictions, any of our work, nor was this

19 jurisdiction at any point reduced or amplified.

20 Q. And then you had to organise everything during the state of war.

21 So what I want to know is how did the civilian protection work?

22 A. When the NATO aggression began and when a state of war was

23 declared, the civilian protection was organised in keeping with the laws

24 providing for this possibility. First there was the federal level and

25 then this trickled down all the way to the district level or the municipal

Page 14390

1 staffs of civilian protection. What was new in relation to the previous

2 period, because the districts were a relatively new institution, there was

3 the law on defence that was in force at the time, the law on defence of

4 the Republic of Serbia, and this provided for a coordinating role of the

5 civilian protection staffs. Each in their own areas. As a result, I

6 specifically was appointed, by a decision of Mr. Geza Farkas, coordinator

7 of the district civilian protection staff and the same thing happened in

8 the remaining or, rather, throughout the Republic of Serbia, civilian

9 protection staffs were organised under the same law and in keeping with

10 the same legal provisions.

11 Q. Can you tell us what the tasks were of the civilian protection

12 since you were its commander in Kosovo and Metohija specifically during

13 the war?

14 A. Just for the sake of precision, let me repeat that I was the

15 commander of the district civilian protection staff. As for our powers,

16 these powers were based on law and included those civilian and military

17 activities that in a state of peace would be left to the civilian

18 protection; protecting citizens, putting them up. Whenever destruction

19 occurred we had to deal with the consequences and repair any damage.

20 Another thing that was typical, we had to gather livestock that was at

21 large. We had to collect supplies that were past their sell-by date that

22 could have left the population at risk. We had to take care of the water

23 supplies and these were all civilian tasks. The civilian protection was

24 an unarmed unit and units of the civilian protection bore no arms.

25 Q. What were the relations to the MUP or possibly the army?

Page 14391

1 A. Certainly we needed talks. We needed to exchange information.

2 These were jobs, quite simply, that couldn't be done without joint

3 assessments. However, the cooperation and the relations were more about

4 exchanging information, about seeking assistance, about certain types of

5 information. I think that is only natural and logical. Civilian

6 Protection Units could not on their own know whether something was safe or

7 whether where the bombs were falling and fragmentation projectiles,

8 whether these areas were safe whether there were any terrorist units

9 nearby. This form of cooperation was necessary because we could not

10 complete our mandate without this.

11 Q. Who was the Kosovo district civilian protection subordinated to?

12 A. I'll repeat about the law on defence. We were subordinated

13 formally speaking to the republican protection staff which means that we

14 were subordinated to federal bodies. That's how it is in terms of

15 hierarchy.

16 Q. Please don't explain. Just answer my questions. Let's move on to

17 a different subject now. You were born and you lived for a long time in

18 Kosovo and Metohija, didn't you? Are you familiar with the facts

19 regarding the more recent history of the area? For example, its history

20 in the Second World War, or should I perhaps ask you more specific

21 question. Do you know what went on in the Drenica area towards the end of

22 the Second World War and in its aftermath?

23 A. I know a great deal about this. I wasn't alive at the time,

24 needless to say, but my family, the place where I was born and many of the

25 events that occurred, and I think history tells us a lot about these

Page 14392

1 events and it would seem to indicate that in the period above all between

2 1941 and 1943, for the first time under Italy in Kosovo and Metohija, a

3 state was created, an Albanian state. This caused a lot of destruction, a

4 lot of expulsion of the population that lived in my area. My family or,

5 more specifically, my mother's family was one of the families expelled at

6 the time from their village. It was my native village and the greatest

7 number of casualties were caused by the Albanian Balists.

8 Q. We have to explain who the Balists were. You are using a term

9 that you never explained, sir.

