Tribunal Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

Page 15726

1 Monday, September 23 2002

2 [Open session]

3 [The accused entered court]

4 --- Upon commencing at 2.25 p.m.

5 JUDGE LIU: Call the case, please, Madam Registrar.

6 THE REGISTRAR: Good afternoon, Your Honours. This is case number

7 IT-98-34-T, the Prosecutor versus Naletilic and Martinovic.

8 JUDGE LIU: Mr. Krsnik, are you ready for your witness?

9 MR. KRSNIK: [Interpretation] Good afternoon, Your Honours. Yes,

10 I'm ready, as always.

11 JUDGE LIU: Are there any protective measures for the next

12 witness?

13 MR. KRSNIK: [Interpretation] No, Your Honours.

14 JUDGE LIU: Thank you very much. Could we have the witness,

15 please?

16 [The witness entered court]

17 JUDGE LIU: Good afternoon, Witness. Can you hear me?

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I can.

19 JUDGE LIU: Would you please make the solemn declaration, please?

20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I solemnly declare that I will speak

21 the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

22 WITNESS: MLADEN ANCIC

23 [Witness answered through interpreter]

24 JUDGE LIU: Thank you very much. You may sit down, please.

25 Yes, Mr. Krsnik.

Page 15727

1 Examined by Mr. Krsnik:

2 Q. [Interpretation] Good afternoon, Witness.

3 A. Good afternoon.

4 Q. Before we start, let me say a few things to you. And to tell you

5 that our conversation will, by and large, address only some of the more

6 important topics in your analysis. Their Honours have read your report so

7 that we shall not waste time. And I'd like to ask you, because I know

8 that you are very proficient in English, please follow the transcript that

9 is in front of you and when you see this dot stop, then find the best way,

10 not too slow, not too fast and always wait for me to finish my question

11 and then start answering it.

12 I believe this is all that I can say by way of introduction and as

13 we talk, if a problem arises I will give you a warning.

14 So let's start. As always, most distinguished doctor, will you

15 please briefly tell your -- something about your CV? Of course I mean

16 your professional career. And, of course, your full name.

17 A. I am Mladen Ancic. I was born in 1955. I completed my primary,

18 secondary education in Sarajevo, where I was born. I read and graduated

19 from the -- from historical studies in Sarajevo at the faculty of

20 philosophy in Sarajevo and then in 1985, I obtained my MA degree in

21 Belgrade. Then worked at the Memorial Centre Vraca in Sarajevo, that --

22 at the Institute of History in Sarajevo. During the war, I left Sarajevo,

23 moved to Zadar, and there I got a job with the Institute for History of

24 the Croat -- Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts. I obtained my Ph.D.

25 in Zagreb in 1996. I teach at the Croatian Studies department of the

Page 15728

1 University of Zagreb and I have the title of docent. I teach at the

2 post-graduate studies of the faculty in Zagreb -- in Zadar. I've

3 published five books, dozens of papers in scientific journals.

4 Just a moment? May I go back? I'd like -- I'd rather that it

5 says here "learned" rather than "scientific."

6 Q. Yes. Every comment that you have is welcome, because the

7 interpretation -- I mean to understand what you are saying in the spirit

8 of the language so please do intervene whenever you think it is necessary.

9 A. So I published dozens of papers in learned journals in

10 Bosnia-Herzegovina in Croatia, in Austria, in England, and that would be

11 my CV, briefly.

12 Q. You mentioned that you worked for the Vraca Memorial Park. Can

13 you tell us what that is?

14 A. The Vraca Memorial Centre is practically the Holocaust museum in

15 Sarajevo, the museum of the victims of the Holocaust in Sarajevo and I

16 worked there for five years as an associate addressing the latest history

17 of Bosnia-Herzegovina and at the same time studying -- doing research into

18 what was my wish to do and that was the medieval history briefly. I

19 addressed, I studied, I also wrote for the media, especially during the

20 war. I was the editor of the educational programme of the Sarajevo

21 Television. And I was -- and I was responsible -- I was the editor of

22 history courses. So this would roughly be the things that define my

23 professional career.

24 Q. You mentioned that you have authored a number of books, and we

25 have the titles in your CV. What I'd like to know is are you also the

Page 15729

1 author of the book, "Who went wrong in Bosnia?"

2 A. I am.

3 Q. Can you, being its author, can you tell us what the book is about?

4 A. That book is in point of fact a collection of texts which I

5 published in periodicals in an attempt to explain where is the link

6 between what is history and what is the political reality of the country I

7 live in, and its neighbours. I also made recourse to what is my personal

8 experience and the experience of my friends, acquaintances, people I

9 communicate with. It was a strange procedure for a historian, strange,

10 insofar as I also lived at a strange time.

11 Q. In that book, I've noticed -- I mean preparing to meet you, I read

12 an interesting detail. You described a meeting in Sarajevo with very

13 interesting participants. Some of them appeared here as permanent expert

14 witnesses for the Prosecution.

15 A. Yes. I was quite surprised when my friend and colleague,

16 professor Dr. Ante Markotic, who has already been here incidentally, told

17 me that he had taken part in a strange, in an odd dinner in Sarajevo in

18 1991, that dinner was organised by an official of the American embassy in

19 Belgrade. He brought together several university professors and tried to

20 learn from them something about their views of the then situation in

21 Bosnia and Herzegovina. One of the participants was Professor Pajic who

22 on that occasion said -- expressed a view that the situation in

23 Bosnia-Herzegovina could be resolved if several heads were taken off. And

24 that came to me as a shock, that a man with such views figured as an

25 expert wherever.

Page 15730

1 Q. M'hm. Right. But we can come back to that later. I'd now like

2 to ask you what was the assignment that the Defence gave you?

3 A. My assignment was to evaluate the finding of an expert witness for

4 the Prosecution, Dr. Donia, to establish how much does it conform to the

5 standards governing the work of historians, how much does it conform to

6 the general knowledge of the history of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and

7 finally to write a study, to write a treatise as to how, in what way,

8 history defines the causes of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina and how it

9 defines the patterns of behaviour of the participants to that war.

10 Q. Was it your task to - since you're a historian - to help the Court

11 with your expert testimony, to show that what happened in Bosnia did not

12 happen out of the blue, wasn't parachuted down, as some claim?

13 A. I hope that the text which I submitted to this honourable Court

14 and my verbal presentation will help towards the comprehension of the

15 context of that conflict. But I need to round off my thought, for a

16 historian the context is by far the most important word.

17 Q. Follow the transcript. Follow the transcript.

18 Now that you've touched upon this, will you tell the honourable

19 Court which is the most important part of the work of a historian? What

20 is a historian, basically?

21 A. A man who engages in the reconstruction of what took place, a man

22 who tries to identify individual events, establish how they came to pass,

23 and then the most important part. From those individual events, one needs

24 to put together a net, which explains the whole historical movement, the

25 historical movement as a whole, the historical context as a whole or

Page 15731

1 rather a social context as a whole which has vanished, which has vanished

2 without retrieve and which only we the historians know how to reconstruct.

3 Q. My next logical question, did Dr. Donia as the expert witness for

4 the Prosecution apply such an approach when he prepared his reports and

5 testimonies before this Court?

6 A. Before I answer that question, I will have to ask you for some

7 time.

8 Q. Yes, of course. I understand that you cannot answer yes or no,

9 but let us not spend too much time and let us also try to be interesting.

10 A. I come from an academic community in which there is no simple

11 answer to any question. Therefore, the meeting with Dr. Donia, not

12 personal but through texts because I've never met Dr. Donia, represented a

13 strange experience for me. I discovered a historian with two faces. One

14 face is the face outlined by his dissertation and a very serious book

15 emerged from it, titled, "Under the double eagle." The second face is the

16 one revealed by texts in a book called "Bosnia - tradition betrayed," and

17 the findings which Dr. Donia presented to this honourable Court.

18 One face is the face of a serious historian, who worked on many

19 documents, who consulted very relevant literature and managed to create an

20 interesting, valuable book.

21 Q. I beg your pardon. When was this book written, which year?

22 A. It was published in 1978.

23 Q. Since 1978, has he appeared in the literature related to history?

24 A. Bibliography, in periodicals, his name never appeared after that,

25 until the mid-1990s. Dr. Donia spent that time working for the Merrill

Page 15732

1 Lynch Investment Fund. It is a fact that for an entire decade, if not

2 even longer, he was not in the academic community. He did not read new

3 literature on a day-to-day basis and that is mirrored in this other face.

4 This other face reveals a historian who uses only secondary sources,

5 secondary sources that are based in their own right on secondary sources

6 yet again. For a historian, the key thing is to be in a constant contact

7 with documents that pertain to the time that he is dealing with. I have

8 carefully looked at the authorities upon which Dr. Donia relies, and

9 indeed, I could bore you to tears here by various quotations that would

10 show and prove what I have just said. The trouble that stems from this,

11 though, and that fully shows the problems that Dr. Donia encounters can be

12 illustrated by one example, if you allow me to quote it, namely at one

13 point in time, Dr. Donia invokes the memoirs of Lord Owen. However, he

14 does not draw anything out of these memoirs that would be a fact. From

15 these memoirs he draws a judgement, rather Lord Owen's judgement,

16 concerning Dr. Franjo Tudjman, at that time the President of the Republic

17 of Croatia. For a conscientious and serious historian, that is an

18 impermissible thing. By your leave, just one more sentence. Lord Owen's

19 judgement concerning another person, actually says a lot about Lord Owen

20 himself, and very little about the man that this judgement pertains to.

21 The mistake that the expert makes in such a way, and that is not his only

22 mistake, brings him into waters that can no longer be considered serious

23 scholarly effort. Of course, other mistakes are derived from that as

24 well.

25 Q. Let us proceed in a logical sequence. So let me ask you the

Page 15733

1 following: Do you agree with Dr. Donia's assertion that mediaeval times

2 in Bosnia-Herzegovina were characterised by a clash between Catholicism

3 and Orthodoxy, that is to say in the territory that we call Bosnia

4 nowadays, of course you will better versed in these matters so could you

5 say something about this?

