1 Monday, 17 January 2005

2 [Open session]

3 --- Upon commencing at 9.04 a.m.

4 [The accused entered court]

5 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Mr. Registrar. Could you call the case,

6 please.

7 THE REGISTRAR: Good morning, Your Honours. Case number

8 IT-03-68-T, the Prosecutor versus Naser Oric.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you. Mr. Oric, can you follow the proceedings

10 in a language you can understand?

11 THE ACCUSED: [No interpretation]

12 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you. You may sit down.

13 But I must point out to the technicians and the translators that

14 there is no reflection, no replication of what the accused said in the

15 transcript, and I did not hear or receive any interpretation myself in

16 English, although I am on channel 4.

17 Of course I can repeat it, but just for the record I needed to

18 point this out.

19 So I'm sorry, Mr. Oric. Unfortunately, there was a technical

20 hitch. I have to ask you again: Are you receiving interpretation in your

21 own language?

22 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Yes, I am, Your Honours.

23 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. I thank you.

24 Appearances. Prosecution.

25 MR. WUBBEN: Good morning, Your Honours. My name is Jan Wubben,

1 lead counsel for the Prosecution team, together with co-counsel

2 Ms. Patricia Sellers and our case manager, Ms. Donnica Henry-Frijlink; and

3 also good morning to the Defence team as well.

4 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you and good morning to you. Appearances

5 for the Defence.

6 MS. VIDOVIC: [Interpretation] Good morning, Your Honours. I am

7 Vasvija Vidovic, together with Mr. John Jones, appearing for the Defence

8 Mr. Naser Oric. With us today are our legal assistant, Ms. Jasmina Cosic,

9 and our case manager, Mr. Geoff Roberts.

10 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you, Madam Vidovic, and good morning to you.

11 Any preliminaries before we bring in the witness? Yes,

12 Mr. Wubben.

13 MR. WUBBEN: Yes, Your Honour. Two limited issues. One will be

14 raised by Ms. Patricia Sellers and by me, referring to the witness

15 schedule of 11th of January, please be informed that the witness on that

16 schedule.

17 JUDGE AGIUS: What do you mean 11th of January?

18 MR. WUBBEN: 11th of January --

19 JUDGE AGIUS: Oh, I see. I understand you, yes.

20 MR. WUBBEN: Dated the 11th of January, Your Honour - I'm sorry I

21 was not explicit enough - but that schedule projected a witness on the

22 18th of January only limited to two hours. That witness is cancelled due

23 to the changes of this week.

24 JUDGE AGIUS: Why? Did you take note of that, Madam Vidovic?

25 MS. VIDOVIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, yes, I did.

1 Unfortunately, I don't have the schedule here. If Mr. Wubben could just

2 tell us the name of that witness. I do not believe that it is a protected

3 witness anyway.

4 MR. WUBBEN: I will write down the name on a note, if the Defence

5 counsel allow me, and ask the usher to pass it to her.

6 JUDGE AGIUS: Well, there's no indication here whether he is a

7 protected witness or not.

8 Otherwise, there is another issue you would like to raise

9 Ms. Sellers?

10 MS. SELLERS: Yes, there is. Good morning, Your Honours.

11 JUDGE AGIUS: Good morning to you.

12 MS. SELLERS: It's just to inform the Trial Chamber, Defence

13 counsel and Prosecution, we believe we've reached substantial agreement in

14 terms of the 94 bis filing as it points to the possibility of having filed

15 quite a few pages that had -- would have had to have been translated that

16 dealt with autopsy reports that are not the underlying substantiation of

17 any deaths in our indictment as charged, we'd like to inform the Trial

18 Chamber that we will be filing a 94 bis motion this afternoon as it

19 relates to one of the underlying crime base persons, and that's

20 Mr. Kostadin Popovic.

21 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you. And the rest can be filed in person by

22 the expert himself while he's here giving testimony. That's so simple.

23 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, I believe at that point 94 bis rules

24 will apply the Defence will indicate whether they will accept the report

25 as filed or whether they wish to cross-examine the witness.

1 JUDGE AGIUS: I'm sure you would cooperate on this. It shouldn't

2 be a bone of contention between you. Yes, Mr. Jones.

3 MR. JONES: That's why we've been in discussions with the

4 Prosecution. There are concerns, serious concerns we have that

5 Dr. Stankovic, if he came here and gave evidence orally, would embark on

6 an inquest into all sorts of deaths, dozens of deaths in Kravica,

7 Fakovici, Rakovici, and we're completely opposed to that because we've

8 never cross-examined on cause of death so part of our operation is we --

9 under no circumstances do we want Dr. Stankovic to come here and give that

10 evidence so we're seeking to find common ground with the Prosecution as

11 regards the autopsy of Kostadin Popovic.

12 JUDGE AGIUS: Right.

13 MR. JONES: We'll file a response setting out our position, but we

14 are, of course, being as cooperative as we can.

15 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, yes, yes. I understand that. Okay, thank you,

16 Mr. Jones.

17 Anything else?

18 So Madam Usher, could please escort the witness in. Thank you.

19 [The witness entered court]

20 WITNESS: NEDJELKO RADIC [Resumed]

21 [Witness answered through interpreter]

22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Good morning, Your Honours. Good

23 morning, ladies and gentlemen.

24 JUDGE AGIUS: Good morning to you, Mr. Radic. We are going to

25 proceed, to continue and hopefully finish with your cross-examination. We

1 should finish before the end of the morning. That doesn't depend on me,

2 or us; it depends on you and also on Mr. Jones. I hope you had a restful

3 weekend and that you are feeling somewhat better. If at any time you are

4 not feeling well, please, like last time, do draw my attention to it. I

5 will discuss it with the two Judges and we will take a decision, and of

6 course the decision will take into consideration your situation. All

7 right?

8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: May I just remind you that you are still testifying

10 under the solemn declaration that you made last week that you will speak

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

12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, that's what I'm here to do,

13 Your Honours. I think so far I have complied in full with these

14 obligations that I undertook. Thank you.

15 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you, Mr. Radic.

16 Yes, Mr. Jones, please.

17 MR. JONES: May it please, Your Honour.

18 Cross-examined by Mr. Jones: [Continued]

19 Q. Mr. Radic, I too hope that you're feeling better this morning.

20 A. Much better. Thank you for asking.

21 Q. Now on Friday when we had to break off, I was asking you about

22 your purported identification of Naser Oric after you left the prison from

23 a videotape and then from a TV broadcast of these proceedings. So I'm

24 going to ask you a couple of more questions on that subject before moving

25 on to another area. And first I want to make clear, really in order to

1 save time more than anything, that I'm not asking you to state how

2 positive you are about your identification. You told us you're a hundred

3 per cent sure, but with respect, you might be a hundred per cent wrong.

4 So what I'm asking you is about specific physical features which can be

5 verified because I take it you agree that human faces are similar, that

6 many people resemble other people, if that's clear.

7 Now, in summary, am I right then in saying that there's no feature

8 about Mr. Oric's face that you can point to and say, "That's what I

9 recognise"? And if there is such a feature, please let us know

10 specifically what it was.

11 A. Well, I can explain this in the following way: Following my

12 exchange, when I saw that gentleman on horseback, my conclusion was that

13 it was Mr. Naser Oric. I may be mistaken, but I do feel 100 per cent

14 certain. I have a photograph from Friday's newspaper, Mr. Naser Oric with

15 a beard. I did not want to bring it along.

16 Also, when he entered a plea before this Tribunal, I saw him

17 again. I don't think I could go wrong there, but then again, I don't

18 know.

19 Q. I'm coming to the court appearance in a moment. We're still on

20 the video. You referred on Friday to the hair of the person on the

21 horseback and you said -- you described, firstly, the person you saw in

22 the prison as being "clean-shaven with a crewcut, short hair." And then

23 from the video you said, "His hair changed a bit. He was -- he had a

24 short haircut at the time."

25 So my question is: Was this a crewcut; short all round, short

1 back, short sides, short at the top? Is that what -- is that the

2 hairstyle which you saw in the prison?

3 A. I don't remember the haircut on when he was on horseback or what

4 his hair was like. I knew that he had a beard, which was not the case in

5 the prison. He had very short hair when he came to see us. But when I

6 saw him on horseback, I can't remember exactly what his hair was like,

7 therefore, I don't think I'm able to answer that question. It's better

8 that I remain silent on the issue rather than say something that may be

9 wrong.

10 Q. Finally, as far as the video is concerned, I think you said you

11 saw it maybe one or two years after your capture. I would suggest to you

12 that in fact that video wasn't circulated until after the fall of

13 Srebrenica, that is July 1995, when the tape was seized by the Serbs.

14 So my question is: Would you agree that possibly you didn't see

15 that video until some two or three years or more after your release?

16 A. Then I must have seen a different one. This was not the one.

17 They were seated in a room, drinking and singing. I believe there was a

18 woman or a man who were having their leg amputated.

19 Q. My question is really when you saw this video. Could it be that

20 you didn't see the video until after 1995? That's all I'm asking.

21 A. I don't remember exactly. I do know that it was awhile after my

22 exchange, but I can't give you the exact point in time.

23 Q. Okay. And then finally, you said that you recognised Naser Oric

24 when you saw this trial broadcast on TV. I take it that was the initial

25 appearance in April 2003. Would that be right?

1 A. Yes.

2 Q. On that occasion he was clean-shaven again. When you saw him on

3 TV.

4 A. Yes, yes.

5 Q. So this is more than ten years after you say you saw Naser Oric at

6 the prison on three brief occasions, when I think you said your brain was

7 practically numb, you couldn't remember anything, and you couldn't even

8 think straight. Is it right when you saw the broadcast you saw Mr. Oric

9 standing between two UN guards and being addressed as Naser Oric and

10 responding, "Yes, I'm Naser Oric"? Is that what you saw?

11 A. No, I didn't need to check. I realised immediately that it was

12 Mr. Naser Oric.

13 Q. Now, you had been contacted at that point as a witness in the case

14 against Mr. Oric, hadn't you, because you'd given a statement in 2000.

15 A. Yes.

16 Q. You had never been asked to pick Mr. Oric out of an identity

17 parade, had you?

18 A. No.

19 Q. And you've never been asked to identify Naser Oric from a

20 selection of photographs?

21 A. No.

22 JUDGE AGIUS: Usher, I think the ELMO as it is now will stand in

23 the way between Mr. Jones and the witness. Could you either push it

24 forward or backwards.

25 MR. JONES: It's okay.

1 Q. And is it right that the first time you mentioned to anyone that

2 you had recognised Naser Oric on these two occasions was when you told us

3 that last Friday when you came to court?

4 A. I'm not sure I understand your question.

5 Q. Let me put it this way: Before you gave testimony here, you were

6 interviewed or you spoke to members of the Office of the Prosecutor. You

7 didn't tell them, did you, that you had recognised Naser Oric on two -- on

8 a video and when he testified here?

9 A. Yes, I did tell them.

10 Q. All right.

11 MR. JONES: I note for the record that the proofing notes we

12 received in relation to this witness didn't mention that, and it's such an

13 important matter that I'm sure the Prosecution wouldn't deliberately omit

14 that from the proofing notes.

15 Q. Now, you don't know for a fact, do you, whether Veselin Sarac knew

16 Naser Oric from before the war, do you? You thought perhaps he did

17 because Sarac had an apartment in Srebrenica, but he never specifically

18 told you that he knew Oric from before the war.

19 A. I heard this from Sarac. I know that for certain. You may have

20 noticed the other day I denied parts of the statement that he made. Sarac

21 said that he had known Mr. Naser before the war and he owns a flat in

22 Srebrenica. He still does. His daughter lives in it. Unfortunately,

23 Sarac has deceased but his daughter remains in that flat in Srebrenica.

24 Q. But Sarac didn't necessarily know everyone in Srebrenica

25 municipality before the war, did he?

1 A. Well, you can't know every single man, can you?

2 Q. Doesn't that also assume that Naser Oric is from Srebrenica town,

3 as opposed to from some other location within the municipality?

4 A. I don't know, sir. What Veselin Sarac told me is that he had

5 known Mr. Naser before the war, and that's what I'm telling you now. As

6 for the accuracy of that bit of information, I don't know. It should be

7 easy enough for you to verify that, but that was what I heard. Now, where

8 he hails from, whether he's from Srebrenica or elsewhere, I really don't

9 know.