10 A. The Balists were a quisling organisation. They worked with the

11 fascists. They joined the fascist side, and they took up the political

12 and strategic objective of setting up their own state. This led to a

13 showdown with the Serbian population, the Montenegrin population and all

14 the other ethnic groups, non-Albanian ethnic groups, they actively

15 participated in the resistance struggle against the liberation army and

16 they were the loyal servants of the fascist state of Italy.

17 THE INTERPRETER: The interpreters didn't hear the question.

18 MR. STAMP: If the question is continuing down this road of

19 analysing the history, I would object to it as not being relevant.

20 JUDGE BONOMY: It appears to be very relevant to the statement

21 made about doing what they did to them in Drenica, which is what it's all

22 about. It's not about the history of Kosovo but it's about the particular

23 event.

24 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] About General Naumann, if I may remind

25 my learned friend.

Page 14393

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Please continue.

2 MR. FILA: [Interpretation]

3 Q. What was the name of that organisation, sir, the Balists?

4 A. One of the names that took hold in a way was Balicombatare

5 [phoen]. I still owe you.

6 Q. Balicombatare when Kosovo and Metohija was liberated from the

7 Germans, what did the members of this group Balicombatare do?

8 A. After the fall of fascist Germany and the breakdown of the Third

9 Reich, a large scale rebellion erupted. The Balists were quite well

10 organised and they continued to put up resistance, to the People's

11 Liberation Army above all at the time, in a bid to keep the Drenica area,

12 create an area in which they would be free to pursue their actions.

13 Drenica is at the border itself. It is one of the border villages. My

14 family comes from there. And the Balists burnt the village down, a total

15 of 50 houses razed to the ground, which just shows that their intention

16 was to expel everyone from the area, to cleanse the area and to create a

17 state or an area that they could then rule with no hindrance, without the

18 Serbs and without the Albanians [as interpreted].

19 Q. Someone who is familiar with history, when they talk about the

20 suppression of the Drenica rebellion in 1945 and 1946, what do they imply?

21 What does that mean?

22 A. The Drenica rebellion was put down. The People's Liberation Army

23 started settling accounts with the Balist units. Coincidentally, I know

24 this from the history of my family, over 4.000 members of the People's

25 Liberation Army and those who were involved in crushing the Balist groups

Page 14394

1 in the area were killed. Quite simply, this was Tito's army. That's what

2 we called it, which comprised Albanians among other ethnic groups, and

3 they were given task of settling accounts with these gangs to neutralise

4 them and free Kosovo and Metohija just like the whole of Europe was

5 liberated at the time. To all practical intents this was the last fascist

6 stronghold after the breakdown of the Third Reich.

7 Q. Were civilians killed while the rebellion was being put down?

8 A. Historians, politicians, and all those who know something about

9 what went on, all those who followed what went on at the time and analysed

10 what happened in Drenica never mention this. I can't rule out the fact

11 that there were individual casualties amongst civilians at the time, but

12 the gist was an armed rebellion was put down that had been organised by

13 Balist gangs under the command of Saban Poloze [phoen].

14 Q. Just briefly, please. You're a native of the area. What do you

15 think lies at the very foundation of all these clashes that occurred in

16 the aftermath of the liberation in 1945, for example? In Kosovo and

17 Metohija.

18 A. Well, it was the intention of the separatists to create another

19 Albanian state in the area. This intention, this desire, has a history.

20 I was alive in 1968 and I saw what happened. I was part of the rallies in

21 Pristina. I was also alive back in 1971. I was an eyewitness to what

22 went on. Rallies started on the 11th of March and continued throughout

23 April. It was the students this time around who set up the same movement

24 with the same demands. This continued in 1989 and 1990, all under the

25 same aegis with the same objectives. The intention being to create a

Page 14395

1 state within Kosovo and Metohija. Unfortunately, we see the same thing

2 happening all over again today.

3 MR. STAMP: Whereas a discourse into the history might have been

4 to some degree relevant, the objection now is that this evidence being

5 elicited is not referred to or properly referred to in the 65 ter summary

6 that is filed.