6 A. Indeed. Dr. Donia has a problem already with the notion of

7 Bosnia-Herzegovina in historical dimensions. What this notion means from

8 a geographical point of view, at different points in time, when it

9 appears, who uses it and for what reasons. However, we can go back to

10 that a bit later. The basic thesis in this case is actually something

11 that has nothing to do with the reality of mediaeval Bosnia. Documents,

12 archaeology, all of this together shows that in the area that we call

13 mediaeval Bosnia, all the way up to the end of the 14th century, there is

14 not a single Orthodox Church. Therefore, it is unclear how this period of

15 time could be marked at all by a clash between Catholicism and Orthodoxy.

16 Of course, I cannot claim, nor do I know, whether this is a mistake that

17 stems from ignorance, indolence or intention. However, some things that

18 Dr. Donia wrote and said can be spelled out in a bit more specific terms

19 therefore.

20 For example, Dr. Donia uses, as a source, various censuses of

21 Bosnia-Herzegovina, from 1910 and 1981, and he compares the numerical

22 ratios in terms of the members of various ethnic communities at these

23 points in time. However, the trouble is that the geographical notions

24 that he uses do not have the same meaning in 1910 and in 1981.

25 Q. Explain that.

Page 15734

1 A. For example, the notion of Fojnica, in the 1910 census corresponds

2 to the notions of Fojnica, Kiseljak and Busovaca in 1981 because the

3 administrative setup of that area is different. The notion of Travnik

4 from the 1910 census corresponds to the notions of Travnik, Novi Travnik

5 and Vitez from the 1981 census. A serious historian would take note of

6 such things, take them into consideration, or at least show that he knows

7 about this. That is the type of mistake that can be considered a

8 consequence of possible indolence or possible ignorance. Another type of

9 mistake or ignorance, formal ignorance, is the following example.

10 Dr. Donia claims that he does not know how big a part of Croatia was under

11 the control of the rebel forces of the Serbs from Croatia in 1992. This

12 is certainly a very relevant matter for understanding the context of the

13 conflict in Bosnia-Herzegovina as well.

14 Q. Furthermore, can it be claimed that it was only the Catholics who

15 fought for religious, educational and cultural autonomy under the Ottoman

16 rule? Actually, the question is as follows: Are there significant,

17 meaningful differences between the Orthodox, the Muslims and the Catholics

18 under Ottoman rule?

19 A. Indeed so. Indeed, there are. And these differences are a key

20 point that is conducive to understanding the continuity which finally

21 leads to the conflict in 1992. All three religious communities become the

22 key of the socialness of the population of Bosnia-Herzegovina, or rather

23 the area that we call Bosnia-Herzegovina nowadays. Please, I would like

24 this word "socialness" to be interpreted as "social consciousness,"

25 because that would more clearly reflect what I actually meant. I am

Page 15735

1 referring to an awareness as to where a person belongs in that society.

2 Belonging to a religious community in that society marks a person in terms

3 of how he will make a distinction between "we" and "us" in the world. The

4 pattern created at that point in time is going to pressure and does

5 pressure the consciousness of the inhabitants of Bosnia-Herzegovina, until

6 the present day, as a historical burden which one cannot get rid of even

7 if one wishes to do so.

8 The conclusion is that the differences that are caused by

9 religious affiliation in the Ottoman Empire, thanks to the fact that the

10 Ottoman Empire was the way it was, it was what we could nowadays call a

11 religious state. All of that led to the following: Religious affiliation

12 became the key to one's awareness, consciousness, as to where a person

13 belonged to in that society.

14 Q. It would be logical, of course, to ask you now, I think that we

15 have now come to the question of nationality. According to your findings,

16 this history starts in the medieval times, not only in the 19th century,

17 not as late as the 19th century and this comes as a counterbalance to

18 Yugoslavness. Can you explain this to the Trial Chamber?

19 A. What really surprised me in Dr. Donia's findings was the fact that

20 he, when debating the problem of nations in Bosnia-Herzegovina, did not

21 seek to rely on the rich body of modern literature that pertains to this

22 question. That surprised me even more because Dr. Donia, in his

23 dissertation, relied upon and used extensively the results of social

24 anthropology. In the findings that he presented to this honourable Trial

25 Chamber, had he repeated that procedure, and had he relied upon, at least

Page 15736

1 in part, the vast literature that speaks about the roots of modern

2 nationalism -- I'm using the word "nationalism" here in the scientific

3 meaning of the word, as this term is used to describe the process of

4 creating modern nations. So had Dr. Donia used at least part of that

5 literature, then the honourable Trial Chamber would have got a completely

6 different picture about this, different to the extent to which the role of

7 ethnic communities would have been more pronounced, those that have been

8 in existence since the medieval times, and that actually are the cradle of

9 modern nations.

10 In this way, the vast array of issues that has to deal with the

11 problem of nations would have looked completely differently.

12 Q. Very briefly, if you could just give me a brief answer too, which

13 sources did Dr. Donia use and where is this rich literature and rich

14 documentation that he did not use and that he should have used, in your

15 opinion?

16 A. The literature is certainly far more accessible to Dr. Donia than

17 to me. Libraries and resources that are available to persons dealing with

18 this subject matter where Dr. Donia lives are incomparably better

19 organised and more accessible than in the environment in which I live, on

20 the one hand. On the other hand, documents are a major problem, a major

21 problem, because as concerns the events of the past 30 years, most of them

22 are not accessible. That is one of the things that Dr. Donia actually had

23 to be aware of. Actually his dissertation reveals how a political

24 movement came into being, but he reveals that to a large extent due to the

25 availability of documents that are of a secret nature, that is to say

Page 15737

1 police reports, findings of intelligence services from the end of the 19th

2 century; in a word, a type of documents that nowadays are not nearly as

3 accessible to us now as the documents pertaining to the 19th century are.

4 This distance that is opened up over the years can show very unusual

5 results.

6 For example, modern historians look at what Austro-Hungarian

7 policies in Bosnia-Herzegovina were like after Austro-Hungary occupied

8 this country. Very unusual things were discovered.

9 We have a problem with the previous sentence actually.

10 Q. That's why I'm asking to you look at the transcript. I am not

11 always fortunate enough in having a witness whose English is very good so

12 I really want to you follow the transcript all the time, because of the

13 dynamics of your speech, but also I want to you check whether everything

14 is in the spirit of the language that you have been using.

15 A. I said something different here. I said that modern historians,

16 when they look at the policy of Austro-Hungary in Bosnia-Herzegovina,

17 revealed something unusual, something that the contemporaries could not

18 have known. The man who governed Bosnia-Herzegovina for 20 years on

19 behalf of Austro-Hungary, and his name was Benjamin Kallay, tried, in

20 Bosnia-Herzegovina -- and at that time there were already three ethnic

21 communities that were on the road of the creation of a modern nation -- he

22 tried to create out of them a single political body. His intimate

23 writings revealed, however, that the objective of such efforts was to

24 de-Islamise the Muslim population in Bosnia-Herzegovina. That is one such

25 case. Subsequent insight makes it possible to create a more reliable

Page 15738

1 picture, and such procedures are recommended, especially in situations

2 where a great deal remains unclear.

3 Q. Let us then move to the most logical question. As a historian,

4 can you tell us when does the Bosniak nation come into being?

5 A. European historians and theoreticians too, of what we call the

6 national problem -- here theoreticians is missing.

7 People who engage in the theory of ethnic relations, the

8 translation is --

9 Q. You're quite free to correct it.

10 A. So those people are today interested in Bosnia and Herzegovina and

11 accord a great deal of attention to Bosnia-Herzegovina, because they can

12 follow how a modern nation is coming into being today. Why is that

13 interesting? Modern European nations came into being in the 19th century,

14 and as of the 19th century, there has been no cases of emergence of new

15 nations in Europe. However, it is precisely in Bosnia-Herzegovina, over

16 the past ten or 15 years, that a modern nation began to emerge. Members

17 of that community acquire awareness of their belonging to a community and

18 that awareness is politically highly relevant. And that is what attracts

19 the attention of many authors in Europe and the world over.

20 So that at present, we can follow what we only knew from hearsay

21 about the 19th century, namely in the process of building a modern nation,

22 and tradition are of extraordinary importance and English historian Eric

23 Hobsbawm in a collection which he edited himself, showed how, in the 19th

24 century, traditions were invented to help towards the integration of a

25 modern nation. Today, in Bosnia-Herzegovina, we can follow such a

Page 15739

1 historiographic production on a large scale. It, that is this

2 historiography, engages in creating a myth about history and the past,

3 which is -- which ought to prove the deep roots of the modern nation.

4 That historiography has been assessed in this way even by Dr. Donia in one

5 of his recent works. In a text which, in the scientific classification,

6 is called a survey, review, Dr. Donia presents several latest works

7 published in Sarajevo, historical books. He concludes -- in his review he

8 concludes that these works are demonstrating how a Bosniak -- how Bosniak

9 historians would like their history to look like, rather than what it

10 truly looks like.

11 JUDGE CLARK: Can I interrupt while we are at it? From what I

12 understand from what you're saying you've been asked several questions,

13 none of which you've given an answer to but what you've said is

14 interesting. Is what you're saying is that you oppose Dr. Donia's theory

15 that there is such a thing as a separate Bosnian Bosniak identity, that in

16 other words it isn't just religious differences according to Dr. Donia,

17 and according to you, it's a reinvented history or a totally invented

18 history to find a separate identity. Are you saying that they are not any

19 different, that the Muslim nation or ethnic group is not the descendant of

20 a separate group, that they are people who changed their religion and are

21 now busily inventing a past? That seems to be what I understand so we can

22 know exactly what you're saying.

23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, that is not what I'm

24 trying to say. I am trying to say that the old religious identity under

25 the modernising influences, some were faster, some were slower, grows into

Page 15740

1 a modern identity, social identity, which we term "nation" at present.