10 Q. Now, last Thursday you told us that during your stay in prison,

11 which would have been more than 20 days, I take it, you saw the person

12 calling himself Naser Oric three times. I think the "da" wasn't

13 interpreted, but it doesn't matter. Three times only.

14 A. Yes, yes.

15 Q. Now, I'm going to ask you a couple of questions about those

16 visits, and I can take it shortly. You told us the first time was several

17 days after your capture, so I take it that's in late September 1992.

18 A. Yes.

19 Q. The second time is when this person brought meat, and I don't

20 think you told us when that was, but would that still be in late

21 September?

22 A. I can't remember whether it was late September or early October.

23 I don't know the exact date, but it was soon after the first introduction.

24 Q. To try and fix it in time, you mentioned that a postman from

25 Fakovici arrived ten days after you. Would it have been before he

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1 arrived?

2 A. Yes.

3 Q. Before he arrived that this -- the meeting where the person

4 brought --

5 A. After the postman arrived, which would mean that it was sometime

6 in October that Mr. Naser brought meat to the prison.

7 Q. So you didn't tell this postman, "Someone called Naser visited us

8 and brought us meat"? That's not something you told him, because it

9 happened when he was there.

10 A. He was there, of course.

11 Q. What I mean is when the postman arrived, you didn't say to him,

12 "There's someone called Naser who has been coming and bringing us meat,"

13 did you, because that happened afterwards.

14 A. Why would I be telling the postman if he was there himself?

15 Q. That was all.

16 Now, just sticking with this second visit, the person who brought

17 you meat was nice towards you, wasn't he; he offered you meat?

18 A. Yes.

19 Q. And he thought that you didn't want to eat because the meat might

20 be poisoned, so he ate it to show you that it was okay?

21 A. That's true.

22 Q. So he didn't notice that it was the problems with your teeth which

23 stopped you from eating the meat?

24 A. No. I told Mr. Naser Oric that my teeth hurt and that I couldn't

25 eat meat. He asked me what had happened. I said I had caught a cold

1 because of the opening in the wall, some sort of a window, did not have a

2 glass pane, but I did not have the courage to say what exactly had

3 happened to my teeth.

4 Q. You weren't afraid of this person who was offering you meat, were

5 you, at that stage? You were frightened that the guards would learn if

6 you spoke of what happened to you?

7 A. Yes. Why would I be afraid of someone like that who came and

8 brought meat? I would not have had any reason to be afraid of that

9 person.

10 Q. Thank you. Now, turning to the third time that you say you saw

11 Naser, that wasn't in your cell but it was in another room just before

12 your exchange.

13 A. Yes.

14 Q. So would it be right, then, that while the postman from Fakovici

15 was in your cell from the 5th to the 16th of October, 1992, that this

16 person calling himself Naser came to your cell once, when he brought meat?

17 A. I remember he came to the cell twice, and the third time I saw him

18 was on the 25th of October, 1992, so just before the exchange. I can't

19 remember any other time he came. He might have, it's just that I don't

20 remember.

21 Q. And you didn't leave your cell much during the whole time that you

22 were in the prison, did you? You told us that you even avoided going to

23 the toilet. So is it right that during the day you were in the prison

24 pretty much -- you were in the cell pretty much the whole time?

25 A. Yes.

1 Q. And during the day, it was pretty quiet as well, wasn't it, with

2 the five of you sitting there?

3 A. Yes.

4 Q. So any conversations which took place with guards or other people

5 visiting the cell would be something which would be overheard by all of

6 you?

7 A. Yes.

8 Q. All right. I'm going to leave this area and go to a completely

9 different area now, and that's to ask you some questions about your arrest

10 on the 24th of September. So apologies if I appear to be skipping around,

11 but I'm sure you can follow.

12 Now, going back to the day of your arrest, you told us you were

13 arrested at Bracan, which is an elevation above the bauxite mine. Now the

14 mine itself was at Gunjaci, wasn't it? The actual mine was at Gunjaci or

15 Gunjace?

16 A. Yes. Yes. It's Gunjace, near Bracan.

17 Q. It might just be helpful for all of us to have on the monitor a

18 map of these places. So if I can ask for the usher's assistance.

19 A. Let me take -- in fact, I left my glasses at the hotel.

20 Q. Well, not to worry. Perhaps I can just, for the benefit of the

21 Court, indicate some places on the map. Then by describing their

22 location, perhaps Mr. Radic will agree with the location.

23 MR. JONES: We need to work on the contrast a little bit. Is it

24 possible to change the colour so it's more green? The letters don't

25 appear very clearly there. No. Okay. Not to worry.

1 MS. SELLERS: Excuse me, Your Honour.

2 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Ms. Sellers.

3 MS. SELLERS: If I might state so, that the fact that the witness

4 won't be able to see the map or assist in the places on the map actually

5 leads to the situation where we have Defence counsel testifying. We would

6 suggest instead of that, we have a very rudimentary loop if we would like

7 to be able to have the witness possibly use this, that might assist

8 Defence.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you, Ms. Sellers. I think at the same time I

10 think basically I can direct the technicians to focus on Gunjace, which is

11 the area shaded at the bottom -- yes, exactly, so that we enlarge --

12 MR. JONES: Yes, if we could pull back, please. Thank you, Your

13 Honour. I certainly have --

14 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. At the same time I think this should help the

15 witness see better, and then of course I appreciate your offer,

16 Ms. Sellers. The usher can hand him the magnifying glass or whatever it

17 is.

18 MR. JONES: Yes.

19 JUDGE AGIUS: Usher, we need your help, please.

20 MR. JONES: Yes. I certainly didn't intend to give evidence.

21 What I was going to do is by describing --

22 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, I understand that. Don't waste your time on

23 that, Mr. Jones. For these matters, there's always a simple solution. So

24 -- can -- Mr. Radic, I would -- I suggest that you look at your monitor

25 rather than at the map. Look at the monitor, because there you can see

1 better. All right?

2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you.

3 JUDGE AGIUS: And then if you need to look at the map, then use

4 the magnifying glass that you have been given. All right?

5 MR. JONES: Yes.

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes.

7 JUDGE AGIUS: So your question, Mr. Jones.

8 MR. JONES: Thank you. Thank you, Your Honour.

9 Q. Yes, Mr. Radic. It was just to see firstly if you can locate

10 Gunjace on that map and then Bracan near it. Do you see that? If not,

11 don't worry.

12 A. I can't see very well without my glasses, but I can see, if you

13 want me to show on the screen, Bracan is here. It's written. That's

14 where I was captured.

15 Q. That's fine. I'm only going to ask you one more question about

16 that map. When you were arrested, you recognised some people from Djile,

17 didn't you, for example, Sifet and Rifet Malovic. Firstly, is that

18 correct?

19 A. Yes, correct.

20 Q. And Djile is on the road just around the corner, it appears, from

21 the mine. Djile is near the mine. That's what I'm asking you.

22 A. Yes, maybe a kilometre and a half or two away.

23 Q. All right. I'll leave that for the moment. You also saw Mirzet

24 Malovic on the day of your arrest, who was a driver whom you knew from the

25 mine. Is that right?

1 A. No, Mirzet, Rifet and Sifet and are brothers who used to work with

2 me together at the mine, and I recognised them straight away.

3 Q. You recognised Sifet and Rifet. Did you also see Mirzet on the

4 day of your arrest?

5 A. Mirzet I saw. I believe he was the bus driver. But I saw him at

6 Viogor, at the house of Zulfo Tursunovic.

7 Q. And when he saw you, did he hit you on the head with a knife

8 handle?

9 A. No.

10 Q. Now, you told us on Thursday in relation to Zulfo -- and I'll

11 quote from the transcript. It's page 15, lines 16 to 17: "A relative of

12 mine had been in prison together with Zulfo before the war. It was most

13 likely that it was he who saved me then." And that is saved you from

14 further mistreatment. Now when you said "he," were you referring to Zulfo

15 saving you from further mistreatment?

16 A. No. I was saved by my cousin, because they had been in prison

17 together before the war. My cousin's name is also Radic, and he asked me

18 what this Radic was to me, and I said it was my cousin. And I believe it

19 helped a lot later. They didn't beat me so much. And three of their

20 guards went to that house in Viogor, awaiting further orders.

21 Q. But your cousin is a Serb, I take it. You're not saying he was

22 present on the 24th of September when you were arrested?

23 A. Who do you mean, the cousin?

24 Q. The cousin who was in prison with Zulfo. He wasn't there on that

25 day.

1 A. No. No.

2 Q. So when you say he saved you, don't you mean mentioning his name

3 to Zulfo saved you from further mistreatment?

4 A. I don't know how you understood me, but I believe it was my cousin

5 who saved me, because when Zulfo asked me what this Nedjelko Radic [as

6 interpreted] was to me, I said it was my cousin, and from that moment on

7 they didn't maltreat me or beat me any more. On the other hand, he

8 ordered those three guards who had escorted me to go to -- back to that

9 house and await further orders.

10 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, yes, exactly.

11 MR. JONES:

12 Q. Just to clarify one matter, is your cousin's name also Nedjelko

13 Radic?

14 A. No, I am Nedjelko Radic and my cousin is Milenko [Realtime

15 transcript read in error "Rakingo"].

16 Q. You're the only Nedjelko Radic in Milici, aren't you?

17 A. The only one, yes.

18 Q. So is it right that Zulfo didn't --

19 JUDGE AGIUS: One moment because I see that on line 17 -- page 17

20 line 1 it says, according to the transcript, "No, I am Nedjelko Radic and

21 my cousin is Rakingo." He said Milenko, not Rakingo, just for the record.

22 Yes, I'm sorry, Mr. Jones, but I think better correct.

23 MR. JONES: Yes, absolutely.

24 Q. So is it right that Zulfo personally didn't physically mistreat

25 you in any way? He didn't kick you or hit you or anything like that?

1 A. Yes. It was Zulfo himself who captured me, and he was the first

2 one to hit me. He held a kitchen knife in his hand, this big perhaps.

3 Maybe 20 centimetres long, together with the handle. And with that knife,

4 as far as I learned later, he slit the throat of Rajko Pantic, an employee

5 of the mine who worked as a security officer.

6 Q. If I can stop there, stop you there. That opens a whole host of

7 questions which I'm not going to go into because that wasn't mentioned in

8 your examination-in-chief, and I don't think you've ever mentioned that

9 before.

10 JUDGE AGIUS: It's not relevant either.

11 Q. Now, you told us that when you were arrested, you were a civilian

12 mine worker. So you weren't in the RS army, then, the Republika Srpska

13 army?

14 A. Yes, because there was no army of Republika Srpska there at the

15 time. As for Milici, Vlasinci, Bratunac, Srebrenica, the army was never

16 active there, not before the war, not during the war. And there was no

17 military installation in this region before the war.

18 Q. You also told us on Thursday that you didn't have a gun with you

19 that day and didn't shoot, and I'm going to read exactly what you said on

20 Thursday and then move on to what you told us on Friday, and I apologise

21 if it's lengthy but I need to go through it.

22 Now, on Thursday, and it's pages 15 to 16 of the transcript, lines

23 18 to 25, you said: "There were those two rifles, and I don't know if you

24 gentlemen and ladies are aware of it. Those are M-48 rifles which can

25 take five rounds plus one in the barrel. Two rifles of that kind remained

1 with Slavko and Krnja at that house because they had carried the rifles in

2 the first place. Of course they returned gunfire and ran out of

3 ammunition, and we didn't need the empty rifles any more because we were

4 going to Bracan and our rifles were up there in Bracan in a small cottage

5 normally used for camping, where we spent our nights. And we never

6 reached them, i.e., never reached our rifles, because of what happened.

7 Zoran and Vidoje were killed and I was captured, without any weapon, that

8 is."

9 Now, that's what you told us on Thursday. My question is,

10 firstly, that gives the impression, what you told us, doesn't it, that

11 Slavko and Krnja were shooting and ran out of ammunition, not you. That's

12 the impression you gave last Thursday. I will move on.

13 Then last Friday we saw the video in which you said you were

14 captured in combat and that you ran out of ammunition, and when you were

15 asked about that in cross-examination --

16 MS. SELLERS: Excuse me, Your Honour I hate to interrupt counsel,

17 but I think that he did state here, "Now my question is first that that

18 gives the impression ..." and then he continues on.