7 JUDGE BONOMY: When you say that, are you referring to the

8 evidence about Drenica?

9 MR. STAMP: The evidence about Drenica, but in particular the

10 evidence about the events of the '70s, 1969.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes. But also saying that Drenica wasn't referred

12 to?

13 MR. STAMP: Yes.

14 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Fila, why is that?

15 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] We have just made a brief overview.

16 This was just one single question about the history of Kosovo. I have no

17 intention of dealing with that any longer. This was just this one

18 question, and the witness is living there and he knows what's going on.

19 JUDGE BONOMY: You're ignoring my question about Drenica. Why was

20 that not referred to in your 65 ter?

21 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] I probably forgot. I didn't think it

22 was all that important, because it is one of the events of the history of

23 Kosovo.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: There's a limited extent to which your birth

25 certificate is going to be a shield for you, Mr. Fila.

Page 14396

1 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] It must be that. There's no other

2 explanation. I thought that was a global overview of Kosovo that the

3 witness was giving.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: It's not that the real complaint is about because

5 the Prosecution have a number of witness who is have given evidence of a

6 fairly general nature about the various events in 1971 and 1989 and 1990,

7 but something as specific as Drenica is clearly a matter that should have

8 been heralded in a 65 ter summary.

9 Anyway, the damage has been done and we must proceed so, continue.

10 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] I do apologise, Your Honour. It's my

11 mistake then. Let us now move on to 1997, as I have no intention to talk

12 about history any more.

13 Q. Can you please explain the situation in Kosovo and Metohija as of

14 1997? How would you describe it?

15 A. What is characteristic of 1997 is that that was the first time in

16 public, as far as I can remember, at a funeral in Metohija armed and

17 trained groups of people appeared in uniform.

18 JUDGE BONOMY: Please stop for a moment.

19 Yes, Mr. Stamp.

20 MR. STAMP: The -- and I'm not one to object to everything, but

21 1997, if we're on that track that is not something referred to in this

22 summary, 65 ter summary.

23 JUDGE BONOMY: I think on this occasion, Mr. Fila, you should --

24 you should confine yourself now to what you have given notice of. You've

25 benefited obviously already in failing to --

Page 14397

1 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I'm talking about the

2 development of events. I can ask the questions about 1998 and again we'll

3 come to 1997. It is just the evolution of the events and of the situation

4 in Kosovo.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: You deal with what's in your 65 ter summary and

6 then we'll see whether something else coincidentally emerges.

7 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Very well.

8 Q. Could you please explain the situation in 1998, the year covered

9 by the indictment. What happens? What happened then?

10 A. What is characteristic of 1998 is that the terrorist activities by

11 terrorist groups became more and more intensified. They -- there were

12 more and more attacks on civilians in 1998, on policemen, more and more

13 kidnappings, blockades of roads. Simply we have an increasingly

14 well-organised action by these bands, and their aim was, as they

15 unfortunately managed to achieve briefly in 1998, to separate a part of

16 the area of Metohija which includes Drenica, unfortunately, and to gain

17 full control of it.

18 Q. Was there any specific incident which was particularly disturbing

19 in the spring of 1998 onwards?

20 A. In the first half of 1998 there were several serious incidents.

21 One of them was certainly the event in the village of Prekaz when one of

22 those groups and gangs was neutralised. Unfortunately, in this conflict

23 in which security organs participate, who first tried to arrest

24 Adem Jashari, civilians were also killed. I think it was in January,

25 February 1998. Then some other very important events which disturbed the

Page 14398

1 entire population of Kosovo and Metohija were attacks on Orahovac,

2 kidnappings.

3 Q. Did the events in neighbouring Albania have any impact, and the

4 appearance of the KLA? Did this affect the situation in Kosovo?