2 That in the Bosniak case, this process, for a variety of reasons, is late.

3 JUDGE CLARK: That's very unclear to me. Are you disagreeing with

4 Dr. Donia or are you agreeing with him up to a point? It's not clear to

5 me what you're saying. You were asked about ten minutes ago when did the

6 Bosniak nation come into being, and my understanding from your paper is

7 that the word "Bosniak" was first used by this governor from

8 Austro -- Austria-Hungary and that he invented that word and the effect of

9 the word was the de-Islamisation of that group of people. But that

10 doesn't -- that's got nothing to do with the question Mr. Krsnik asked.

11 Mr. Krsnik asked when did the Bosniak nation come into being? Well,

12 surely the question is before you gave it the name Bosniak, did the group

13 exist as a separate entity or ethnic group even before the concept of

14 nationhood? That I think is what Mr. Krsnik was asking you and I'm very

15 interested in the answer.

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] My -- in my answer, I start from the

17 fact that terms have a history of their own, that at different times

18 different notions are used in different ways, that at one and the same

19 time, different people use them with different purposes in mind.

20 Benjamin Kallay endeavoured to use the term "Bosniak" for his own purpose.

21 Present-day -- the present-day political elite endeavours to use this same

22 notion for their own -- for its own purposes. And having said that, I

23 must emphasise that in conformity with the modern interpretation, a nation

24 is exclusively a form of massive political mobilisation, that as a manner

25 of massive political mobilisation, it relies -- it looks for support in

Page 15741

1 what it has found in the society, that is, its actors look for support in

2 the things they've found in a society, and in this particular case, it

3 means ethnic identities.

4 In the 19th century and for the most part of the 20th century, the

5 Bosniak nation, as we call it today, did not have support in the old name

6 of the ethnic community.

7 MR. KRSNIK: [Interpretation]

8 Q. Professor, will you please try to speak in a language which is

9 comprehensible to us who are laymen? Try to explain simply when did the

10 Bosniak nation come into being, as we call it today, and of course, if you

11 cannot do that in a nutshell, please then try to make some of the notions

12 more comprehensible to us who are lay, because you are really beyond

13 comprehension.

14 A. Very well, it's like this. I think that the whole picture will

15 become easy to understand the moment I say that in Sarajevo, as the

16 capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, you do not have a single monument to

17 any historical -- of any historical figure from the national past. In

18 Zagreb, for comparison's sake, what does that mean? In Zagreb, as you

19 come out of the railway station, you come across the monument of

20 King Tomislav. All the inhabitants of Croatia, when they arrive in

21 Zagreb, acquire awareness of their common past when they cast a look at

22 the monument. He is their old king. In Belgrade likewise. In every city

23 in western Europe, again likewise. In Sarajevo, the first king of the

24 mediaeval Bosnia had a street, that is, a street named after him, and it

25 was a side street. Is the picture clear now?

Page 15742

1 Q. To me, of course it is, but I want you to explain it to the

2 honourable Court and you still have not answered to me in a comprehensible

3 language, when does the Bosniak nation come into being? I understand you,

4 that you are saying that it is coming into being today, and that we are

5 witnesses to its emergence but now the time is coming for a break. If you

6 can do it now, then let us do it before the break. If not, then I will

7 ask Their Honours to have the break and then we will come back to it

8 because the crucial question that is of concern to us we want to you bring

9 closer to us laymen of course if you can answer it, when did the Bosniak

10 nation come into being, 1915, 1980 it began to evolve, you understand that

11 is what I want to you to do, to bring it closer to us who are lay?

12 A. Right. So a nation in the modern sense comes into being

13 at -- when people start to identify themselves by a name, a common name.

14 In the case of the Bosniak nation, that moment could be situated in 1974.

15 That name, as the name of people who are aware of the fact that they are

16 Bosniaks, and that term is not used before that.

17 THE INTERPRETER: The interpreters correction 1994, not 1974.

18 A. Since 1971, there is officially the name for members of that same

19 community, and that is Muslims. Prior to 1971, members of that same

20 community defined themselves by the fact that they were neither Serbs nor

21 Muslims -- sorry, neither Croats. My apologies.

22 JUDGE CLARK: Can I ask you this? Is it the situation that there

23 was never in modern times, and I would say from the mid-19th century,

24 never a time when the citizens of what is now Bosnia-Herzegovina called

25 themselves Bosnians? Because when you go to the United Kingdom or

Page 15743

1 Ireland, Bosnians mean Bosnian Muslims. If somebody says they are a

2 Bosnian, everybody knows what they mean. That's why we use the term a

3 Bosnian Serb and a Bosnian Croat. That means that they are people from

4 Bosnia who are Orthodox and claim allegiance to Serbia and likewise

5 Croatia but they are natives of what is now Bosnia-Herzegovina. So did

6 Muslims never, if they were asked in the 19th century, if they were

7 travelling in Europe, "what is your nationality?" Say, "We are Bosnians"?

8 MR. KRSNIK: [Interpretation]

9 Q. Do you now understand how things ought to be explained?

10 A. The name "Bosnian" Bosanac, in contrast with "Bosniak," Bosnjak --

11 [In English] The name Bosnian as contrast with the Bosniak.

12 JUDGE CLARK: I understand that but the question I asked you,

13 Professor Ancic, was, did these people before anyone invented the name

14 Bosniak, not have an identity? The Ottomans were gone, the

15 Austro-Hungarians were there, I mean these people were neither Arabs,

16 Turks or Austro-Hungarians. They had an ethnic identity. Did they not

17 describe themselves as Bosnians? After all, they came from Bosnia.

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] They called themselves Bosnians, but

19 Serbs and Croats also called themselves Bosnians because that is the

20 definition, that is a definition, like, for instance, a Toscanian or a

21 Lombard or Lombardian or for somebody who was born in Normandy in France.

22 So it is a regional definition which does not imply political loyalty.

23 JUDGE CLARK: Yes, but they had a name. They were happy to stand

24 up and say, "I'm a Bosnian." In the 19th century, the 18th century,

25 before nationhood apart from very few countries had become fully

Page 15744

1 established or maybe a century earlier, people were still saying that they

2 were from smaller principalities of Italy or Germany. They might have

3 said that they were English or French but they were much more likely I

4 think as a historian, you would know, to say I'm a Norman, I'm a

5 Provencal, I'm whatever, from the particular provinces. It was important

6 so there was an identity which was Bosnian. So in that sense you don't

7 disagree with Dr. Donia so far. What you're talking about is, I

8 understand it, a suppression of an identity and a reemergence of something

9 different. And we've had people here who spoke about a Muslim identity

10 being suppressed or their religion or whatever, and Muslims always being

11 unrecognised. And I think that's what -- we are going round and round in

12 circles. If we are going to use Bosniak as opposed to Bosnian, to be the

13 genesis of a new nation, that when somebody rechristens you or renames you

14 suddenly you emerge for the first time and that's, I think, simply not so,

15 but I don't know where this argument is getting us any way. Why are we

16 getting bogged down? This is not what this expert came to talk about

17 because you don't really deal with that in your paper to any great extent.

18 The paper is not a criticism of Dr. Donia. I thought it was your view of

19 the war and its motives.

20 MR. KRSNIK: [Interpretation] We shall most certainly come to that,

21 Your Honour, but you now prompt me, and experience in this courtroom for

22 the past year, to try to explain how things are, because it is not how you

23 understood it, Your Honour, because Bosnian and Bosniak is not the same in

24 the present meaning of the modern nation, and that is why we brought this

25 professor to explain it because I'm saying that the Bosnian nation did

Page 15745

1 not -- never existed before 1994. We can speak about an ethnic community.

2 We can speak about a religious community but not about a nation. And that

3 is a major difference. And for the past year we have been listening here,

4 myths and for the past year we have been listening what historians of the

5 same a category, through Bosniak historiography try to market in the world

6 and in this Tribunal through the Prosecutor's Office and that is why we

7 have brought a historian -- of course I won't say that because it wouldn't

8 be decent -- who he is considered one of the great men who know most about

9 the Bosnian and Bosnian history. But it is time for the break so I will

10 ask only a very short question to round off this topic because you know in

11 the indictment we have the language and history and nation, so unless we

12 analyse these terms and unless a historian explains them to us, then we

13 shall leave here with wrong ideas because a court may not try history.

14 History is facts and notorious facts. And this is my feeling is what is

15 looked for here, that these judgements, pass judgement on history,

16 especially with regard to the nation in its final stages, in the final

17 stages of its taking shape.

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honours?

19 JUDGE LIU: Yes. You want to answer that question? Yes, you may.

20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] An important fact, which is related

21 to your question, is that your view of Bosnia is significantly different

22 from the view of those who live in it. For those people, the marker is

23 membership in a community and that community's name, who says of himself

24 that he's a Bosnian says that he was born in Bosnia, and the one who says

25 of himself that he's a Bosniak says of himself that he belongs to a modern

Page 15746

1 nation, and these are highly relevant differences for those people, and

2 because of these differences, they are up to going to war about them.

3 JUDGE LIU: Well, Mr. Krsnik, we have spent over an hour talking

4 about those terminologies. As you rightly put it, we are not trying

5 history. Of course, I believe that history is related to this case but

6 what we want to hear is those facts in history which relate to what

7 happened in 1992 and 1993. Now we have an expert witness and you will be

8 allowed to ask some leading questions because we already have his

9 statement at our hands and I hope during the break you could organise your

10 questions and ask some direct questions which appear in his statement and

11 which is related to what happened in 1992 and 1993.

12 We will resume at 20 minutes past 4.00.

13 --- Recess taken at 3.47 p.m.

14 --- On resuming at 4.19 p.m.

15 JUDGE LIU: Yes, Mr. Krsnik.

16 MR. KRSNIK: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honours.

17 Q. I was thinking during the break how to phrase my question in order

18 to round off this topic, because I believe I realised what is the gist of

19 our misunderstanding. So let me ask you like this. The Islamic religious

20 community, that particular group, which peoples comprise it and when did

21 this Islamic religious community begin to develop into a nation? Is that

22 clear?