19 MR. JONES: Answer.

20 MS. SELLERS: But I don't believe he was given the opportunity to

21 answer the question. I just want to know is counsel actually narrating

22 something or has he asked a question he would like the witness to answer.

23 MR. JONES: I'm coming to a question.

24 JUDGE AGIUS: I think he's coming to a question, and I think it's

25 an obvious question that he's going to put, so go ahead, Mr. Jones.

1 MR. JONES:

2 Q. When you were asked about this in cross-examination after we saw

3 the video, and it's page 16, line 17 to 19, you said: "I believe that

4 since I was shooting at them and they were shooting at me, it was combat.

5 Of course, I ran out of ammunition, then I dropped my gun."

6 Now, my question is this: Was it when you saw the video and heard

7 yourself saying that you ran out of ammunition that you realised that you

8 had to change your story and admit that you had been shooting, whereas

9 before you sought to suggest that Slavko and Krnja were doing the

10 shooting?

11 A. I don't remember saying that Slavko and Krnja did any shooting.

12 As far as I remember my talks with the Prosecution, I said I was carrying

13 a rifle. I didn't say Krnja or Slavko had a weapon.

14 After the shooting started from Bijelo Polje, from Kutuzari

15 village directed at us, I returned fire, and that's what I remember saying

16 in my statement to the Prosecution. I said exactly how many rounds I had,

17 five plus one in the barrel, that's the maximum the rifle will take. And

18 after shooting all of the rounds, I threw the rifle to Slavko. Krnja had

19 another rifle. Some of them stayed in that house, and the two of us went

20 back to Bracan. And since there was an exchange of fire, I thought it

21 qualified as combat. Doesn't it?

22 Q. Certainly, Mr. Radic, but you didn't make that clear to this Court

23 when you testified on Thursday, that you were shooting and returning fire.

24 That was my point.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: He is making it clear now, Mr. Jones, and it's --

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1 MR. JONES: Yes. But it's a question of how truthful this witness

2 is.

3 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, but it's a matter for us.

4 MR. JONES: That's why I make the point.

5 Q. On the 24th of September, 1992, didn't you also throw a grenade or

6 a bomb at the attackers?

7 A. Yes.

8 Q. Something else you didn't mention, isn't it? You threw a bomb or

9 a grenade at the attacking forces.

10 A. Where would I get a grenade? A grenade is something that you

11 don't launch with your own hand. You need something to launch it with.

12 There is a special section shooting grenades.

13 JUDGE AGIUS: One moment, because again this is how, then, the

14 wrong interpretation can be given to the text or the transcript.

15 The question, as I read it on -- in line 17 was: "On the 24th of

16 September, 1992, didn't you also throw a grenade or a bomb at the

17 attackers?" And according to the transcript, the witness said, "Yes,"

18 which would mean that he did. But if you continue reading, it's obvious

19 that he never did.

20 MR. JONES: I thought he said "da," but in fact he may have said

21 "ja."

22 JUDGE AGIUS: I don't know. So I'm going to call on you again,

23 Mr. Radic, because when we read the transcript it's as if, to that

24 question, you admitted having thrown a grenade or a bomb at the attackers.

25 Did you at any time on the 24th of September, 1992, throw any

1 grenade or any bomb or even a hand grenade on the attackers or at the

2 attackers?

3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honours, how would I throw a

4 hand grenade or any other grenade when the attackers who were shooting at

5 us were two or three kilometres away? It's impossible without a special

6 weapon.

7 JUDGE AGIUS: I'm not arguing with you, Mr. Radic, I just wanted

8 an answer.

9 MR. JONES: Yes. I take it the answer is no.

10 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Yes, Mr. Jones.

11 MR. JONES: All right.

12 Q. Now, do you recall being interviewed about these events in 1994,

13 in August, the 25th of August, to be precise? Not by this Tribunal but by

14 the Serb authorities.

15 A. I don't remember that.

16 MR. JONES: We have copies of the 1994 statement which, if the

17 witness could be shown the B/C/S version, and there are copies for

18 everyone else.

19 JUDGE AGIUS: Mr. Jones, before you proceed, Judge Eser would like

20 to put a question.

21 JUDGE ESER: Just to make sure. Did you ask whether he was

22 questioned by the Serb authorities or was it a questioning by the

23 authorities of the ICTY?

24 MR. JONES: By the Serb authorities.

25 JUDGE ESER: By the Serb authorities.

1 JUDGE AGIUS: This is the statement of the 18th November 1999,

2 Mr. Jones.

3 MR. JONES: No. It's 25th of August, 1994. ERN is 03602052 to

4 03602059.

5 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you.

6 MR. JONES:

7 Q. Mr. Radic, I'd ask you to first of all look at the foot of each

8 page and to look at the signature at the bottom. Use the magnifying glass

9 if you like, because I'd like you to take a very good look at the

10 signature.

11 Can you please have a look at that signature and tell us whether

12 you recognise that as your signature or not.

13 A. Yes. Yes.

14 Q. And can we turn through each page just to make sure, absolutely

15 sure. Is that your signature on every page?

16 A. Yes, yes.

17 Q. Okay. Now, it's an eight-page statement, so I'm not going to ask

18 you to read through the whole statement, but I am going to refer you to

19 certain passages. And in English I'll start with page 3. And the ERNs

20 are the same for the English and B/C/S. So it's 03602054. It's page 3 of

21 both versions, paragraphs 1 and 2. And there we see the words: "Among

22 the Muslim soldiers who came there, apart from Zulfo Tursunovic, I also

23 recognised Malovic Sifet from the village of Djile, his brother Rifet."

24 So those are the brothers you mentioned today.

25 A. Yes.

1 Q. And the next paragraph you mention some of the killed Serbs you

2 saw, Salipurevic, Slavko, Boris Music, which I think should be Miso Misic,

3 perhaps. If you can help us with that.

4 A. Very well. I was probably mistaken about the last name. It could

5 be Boric from the Misic village, from Milici.

6 Q. And Rajko Pantic, a worker from the Miletici mine. Those were the

7 people you saw.

8 And then on the next page, on page 4, first paragraph, you refer

9 to Mirzet Malovic and the story you told us just now, about seeing him in

10 Viogor.

11 Now, my question is: Seeing your signature, seeing those details,

12 do you accept that this statement records what you told the person

13 interviewing you in August 1994?

14 A. Could you please repeat that question?

15 Q. Is this the statement which you gave in August 1994? Do you

16 recognise it as such?

17 A. Judging by what you read so far, yes, it seems to be, but I didn't

18 throw any grenades.

19 Q. I'll ask this -- I'll come back to that.

20 MR. JONES: I'll ask this to be given a Defence exhibit number,

21 the 1994 statement.

22 THE REGISTRAR: Your Honours, the number will be D156.

23 JUDGE AGIUS: So this will be -- this document is being admitted

24 as Defence Exhibit, being marked as D156.

25 MR. JONES: Thank you, Your Honour.

1 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you.

2 MR. JONES:

3 Q. Now, you can keep the statement with you because I'm going to ask

4 you about it. Let's turn back to the beginning of that statement. You

5 told us today that you were a civilian mine worker. Now, looking at that

6 statement, the first three paragraphs on page 2, ERN 03602053, I quote,

7 "As the RS army soldier under the command in Milici on September 24 --

8 sorry, September 23, 1992, I was assigned to secure the bauxite mine in

9 Milici, the area called Bracan. This place, which was secured by my

10 squad, was suddenly attacked by Muslim armed forces on September 24, 1992,

11 at about 9.30 a.m. At that moment I was going to get some water with

12 soldiers Salipurevic Vidoje, Lalovic Zoran from Milici, and Gordic Slavko

13 and Susic Milivoje, also from Milici. When we were halfway to the water

14 spring, shooting suddenly started and we went back to our positions, not

15 knowing what it was all about."

16 See here you described yourself, didn't you, and others, as RS

17 soldiers, whereas now you say you were a civilian; correct?

18 A. Dear gentlemen, you are not right, because unfortunately I

19 couldn't be a soldier. I didn't qualify to be a soldier, and I said so in

20 my statement. However, every municipality in the former Yugoslavia had

21 its Territorial Defence. This Territorial Defence had its weaponry, had

22 uniforms.

23 Q. I'll stop you there. I'm just reading what's in this statement,

24 and it refers to RS army, not to Territorial Defence. That's what I was

25 seeking to establish. I'm going to come back to that in a moment. I just

1 want to continue to the next paragraph.

2 "As our tank was nearby, as well as a group of uniformed

3 soldiers, I thought that they were our soldiers and hurried towards my

4 position to see why they were shooting. I climbed on a boundary. My

5 dugout was behind it. They started shooting from the immediate vicinity,

6 and I lay down and threw a bomb in the direction from which they fired at

7 me."

8 I don't know if you can see that. I think you're not actually

9 reading your statement, but that's the -- that's what's in the English.

10 Now, I have a number of questions for you arising from these

11 passages. Firstly, this is a very different account, isn't it, from the

12 one that you've given us here. Would you agree?

13 A. I'm telling you again that I was not a soldier, because everybody

14 knows perfectly well what an army is. I served in the army in 1970. You

15 know the distinction between a soldier, a civilian, a worker.

16 Q. I'm going to stop you there. But my question is this account is

17 very different from the one which you gave us before this Court. That was

18 my question. I'm not asking you to go into this distinction again between

19 the Territorial Defence and the RS.

20 Now, let's go through it. You've told us here, under oath, that

21 you were a mere civilian, guarding the mine with an M-48 with other

22 civilians. And in this statement you describe the situation of an RS

23 soldier in an squad with an assigned task, taking positions, having a

24 tank, and throwing bombs at the enemy. Now, are you saying you didn't say

25 those things?

1 A. I don't remember this, that's one thing. Secondly, we never had a

2 tank. There was a unit in Vlasenica, some sort of an armoured combat

3 unit, young lads up to 25 years of age, single. They were some sort of

4 Intervention Platoon, the one that they set up at municipality level in

5 the event of an attack. They had two APCs, and as for ourselves we had

6 nothing except for our mining equipment.

7 Q. There was a tank, a T53, up at Bracan on the day of your arrest,

8 wasn't there?

9 A. Maybe it was later after my arrest, but I don't remember that

10 there were any around before.

11 Q. Well, you know Bracan very well, I take it, at this time. You

12 were guarding the area day in, day out.

13 A. Yes.

14 Q. Either there was a tank there and you would have seen it, or there

15 wasn't. You're not telling us that there might have been a tank up where

16 you were guarding and you didn't notice it.

17 A. I did not see a tank. Again, I must say maybe it was after I had

18 been captured that a tank arrived or that a unit arrived to help out. But

19 when I was there, I don't remember seeing any tank.

20 Q. How about heavy artillery, anti-aircraft guns and that sort of

21 thing? Surely if that was on Bracan you would have noticed that because

22 that's fixed.

23 A. There was only a three-barrelled weapon at Bracan and a

24 180-millimetre mortar.

25 Q. And that three-barrelled gun and the mortar were firing at Muslim

1 villages like Suceska, weren't they, shooting at Muslim towns and

2 villages?

3 A. Probably, as necessary.

4 MR. JONES: I have a new exhibit, document for everyone. It's a

5 document of the Srebrenica War Presidency, dated 25 September 1992, and

6 the ERN is 01801622, 01801623. It describes the events of 24th of

7 September, 1992.

8 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Registrar.

9 MS. SELLERS: Excuse me, Your Honour. I would just like to state

10 for the record that the Prosecution did receive a list of these exhibits

11 yesterday evening but did not have the benefit of these exhibits prior to

12 the witness having direct examination conducted.

13 MR. JONES: Yes. We found them over the weekend.

14 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. Thank you.

15 THE REGISTRAR: Your Honours, I need to make a correction. The

16 exhibit number for the previous exhibit has to be D158 and not D156.

17 JUDGE AGIUS: All right. So please, Prosecution and Defence, do

18 enter a correction in your records. The statement in B/C/S starting with

19 ERN 03602052 up to and inclusive of 03602059, and the corresponding

20 English translation of the same, bearing the same ERN number, are being

21 marked as Defence Exhibit D158 and not as D156 as previously inadvertently

22 or mistakenly indicated.