5 A. Precisely what I was saying. The intensification of these

6 terrorist activities in 1997 and 1998 were most directly linked to

7 developments in Albania because it was then when an enormous quantity of

8 ammunition and weapons were transferred to the territory of Kosovo and

9 Metohija and especially in Metohija, and that means Drenica. Some people

10 were armed of their own free will, others at first by force. In any

11 event, hundreds of thousands of long barrels crossed illegally the state

12 frontier and entered Kosovo and Metohija and were distributed to the

13 population.

14 Q. You said that they took control of a part of Kosovo, and what

15 about the other parts of Kosovo that were not taken control of by this

16 group? Wasn't life normal there? Yes or no?

17 A. In the most part of Kosovo and Metohija life was normal. What was

18 happening in Metohija fortunately did not spread to the entire territory

19 of Kosovo and Metohija, which doesn't mean to say there weren't isolated

20 incidents, but in any event, there were no blockades of roads or

21 interruptions of communications, nor were there large groups or bands that

22 were attacking large settlements as was the case with Orahovac.

23 Q. Do you know anything about the strength of the KLA and the

24 influence of Rugova?

25 A. Mr. Rugova, in the '90s, that is at the end of the '80s and the

Page 14399

1 beginning of '90s was an absolute leader among the Albanians. At

2 elections that they themselves organised in 1992, he was elected

3 president. His relationship to the so-called liberation army was not a

4 relationship that could be described as one of cooperation or sympathy.

5 In fact, my impression was that these were two opposing options heading

6 towards the same goal. Mr. Rugova never gave up the idea of creating a

7 state, but at least to the best of my knowledge; and I had contacts with

8 some people who were close to him, he did not wish to achieve that by

9 force of arms as opposed to the leaders of the KLA who sought to achieve

10 that goal by force of arms.

11 Q. Do you know that representatives of the government of the Republic

12 of Serbia came to negotiate with the politicians of large Albanian parties

13 such as Mr. Rugova and others in this period of 1998?

14 A. Yes, I am aware of that. There were several such attempts in

15 1998.

16 Q. We've heard a number of witnesses, so let us not waste any more

17 time. Do you know how invitations were handed to Albanian politicians to

18 attend these meetings?

19 A. I do know for the simple reason that most of these invitations

20 were handed via the office of the Kosovo district, that -- through my

21 service, so a courier from my office would carry these invitations to the

22 leaders of the Albanian political parties and hand in these invitations

23 and -- to them at their addresses.

24 I apologise. Just one further comment. As for Mr. Rugova, his

25 office was in the Writers' Association of Kosovo, in the very centre of

Page 14400

1 Pristina, and that is where Mr. Adnan Merovci signed that he received the

2 invitation. So his signature is a guarantee that those invitation were

3 received.

4 Q. How did the other Albanian politicians behave in the summer of

5 1998 in relation to the KLA, and how did they behave later on?

6 A. Up until the summer of 1998, public sympathy towards the so-called

7 KLA was shown only by Adem Demaci. All the other leaders on the political

8 stage among the Albanians were quite reserved. However, one event, at

9 least that is my own judgement, overturned the entire situation, and that

10 was when Mr. Holbrooke, at the end of June, mid-June, I can't remember the

11 exact date, did something in UNMIK which in general opinion was the most

12 direct support of these terrorist bands, and after that among the

13 political leaders of other Albanian parties, their behaviour started to

14 change; and they started to extend greater support to this so-called

15 liberation army.

16 Q. For the transcript, there's an error in the interpretation. It

17 says UNMIK and it should be Junik place, a settlement in Kosovo and

18 Metohija between Decani and Djakovica.

19 Could you please, but very quickly because we've heard quite a

20 number of witnesses about the same issue, tell us what was the situation

21 in Kosovo and Metohija in the spring and summer of 1998. Give us a very

22 quick overview.