23 A. Yes. The question is quite clear. The answer, as usual, is not

24 simple.

25 Q. Please try to simplify it, and explain it to us in a

Page 15747

1 comprehensible language?

2 A. I shall do my utmost to make it comprehensible even though it will

3 certainly not be simple. So research and in this regard, we fortunately

4 can rely on an author whose results so far have not been undermined, and

5 that is the German historian who originally came from Bosnia-Herzegovina,

6 and whose name is Srecko Dzaja. It is beyond any reasonable doubt that he

7 established -- no. It is -- he established beyond any reasonable doubt,

8 it is not beyond reasonable doubt that he established. He established

9 beyond any reasonable doubt that the roots of the ethnic community from

10 which the Bosniak nation would emerge are very diverse and they comprise

11 descendants of the population which happened to be there at the time when

12 the Ottomans conquered the territory, who embraced Islam, then parts of

13 the population whom the sultan moved to that territory, be it of Turkish

14 or some other origin, that is ready-made Muslims who were then sent to

15 those areas. The third layer is a large number of refugees who headed for

16 Bosnia and Herzegovina after the Ottoman empire lost a territory which we

17 call today the Republic of Hungary, the Republic of Croatia, and even

18 parts of the Republic of Slovakia. Therefore, at least three very

19 important strata of different ethnic origin. First, under the influence

20 of the Ottoman authority, these strata were put together in one group,

21 which was originally defined only by their religious affiliation. Is that

22 sufficiently short and clear?

23 Q. I hope so. I am clear. I understand. But I'm not the one who is

24 important here. But I believe that the Prosecutor will have some questions

25 about it so we shall leave it to him and we shall move on.

Page 15748

1 Can you tell the honourable Court if the Bosnian case, let me call

2 it that, is singular or what one could call the Bosniak mosaic -- is that

3 a situation specific of only this region, only the area that we today

4 denote as Bosnia-Herzegovina?

5 A. The composition of the Bosnian society is specific, no doubt, but

6 the type of relations which governed the society is not specific. A

7 similar group of problems, a similar type of problems concerning the

8 relations among different groups exists in other parts of Europe too.

9 Understanding of such a type of relations which can be gained by an

10 insight Into a situation in countries such as Northern Ireland, Wales and

11 Denmark, and I picked out the example from a part of the English, from a

12 work by an English anthropologist, Richard Jenkins show how this type of

13 relations took shape in the course of history and how history determined

14 how these problems would be solved. For instance, the history is the one

15 which defines the model of the violent solution of problems in Northern

16 Ireland, just as history is the one which defines the fact that similar

17 problems in Wales are not solved by force. And at long last, history is

18 the one which has brought about the fact that the Danish nationalism had

19 no need for -- had no need to resort to this model of behaviour because of

20 the different circumstances under which the modern-day Denmark emerged.

21 All these examples show that, with all the specificities notwithstanding,

22 Bosnia-Herzegovina is not an exception. But they also help to understand

23 the problems of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

24 Q. Sir, doctor, let's move on to modern history. Let us move to the

25 events of the past ten years. By way of introduction, perhaps I would

Page 15749

1 like to ask you, relying upon what you've just said about Europe, that is

2 to say western Europe and central Europe, there have been multi-ethnic

3 communities that have ethnic problems but these problems were not resolved

4 in a drastic manner. Was there a possibility of resolving interethnic

5 problems in Bosnia, those that were in latent conflict? Could they have

6 been resolved without resorting to war? Can you address that by way of an

7 introduction to this part of modern history? I would like to hear your

8 thinking.

9 A. You mean did history mean that problems would have to be resolved

10 via -- by violence? This is not exactly predetermined, but tradition is

11 the one that influenced the choice made by people who live in that area.

12 Now, how did that happen? The traditional way of resolving such problems

13 was, to a large extent, violence. Another important thing that affected

14 these developments that led to a violent resolving of problems was the

15 very beginning of the conflict. The role that at this beginning was

16 played by that side which had an advantage to begin with, and which

17 imposed violence as a method of resolving the problems.

18 However, it is important to remember another important thing. The

19 book of Istvan Bibo, a Hungarian historian, "The misery of small European

20 nations," written in 1946, reads nowadays, as the scenario of the war in

21 the former Yugoslavia. However, it was written at a time when it seemed

22 to the author that Yugoslavia was the only country of central and eastern

23 Europe that had resolved these problems. Bibo deals with the Czech

24 Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and their mutual relations. However

25 when these names are replaced by Serbs, Croats, Bosniaks, Slovenians and

Page 15750

1 Macedonians, one actually obtains that which was Yugoslavia's reality

2 after 1990. Once again, situations in the neighbourhood of

3 Bosnia-Herzegovina, that is to say in the most immediate neighbourhood,

4 are quite helpful in terms of understanding its own problems.

5 Q. A subquestion: In its history, did Bosnia-Herzegovina ever have

6 institutions, traditional state institutions, in which it would train, if

7 I can put it that way, for the peaceful settlement of disputes? Have I

8 been clear?

9 A. Yes. First of all, a representative body where social conflicts

10 of this type could have been resolved, the first one of this kind, was

11 created in 1910, and it operated until the outbreak of the First World War

12 in 1914. The second time that Bosnia-Herzegovina got any form of

13 political representation within the boundaries of Bosnia-Herzegovina was

14 in 1945. However, the body that was established then as the Assembly of

15 Bosnia-Herzegovina was actually just a mere transmitter for the government

16 of the then-Communist Party. In it, there were no possibilities for

17 resolving such problems. So when, in 1990, for the first time it was

18 democratically elected, the population that entered the Assembly of

19 Bosnia-Herzegovina never had any kind of experience with working in such a

20 body. Never before that did Bosnia-Herzegovina have a true representative

21 parliamentary body, that is.

22 Q. So we've come to 1990. Could you give us a brief summary, in

23 terms of this historical distance of ten to 12 years? So let us restrict

24 ourselves to Bosnia-Herzegovina. Let us view the true causes that led to

25 the war.

Page 15751

1 A. In response to such a question, I have to say straight away that

2 the inaccessibility of a large number of documents makes it impossible to

3 carry out a detailed analysis. However, since historians have to deal

4 with the past even when there is not enough documents, from the

5 present-day point of view, and on the basis of what is accessible today, a

6 general framework can be portrayed within which the conflict broke out.

7 This general framework would be the following: An attempt by the

8 political establishment located in Belgrade to carry through a plan which

9 can be called "internal secession." This notion was introduced in

10 literature by a professor of political science from the Central European

11 University in Budapest, Daniella Conversini. The point is that the

12 Belgrade political establishment intended to take over parts of the former

13 Yugoslavia and to create a new state out of them. In the attainment of

14 this objective, that establishment did not refrain from the use of force

15 either, which gave rise to the conflict. According to the possibilities

16 we have available today in order to learn about these matters, this was

17 actually the beginning of the war.

18 However, due to different objectives, different political

19 objectives, in the political elites within Bosnia-Herzegovina, for a while

20 there was a concerted resistance to these endeavours made from Belgrade.

21 Then the differences became too big. Therefore, they could no longer be

22 concealed, these differences in political objectives, that is. They are

23 what actually brought about a conflict within the conflict, and in this

24 way, the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina got the form of a civil war. That

25 would be the general framework that can be outlined on the basis of

Page 15752

1 everything that is accessible nowadays.

2 Q. In part you've already answered my question, because I had

3 intended to ask you whether there were any differences between the

4 protagonists of what was going on in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Perhaps you've

5 already answered this question in part already.

6 A. There were major differences. These differences stem, first and

7 foremost, from the initial positions. The Belgrade political

8 establishment managed to have full control over a large part of the

9 structures of the former Yugoslavia, that is to say the state authorities,

10 the army, the police, the intelligence services, the diplomatic service.

11 They put them all under their own control and used them for attaining

12 their own objectives.

13 On the other hand, neither the Croats nor the Muslims had any

14 support in what could be described as the state apparatus. These two

15 communities represented political elites -- were represented by political

16 elites -- were represented by political elites that practically only in

17 1990 came to power, that did not have any experience in terms of governing

18 a state, did not have experience with dealing with the structure of

19 institutions that are called a government, and very soon these

20 institutions fell apart anyway. So this is a major difference, and it

21 stems from their very initial points of departure, initial positions.

22 Q. Precisely. This was your last sentence and I would like to you

23 clarify that to the Trial Chamber. Does that mean that in 1992, the

24 organised state apparatus, although the state of Bosnia-Herzegovina was

25 internationally recognised, that this state apparatus did not really

Page 15753

1 exist? There wasn't one?

2 A. We have to proceed from the following, that according to a modern

3 concept, a state is an institution which has a monopoly over force in a

4 certain area, and which ensures for its subjects the meeting of a variety

5 of social needs. At the point in time when Bosnia-Herzegovina was

6 recognised as a state, the authorities that represented that state were no

7 longer in a position to exercise a monopoly over the use of force, even in

8 Sarajevo, their very own capital. At that moment, there were situations

9 that showed that the authorities do not have any control over persons who

10 had weapons in their hands. Another problem that these authorities had

11 was the fact that already in the month of April, all -- about 80 to 90 per

12 cent of all Serbs who were employed there had left state authorities and

13 agencies. So these authorities could no longer carry out the functions

14 that they were supposed to carry out. They did not have skilled persons

15 who knew their jobs.

16 A third problem for the authorities concerned was the fact that it

17 was gradually losing formal legality too, and electoral legitimacy.