23 So this one now will become D159.

24 MR. JONES: Yes. Thank you.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: So don't make any further mistakes.

1 And of course I have -- we have taken into consideration your

2 remark, Ms. Sellers, which is perfectly logical. I mean, it's --

3 obviously, you will have an opportunity to re-examine the witness later

4 on. Take into consideration what you have said.

5 Yes, Judge Eser.

6 JUDGE ESER: Before we turn to the new exhibit, may I just come

7 back to D158. I just realised that the statement given by the witness,

8 according to this document, was on the 25th of August of 1994.

9 MR. JONES: Yes.

10 JUDGE ESER: And there is a signature down there was of 19 August

11 of 2004.

12 MR. JONES: That's another signature altogether. That's a

13 signature of the Judge, Vaso Eric, when he was shown this document. The

14 signature we're concerned with is the one to the right of that, which

15 doesn't bear that date.

16 JUDGE ESER: Could the accused be asked whether his signature was

17 put on this when he was examined in 1994 or whether it was on the occasion

18 of the 19th of August 2004.

19 MR. JONES: 19/08/2004 is an altogether different signature, so I

20 don't think it would be appropriate to put that --

21 JUDGE AGIUS: You're not on the same wavelength.

22 MR. JONES: I do understand, Your Honour.

23 JUDGE AGIUS: What we want to know is -- Mr. Radic, you were shown

24 before this statement that supposedly you made to the Ministry of the

25 Interior of Republika Srpska in way back on the 25th of August, 1994, and

1 you were shown your signatures on different pages, and you accepted that

2 this was your signature.

3 THE WITNESS: [No interpretation]

4 JUDGE AGIUS: When did you sign these documents; in 1994 when you

5 were interviewed, or later?

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Believe me, I don't remember whether

7 it was before or later.

8 JUDGE AGIUS: But when you were interviewed in 1994 by the officer

9 of Republika Srpska, by one of the investigative judges, and you were

10 being asked questions and you were answering questions, what was the

11 procedure? Was it being typed out or was it being recorded? And if it

12 was recorded, when were you given the text to sign; on that same day or

13 later? And if later, how much later?

14 Let's take them one by one. On the 25th of August, 1994, you were

15 interviewed by an officer of Republika Srpska. Here we have an indication

16 that it was a certain Trajkovic Gorica. Trajkovic Gorica. You may or may

17 not remember. Where did the interview take place; in Zvornik or in your

18 own residence?

19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I don't remember. I

20 can't remember the year or the place of the interview. What I do know is

21 that I was interviewed, but I can't remember the year or the place of the

22 interview.

23 JUDGE AGIUS: And do you remember whether you signed the document

24 on that same day you were interviewed or not or later?

25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I can't remember. This is my

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1 signature, but I can't remember anything else.

2 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. I think we can leave it at that, safely leave

3 it at that because it's not going to change anything, but the point is

4 made that Judge Vaso Eric's signature comes later when obviously --

5 MR. JONES:

6 Q. So looking at D159, the document of the Srebrenica War Presidency,

7 I'm going to read from part of that and ask you some questions. We see on

8 the first page: "Around 1000 hours on 24 September 1992, Serbian Chetnik

9 criminals from Podravanje and Milici attacked the villages of Kutuzari,

10 Lipovac, and Suceska, using the most destructive hardware that the

11 Yugoslav soldiery had given them. There were casualties among the

12 innocent civilian population. The most notorious criminals from

13 Podravanje and Derventa were unsuccessfully trying to move the front line.

14 In a speedy and effective action, the Srebrenica armed forces moved to

15 counter-attack on the line between Zutica, Suceska, Kutuzari and Bucje

16 villages. In an exceptionally well prepared sabotage action the Chetnik

17 Bracan stronghold was taken, a T-53 tank and a PAT anti-aircraft gun were

18 quickly seized from the aggressor and two armoured personnel carriers were

19 destroyed. A great deal of artillery and infantry ammunition, grenades

20 and other MTS (material and technical equipment) was seized in the

21 action."

22 Then in the fourth paragraph on the next page, the document states

23 how the Serbs then launched hundreds of shells at Srebrenica in

24 retaliation, wounding many civilians, and the Yugoslav air force carried

25 out raids, wounding and killing dozens of people.

1 My question is: Isn't that the reality as described in that

2 document, and given that you were there and you know what was going on,

3 that's something you saw with your own eyes?

4 A. You can't say that Bracan was the only place where weapons were

5 stationed. There was Podravanje, there was Gunjace. I'm not a military

6 expert myself to know exactly where weapons were positioned. I was at

7 Bracan so I know what was there but I know nothing about the rest of it.

8 Q. Exactly. So you know, don't you, that Bracan was a stronghold

9 with heavy artillery and anti-aircraft gun and that they were firing from

10 there onto Muslim villages. I put it to you that's something you know to

11 be the case.

12 A. There was only one mortar and one three-barrelled gun there,

13 speaking of artillery. There was nothing else. There were seven or eight

14 of us guards who were there.

15 JUDGE AGIUS: So -- so basically what has been read out to you by

16 Mr. Jones, particularly this second paragraph of this document, you don't

17 agree with? Am I right? Am I correct?

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The document that has just been read

19 back to me, no, I disagree with the part about the weapons. I don't agree

20 that those weapons were there. The tanks were in Vlasenica with the

21 units. I believe it was referred to as an assault platoon or something of

22 the kind.

23 At the mine it would have been impossible. I don't know about the

24 nearby woods, but I didn't go there. This is more or less all I can say.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Mr. Jones.

1 MR. JONES:

2 Q. This was a pretty heavily militarised area, though, wasn't it?

3 We've seen in your 1994 statement reference to your positions and a

4 dugout. Isn't it the case that this was actually heavily fortified front

5 lines against the Muslims?

6 A. Well, we need to clarify one thing. A trench is one thing, and

7 bunkers are a different thing. There were no bunkers there. There were

8 trenches that were dug in a very primitive way, so you could just dig down

9 and the enemy couldn't see you. But there were no bunkers. There were

10 just two or three shallow trenches around Bracan. There was a trailer

11 where we slept, and that was all we had.

12 Q. And isn't it also right, didn't Sarac even admit when interviewed,

13 when he said of the events of the 24th of September, 1992, in Podravanje

14 that, I'm quoting from the transcript: "They, the attackers, captured a

15 lot of weapons from us, light and heavy." Isn't that correct, a lot of

16 light and heavy weapons were captured from the Serbs that day?

17 A. Again I'm telling you Sarac was captured in Podravanje. I told

18 you that I'd never gone to Podravanje. The distance between Bracan and

19 Podravanje is three or four kilometres. I had no need to go there and I

20 have no idea what was happening there. Sarac must have known, but his

21 statement is not true. It's his statement, but I really can't tell you

22 what was going on over there because we were captured at two different

23 places.

24 Q. Sarac said a lot of things when interviewed which weren't true,

25 didn't he? You mentioned two yesterday, and that seems to be a third one

1 which you're saying he said but which was not true.

2 A. I can't say that it's true or that it's not true. I simply wasn't

3 there and I don't know. It's possible that his statement is true. I just

4 can't confirm or deny it because I simply wasn't present. I wasn't there.

5 Q. Now, the document we just saw also refers to mercenaries from

6 Serbia, referring to Chetniks who were killed and mercenaries from Serbia.

7 The guard which you were in included people from Serbia, didn't it? Kukic

8 and Nevenko were from Serbia.

9 A. They were not with me there. They were in a different place.

10 They were hired by the bauxite mine as some sort of help. You should be

11 able to check that with the company itself, but I have no idea who brought

12 them over or who paid them.

13 Q. But they weren't there to work as miners, were they? They didn't

14 work in the mine. They were purely acting as guards.

15 A. Yes, security.

16 MS. SELLERS: Excuse me, Your Honour. I really would like to make

17 sure that counsel's characterisation of volunteer guards differs from what

18 I recall Mr. Radic stating that these were employees. No one has brought

19 forward a notion of volunteer employees and I would like to know if that's

20 what counsel is trying to ask this witness.

21 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Point -- point taken, and I think, however, if

22 one reads the transcript, that emerges quite clear, because although it's

23 true that Mr. Jones did hint these may have been volunteer guards, the

24 witness's reply is very clear that they were hired by the company as

25 guards, which excludes what was -- what was suggested to --

1 MR. JONES: Yes. My suggestion is that Nevenko and Kukic could be

2 described as mercenaries from Serbia because they're being paid to fight

3 in a war in a country which was not theirs. That's what I'm getting at.

4 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Do you agree with what Mr. Jones has just

5 stated now, Mr. Radic? It's being put to you that respective of what you

6 have just said yourself, these two gentlemen can be described as

7 mercenaries from Serbia because they were paid to fight in a war in a

8 country which was not theirs. Do you agree with this?

9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, I don't. They were not paid to

10 fight. They were hired by the company on a three-month contract to watch

11 the mine, to provide security.

12 Secondly, these two persons, Kukic was over 60 years of age at the

13 time. I don't think he would have been fit enough to take part in combat,

14 a man aged over 60. What can he possibly do?

15 MR. JONES:

16 Q. Moving to another area, and it's a short topic, so I think I can

17 deal with it before the break.

18 You told us on Thursday that the bauxite mine was the second

19 largest bauxite mine in Europe. It was worth a lot, wasn't it, the mine,

20 to whichever side controlled it?

21 A. Yes.

22 Q. And in September 1992, the Serbs controlled it, controlled the

23 mine, didn't they?

24 A. Yes. As well as earlier. Prior to 1992, I mean. Prior to

25 September 1992, because the mine itself was never taken. It was Serb

1 controlled throughout the war.

2 Q. It was controlled from May or June 1992 when all the Muslims left

3 the mine. Would that be right?

4 A. Yes.

5 Q. Now, you've accepted that the mine was the primary source of raw

6 materials to produce aluminium. Among others, it supplied the

7 Birac-Zvornik aluminium factory in Zvornik, didn't it?

8 A. Yes.

9 Q. That factory was also controlled by the Serbs from early in the

10 war?

11 A. Yes.

12 Q. Weren't both the aluminum mine and the bauxite mine very important

13 for the Serb war effort, for financing the war effort?

14 A. Well, the clay factory or the mine did not operate throughout the

15 war. Maybe earlier. Maybe up until November, but later there were stops,

16 and it was operating below capacity. One day there would be five lorries

17 taking the ore away and the next day two. There was not enough food for

18 locals to go around let alone petrol for the vehicles.

19 Q. Let me put it this way: Wasn't the bauxite mine, firstly, a

20 fiefdom in a sense of Rade Bjelanovic who was very involved both in ethnic

21 cleansing and prosecuting the war on behalf of the Serbs?

22 A. I don't know. Rade Bjelanovic was police chief in Milici when the

23 war broke out. I have no idea what they did. There is no way for me to

24 know. I think you should ask Rade Bjelanovic himself. One thing you must

25 know is that an ordinary citizen can't be familiar with what's going on in

1 -- within the police or the army.

2 Q. He was the manager of the bauxite mine as well, wasn't he, Rade

3 Bjelanovic?

4 A. No. He was in a leading position, but he was not the director,

5 the manager, himself.

6 Q. Now, you told us that the Muslims, 1.500 Muslims approximately,

7 left the mine in May 1992. Now, at this time jobs were scarce, weren't

8 they?

9 A. In 1992, I think about 3.000 Muslims. My rough estimate was

10 50/50. That means there must have been around 1.500 Muslims. This is not

11 necessarily accurate, but it was thereabouts.

12 Q. My point is a different one, which is that at this time, with the

13 war starting and all those problems, jobs outside the mine, leaving the

14 mine for one moment, they weren't very available, were they, so that

15 people wouldn't just leave their jobs and their livelihood just for the

16 hell of it. Do you accept that?

17 A. There was no pressure for them to leave their jobs. That's one

18 thing I know for certain. I believe I said this in one of my statements.

19 It was on a Thursday. The parties, the ICS and the SDA, divided people,

20 and obviously once this division was introduced the Serbs followed their

21 leaders and the Muslims followed theirs. So this was the underlying

22 reason for people leaving their jobs.

23 Q. That's precisely my point, though, Mr. Radic; that you're linking

24 people leaving their jobs, their source of livelihood, when other jobs are

25 not easily available, and you're suggesting that somehow that's linked to

1 the formation of the SDA. And so my question is why would people leave

2 well-paid jobs, which you told us was a source of pride to work at the

3 mine, unless they were forced to leave?