23 A. Extremely difficult. Almost a third of the territory was under

24 the control of these armed bands. More than 80 villages which until then

25 were inhabited by Serbs, Montenegrins, and other non-Albanians were

Page 14401

1 ethnically cleansed. I think we had more than 4.500 displaced persons in

2 1998. There were very serious incidents of mass kidnappings, miners at

3 the mines in Bilacevac, in Retimlje, and Opterusa where more than 60

4 civilians were taken from their homes. The attack on Orahovac. All this

5 among the Serbs and other non-Albanians caused a great deal of concern,

6 and fear, and there was obvious panic. So people started to move out

7 their families to central Serbia. Some of them came to the part of the

8 territory which was not the site of serious conflicts, but Metohija,

9 Drenica, and some villages around Podujevo had been ethnically cleansed

10 and were under the control of terrorist bands. And what was particularly

11 alarming was that at the end of June or the beginning of July, they almost

12 reached Pristina. They took control of the coal mines at Bilacevac which

13 was of major significance as a source of energy, and this most seriously

14 disturbed people in Kosovo Polje, Obilic, and Pristina, because somehow

15 the limit had been crossed.

16 Q. Were there problems with the communications?

17 A. Most of the vital communications in the area of Metohija were

18 interrupted. Whoever would take those roads was at risk. One of the

19 strategic routes, Pec-Pristina, were inaccessible. The roads towards

20 Glogovac, from Mitrovica towards Srbica as well, so that communication was

21 extremely difficult and unsafe.

22 Q. Have you been given the documents, please? I'd like you to have a

23 look at them. Could you take a look at tab 1, please. Defence Exhibit

24 2D364.

25 What document are we talking about? What is it?

Page 14402

1 A. This is a document containing a list of citizens and members of

2 the MUP who in the period from 1st January to 1st of July, 1998, were

3 abducted by Albanian terrorists.

4 Q. Do we have on the list only names of Serbs or are there others as

5 well?

6 A. On this list, in addition to names of Serbs and Montenegrins,

7 there are names of citizens of Albanian, Romany, and other ethnicities

8 which the terrorists had hijacked -- I'm sorry, kidnapped, and also six

9 members of the police who suffered the same fate. They, too, were

10 kidnapped by Albanian terrorists.

11 Q. Did they ever return?

12 A. In view of the fact that I head the commission for missing

13 persons, by briefing looking at these names I can say with certainty that

14 more than 90 per cent of these persons have not -- have not returned to

15 their families to this day. Their destiny is unknown. And as for members

16 of the police as we matched with the MUP of the Republic of Serbia the

17 names of those missing, I can tell you that out of these six, five are

18 still missing. And the same applies to the miners kidnapped at Bilacevac

19 on the 22nd of June. Nothing is none about their fate either. Thank you.

20 Q. Why were these Albanians kidnapped?

21 A. As for the kidnapping of Albanians, this was precisely the

22 objective and the intention of the terrorists, in order to crush any

23 resistance or stop anybody from thinking differently, the aim being to

24 intimidate all those -- well, I see here now that some of these Albanians

25 who were kidnapped were actually employed. They worked in companies and

Page 14403

1 institutions, and the aim of the terrorists was for Albanians to leave

2 those companies, institutions. They made promises to them that once they

3 were in power they would bring them all back. And this made it easier for

4 them when undertaking certain activities they knew that there were no

5 Albanians among those people. And if you look at this, they are workers

6 of the Stimlje Plantation. Included here this is the part of the Kosovo

7 district. So these are workers who were employees of Srbija Sume in

8 Trepca. So in essence, this was the objective and this was the intention

9 behind what the terrorists did.

10 Q. All right. Could you look at tab 2 now, please, 2D372. That is

11 the exhibit number. What is that? Comment briefly, please, because we've

12 heard other witnesses on this document.