18 Q. Could you please clarify this last point?

19 A. It is simplest to explain it using the example of a body that is

20 called the Presidency of Bosnia-Herzegovina. The Presidency was a body

21 that was inherited from the time of socialism. It was conceived as a body

22 that would represent the entirety of the population of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

23 It consisted of two representatives respectively of every one of the

24 constituent peoples of Bosnia-Herzegovina, and a 7th representative who

25 was elected from the list of persons who felt themselves to be Yugoslavs

Page 15754

1 and members of other ethnic communities. That is to say apart from the

2 three ethnic communities mentioned. Until the month of June 1992, this

3 Presidency remained without three of its elected members. The seventh

4 member, who was elected from the list of those who did not belong to the

5 three constituent peoples, started publicly and officially introducing

6 himself as a member of one of these three ethnic communities, as a Muslim,

7 that is, so at that time there weren't any Bosniaks yet. So this was the

8 seventh member of that body who was supposed to represent persons who were

9 neither Serbs nor Croats nor Muslims, and during the elections themselves,

10 he declared himself as being one of those who declared themselves as

11 Yugoslavs, so he betrayed the votes that he had won and he became a Muslim

12 himself. So in that way, this body lost its lawful legality because it

13 did not function in its entirety. It also lost its electoral legitimacy

14 because it no longer represented the voters who had voted for it. In

15 addition to that, and this is one of the unusual ideas that prevailed in

16 the times of socialism, not a single member had any kind of supremacy in

17 that body. All of them bore the same responsibility and all of them

18 enjoyed the same rights.

19 Chairing sessions was the right enjoyed by one of the members of

20 that body, and this right was exercised in the following way. That member

21 of the Presidency chaired sessions during one year. Then he would be

22 replaced by another member of the Presidency who belonged to a different

23 people. And then during the third year, a third member of the Presidency

24 would chair sessions, a member coming from the third ethnic group. And

25 during the fourth year of the four-year term of this body, these three

Page 15755

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12 Blank pages inserted to ensure pagination corresponds between the French and

13 English transcripts. Pages 15755 to 15764.

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

Page 15765

1 would take four-month turns. That was the legal procedure involved, or

2 rather the procedure stipulated by law. However, this procedure could no

3 longer be observed and there was no wish to have it observed, so the man

4 who happened to be at the head of that body gave himself the right to

5 permanently chair that body. As a matter of fact, he even allowed

6 himself, in colloquial speech, to use the title "president". These were

7 certainly problems that require very careful explanations, detailed

8 explanations, too, because such acts can cause major confusion among

9 persons who are not well-versed in the reality of the world from which the

10 protagonists hail. When somebody introduces himself as the president, and

11 when he introduces himself as such worldwide, then this comes across as

12 something that people worldwide perceive as a president, then a person who

13 is elected to such a position, who has a full mandate to reach decisions

14 and who is responsible for his actions. However, in this particular case,

15 it was not so, not even according to law. So the notion that is were

16 being used did not correspond to the reality of the world from which they

17 came. I don't know if I've been clear enough on this.

18 Q. Absolutely so, because for a year now, we've been listening to

19 attempts made by the office of the Prosecution of course to portray the

20 President of the Presidency that way, the way you've just explained it.

21 Of course you are the person who is supposed to say the name of this man?

22 A. Yes, the man [Realtime transcript read in error "plan"] who

23 chaired the Presidency at that time.

24 Q. Please look at the transcript.

25 A. It's supposed to read "the man" not "the plan" who chaired. The

Page 15766

1 man who chaired the Presidency was Alija Izetbegovic. May I just add one

2 more thing? Something that will shed more light on the situation

3 involved? In Bosnia-Herzegovina itself, there were three men who were

4 called president. They had the same legitimate right to that title.

5 Because none of them had an electorate behind him whose president he would

6 be. So all of them, in a way, were self-proclaimed presidents.

7 Q. Do you know about the situation concerning the constitutional

8 court sometime in November, 1992, because here in this courtroom, attempts

9 are being made to portray it as a constitutional, legal body that actually

10 functioned.

11 A. The other agencies of state authority, none of them operated in

12 full strength, and the same is true of the constitutional court. True, I

13 am not an expert who can authoritatively speak about those problems, but I

14 can affirm with certainty that the system of state authority fell, indeed,

15 apart in 1992, and I do not know why would the constitutional court be an

16 exception.

17 Q. Tell me, please, to cut a long story short because I want to hand

18 you over to the gentleman in the Prosecution as soon as possible, apart

19 from all the circumstances in -- concerning the emergence of the HZ HB,

20 what I would like you to explain to the Court is whether the HZ HB, that

21 is the HR HB, ever applied for international recognition as a state. And

22 I will have two side questions to that. So first did it ever request to

23 be recognised? And will you explain the Court too whether the

24 international community either in the Washington or in Dayton Accords

25 recognised all its laws which are still in force and in use? And the

Page 15767

1 Washington Agreement also envisaged a confederation between the federation

2 of the Bosniaks and Muslims, and the Republic of Croatia.

3 A. The Croat Community Herceg-Bosna, subsequently the Croat Republic

4 of Herceg-Bosna, could not apply for the international recognition because

5 it emerged as an ad hoc body which was to fill in the political void after

6 the disintegration of the state of Bosnia-Herzegovina. I do not know how

7 could it apply for international recognition if, in all the documents, it

8 said the name of Bosnia and Herzegovina. That much about the

9 international recognition.

10 The category of international recognition obviously was not a

11 matter that was on the agenda for Herceg-Bosna, whether we speak about the

12 community or the republic, subsequent republic.

13 Q. And what about the laws and the confederation?

14 A. The Washington Agreement recognised the de facto situation, that

15 is, subsequently legitimization of the Croat community and Croat Republic

16 Herceg-Bosna by the fact that its laws were recognised. The Dayton

17 Accords, however, is something completely different. The Dayton Accords

18 subsequently, in retrospection, in retrospect, recognised that a state

19 called the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina, in point of fact never worked.

20 The Dayton Accords drew the political landscape of Bosnia-Herzegovina as

21 if the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina has never existed. The Dayton

22 Accords put in place Bosnia and Herzegovina, and even eliminated the name

23 Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina, the name under which this -- that country

24 was recognised in 1992, as a composite state, which the Republic of Bosnia

25 and Herzegovina was not. And the Dayton Accords revised the provisions of

Page 15768

1 the Washington Agreement if they ran counter to what was achieved in

2 Dayton.

3 Q. So, please, from Dayton until today, what does it look like, and

4 its real name is the state of Bosnia-Herzegovina. What does it look like?

5 And is there a government of the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina? Who

6 represents that state, Bosnia and Herzegovina? Please explain to the

7 Court, as briefly as possible, from Dayton to this day.

8 A. Here we have problems with the translation of individual terms,

9 because translated terms can always cause a confusion. So please tell me

10 what you meant -- what you had in mind, because there is a body which is

11 called the government of Bosnia-Herzegovina. If that is what you meant,

12 then such a body does not exist. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, there is a

13 body called the council of ministers, and having said that, the Dayton

14 Accords and the constitution of Bosnia-Herzegovina avoid explicitly the

15 term "government." That is, "vlada". The term "government" is used

16 explicitly to denote bodies in two constituent states of

17 Bosnia-Herzegovina. So there is the government of the federation of

18 Bosnia-Herzegovina, there is the government of the Republika Srpska, but

19 there are ten more governments in every county, cantons that make up the

20 federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina. So with your permission, to put this

21 matter on a level at which the inhabitants of Bosnia and Herzegovina come

22 across every day, in the daily use, in the media in Bosnia-Herzegovina,

23 the term "government", "vlada", of Bosnia-Herzegovina is never used but

24 only and exclusively the term "the council of ministers." To go into

25 reasons why that is so, the reasons for the situation would take us too

Page 15769

1 far.

2 Q. No, please. This is a very important topic and will you please

3 explain to the Court these two states within one state? So the Federation

4 of the Bosniaks and Muslims, and the Republika Srpska. Which are their

5 powers and what powers have they transferred to the joint state? Which,

6 since the Dayton has been called the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina, to

7 clarify this, because you know for the past year, I've been listening in

8 this courtroom, that is the whole world has been listening, to the

9 Prosecutor who keeps saying, this document was given me by the government

10 of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina and secondly, he is setting out to

11 say that there is such a thing as the government of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

12 You know, these are important issues. So let us see --

13 JUDGE LIU: Well, Mr. Scott?

14 MR. SCOTT: Mr. President, I was trying to avoid interrupting

15 counsel but the time has come for a couple of things. Again I object to

16 the attacks on the politics of counsel, if that's an issue. Number one.

17 The Chamber has heard that before. Number 2, I had the firm

18 understanding, perhaps the Chamber did as well, that this was an expert on

19 mediaeval Yugoslavian history and it seems to me we have gone very far

20 afield from mediaeval Yugoslav history to what we are talking about now.

21 JUDGE LIU: Well, as you know, Mr. Scott, that this Trial Chamber

22 allowed this witness to testify on certain issues which is related to 1992

23 and 1993, on the conflict which is the subject matter of this case. And

24 the matter of the government of Bosnia and Herzegovina has been raised

25 many, many times during the proceedings. This witness is the last witness

Page 15770

1 in the Defence case, and he is an expert witness. Taking all those

2 factors into consideration, we will allow this witness to answer that

3 question from his perspective. Of course the Prosecution has plenty of

4 opportunity to challenge whatever this witness says.

5 Witness, you may answer the question, please.

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I do not consider myself an expert

7 on the constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, but whilst involved in my

8 job, I read documents of relevance to your questions, and I can reproduce

9 their contents to the extent that will satisfy what you're after. The

10 council of ministers in Bosnia and Herzegovina has the mandate over the

11 foreign policy, foreign affairs, foreign trade, including customs,

12 communications of importance for the entire Bosnia and Herzegovina. It

13 has powers to control the borders of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It has

14 powers involved in the return of people to the entities from which they

15 had been expelled, from which they have been expelled, and that would be

16 more or less it. On the other hand, all the other powers, all the other

17 jurisdiction concerning state administration and state bodies, belong to

18 what the Dayton Accords and the constitution define as entities. I have

19 to emphasise that the agreement and the constitution avoid, presumably

20 very precisely, to use the term "state" when referring to the entities.