4 A. Well, sir, they were not forced to leave. The war began. What I

5 believe is when you have a war going on, you hardly have any -- I'm not

6 sure how I should put this. Privileges. You can't choose if you want war

7 or not. You may leave any day. But I'm sure this was due to the war

8 breaking out, the whole thing. And probably people much like myself felt

9 unsafe staying there with the war on. If I had been a Muslim, I would

10 have felt very much the same.

11 Q. That's what I'm --

12 A. And they were the predominant group.

13 Q. Yes. If I could stop you there because you're giving fairly

14 lengthy answers and I need to keep your answers short if we are to finish

15 today. That's precisely what I'm getting at. Why would the Muslims at

16 the mine feel unsafe staying at the mine when the Serbs felt perfectly

17 happy staying there and working there? Why did the Muslims feel unsafe?

18 A. Well, sir, it's difficult for me to explain. I think you should

19 ask someone else. I have no idea why. I can only talk about my own

20 personal case, but I can't provide any answers in relation to anyone else.

21 Q. I think you're being evasive, Mr. Radic. Isn't it obvious that

22 -- and wasn't it obvious to you at the time, that the Muslims left their

23 jobs, 1.500 of them, because they were intimidated and frightened and

24 bullied so that they would leave the mine because the Serbs were taking it

25 over?

1 A. I have no idea who bullied them or who pushed them to leave. I

2 don't know. If I knew, I'd be certain to tell you who it was that did it

3 or why. But honestly, I don't know, and that's why I simply can't answer

4 these questions.

5 Q. One more question before the break. I'm not asking you who, I'm

6 just asking if you confirm that that's what happened, that they were

7 bullied by someone to leave the mine.

8 A. I don't know what camp you're talking about. Mine, oh, okay. I

9 don't know about that. All I can is I don't know who made them or whether

10 anyone did, for that matter. There were Muslims working there. They

11 stayed on until sometime in October, those who worked in the mine.

12 Therefore, not all of them left immediately. It took place in stages, in

13 a manner of speaking, but they continued to work there, and there are

14 people who worked there who have in the meantime returned, the same people

15 who used to work there before the war.

16 Q. Thank you.

17 MR. JONES: I think that's a good time for the break.

18 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you, Mr. Jones. We will have a 25-minute

19 break. How much longer do you have so that we give the Prosecution an

20 indication of when to prepare the other witness, the next witness?

21 MR. JONES: I'm making quite good progress.

22 JUDGE AGIUS: I think so, yes.

23 MR. JONES: I think I'll probably be finished by the next break,

24 although there is the possibility that I will go slightly after that.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay.

1 MR. JONES: But we could certainly start with the next witness.

2 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, thank you. We will have a 25-minute break.

3 --- Recess taken at 10.31 a.m.

4 --- On resuming at 11.01 a.m.

5 MR. JONES: Thank you, Your Honour.

6 Q. Mr. Radic, before the break, you were telling us how Muslims left

7 the Bracan mine in stages. My question is: Don't those stages correspond

8 to the stages of ethnic cleansing of Muslims from their villages in the

9 Vlasenica area? That is, Muslims stopped coming to the mine after they

10 had been chased from their villages.

11 A. I don't know for sure that they were chased out. It's not within

12 my competence, and I know nothing about it. I told you a moment ago that

13 I was a regular citizen just like anyone else. You should ask somebody

14 from a higher level whether they were expelled or not.

15 Q. Mr. Radic, I'm asking you, and the questions I put to you I'd be

16 grateful if you would answer if you can and otherwise not. There's no

17 need to suggest that I should speak to anyone else, if you understand.

18 And it would also -- it would also be helpful to make progress if you keep

19 your answers short.

20 A. I'm sorry.

21 Q. That's okay. Now, you told us that you wouldn't know anything

22 about ethnic cleansing of Muslim villages, but you're from Milici, you

23 work -- you worked, at the time, in Bracan, and there's a road which goes

24 from Milici down to Bracan which passes lots of Muslim villages on the

25 road, Pomol, Besici, Nurici, Stedra, Djile. Now, what I'm saying is you

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1 passed those villages, you saw them, and surely you would be aware if the

2 houses had been burnt and the inhabitants had been expelled. So are you

3 saying it didn't happen, or are you saying that you didn't see it?

4 JUDGE AGIUS: I think there's too much in one question. Perhaps

5 you could break it -- break it down in various stages, Mr. Jones, because

6 it's --

7 MR. JONES: Certainly, Your Honour.

8 JUDGE AGIUS: You know exactly what I mean. It's loaded.

9 MR. JONES: Yes.

10 Q. You're familiar, Mr. Radic, with the Muslim villages of, and I'll

11 do them one by one, Pomol. Muslim village before the war?

12 A. Pomol.

13 Q. So you're familiar with that Muslim village before the war?

14 A. Yes.

15 Q. And it's on or near the road between Milici and the mine where you

16 worked?

17 A. Yes. Not close to the main road but maybe two or three kilometres

18 away from the road.

19 Q. How about Besici, also a Muslim village, also one which is not far

20 from the main road?

21 A. Yes.

22 Q. Nurici is really right on the road, isn't it, and a Muslim village

23 before the war?

24 A. Yes.

25 Q. And the same for Stedra as well? It's actually on the road and it

1 was a Muslim village before the war?

2 A. Yes.

3 Q. Now, are you saying that on September 24, 1992, just to take a

4 date, that the Muslims were all living in all those villages at the time?

5 A. Yes.

6 Q. You maintain that Muslims were living without any harassment, in

7 September 1992, in, for example, Nurici. That's your testimony?

8 A. No. They were not there in September. I believe sometime in May,

9 not later than June, they left their villages. Naturally, because most of

10 these people that lived in those villages worked in the bauxite mine.

11 Q. That's exactly what I'm getting at. Muslims leaving their

12 villages in May/June 1992, that's what I'm asking you about, that's a

13 pretty significant event, isn't it, Muslims leaving their villages?

14 That's something which you confirm occurred.

15 A. Yes. But I don't know the reason why.

16 Q. Is that your honest answer, you don't know why they left, or do

17 you know that they left because they were brutally, brutally expelled,

18 ethnically cleansed by Serb forces from their villages?

19 A. My honest opinion, to the best of my knowledge, as I said, those

20 people worked at the bauxite mine, and when they left the bauxite company,

21 it was natural for them to go elsewhere. Where, I don't know. And they

22 took their families with them, as I would take my family if I was moving.

23 And to be honest, of course there were attacks on those villages just as

24 Muslim forces attacked Serb villages.

25 Q. That's it. I'm asking you to be honest and to tell us frankly

1 about attacks on their villages and not to hold back. And that's what

2 I've been trying to get you to help us with. Isn't it true that Muslims

3 left their villages because they were attacked and their houses were

4 burnt?

5 A. Let me tell you, as I said a moment ago, those villages were

6 attacked, but I don't know about it. I didn't participate in those

7 attacks. I cannot tell you about things that I don't know anything about,

8 but there were attacks on those villages, yes.

9 Q. And the people who left didn't just go elsewhere, as you said,

10 they went and lived in the woods across on the other side of the road,

11 didn't they, because they had nowhere else to go?

12 A. No, they didn't go to the woods. You didn't mention a place

13 called Zutica. I didn't see it on the map. It's between Besici hill and

14 the village of -- let me think for a moment. I can't remember the name of

15 the village, but if you go from Milici it's on the left. Zutica I

16 couldn't find on the map. There was a passage from there towards the mine

17 only after Srebrenica fell, which means that those Muslims from the

18 surrounding villages were there. Zutica, Zabensko [phoen], and others

19 towards Srebrenica. So they didn't go to the woods, they were there,

20 close by.

21 Q. Did you also hear in relation to attacks on villages that there

22 was a massacre in Zaklopaca in which women and children were killed, and

23 also killings in Pomol, as well as in Nurici and the other places that I

24 mentioned? Did you hear about that or any of those events?

25 A. I heard about Zaklopaca, that there was indeed a massacre there,

1 and I can confirm that with certainty. As for the other places, they were

2 attacked. Whether any other massacres were involved, I don't know, but if

3 there were attacks, of course there were casualties and people killed,

4 wounded.

5 Q. And that's the massacre of Muslims in Zaklopaca, just to be clear.

6 A. Yes.

7 Q. Are you aware of Susica camp in Vlasenica where Muslims were held,

8 where Dragan Jenki Nikolic, convicted by this Tribunal of crimes against

9 humanity, was a camp commander? Did you know about Susica?

10 A. No, I never went near that camp. I didn't need to go there. It's

11 in the Vlasenica municipality. Milici was then part of the Vlasenica

12 municipality, as a matter of fact, but I heard about the existence of that

13 camp, and I also heard that things happened there.

14 Q. Let's deal with Milici, then, because you're from there and

15 obviously you knew Milici well at the time. Wasn't there a huge military

16 presence in Milici in September 1992 with armoured transport units, tanks,

17 transporters, artillery, and even units which had fought in Croatia?

18 A. No. I don't know about that. I know that, as required, those

19 armoured units came from Vlasenica. But I know that we had no tanks or

20 APCs. They were located in Vlasenica, and they would come as required.

21 Milici was, at the time, under the Vlasenica municipality, and now it's

22 separate.

23 Q. There was a Milici Brigade, wasn't there?

24 A. Yes, in October, but not before.

25 MR. JONES: With the usher's assistance, I'd like to show the

1 witness a new document, new exhibit. It's from the SJB public security

2 station Milici, dated 28 May 1992. And the ERN is 01782455, and it's a

3 duty report of the police station in Milici.

4 I want to draw your attention and the witness's attention to the

5 section under "Vehicles," where it states that: "All vehicles were used

6 to cleanse the field in the area of Milici Brdo." And at the bottom under

7 the note, that: "Two police squads led by R. Bjelanovic and R. Pantic

8 were cleansing the areas in Koprivno and providing support to the local

9 population."

10 Q. And my question to you, Mr. Radic, is wasn't there ethnic

11 cleansing of Muslims from the Koprivno area in May 1992?

12 A. The area of Koprivno is a Serb area with a 100 Serb population.

13 Q. Let's take that one stage at a time. Firstly, dealing with

14 R. Bjelanovic, there, would you agree that that most probably refers to

15 Rade Bjelanovic, the manager of the bauxite mine and the person whose

16 voice you identified on the audiotape?

17 A. Yes, it is Rade Bjelanovic. But Rade Bjelanovic was never

18 director of the bauxite company. He was an administrator of one of the

19 units, and he was my boss, my manager, and he's the same Rade whom we

20 heard on the tape.

21 Q. And the R. Pantic in that document, could that be the R. Pantic

22 from the mine who was killed on the 24th of September, if you know? Did

23 he work with Rade Bjelanovic in cleansing operations?

24 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, which question does Defence counsel

25 want the witness to answer?

1 MR. JONES: Really, it's an attempt to clarify the question.

2 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes.

3 MR. JONES: I'll rephrase it.

4 JUDGE AGIUS: I think it's a case of rephrasing it, Mr. Jones,

5 yes.

6 MR. JONES:

7 Q. In the document I've just referred to there's a note which reads

8 as follows: "Two police squads that were cleansing the areas in Koprivno

9 and provided support to population in this area led by the head

10 Bjelanovic, R., and the commander Pantic, R., returned to Milici at 6.30

11 p.m."

12 My question would be R. Pantic referred to in that document, could

13 that be the Pantic from the mine who died on the 24th of September 1992?

14 A. First of all, sir - I'm sorry, I don't know your name - the place

15 of Koprivno is a Serb place with 100 per cent Serb population, and Rajko

16 Pantic, who was killed on the 24th of September, 1992, when I was captured

17 at Bracan, is not the same Pantic. There is Radomir Pantic, sometimes

18 called Rado, who was head of the Milici SUP, or the police.

19 Q. Going back to Koprivno, there isn't any reason as to why Serb

20 policemen would be conducting a cleansing operation in the sense of

21 ethnically cleansing Serbs, is there?

22 A. I don't know. It must be a case of wrong information. I have

23 already said, and I can confirm, that Koprivno is a Serb place.