13 A. But I have to read it first, don't I. This is a dramatic appeal,

14 I would say, by Andjelko Kolasinac who was a representative of the

15 Orahovac Municipal Assembly. He talks about the critical situation that

16 prevailed in the area at the time. He is requesting assistance from

17 official bodies. You see that it was forwarded to the government, to the

18 MUP in Orahovac and Prizren and to the command of an area in Prizren. He

19 was seeking assistance. He was asking for help. He knew obviously that

20 what was going on on the ground at the time was very serious and based on

21 what I can see here, he's trying to --

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Odalovic, was this sent to you?

23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: In that case, we don't need Mr. Odalovic to tell us

25 what the letter says, which is what he's actually continuing to do.

Page 14404

1 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Fair enough. Thank you.

2 Q. Now my other question, so don't comment. What was the situation

3 in your district in 1998?

4 A. Well, I have to say that in relation to what the situation was in

5 Metohija ours was much better. In my area there were certain problems.

6 In Glogovac municipality, in Podujevo municipality, in Stimlje and parts

7 of Kacanik, while the other areas were relatively peaceful with sporadic

8 incidents occurring.

9 Q. What about all these events that you've described and the general

10 situation? Was there any reaction by the Serbian state? Was there any

11 reaction by Yugoslavia, and what was the reaction, if so, in the summer of

12 1998?

13 A. All of us were sending such appeals to the state bodies. We asked

14 the state, we appealed to the state to protect the people, the buildings,

15 all the facilities, the companies, because at this point in time the

16 operations conducted by these terrorist gangs were putting everything at

17 risk; and I think this is something that is a well-known fact. There were

18 certain anti-terrorist activities that followed as a result of these

19 appeals. So throughout this period there erupted a serious -- a serious

20 -- clashes with these gangs. For the first time, and that is what is

21 particularly noteworthy about this, the state decided to settle accounts

22 once and for all with these terrorist gangs simply because the state

23 territory was under threat.

24 Q. How did these developments effect the humanitarian situation in

25 Kosovo and Metohija, and what did the state do about that?

Page 14405

1 A. All of this caused large-scale humanitarian problems in terms of

2 supplies, above all but also in terms of how free people were to move

3 about or leave their homes. This called for an intervention on the part

4 of the state bodies. The state stepped in in June. The federal and

5 republican government set up a staff to provide supplies to people in an

6 organised manner. I was a member of the central headquarters of Kosovo

7 and Metohija and we also set up local offices elsewhere to bring supplies

8 to the local population, the objective being to bring supplies and to help

9 people who were in a very difficult situation at the time, to help them in

10 both humanitarian terms and also to make possible that people had all the

11 supplies the necessary supplies throughout Kosovo and Metohija.

12 Q. Mr. Odalovic we have heard a witness who talked at great length

13 about it can you tell us briefly about what sort of aid we're looking at

14 how this aid was distributed and so on and so forth?

15 A. There were displaced people and there were those in need and they

16 all required humanitarian aid. We worked with the Red Cross. We worked

17 with bodies of local self-government and our own people helped to set up

18 humanitarian -- humanitarian aid distribution centres in certain

19 localities. We did this in keeping with the norms based on the monthly

20 need of any citizen. A litre of oil, eight kilogrammes of flour, sugar

21 and so on and so forth. These are details I'm not going into that. We

22 made sure there was enough energy of any kind for life to go on normally.

23 This was something that was an enormous problem another aspect was state

24 intervention in terms of sufficient quantities being secured in as far as

25 possible from the state's commodity reserves. There was a lot of shady

Page 14406

1 business at the time. People started smuggling these goods. The goods

2 were overpriced. The tariffs were far to high for the population and some

3 people were making enormous profits. The objective on our part was to put

4 this under control.

5 The third aspect, which also tells you something about what we did

6 was this: according to these norms, each and every citizen of Kosovo and

7 Metohija needed an opportunity through socially owned companies and shops

8 on the ground to purchase these goods at regulated prices and each and

9 every citizen of Kosovo and Metohija needed access to these things

10 regardless of any of their differences.