21 What, at first glance, looks like a constitutional argument, a dispute

22 about the constitutional organisation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, is in point

23 of fact a purely political argument, but that is not something that is of

24 much interest to the Judges. And the governments of the federation of

25 Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Republika Srpska are institutions with

Page 15771

1 identical powers, but they do not operate in the same way, because the

2 internal order, the internal organisation, of these two entities is

3 different. Republika Srpska belongs to a type of unitarian state,

4 centralised, and the federation, as its name shows, is a composite state.

5 The constituent elements of which are, in terms of the law of state, of

6 state law, are counties, that is, cantons much which there are ten whose

7 terms of reference are such that they can have their autonomous

8 governments and autonomous representative bodies.

9 Another uncommon [Realtime transcript read in error "and common"]

10 thing concerning the government of the federation, which stems from the

11 climate of mutual distrust. Here this is not "common" but "uncommon".

12 So another uncommon aspect of the government of the federation is

13 that it has ministers and deputy ministers with almost identical rights.

14 The offices are distributed on the parity basis between the Croats and

15 Muslims, that is, Bosniaks, and a minister and his deputy cannot come from

16 the same people. At the same time, no act becomes final and valid unless

17 it has been co-signed by the relevant minister and his deputy. And that

18 would be it.

19 MR. KRSNIK: [Interpretation]

20 Q. Thank you, expert. I've been waiting for somebody to explain it

21 for a full year. What is the reality of Bosnia and Herzegovina and now I

22 wish to -- I want to ask you -- I received a letter from the minister of

23 defence of the federation in which he says that the he would be very happy

24 to allow me access to the archive but that his deputy minister does not

25 allow it and that is what you just --

Page 15772

1 A. That is the reality. A minister cannot meet your request unless

2 it is also approved by his deputy.

3 Q. I have given this document to be translated because on the basis

4 of this, I will also seek -- but that doesn't matter. I wanted to hear

5 your explanation. We are moving towards the end. Two questions which

6 have also been preoccupying us here: Are you aware of any ultimatum of

7 April 1993 that would issued by the HZ HB to the Muslims, Bosniaks?

8 A. Yes. I am aware of this ultimatum.

9 Q. Is it really an ultimatum or is it something else? I want an

10 explanation.

11 A. I am aware of the ultimatum from the expert opinion of Dr.

12 Donia's.

13 Q. Yes. Can you?

14 A. What struck me as odd was that Dr. Donia relied on two newspaper

15 comments referring to this ultimatum in his expert opinion. This

16 ultimatum, as interpreted, and it needs to be interpreted within the whole

17 context of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in my judgement, is a kind

18 of political pressure, it at the same -- on a par with, say, the decision

19 of the constitutional court of 1992 on the unlawfulness, illegality of the

20 Croat Community of Herceg-Bosna.

21 Q. Interesting. Now, my one-before-the-last question. As a

22 historian, have you had an opportunity to come across or see the

23 transcripts, alleged, in inverted commas, or authentic ones, from

24 President Tudjman's office? And if yes, tell us what it is about. And

25 how do you see them? What do you think of them?

Page 15773

1 A. I have come across this material in a book by Ciril Rebicic, who

2 was another expert in this honourable court.

3 Q. On whose side?

4 A. The Prosecutor's. In his book, published in Zagreb, published the

5 transcript of an audio recording, from a meeting which Dr. Franjo Tudjman

6 held with representatives of the HDZ from Bosnia-Herzegovina.

7 Q. Do you know the meeting on the 27th of December, 1991?

8 A. Yes, yes, yes. That is the record or rather the transcript

9 because minutes is a much stricter defined term than what we are dealing

10 with here. Moreover, in different papers in Croatia --

11 Q. Different papers?

12 A. [In English] Newspapers.

13 Q. See how it's translated?

14 A. I'm talking about newspapers, about the press, written press. So

15 in these newspapers, texts were published and a claim was made that they

16 represented transcripts of the audio recordings done during meetings which

17 President Tudjman held in his residence. The problem regarding these

18 texts, and I deliberately say "texts," is very simple for a professional

19 historian. There is no guarantee that these are authentic documents. The

20 audio recording itself is missing. Those papers have no official

21 authentication. And a historian must, in the first place, establish to

22 what extent is a document what it purports to be. In this case, it is

23 impossible to establish. Namely, although these texts circulate, the

24 originals are not accessible. So that it is impossible to establish

25 whether they are truly what they presume to be.

Page 15774

1 On the other hand, what I read in Ciril Ribicic's book, namely

2 what is printed there as a conversation, as a record of a conversation, as

3 a historian, I cannot really fully judge it because I do not have an

4 insight into what previous conversations, preceding conversations, looked

5 like, all the people that President Tudjman met, what kind of information

6 he had at his disposal, and how those conversations were interpreted later

7 on in subsequent conversations, and these are all the elements which must

8 underpin the evaluation of such material.

9 What can be done on the basis of a text edited in this manner is

10 to discern a situation in which a man who maintains permanent contact with

11 representatives of what we call today the international community, it is a

12 man who is aware, who realises that the decision on the future of

13 Bosnia-Herzegovina is taken by and large by representatives of that

14 international community, and that this is indeed so, that it has indeed

15 been so during the past few hundred years is attested to by Misha Glenny's

16 books, Stavrianos, an American historian of Greek origin and so on

17 and so forth. I won't now list them all. In their books, they all show

18 how, in, on the Balkan peninsula, relevant political decisions have always

19 been made by representatives of the big powers. In contrast, therefore,

20 with a man who realises that, and across the man who realises it, there

21 sit people who come from their small milieus, who believe in their

22 messianic role and who believe that they have a prescription for the

23 solution to the crisis in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The atmosphere at that

24 meeting, and I can speak only about my impressions about the atmosphere,

25 if the things which are written there are true, that atmosphere therefore

Page 15775

1 is as follows: An attempt by that man to people gathered there, to

2 confirm their importance to the people gathered there, to, on the other

3 hand, hear what they think. And thirdly to try to transmit to them that

4 most important message, that in spite of their wishes, they will not be

5 the ones who will decide on the future of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

6 Q. I left this question for the very end, because again, for a year,

7 I've been listening to something in this courtroom. I've been listening

8 to references played to the Banovina of Croatia. Mr. Usher, you can use

9 my copy. I know this by heart anyway. This is Exhibit P899. Oh, yes,

10 oh, yes.

11 In my opinion, until now, nobody explained the time,

12 circumstances, what happened, and how come this happened, and where this

13 name came from. Nobody explained this to the Trial Chamber. I've been

14 listening to this for a year now, that President Tudjman wanted to

15 establish the banovina to the detriment of Bosnia-Herzegovina. I would

16 like to hear your expert's opinion. That is my last question. That is

17 exactly the amount of time that we have left until the break. So that you

18 can explain the time circumstances, the historical circumstances, and

19 everything else to the Trial Chamber, and could you please explain whether

20 this has anything to do with 1992.

21 A. It would be pretentious on my part to believe that I can explain

22 what Dr. Tudjman actually meant, and I hope that that is not what you're

23 asking me to do, because after all, after 50 years' time, perhaps some

24 papers will surface that will shed new light on all these problems.

25 Q. By all means. I meant that you should explain these historical

Page 15776

1 circumstances using this map because that is what has been shown here time

2 and again.

3 A. I have understood that perfectly, but I have to say what I cannot

4 do. What is called banovina --

5 Q. You can also use your pointer and show this on the map.

6 A. Banovina is an attempt made in 1939 to resolve the problems in the

7 relations between the Serbs and Croats, but please, this was 1939. That

8 was a time, and actually now we are going back to what we debated, so to

9 speak, during the first part. At that time, nobody took

10 Bosnia-Herzegovina seriously as a separate problem or the Muslim

11 population in Bosnia-Herzegovina as a serious problem. And as a

12 historian, I have to warn about that. There are very different

13 circumstances involved in terms of when something happens. So to transfer

14 a situation from 1992 into 1939 is the same kind of nonsensical thing like

15 transferring the situation of 1939 to 1992. Another question that is

16 important to explain what the banovina is, the Banovina of Croatia, that's

17 what it was called, was created by observing the borders, the

18 administrative borders, of a body which, until 1918, was called the

19 Kingdom of Croatia, Dalmatia and Slavonia, and to this territory was added

20 a territory which at that point in time, the Croat population outnumbered

21 the Serb population.

22 Q. Excuse me. In that year, in 1939, was there a Muslim or a Bosniak

23 nation?

24 A. There were certainly ideas about that in certain circles, ideas

25 that this is a separate community, but this is not a subject of public

Page 15777

1 discourse. In political relations, no one was thinking in those terms,

2 because a distinction has to be made here as to what political reality is

3 and what future potential is. And that point in time, there were

4 certainly foundations out of which a new nation would grow, but that is

5 not a reality in political life yet. In 1939, no one could think in terms

6 of what was topical in 1971 or 1972.

7 Q. Please look at this pink-coloured thing here within the banovina.

8 What was it called in 1939, the pink thing in the middle, in the middle of

9 the banovina.

10 Q. Yes, that's right, what was it that called?

11 A. At that time that was called the Savska Banovina. I'm sorry, not

12 Savska banovina, the Vrbaska Banovina. The green area up here is Savska

13 Banovina. And all of then Yugoslavia was divided into banovinas. So the

14 Banovina of Croatia was not an exception in terms of the setup existing

15 throughout the former Yugoslavia then. It is not even an exception in

16 terms of the fact that its majority population were Croats, because Savska

17 banovina at that time was populated by Slovenians only. So that would be

18 it. That would be the historical context of the banovina.

19 Q. Expert, sir, that was my last question. I thank you for having

20 come and for having helped all of us with your testimony to understand

21 certain things.

22 MR. KRSNIK: [Interpretation] Your Honours, I have concluded.

23 JUDGE LIU: Well, it's time for a break, I think. We will resume

24 at ten minutes past 6.00.

25 --- Recess taken at 5.42 p.m.

Page 15778

1 --- On resuming at 6.15 p.m.