24 Q. How about it referring possibly to cleansing the area in the sense

25 of seeking out Muslims who had left their homes and hunting them down,

1 killing them, capturing them? It could refer to that, couldn't it?

2 JUDGE AGIUS: Again, I'm not going to allow the witness to answer

3 this question because if you put the question to me, Mr. Jones, looking at

4 this document, I would never even dare give you an answer to that.

5 MR. JONES: I would simply ask that this document be given an

6 exhibit number.

7 JUDGE AGIUS: I think it's the case, and then -- as we say in my

8 own language, the Lord will try to understand.

9 So this will be D160, and I think Judge Eser has a question.

10 JUDGE ESER: Yes. I just want to have a question with regard to

11 the term "cleansing." Now, in the Serbian Croatian language, does it have

12 the same meaning or connotation as it is used in English? When we

13 referring to cleansing, it's always meant in terms of ethnic cleansing.

14 MR. JONES: I would prefer to leave the witness to answer that, if

15 you don't mind.

16 Q. Mr. Radic, how do you understand the term "cleansing" as used in

17 May 1992?

18 A. I don't know because I did not participate in this. I never moved

19 far from the mine. I would stand on guard eight days, rest for seven

20 days, then work on the shop floor. So I moved between my home and the

21 mine. I didn't go anywhere else.

22 Q. Two things: Firstly, that's not the question which we were

23 asking; and secondly, you are tending to give quite lengthy answers, and I

24 think we will want to finish with your testimony today.

25 It's a question of language purely. Never mind whether you know

1 of this action. In May 1992, if one said to you -- if a Serb policeman

2 said to you, "We cleansed this area," what would you understand him to be

3 referring to?

4 A. Of course if he had said something like that to me, I would

5 understand him to mean that it was cleansed of Muslim people, but nobody

6 told me any such thing. And of course the police would not tell a

7 civilian what they were doing, like the commander would not tell a regular

8 soldier about his intentions.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: One moment, Mr. Jones. Could the interpreters who

10 are interpreting from English into Bosnian Croat -- B/C/S, please tell me

11 what word they use -- they used in translating Mr. Jones when he used the

12 word "cleansed"? What word did you use in B/C/S?

13 MR. JONES: It's "ciscenje." I'm sorry, the --

14 JUDGE AGIUS: I want the interpreters to answer me.

15 THE INTERPRETER: We use the term "ocistili."

16 JUDGE AGIUS: Which is not "ciscenje."

17 THE INTERPRETER: "A to nije," "ciscenje."

18 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Let Mr. Radic -- look at me. If I used the

19 words, "Koristana su sva vozila radi ciscenja terena na potezu Milica

20 Brdo, Koprivno", what would you understand? When I use the word

21 "ciscenje," what do you understand?

22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Cleansing or cleaning, depends on

23 the object. You can clean the road. You can cleanse a people. It

24 depends on how it's used.

25 JUDGE ROBINSON: Let's move, Mr. Jones. I think we've got a clear

1 answer. And thanks to the interpreters, please. Thank you.

2 MR. JONES: Well, I'm moving to an entirely different area now.

3 Q. I'm going to ask you some questions about your treatment in the

4 prison. Firstly, I want to ask you about the very first night that you

5 arrived at the SUP. And again, so we make progress, there's no need for

6 you to retell your story at any stage. My questions will be specific.

7 Now, firstly, in 1994 -- in your statement in 1994, speaking of

8 the first night of your arrest, and I'm referring to page 4 of the

9 English, the ERN is 03602055, fifth paragraph, "During the night they

10 brought Veselin Sarac from Podravanje to the same room as well as

11 Brankovic Zoran, about 18 years old from Smederevo, a volunteer of the RS

12 army. They did not touch or maltreat us that night."

13 And that's also what you told us last Thursday, and for the

14 transcript it's page 27, lines 23 to 25, and page 28, line 1: "That first

15 night that you were there, did anything happen to you in terms of physical

16 mistreatment, the night that you arrived?" "No, no, not when we arrived."

17 But if I could refer you now to your statement made in 2000 to

18 ICTY investigators, a statement which you signed as truthful, and if we

19 have that, it's page 5 of 12, ERN 02030468, and it's the 7th, last

20 paragraph.

21 You said: "During that first evening, after the two new prisoners

22 came, the door to our cell opened, and two or three men came in and beat

23 us. They hit us with their fists, and they kicked us all over our bodies.

24 We were sitting on the floor, and they would kick and kick us. It was

25 dark and no lights were on. I could not see them."

1 Now, that's a clear statement, isn't it, about the first night

2 that you were imprisoned, after the two other prisoners came in, and it

3 completely contradicts what you told us last week and in your 1994

4 statement, doesn't it?

5 A. I still stand by my statement to the effect that nobody even

6 touched us that first evening. It could be a case of misinterpretation or

7 a wrong date. It did happen that they entered our cell and beat us, but

8 not on that first night.

9 Q. Exactly. That's what I'm getting at, Mr. Radic. In your 2000

10 statement, it's a very clear statement, isn't it? It refers to the first

11 evening after the two prisoners came in, and you say you were hit with

12 fists, kicked all over your bodies, kicked and kicked.

13 What I'm putting to you is there's no room for a mistake there.

14 Whoever wrote that down was clearly under the impression that you told

15 them that you were very badly beaten on your first evening, and in fact

16 that's untrue. Are you saying that the ICTY investigator put that in your

17 statement when it was not true?

18 A. No. I do not doubt the honesty of the Prosecution's

19 investigators. I could have made an error and mixed things up and said

20 this about the first evening, or maybe the interpreter didn't get it

21 right.

22 Q. You understand the need to give an accurate and truthful account

23 of what happened to you in prison, and when you gave this statement you

24 knew that it was for an investigation in the Oric case, and you signed it

25 as being true to the best of your knowledge and belief after it was read

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1 back to you, didn't you? What I --

2 JUDGE AGIUS: Again there are a lot of questions in one question

3 here. I mean, I very much doubt if he ever knew at the time about even

4 the Oric case, and I don't know if it even existed at the time.

5 MR. JONES:

6 Q. The point is this, Mr. Radic: Doesn't your account about what

7 happened to you at the SUP change every time you tell this story?

8 A. I don't know which SUP you are talking about. The SUP in

9 Srebrenica, is that what you mean?

10 Q. Of course. There's no other SUP which has been referred to. The

11 SUP in Srebrenica. Let me put it a different way.

12 I put it to you a moment ago that each time you speak about these

13 events you give a different account. In one you're a civilian, in another

14 you're an RS soldier in a squad. In one statement you're getting savagely

15 beaten on your first night, in another statement you're left completely

16 alone. So my question to you is: Are you what you're telling us -- is

17 what you're telling us the fruit of genuine recollection, or are you

18 making it up as you go along?

19 A. No, I'm not making anything up. When you see something for

20 yourself, you can't make it up. It's possible that I gave this statement

21 about the first evening. I mean, it has been a long while, after all, and

22 I would have been unable to remember every single thing. But I must say

23 it again, the first evening no one touched us. The next evening they

24 smashed my teeth and extracted them.

25 I have no need in the world to make things up.

1 Q. Sorry to have to insist on this, but another part of your story,

2 what you told us, was obviously a very unpleasant memory of Kemo urinating

3 in your mouth. And as I say, I'm sorry to have to ask you about it, but

4 here in this Tribunal, when specifically asked about it, you said that

5 Kemo urinated in your mouth. In your 2000 statement, you said that

6 someone else altogether did it. I'm looking at page 9, ERN 02030472.

7 "Kemo then ordered the soldier to pee in my mouth. Kemo said this will be

8 good for you. Your wounds will be washed out. The soldier then peed in

9 my mouth and the Kemo forced me to swallow it all."

10 Then three paragraphs down, you refer to another instance, and you

11 say: "This time Kemo said, 'This time there is no one who can wash your

12 wounds out.'"

13 Now, looking at this statement, whoever wrote this down was very

14 clear, weren't they, that you told them that a soldier urinated in your

15 mouth, not Kemo.

16 A. Kemo was a soldier.

17 Q. But here you're saying that Kemo ordered another soldier to do

18 that to you. And my point is this would be a vivid unpleasant memory, and

19 I suggest it's impossible to get something like that wrong and that you've

20 invented this part of the story.

21 A. No. I didn't invent it. They urinated into my mouth. They

22 extracted my teeth. Kemo, more specifically.

23 Q. I'm referring you to page --

24 JUDGE AGIUS: One moment, Mr. Jones.

25 So basically Mr. Jones has just put it to you that there are two

1 versions to this unfortunate event. One version is what you said during

2 your testimony here and what you seem to have repeated now, namely that it

3 was Kemo who urinated in your mouth. The other version is what comes out,

4 what emerges from the statement that was referred to, which does not state

5 that Kemo urinated in your mouth but that Kemo ordered someone else, a

6 soldier, to urinate in your mouth, and it was that soldier and not Kemo

7 who urinated in your mouth. Which of the two versions is the correct one?

8 Let's start from there.

9 A. Kemo. That is the true answer.

10 JUDGE AGIUS: And if that is so, what is your explanation for what

11 is contained in the statement where it says that you were telling the

12 investigators that it wasn't Kemo who urinated in your mouth but someone

13 else who Kemo ordered to urinate in your mouth? How do you explain this

14 difference? If you told the investigators "It was Kemo who urinated in my

15 mouth," how on earth would the investigator write down that Kemo ordered

16 someone else to urinate in your mouth? How do you explain the difference?

17 This is what basically we want to know.

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, when I returned home in

19 December, I had time to mull things over and to understand what was going

20 on, and I realised that the same man named Kemo who had smashed my teeth,

21 there was a table over there. He leaned my head against the table and

22 then he urinated into my mouth. Therefore, it was Kemo. Kemo was the

23 person. There was only Kemo around, after all. Mrki was there, too, and

24 the turnkey.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: Did you ever tell anyone, any one of the

1 investigators of the Office of the Prosecution, did you ever tell anyone

2 that Kemo ordered a soldier to urinate in your mouth and that soldier

3 urinated in your mouth?

4 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I don't remember that statement,

5 Your Honour.

6 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Mr. Jones. He's all yours.

7 MR. JONES:

8 Q. Let's look at your 1994 statement again, it's page 4, sixth

9 paragraph. You don't need to look at it, I'll read it to you. This is

10 now -- I want to ask you about the first interview at the SUP by the

11 chief, Mirzet. So this is the next morning, 25th of September. I think

12 you've been very clear that the first morning you were at the SUP, you

13 were interviewed, and you say: "The next morning, between 10.00 and

14 11.00 a.m. they took us one by one for questioning to a room at the ground

15 floor. They took me for questioning first. SUP chief Mirzet questioned

16 me. They did not beat or maltreat me this time." And I think I'm right

17 in saying that on the 1994 statement your signature is right by that line

18 which says, "They did not beat or maltreat me this time."

19 Now, let's look at what you said about exactly the same interview,

20 the first questioning, the morning after you were brought in, in your 2000

21 statement. It's a bit lengthy but I'll read it out. It's page 6, ERN

22 02030469, second paragraph: "The next morning, I think around 9.00 a.m.,

23 but again I did not have my watch so I do not know the time for sure, that

24 morning each of us was taken one by one to the chief's office for

25 interrogation. A soldier who was dressed in a camouflage uniform took me

1 to see the chief. Two other men were present. They were dressed in

2 civilian clothes, as was the chief. None of them were carrying weapons.

3 The chief explained that one man was a Croat and the other one was from

4 the international community. The chief offered me a cigarette and lit it

5 for me, then he began punching me and he told me that it would be my last

6 cigarette. The chief kept asking me questions and hitting me. I was

7 sitting in a chair and he slapped me, punched me, and he kicked me in the

8 face with his foot. After the interrogation, I was taken back to the

9 cell. I was bleeding from the mouth and nose."

10 Now, that's, again I would put to you, a very specific reference

11 to hitting, slapping, punching, kicking, and at the end that you were

12 bleeding from the mouth and nose. Now, do you remember saying that?

13 A. Yes.

14 Q. Yet on Friday you said something else again, and it's at page 30,

15 line 16 to 20: "Now, when you went back to your cell --" this is

16 referring to that same occasion -- "do you recall whether you were

17 bleeding or not?" "No." Question: "No, you do not recall or no you were

18 not bleeding?" "I was not bleeding." And that was on Thursday, and then

19 you were very clear and categorical that you were not bleeding when you

20 returned to your cell after your first interrogation on the 25th of

21 September, 1992. Now, is that correct, that you weren't bleeding after

22 the left the first interrogation?