11 Q. Was any aid offered in terms of repairing houses, that sort of

12 thing?

13 A. Just before this, and I can't remember the exact date, the

14 directorate for regional development was set up in Kosovo and Metohija.

15 This directorate was established by the government of the Republic of

16 Serbia. It was through Serbia's development fund that certain amounts of

17 building material and everything else that was required for repairs was

18 brought there. There was a lot of destruction and there were

19 consequences. The directorate was quite successful in general. There

20 were areas that were never reached by this aid because terrorist activity

21 continued in those areas. On the other hand, they did everything within

22 their power for Albanians who were offered this sort of aid to refuse to

23 have it. They were trying to create a different media image, to show the

24 destruction and the destruction in all of its consequences and they wanted

25 to make this come across as if nobody really wanted repairs. The

Page 14407

1 directorate, and I remember this one meeting we had, invested over 2

2 million in funds in repairs and reconstruction.

3 Q. What figure did you have in mind?

4 A. 200 million dinars it's very hard to convert now but that was the

5 reported figure.

6 Q. Do you know anything about the implementation of the education

7 agreement in Kosovo and Metohija in 1998? And perhaps -- well, could you

8 go to tab 3, please. Defence Exhibit 2D2. Tab 4. Defence Exhibit 2D3.

9 Please comment briefly.

10 A. These two documents are in relation to an agreement that was

11 previously signed, the education agreement. Actually, with the assistance

12 of Sant'Egidio, an Italian organisation, and Monsignor Paglia an agreement

13 was reached that both Mr. Milosevic and Rugova signed on the normalisation

14 of issues regarding education. This was one of the most burning issues in

15 Kosovo and Metohija. What this shows is that with the assistance of some

16 other organisations as well and first and foremost I'm here referring to

17 issues to do with reconstruction. I don't know who else was involved.

18 They started implementing this agreement. This is how the agreement

19 looked in purely operational terms. Certain buildings were to be built,

20 certain buildings were to be repaired. And the other document also talks

21 about the fact that the intention was to build a number of new buildings

22 and facilities. The students and pupils were to be given more room. This

23 was primarily about secondary school students because Albanians students

24 had remained outside the university up until that time.

25 Q. Were any of your people involved in this?

Page 14408

1 A. Whenever the government and the state bodies took up a certain

2 responsibility, all of us who were part of the system would receive

3 instructions and would have the responsibility of being involved. In

4 addition to Mr. Milivoje Simonovic who was the focal point for this

5 project I see Mr. Milan Canovic who was the head of a department in my

6 district. The ministry of construction. We were a whole unit. There

7 were eight of us and we were all involved in implementing these tasks. We

8 believed this to be a priority, our objective being to make sure that the

9 3 plus 3 Agreement would be implemented by the academic year on the 1st of

10 September what this meant is the Albanian students who up to that point

11 had remained outside the work of the university would now be back to

12 continue their education in the all the public institutions.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: Could you remind me what the 3 plus 3 Agreement

14 was?

15 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Me?

16 JUDGE BONOMY: The witness. Can you remind me what the 3 plus 3

17 Agreement was?

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The 3 plus 3 Agreement was signed by

19 Mr. Rugova and Mr. Milosevic in September 1996.

20 JUDGE BONOMY: You need say no more. I'm simply confused by the

21 use of more than one name for it.

22 Please continue, Mr. Fila.

23 MR. FILA: [Interpretation]

24 Briefly. Let's move through this as quickly as possible. What about

25 the -- giving more room to university students and was there resistance

Page 14409

1 from any quarters as far as this intention was concerned?