2 JUDGE LIU: Yes. Cross-examination. Mr. Scott?

3 Cross-examined by Mr. Scott:

4 Q. Good afternoon, sir.

5 A. Good afternoon.

6 Q. Before we get too far away from it, sir, I want to ask you a

7 couple of questions. Toward the end of your direct testimony in

8 connection with the ultimatum in April, 1993, you said that this was a

9 kind of political pressure. Can you please explain a bit more about,

10 first of all, political pressure by who? Who was exercising this

11 political pressure?

12 A. Well, obviously, at that point in time, it was exercised by the

13 HVO against the other side in the conflict, which had not yet attained the

14 form of an open conflict. As far as it can be discerned today, the

15 pressure had a very definite objective. The objective was to try to win

16 over the then-still-Muslim side to accept fully the provisions of the

17 Vance-Owen Plan.

18 Q. Would it be more accurate to say, sir, I don't question what

19 you've said but at all, in fact, but would it be more accurate to say that

20 it was pressure on the Muslim side to accept the HVO vision of the

21 Vance-Owen Plan?

22 A. Perhaps it would be quite accurate but we would have to take into

23 account the fact that Vance and Owen had one vision of the plan and they

24 were the ones who conceived of it, and then another vision was on the side

25 of the Croats, and a third on the side of the Muslims, and fourth the

Page 15779

1 representatives, the political representatives of the Serbs and so on and

2 so forth so then we could speak about a countless number of visions of

3 this agreement.

4 Q. All right. Now n your report, you say that the rise of Serbian

5 nationalism, I'm referring to page 22 of the English version, or the

6 translation, the rise of Serbian nationalism calls the same reaction

7 everywhere, that is the awakening or awaking and rise of another

8 nationalisms.

9 Do I understand correctly, sir, when you say "other nationalisms"

10 you include in that nationalisms to use that phrase, if I can say it that

11 way, nationalisms of the Muslim group, and nationalisms among the Croats?

12 A. If we wish to be quite accurate, then we would proceed from the

13 following: That every form of national determination is situation-bound.

14 In any situation, when a given group accentuates its own national

15 identity, this inevitably causes a reaction on the part of those who do

16 not belong to that group. I was speaking in that sense, not only about

17 the Croats, about the Muslims too. But also about the Slovenians, the

18 Macedonians, the Albanians, and so on.

19 Q. All right. I appreciate that, sir. I just wanted to make sure

20 that you were not limiting that comment or your conclusion or observation

21 in that regard to only the Serbs but that you found that to be true about

22 the Muslims and Croats as well. Correct?

23 A. I don't really understand what is the same as in the case of the

24 Serbs. I don't really understand your question because obviously it

25 cannot be the same.

Page 15780

1 Q. Well, you said the same reaction, that the rise of Serbian

2 nationalism caused the same reaction everywhere, the awakening and rise of

3 other nationalisms and my earlier question to you, and I thought we were

4 essentially in agreement on, was that when you say "other nationalisms"

5 you include in that Muslim nationalism and Croat nationalism.

6 A. Generally speaking, yes.

7 Q. And at page 16 of your report, sir, you say this: "That constant

8 conflicts over disputed territories inhabited by," in your paper

9 "minorities" and "diasporas" permanently seeking a way to join the

10 "mother national state" can you explain to the Judges in that context

11 what you mean by the phrase "mother national state"?

12 A. A "mother national state" is something which, in the territory of

13 the former Yugoslavia, exists only in the case of the Serbs. National

14 states then, according to that logic, the mother state or this kind of

15 perception, does not exist in any other case, because before 1991, there

16 were no other nation-states. However, it is possible to speak about

17 territories, about where this is generated, and in which way. That is to

18 say this feeling of belonging to a particular community. And then how

19 that feeling is manifested.

20 Q. It's true, is it not, sir, that your statement about mother

21 national states after the recognition of Croatia as an independent

22 country, would also apply to Croatia, wouldn't it? That was another

23 mother national state in relation to one of the main ethnic groups in

24 Bosnia-Herzegovina, correct?

25 A. The problem that you are raising here implies a very complex

Page 15781

1 answer. What you are implying in your question is something that I would

2 not accept, because the process of Yugoslavia's disintegration is a very

3 complex set of events in which, from the point of view of day to day

4 events, and that is definitely the perception that the participants had,

5 things are viewed in a special way.

6 Q. Sir, on page 23 of your report, filed with the judges, do you not

7 say "another important fact became clearly visible. Two of the three

8 local nations did not link their future to Bosnia-Herzegovina but to their

9 again 'mother countries,'" in reference to the Croats and Serbs, correct?

10 A. Yes. Their political loyalty was linked to the notions of Croatia

11 and Serbia. According to the logic of the fact that they are Croats and

12 Serbs respectively.

13 Q. And how did this manifest itself, this linkage to the two mother

14 countries, respectively, Croatia and Serbia? What did you see as a

15 historian that supports the statement at page 23 of your report?

16 A. What I meant when I wrote what I wrote on page 23 was the fact

17 that could be discerned from the public discourse. That is, that these

18 people would like to live within the same state frameworks respectively

19 with the other members of their ethnic community.

20 Q. When you say public discourse, I take it you would include

21 political discourse in that?

22 A. Yes. To the extent to which such things were discussed by people

23 at lower levels of the political establishment. In my opinion, it is very

24 significant that the top echelons of the political establishment never

25 talked about it in such a way.

Page 15782

1 Q. All right. Well, we'll come to that eventually, I'm sure. But

2 you agree, in fact again on page 23, and for those who may be following

3 just a few lines below the passage I directed your attention to a few

4 moment ago, sir, you agree in your paper that the HDZ party in Bosnia and

5 Herzegovina was a local branch of Franjo Tudjman's HDZ party established

6 in Croatia, correct?

7 A. As usual, every sentence has its own context. If you mean by way

8 of a context that the HDZ of the B and H was established and started to

9 operate at the moment while Yugoslavia was still in existence, and which

10 is very important to note, then that is a quotation that is correct.

11 However, at any rate, along with such a quotation, one should always

12 highlight the context as well. At that point in time, no one thought that

13 political organisations are to be confined to the borders of the then

14 socialist republics. The pattern for organising political parties was the

15 existing League of Communists, which was actually a political organisation

16 throughout the territory of the former Yugoslavia.

17 Q. Sir, at this point in time, I'm just simply trying to make sure

18 that I understand some of the basic points in your paper. I don't believe

19 it's fair to say that I've taken anything out of context. I refer you

20 again to page 23 much your report. And to read to you exactly I will

21 quote the English language of the two points that I've just asked you

22 about. Your report says, "Another important fact became clearly visible.

23 Two of the three local nations did not link their future to

24 Bosnia-Herzegovina but to their mother countries. Both Croats and Serbs,

25 primed by events in Yugoslavia since the late 1980s and their firm

Page 15783

1 networks of primary social [family] links with Croatia and Serbia, turned

2 out en masse for the local branches of parties previously established in

3 Croatia, the Croats for the HDZ, the Serbs for the SDS."

4 Now, I've read that correctly, haven't I?

5 A. [In English] Yes.

6 Q. And following on from that, at page 26 of your report, you said

7 that "the strength and attraction of the party lay in the fact" -- in

8 reference to the HDZ -- "the strength and attraction of the party lay in

9 the fact that at that time, it had already come to power in neighbouring

10 Croatia and that the Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina therefore saw it as

11 a 'Croatian party' with its seat in Zagreb."

12 Correct?

13 A. Yes. That is what it says in my text.

14 Q. And you go on to say that the voters, the Bosnian Croat voters, in

15 Bosnia-Herzegovina, saw as the real leader of the HDZ both in Croatia and

16 Bosnia-Herzegovina, as Franjo Tudjman. Correct?

17 A. Yes. That's what I say in the text.

18 Q. Now, one of the -- I'm going to ask you for several more is the

19 reason I'm going to ask you this but just so you know where I'm coming

20 from and where I'm going. One of the items that you give in support of

21 your position, your assessment of the role of Franjo Tudjman was his role

22 concerning a JNA convoy going through a certain part of Bosnia-Herzegovina

23 in 1991. And you said at page 27, "This was a clear indicator of who

24 enjoyed real authority and whose word had actual political weight." And

25 again, I understand, sir, that you base that in part on this anecdote

Page 15784

1 about the convoy.

2 A. May I just have a minute or two so that I could find my text in

3 the Croatian language so that I can check exactly what it says there?

4 Q. Of course.

5 JUDGE CLARK: Mr. Scott, can I say something? Your form of

6 cross-examination of this expert and the last expert are a little unfair,

7 are they not? You're very familiar with the little excerpts that you're

8 going to quote from and just to throw them in rapid succession at the

9 expert, I don't think that serves any real purpose. Why don't you put

10 your thesis to him and then say, "Didn't you say something else?" Because

11 you've gone sort of through about six or eight different excerpts very,

12 very rapidly and unless Professor Ancic knows his report by heart it's

13 very difficult for him. Perhaps we have to be a little more fair. An

14 expert isn't a machine.

15 MR. SCOTT: Judge Clark, he can take as much time -- it is his

16 report, after all, he wrote it, and as was in my respectful submission, I

17 choose my words carefully, a matter of some concern with the previous

18 witness, is that sometimes what appear to be said on the face of his

19 report was not in fact apparently what he meant at all. And that's why I

20 want to confirm that I, in fact, do understand what's being said.

21 JUDGE CLARK: I think I know which expert report you're talking

22 about and I think that we all agreed that there were problems with some --

23 I'm being careful with my words, too -- a translation that wasn't of the

24 standard that we are used to, shall I say that? Which made it very, very

25 difficult for us to understand.

Page 15785

1 MR. SCOTT: I agree.

2 JUDGE CLARK: I don't think that's the problem here.

3 MR. SCOTT: Well, let me build upon the last question, if you

4 found that place in your report.

5 JUDGE LIU: Well, Mr. Scott, I think the witness would like to say

6 something.