23 A. Yes, I was not bleeding in the cell. It was in the office when

24 the chief kicked me that my nose started bleeding, and my teeth too. Not

25 much blood, though, just a little, and then it stopped. Back in the cell,

1 I was no longer bleeding. There was this gentleman in civilian clothes,

2 the chief, I think. The other two did not touch me.

3 Q. In your 1994 statement, you're saying that you weren't beaten or

4 maltreated at all. Do you recall saying that when you were asked by

5 the --

6 A. Yes. Not those two, just the chief.

7 Q. These details may seem not so significant to you, Mr. Radic,

8 whether you were beaten on the first night, whether you were bleeding or

9 not after your interrogation, but I hope you appreciate we need to get

10 this right. And it seems to me and I'm suggesting to you that every time

11 you tell this story you say something different.

12 You've signed the 1994 statement as being correct, haven't you?

13 You've signed -- you admitted it's your signature.

14 MR. JONES: I'm going to move on to another area and I'll come

15 back to that.

16 Q. Now, moving to another area, you were asked by the Prosecution on

17 Thursday if you were treated as a prisoner of war, whether you were asked

18 your name, rank, and serial number. Now, the people who interviewed you

19 didn't say to you, did they, "You are a prisoner of war," and ask you

20 those details, did they? They just asked you normal questions about who

21 you were.

22 A. Should I answer?

23 Q. Sorry. Yes.

24 A. I'm sorry. They asked me if I was a soldier, what my rank was,

25 which army I belonged to, that kind of thing.

1 Q. They didn't say, "You're a prisoner of war and you must tell us

2 your name, rank, and serial number," did they?

3 A. No, they didn't say that I was a prisoner of war, or at least I

4 don't remember. As for the rank and serial number, yes, they did say

5 that. They asked me the number of my military post, what sort of soldier

6 I was, and which rank I held.

7 Q. As far as you were concerned, you weren't a prisoner of war at

8 all, were you, because you were a civilian, as far as you were concerned.

9 A. Well, in war, even a civilian is a prisoner of war. If you have a

10 war going on, everyone who is taken prisoner is a prisoner of war. That

11 at least is my opinion.

12 Q. My point is this: You told them, didn't you, that you were a

13 civilian, not that you were a member of the RS army. If we can just

14 clarify that.

15 A. Yes.

16 Q. And this was, as far as you could tell, a civilian police

17 operation, wasn't it? You were in the civilian SUP, and it was the

18 civilian police who were questioning you.

19 A. Yes.

20 Q. Do you remember --

21 A. Yes.

22 Q. Now, do you remember the person who you called the chief telling

23 you that one of the people present during your interview was a Croat and

24 one was from the international community?

25 A. I think he did say, but I'm not absolutely positive, therefore I

1 can't answer the question.

2 Q. It's in your 2000 statement that you recollect the chief telling

3 you that. So is that right that you recalled the chief telling you that

4 one of the people there was a Croat and one from the international

5 community? Does that ring any bell or is that a figment of Ms. Gilleece's

6 imagination?

7 A. No. I don't remember. I'll say again, I'm not positive. I

8 believe, as I said a moment ago, the chief explained it to me that way.

9 MR. JONES: I'll ask the 2000 statement of this witness to be

10 given an exhibit number. Not for the truth of its contents, obviously,

11 but to illustrate these contradictions.

12 JUDGE AGIUS: Any objection, Ms. Sellers?

13 MS. SELLERS: No objection from our part.

14 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you. So that statement, statement of the

15 witness to the Office of the Prosecution, dated -- again could I have the

16 date, please?

17 MR. JONES: Yes, one moment.

18 JUDGE AGIUS: And --

19 MR. JONES: It's 23-25 May, 2000. The ERN is 02030464.

20 JUDGE AGIUS: It is being admitted into evidence for the purpose

21 indicated by Mr. Jones and solely for that purpose and is being marked as

22 Defence exhibit D161.

23 MR. JONES: I probably didn't need to say that but--

24 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, but --

25 MR. JONES: I'm not precluded from making the same point on other

1 exhibits.

2 Q. Now, you told us on Thursday that you were only beaten at night, I

3 think, and that nobody touched you during the day. So is that right, that

4 all beatings were done under cover of night?

5 A. Yes. By day they would only beat us in the hall on our way to the

6 lavatory.

7 Q. And it wasn't every night, was it, that you were beaten, as it was

8 suggested to you. You told us --

9 A. No. No. When Cude was on duty, that's when they didn't.

10 Q. Now, I asked you on Friday whether you were beaten before you

11 arrived at the SUP, and you said that you were but that didn't leave any

12 marks. Now, I want to look briefly at what you said in your statement,

13 your 2000 statement, and it's page 4 in English, 02030467, third

14 paragraph, starting with the second sentence, and I'll leave out

15 irrelevant parts. "As we walked, Rifet and the other Muslim soldier --"

16 which is referring to Beli -- "would hit one of us which caused us to fall

17 down many times. They hit us with their rifles and they continued to kick

18 us while we walked."

19 Then skipping a paragraph: "We walked for more than two hours to

20 reach Zulfo's house. We stayed outside the house for more than an hour.

21 While we were there three Muslim soldiers in camouflage uniforms and Beli,

22 FNU LNU, beat us with their feet, cursed us, and hit us with their

23 rifles."

24 So for an hour outside that house, three soldiers were beating you

25 with their rifles; is that right?

1 A. No, not for an hour. It lasted perhaps several minutes.

2 Q. That was a pretty savage beating then, in any event, three

3 soldiers hitting you with their rifles.

4 A. Well, yes, depending on your point of view. They kicked us and

5 hit us with rifle butts. There were three of us taking the beating. If

6 there had only been one person, perhaps the person would have been killed.

7 There were three of us. They kept beating us for several minutes. It

8 certainly wasn't for one hour, and I don't think I ever stated that

9 anywhere.

10 Q. That's fine. That might have been my inference. But you say that

11 that didn't -- that beating didn't leave any visible marks on your body?

12 A. No, not that I noticed. It did hurt and probably there were

13 marks, but I simply didn't notice. I did notice the pain, though.

14 Q. Then you were beaten again, a third time - this is all the time

15 before you arrive in the SUP - during the drive in the back of a truck.

16 And I'm referring to that next paragraph on that page, 4 of 12. "They put

17 us on the floor of the back of a truck. We drove approximately one hour,

18 from what I remember. During the drive, the soldiers began kicking and

19 beating us. They ripped my shirt off and beat me. They also took my

20 wristwatch and my shoes."

21 So again, are you saying that occurred, kicking and a beating, and

22 again that you arrived in the SUP without any marks on your body from that

23 mistreatment?

24 A. No. I felt pain, but there were no marks on my face because they

25 didn't hit us on our faces. They hit us on our chests and backs.

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1 Q. There may be -- there may be a difference in language when you say

2 that you were beaten or that you suffered beatings. When you use that

3 phrase, do you sometimes use it just to mean being struck but not

4 necessarily referring to severe or hard blows?

5 A. Well, when I say "hard blows," that would mean, for example, if

6 someone knocked me off my feet and I fell on the ground. The blows that

7 they dealt us, they weren't really horrible. Sometimes they kicked us,

8 sometimes they hit us with rifle butts. If the beating had been any

9 harder, none of us would probably have survived in the first place.

10 Q. But when you -- when you say beating or beaten, are you sometimes

11 referring to something which is nothing more than a slap? I'm not saying

12 that the whole treatment is nothing more but a slap but --

13 A. Slap. It was a good deal more than that. Being struck several

14 times, not just slapped once.

15 Q. I think it's the difference between "tuklisu" and "udaralisu" in

16 your language. Actually, that will be difficult to put that question to

17 him.

18 A. My language?

19 Q. That's all right. Moving to another question. Isn't it the fact

20 that there was a lot of violence at that time so that people would often

21 get badly beaten up by the people who first arrested them, by the enemy,

22 especially in this situation, local Muslims angered at being sacked from

23 their mine and chased from their homes? Is that something that you'd

24 accept?

25 A. The local population not beating us, is that what you're talking

1 about?

2 Q. Let me put it this way: When you were arrested on the 24th, you

3 mostly recognised local Muslims, didn't you, from Djile and other local

4 villages?

5 A. Yes.

6 Q. Those people, you accepted, had left their homes sometime before.

7 They'd been --

8 A. Yes, yes.

9 Q. And weren't a lot of those people angry and aggressive towards

10 you, a Serb, because of this local -- these local occurrences?

11 A. Of course.

12 Q. And doesn't that explain there was a great deal of violence at the

13 time upon -- upon the arrest of people like yourself?

14 A. I tend to agree with you, sir.

15 Q. Now, when Sarac and Bankovic arrived at the SUP, they had signs of

16 being beaten on them, didn't they, i.e., beaten upon arrest and before

17 they were brought to the prison?

18 A. I don't remember that. It was night. I can't remember. Bankovic

19 did not have any marks for sure, and I don't remember about Sarac.

20 Q. Now, just on the same theme but skipping forward to the day of

21 your exchange. You were emphatic here on Friday that you were never

22 beaten at Potocari. You said, and it's at page 29, lines 1 to 2: "At

23 Potocari no one beat us. I deny that. I'm not sure who stated that in

24 the first place."

25 And I put it to you that you said it in the first place, in your

1 1994 statement, at page 7 for the record ERN 03602058, second to last

2 sentence, and stated there: "When we arrived in Potocari and parked in

3 front of a house, local inhabitants gathered around us and also beat us

4 and mistreated us."

5 Is it right that you didn't say that either? You never said to an

6 investigator that you were beaten at Potocari?

7 A. I don't remember ever having said that to the investigators.

8 You're talking about 1994, aren't you? I don't remember that. As I've

9 said awhile ago, I don't remember that statement at all. I don't remember

10 when I signed it or who asked me questions, but we certainly were not

11 beaten at Potocari.

12 Q. And you personally didn't need to go to hospital on the night of

13 your release, on the 16th of October, 1992, did you? You stayed in the

14 Hotel Fontana.

15 A. No. I refused to go to the Zvornik hospital. I spent the night

16 right there. I went to Milici, my own village, there was a hospital

17 there, and I was in a position to receive treatment there.

18 Q. And you exchanged, with the person you've described as the postman

19 from Fakovici and four others, and you were exchanged alive for 20 or so

20 dead Muslims. Would that be correct?

21 A. Four of us; the postman, myself, and another three persons, it is

22 quite true that we were exchanged for 20 dead Muslim bodies.

23 Q. We heard on the audiotape last week Rade Bjelanovic saying that

24 the Serbs never got back their people alive. In fact, it's the reverse,

25 isn't it, at least in that exchange; the Serbs got back their people alive

1 and the Muslims only got back their dead. Would you agree with that?

2 A. Well, the tape, at least to the extent that I remember, indicates

3 that this was before the exchange, when Rade Bjelanovic was involved in

4 negotiations.

5 Q. Now, on that day Sarac could walk, didn't he? He didn't have any

6 problems with his legs or anything like that?

7 A. He was able to walk, yes.

8 Q. Nothing dramatic had happened to his legs. They hadn't been

9 damaged or beaten in any way?

10 A. When do you mean, about him being able to walk on which specific

11 day?

12 Q. On the 16th of October, 1992. Sarac didn't have any --

13 A. The 16th, yes, he did. We had to hoist him up onto the lorry

14 outside the SUP building, him and Zoran Bankovic. On the 17th, the next

15 day, he remained at the hotel in Bratunac in bed. I don't know because I

16 myself left for Milici.

17 JUDGE AGIUS: Again, Mr. Jones, I hate interrupting you, but again

18 this is not clear. From what the witness has answered, I'm not clear in

19 my mind whether Mr. Sarac on the 16th, the day of the exchange, could

20 walk, whether he had any problems with his legs or feet --

21 MR. JONES: Yes, that's what I am --

22 JUDGE AGIUS: -- or not.

23 MR. JONES: Yes, that's what I'm trying to establish.

24 MR. JONES: Because he just said the day, they helped him, they

25 hoisted him, and whatever.