2 A. This was implemented. I don't have the details of that later

3 agreement, but as far as I remember the government of the Republic of

4 Serbia had its own group comprising Percevic, Bjeletic, and some other

5 persons, as well as Mr. Ganja [phoen] who took part in the implementation

6 of this project on behalf of Mr. Rugova, if I remember correctly; and I

7 might go wrong on this, there were about 42 square metres of room and most

8 of it was devoted to teaching in the Albanian language. 42.000 square

9 metres. That was reaction among those teaching the Serbian language and

10 the students. There was fear quite simply that their interests were at

11 stake, their positions would be jeopardised. There was fear of new

12 incidents occurring. There was a certain amount of resistance but the

13 state determined that this was a priority task. So despite all the

14 resistance those most directly involved despite all managed to see this

15 through and give more room as had been agreed.

16 Q. Could you go to tab 5 now, sir. 2D373. I only have two minutes

17 left, sir. If you could please use those two minutes well and answer my

18 question.

19 What's this about?

20 A. Unfortunately, there is no Serbian translation but I believe I can

21 understand this document. I am quite familiar with the subject matter

22 after all. This is the memorandum of the so-called Republic of Kosovo

23 which didn't exist at the time and secretariat or, rather, the ministry,

24 education ministry. The fund is being requested here to secure that there

25 was sufficient chairs and desks for a total of 13 schools in the Pristina

Page 14410

1 area. In Pristina municipality these are preparations obviously not quite

2 preparations because the academic year has already started but obviously

3 the people from elementary schools has run out of chairs and desks

4 throughout Kosovo and Metohija; and what I can say based on this document

5 is that these are state institutions, buildings, schools that belonged to

6 the state of Serbia or to its local units and teaching in the Albanian

7 language went on with no interruptions with no hindrance. We made sure

8 they had electricity, firewood at one point in time we paid help people

9 who were assisting the schools. At no point in time was this a problem.

10 If they addressed us for these desks and chairs I'm sure we would have

11 somehow made funds available to somehow secure the equipment.

12 Q. What was the reason you accepted something like this?

13 A. Our objective was to stop anyone who was trying to manipulate

14 children. We didn't want children not going to school although the

15 conditions were irregular. We gave them buildings and schools so that

16 children wouldn't go to private homes and attend facilities that just

17 weren't appropriate. We simply opened the doors of all schools to

18 everyone, elementary schools, and in part also secondary schools and we

19 made it possible for them to be taught in their native language in

20 Albanian.

21 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Your Honour, lest you should warn me, I

22 think this is a got time to stop.

23 JUDGE BONOMY: Can I clarify with you, Mr. Odalovic, the English

24 version of this document relates to the supply, by the Republic of Kosovo

25 Municipal Education Board, of furniture. Now, these -- the indication is

Page 14411

1 that this was furniture that was not supplied by the Republic of Serbia.

2 Is that the position?

3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I didn't say that. In case you

4 understood me to be saying that. I said if they had addressed us we --

5 we --

6 JUDGE BONOMY: I understand your evidence that if they would have

7 asked you, you would have of found the funds for it, but it's the nature

8 of the document I want to be clear about. The nature of the document is

9 coming from -- it's a communication from the Republic of Kosovo which you

10 say was not properly constituted and should not be recognised, and it

11 relates to the provision of furniture through a foundation. Is that

12 correct?

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, that's correct. The Republic

14 of Kosovo never existed.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Which means that this is a ...

17 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, perhaps the desks existed. That's another

18 matter. But thank you for helping us.

19 Mr. Odalovic, we have to bring the proceedings to an end for this

20 week at this stage and we will resume at 9.00 on Monday. You have to come

21 back here ready to continue your evidence at 9.00 on month day morning.

22 Meanwhile, it is vital that you have no communication with anyone at all

23 about any aspect of the evidence in this case. You can talk to whoever

24 you like about whatever you like except the evidence in the case.

25 Please now leave the courtroom with the usher and we will see you

Page 14412

1 again at 9.00 on Monday.

2 [The witness stands down]

3 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 7.03 p.m.,

4 to be reconvened on Monday, the 27th day

5 of August, 2007, at 9.00 a.m.

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