7 MR. SCOTT: Of course.

8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honours, Your Honours, what

9 perplexed me was the interpretation I got just now, the interpretation of

10 the Prosecutor's question, namely in my text, I refer to "authority" in

11 the sense of political authority, and the interpretation I got meant

12 authorities in the sense of government.

13 MR. SCOTT:

14 Q. I appreciate that, sir. All I can do obviously is read as

15 accurately as I possibly can from the English translation of your report.

16 And unfortunately how that comes to your ears I can't control that.

17 But I appreciate the clarification.

18 JUDGE LIU: Yes, Mr. Krsnik?

19 MR. KRSNIK: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour. We have come to a

20 certain point and I thank the Honourable Judge Clark for her intervention

21 I had meant to do this too but now it's pointless of course because the

22 Prosecutor said "authority" in English and it was translated into the

23 Croatian language properly, "authority" but that is not what the Croatian

24 text says. In his cross-examination, the Prosecutor resorted to tricks.

25 Perhaps I should put it that way. And that is obvious from the

Page 15786

1 transcript.

2 JUDGE LIU: Well, I believe that the Prosecutor just reads what

3 was said on the page 27 of that report. I don't see any differences.

4 Maybe, Mr. Scott, you may read that paragraph once again so that we could

5 know which paragraph we are talking about, at least I found that

6 exceptions in page 27.

7 MR. SCOTT: The top of page 27, sir, and all I can do, sir, I

8 regret, is to read from the English translation I have been provided of

9 your report. And I can read -- I read it this way, and if I misread it

10 I'm sure someone in the courtroom will correct me. "The situation

11 changed, however, when the assembled mass was addressed directly via

12 television by Dr. Tudjman, after his assurances, the crowd dispersed and

13 the military column went on its way. Even for those who were completely

14 uninformed, this was a very clear indicator of who enjoyed real authority

15 and whose word had actual political weight." Now, I think at this point

16 the only question -- did I read it correctly?

17 A. Yes. It was correctly read, probably, and this time it was

18 properly interpreted into the Croatian language. I certainly hope that

19 the honourable Trial Chamber notes the distinction between "authority" on

20 the one hand, and the authorities on the other hand. Political authority

21 is a matter of conviction, and authorities is supervision over the

22 mechanisms of the state.

23 Q. And during the time, sir, from at least 1991 to 1995, there was no

24 single person in the Republic of Croatia who more made and represented

25 Croatian state policy than Franjo Tudjman, correct?

Page 15787

1 A. It is. His constitutional duty was to conduct the state policy

2 and that is why he won the confidence of the voters in the elections, and

3 that was his duty.

4 Q. Now, you also say in your report, sir, and is it correct, is it

5 your observation, or assessment, that the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina was a

6 war for territory?

7 A. Yes.

8 Q. You also --

9 A. Or.

10 Q. Go ahead.

11 A. Or - and that would be much more accurate - that it turned into a

12 war for territories, that the dynamics of the conflict, which began in

13 1992 as one form of the conflict, led to -- resulted in the fact that it

14 changed its nature and goals set by those who waged it.

15 Q. You say at pages 23 and 24 of your report that the Serb

16 nationalist movement had a developed strategy of how to present its

17 attempts in the media and hide its true aims and methods. What do you

18 mean by that?

19 A. As regards what you have just said, I found confirmation of it in

20 a debate already mentioned between political scientists -- by political

21 scientist Danielle Conversini. What I meant by this is the fact that the

22 attempt to separate a part of Yugoslavia was publicly presented as an

23 attempt to preserve Yugoslavia, as a well-organised system, the political

24 establishment in Belgrade also had an elaborate strategy of their media

25 presentations.

Page 15788

1 Q. What was the strategy, sir? And what were some of the ways it was

2 carried out?

3 A. Well, the strategy was as I have just said. Not to allow the real

4 goals, which undoubtedly could not count with the support by relevant

5 parts of the international community, to disguise and therefore they were

6 disguised by acceptable explanations.

7 Q. Now, you say, about the beginning of the mutual conflict between

8 the Croats and the Bosniaks or Muslims, and this is covered on page 25 of

9 your report, you said that, unlike the Serbian nationalists who were

10 evidently working from a plan drawn up and developed in advance, the

11 Croats and Bosniaks or Muslims were clearly acting chaotically and with a

12 high level of disorganization until the time of their mutual conflict. My

13 first question about that, sir, was when do you mark, because there has

14 been much discussion, as Mr. Krsnik says, in the past year, when do you

15 mark as the beginning of the time of their mutual conflict?

16 A. The beginning of the conflict could be placed tentatively in the

17 latter half of May, but, although by that time it was already clear that

18 the views about the political future of Bosnia and Herzegovina diverged

19 significantly and that they could result in a general conflict, that

20 conflict did not yet acquire the dimensions of a general one until well

21 into -- until July, 1992. On the other hand, different forms of conflict

22 emerged from different contexts, could be observed as of the beginning of

23 1992. The first conflict that can be considered a real conflict is the one

24 which broke out in Busovaca.

25 Q. And when was that, sir, for the record and for the Judges? What

Page 15789

1 conflict are you talking about in Busovaca and the date, please?

2 A. It was in May, 1992, at a moment when, from the barracks in

3 Busovaca, when the Yugoslav People's Army withdrew from the barracks in

4 Busovaca. The conflict broke out when the troops left the barracks and

5 when Muslim, Muslims still at that time, Bosniak, soldiers, entered the

6 barracks and tried to change the already-existing understanding about the

7 distribution of weapons.

8 Q. Sir, before we get --

9 A. Namely --

10 Q. I apologise for interrupting you but before we lose it on the

11 screen and get too far away, at the beginning of your answer just now, you

12 said, actually now it's your prior answer you said, "The beginning of the

13 conflict could be placed tentatively in the latter half of May." At that

14 point in time, sir, you didn't give us a year. Could you give us which

15 year you were talking about there?

16 JUDGE LIU: Well, Mr. Krsnik, what's the problem?

17 MR. KRSNIK: [Interpretation] Your Honours, the problem is that the

18 witness must be allowed to, that the Prosecutor interrupted him through

19 mid-sentence and halfway through his thought, and he can resume his

20 interrogation after the witness is allowed to finish his sentence and his

21 thought. How shall we understand what happened in Busovaca if the witness

22 was interrupted halfway through his thought? And the Prosecutor can take

23 him back where he wants to after we have heard the whole answer.

24 MR. SCOTT: Mr. President, the translation, as you know, the

25 translation stopped, I took it that was the end of the answer and that's

Page 15790

1 exactly when I did try to go back. Then the witness started speaking

2 again. So that's all that was -- that's all that need be said, I believe,

3 about that.

4 JUDGE LIU: I think that is a misunderstanding. Witness, would

5 you please furnish us with the years first? And then the Prosecutor will

6 go on for your question. And if you did not finish your answer, you're

7 allowed to continue.

8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, let me go back to where I

9 started. I think I said that the conflict started in May, what we might

10 call the general conflict. That had its beginning in May, 1993.

11 Individual conflicts, however, lasted -- and that is what I was referring

12 to, that example -- have been lasting since May, 1992, and if I am -- I

13 may be allowed to finish, I'd be happy to finish my tale about what caused

14 the first such conflict that I know about.

15 MR. SCOTT:

16 Q. I never stopped you sir. All I did was try to get the date which

17 you finally did give us when Judge Liu asked you. So that was my only

18 question. Please continue.

19 A. So the conflict in Busovaca broke out after the Muslim side, the

20 Bosniak side, having been the first to enter the barracks premises, tried

21 to change the already-existing agreement on the distribution of weapons.

22 And the reasoning behind it was that the Croats had more weapons anyway.

23 And in that situation, the Muslim side demanded, on the basis of its

24 advantage of having the first to be -- to enter the barracks, the majority

25 of the weapons there. At that time I lived in Sarajevo and about that

Page 15791

1 conflict I heard the reports on the radio. Fortunately, I was in a

2 situation to even see it on television. And also to read the written

3 report in the Oslobodjenje daily. So what I just told you is the version

4 that I learned in Sarajevo. Such conflicts, individual, were occurring

5 for the whole year between May, 1992 and May, 1993.

6 They broke out within different contexts, but they generated an

7 atmosphere of mutual distrust and thus provided conditions in which local

8 conflicts could then grow into an all-out conflict. That is what I wanted

9 to say.

10 Q. You said that by mid-1992, in this regard, in the context that

11 you've just given us, that by mid-1992, ethnic nationalism had become, in

12 your terms, "the only real value and beacon for the population." Page 27

13 of your report. Can you explain to us a bit further what you mean when

14 you say -- when you say that by mid-1992, "ethnic nationalism had become

15 the only real value"?

16 A. What I wanted to say is in the previous sentence, the sentence

17 preceding that one, and I will read it out in Croatian. I hope you have

18 it translated into English. "In a situation in which there was no longer

19 an organised state apparatus of coercion, without the moral and political

20 authority to support former solidarity networks at the microsocial level,

21 and with a deeply rooted experience of life in silent, latent segregation,

22 the ethnic nationalism did not become, it remained, it was left as the

23 only real shelter of collective consciousness." If you want a more

24 detailed explanation of the notions what it means, the solidarity or

25 solidarious [phoen] networks or silent segregation, in inverted commas,

Page 15792

1 because these terms have a special definition, then, of course, I could

2 spend at it a great deal of time.

3 Q. Well, your statement that ethnic nationalism became the only real

4 value, that again applied, do I understand correctly, as you say, carrying

5 over to the top of the English part of your report on page 28, that

6 comment applied equally to the Croats, Muslims and Serbs? Correct?

7 A. Yes.

8 JUDGE LIU: Well, Mr. Scott, shall we stop here? It's almost

9 7.00.

10 MR. SCOTT: Of course.

11 JUDGE LIU: Well, we will resume tomorrow morning at 9.00 in the

12 same courtroom.

13 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at

14 6.59 p.m., to be reconvened on Tuesday,

15 the 24th day of September, 2002, at 9.00 a.m.

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