1 MR. JONES: Yes, I do --

2 JUDGE AGIUS: What was Mr. Sarac's condition the day of the

3 release? Could he walk on his own? Did he need help? And if he needed

4 help, why did he need help? Had he sustained any injuries that impeded

5 him from walking on his own or being able to walk on his own?

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] As for being able to walk on that

7 day, I don't know, but he was beaten that morning before we were to be

8 exchanged, and it was probably as a result of that beating that he was

9 dragging his leg behind. And we were pulling him along because he was not

10 able to move on his own unaided.

11 JUDGE AGIUS: That explains it now, Mr. Jones. So you move to

12 your next question, please, thank you.

13 MR. JONES: Yes. Well, I wanted to make that clear.

14 Q. Because on Friday, Mr. Radic, you told us that Sarac wasn't beaten

15 on the day of the exchange. So I take it that's wrong. He was in fact

16 beaten on the day of the exchange.

17 MS. SELLERS: Excuse me, Your Honour. I think counsel might be

18 mischaracterising the testimony. My memory is that it was only Mr. Sikic,

19 the postman, and I believe Mr. Radic who were waiting for other men who

20 remained in the SUP and were beaten again, and then they were brought to

21 the truck. Unless that is a misunderstanding, I would just ask counsel,

22 please lead us in the transcript to where he is referring.

23 JUDGE AGIUS: I think Ms. Sellers is correct, or else we go to

24 your next question, Mr. Jones; it's up to you.

25 MR. JONES: It might be rather slow to find that part of the

1 transcript. My recollection certainly is that this witness said that

2 Sarac was not beaten on the day of the exchange. There's no need to --

3 I'm not seeking to point out a contradiction. If he can confirm simply

4 that Sarac was beaten on the day of the exchange, then that's perfectly

5 fine.

6 JUDGE AGIUS: Was Sarac beaten on the day of the exchange,

7 Mr. Radic.

8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: Who else was beaten on the day of the exchange?

10 Were you beaten?

11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I was not beaten. Sarac and Zoran

12 Bankovic were beaten. I believe that's in my statement, and I also said

13 it on Thursday and Friday. They were taken off the truck, beaten in the

14 SUP building, and then we hoisted them back up on the truck, and then we

15 went for that interview. I believe I said it in my testimony on Thursday

16 and Friday.

17 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you, sir, Mr. Radic. So if there is an

18 apparent contradiction, it's now superseded.

19 MR. JONES:

20 Q. It's that those beatings then occurred after the last time that

21 you saw the person calling himself Naser Oric?

22 A. That beating after I saw Mr. Naser Oric -- you mean the beating of

23 Sarac? Yes. That's after the visit of Naser Oric, because we saw Naser

24 Oric on the 25th, and this happened on the 26th in the morning.

25 Q. That might be wrong. It would be the 15th and the 16th.

1 JUDGE AGIUS: 15th and 16th, yes.

2 MR. JONES:

3 Q. So Sarac was beaten after you last saw the person calling himself

4 Naser Oric. I want to be absolutely --

5 A. 16th.

6 Q. [Previous translation continues]... step-by-step. You last saw

7 Naser Oric on the 15th of October; correct? The eve of the 15th of

8 October.

9 A. Correct.

10 Q. Sarac was beaten on the 16th of October.

11 A. That's so.

12 Q. Now, going back to that -- that visit or that meeting on the eve

13 of the exchange, on the 15th of October, when you told us you saw Naser

14 Oric, you say that you were taken to Naser's office and that he asked

15 Sarac questions and then struck him. And I'm going to refer to your 2000

16 statement, page 10 of 12, ERN 02030473, and you say that Naser asked

17 Veselin Sarac about Akif, and then you say, "Naser Oric then began kicking

18 Sarac and beating him."

19 Now, just stopping there firstly, that's not true, is it, because

20 here you told us it was one strike with the back of the hand. That's not

21 true, is it?

22 A. He certainly hit him with his hand. Whether it was a fist or the

23 palm of his hand, I have no idea.

24 Q. [Previous translation continues] ... hit Sarac, did he?

25 A. Not until then, but this time he probably angered him by not

1 acknowledging that he knew Akif, and he told us later that he did know

2 Akif, and Naser was probably upset over that, angered, and he hit him.

3 Q. Sir, you don't need to retell the whole story. I've got specific

4 questions for you.

5 JUDGE AGIUS: This is basically what we want to know, Mr. Radic --

6 MR. JONES: May I ask my question?

7 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, please, and get it over and done with because

8 you are inviting answers that are at a tangent.

9 MR. JONES: I'm not sure if I'm inviting them. I'm getting them.

10 JUDGE AGIUS: You're getting them but you're also inviting them.

11 So let's try to restrict the questions to what is basic and essential.

12 MR. JONES: Yes.

13 Q. In your 2000 statement, Mr. Radic, which you signed as true, you

14 said that Oric was kicking Sarac. My point is that's not true, is it? He

15 was not kicking Sarac.

16 A. Once he hit him with his hand and then with his foot --

17 MR. JONES: This is simple --

18 MS. SELLERS: Please allow the witness to continue, thank you.

19 JUDGE AGIUS: Let him finish answering your question. Because you

20 interrupted. The moment he said he moved from the hit to the foot, you

21 intervened yourself. So please answer the question, Mr. Radic.

22 MR. JONES: A simple yes or no answer.

23 JUDGE AGIUS: It's not a simple yes answer because the moment he

24 started answering your question, you interrupted him.

25 MR. JONES: Because it only required a yes or no answer.

1 JUDGE AGIUS: No, but -- that's what you think.

2 Did Mr. -- the man or the person you describe as Naser Oric, or

3 the person who described himself as Naser Oric, hit Veselin Sarac by hand

4 only or also by foot?

5 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, he hit him with his

6 hand and then later he laid us down on his arm, and then he did something

7 with his leg. He sort of slid his leg up -- up the man's body and did I

8 don't know what, and then he released him.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: And, Mr. Jones, I'm --

10 MR. JONES: That's not kicking, is it?

11 JUDGE AGIUS: Precisely. If you go to the previous page - this is

12 why I intervened - because I'm usually careful for every word that the

13 witness is saying.

14 If you go to page 66, line 23 -- or line 21, the witness is saying

15 in line 21: "He certainly hit him with his hand. Whether it was the fist

16 or the palm of his hand, I have no idea." Then you intervened and you

17 suggested he hit Sarac, didn't he? And he said, not until then. Not

18 until then. And this is why I was on the watch-out and the look-out for

19 your next questions.

20 MR. JONES: That answered to me not before then, the first time.

21 JUDGE AGIUS: There was one moment where he just hit him with his

22 hands but then there were other moments that followed.

23 MR. JONES: Let me take it this way, Your Honour, and I'm going to

24 skip ahead and then skip back.

25 Q. You told us on Friday -- sorry. Let me find the exact quote. You

1 told us you don't know -- you didn't know whether the person who called

2 himself Naser hit Sarac on the head or on the body, and you said and I'll

3 quote, it's from the 14th of January, Friday, page 6, lines 20 to 24:

4 Question: "So did Mr. Naser Oric strike Veselin on his face or on his

5 chest or on another part of his body?" Answer: "I didn't notice because

6 I wasn't really paying any attention. In fact I didn't dare to look. I

7 think he struck him on the face. I'm not sure."

8 Now, doesn't it follow that you didn't actually see the contact,

9 because if you saw the contact, you would know whether he struck him on

10 the head or on the body?

11 A. I think it was on the face. I think that's what I said on Friday

12 as well.

13 Q. No. You didn't say that. You said, "I didn't dare to look."

14 A. Yes.

15 Q. You didn't actually see the contact. You weren't looking.

16 A. I think I said he struck him on the face. I didn't dare to look

17 openly. I kept my eyes more on the ground than -- than I looked sideways.

18 Q. [Previous translation continues] ... you kept your eyes on the

19 ground, so in fact you didn't see the contact at all, did you, and that's

20 why you don't know --

21 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, that's --

22 JUDGE AGIUS: He also said he looked sideways. You took advantage

23 of one part of his statement and forgot or ignored the rest.

24 MR. JONES: Your Honour --

25 JUDGE AGIUS: I think he's being clear. He didn't look --

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1 blatantly look, but he saw what was happening. This is what he's telling

2 us now.

3 MR. JONES: Yes. And he's told us he didn't see whether it was to

4 the head or to the body.

5 JUDGE AGIUS: Let's let him answer, not you.

6 MR. JONES:

7 Q. You don't know, do you, whether the hit was to the head or to the

8 body, do you, for sure?

9 A. I don't know. I believe it was on the head, as far as I was able

10 to see. If I were certain 100 per cent, I would tell you. But I could

11 see the movement of his hand and where it was directed, and it was moving

12 towards the face.

13 Q. All right. Now you said that this followed a conversation between

14 Naser, the person calling himself Naser, and Sarac about Akif. And you

15 said, and this is in your 2000 statement, that you heard Oric say to

16 Sarac: "His, Akif's, father was a butcher. You should know. He is my

17 nephew, my sister's son."

18 Now, on Friday you said it wasn't nephew, it was uncle which you

19 heard. But it's very specific, though, isn't it, in your 2000 statement;

20 sister's son, i.e., nephew. So haven't you changed that part of your

21 story, too, in light of what you've heard subsequently?

22 A. No. In my language you say "ujak," which means "uncle," to

23 denote the brother of your mother. That's what I believe I said.

24 Q. You told us that you learned later that Akif was, as you say, the

25 uncle of Naser. I'm looking at Friday's hearing at page 9, lines 18 to

1 22: "Among those dead bodies there was also the body of Akif Hrustic. I

2 apologise I believe the last name is Hrustic. This is something I found

3 out later. I found out that he was the uncle of Mr. Naser Oric. At

4 least, that's what I heard. I have no idea whether it's true or not, but

5 that's what I heard."

6 Now, my suggestion to you, and if you'll let me put it in stages,

7 is firstly that you heard no such conversation about nephews or uncles on

8 the 15th of October, 1992, that you later heard, probably from a Serb,

9 that Akif was Naser's nephew or uncle, and you added that to your 2000

10 statement that you heard that conversation, although it wasn't true, and

11 then later, perhaps when someone told you that Akif was 20 years older

12 than Naser and was not his nephew or uncle, you changed your story again.

13 That's my suggestion to you, that you're adding to the story --

14 JUDGE AGIUS: Again I think you have to split it in two parts,

15 because as it is it will only confuse the witness, and I wouldn't even let

16 him answer your question because I wouldn't know which part of the

17 question he would be answering.

18 MR. JONES: Okay. Well --

19 JUDGE AGIUS: So let's take it one by one. The first question --

20 the first part is that you're suggesting that you never -- that he never

21 heard any such conversation about nephews or uncles on the 15th of

22 October, 1992. Is that correct?

23 He's suggesting to you, Mr. Jones, that when you heard this

24 conversation about Akif Hrustic being an uncle or nephew, whatever, you

25 were not telling us the truth; you never heard any such conversation on

1 the 15th of October, 1992, or on any other date for that matter.

2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Naser did ask Sarac, How could you

3 possibly not know Hrustic, because his father was -- I'm not sure now

4 whether he said butcher or barber --

5 JUDGE AGIUS: So it's being suggested to you that you never heard

6 this conversation, your answer is no, I did hear that conversation. That

7 is your answer. Okay.

8 Your next question now, Mr. Jones, once you have got this

9 confirmation.

10 MR. JONES:

11 Q. Yes, but at the same time it's true that you heard or you say you

12 found out later that Akif Hrustic was Mr. Oric's uncle? Is that true,

13 that you found that out later?

14 A. Yes, uncle or nephew. I don't know exactly what -- which.

15 MR. JONES: I'm going to move to another area.

16 JUDGE AGIUS: Because at the end of the day where is it getting

17 you? I mean this part, particular, whether he was the uncle or nephew --

18 MR. JONES: He's neither, he's not uncle or nephew.

19 JUDGE AGIUS: I don't know. You should know better about that,

20 but in any case, let's move.

21 MR. JONES:

22 Q. I'm going to ask you questions --

23 JUDGE AGIUS: And watch the clock because you've got roughly 15

24 minutes from now, and you choose the time when you would like to stop.

25 MR. JONES: Yes. Thank you, Your Honour.

1 Q. I'd like to ask you some questions about the radio, the

2 conversation you heard of an exchange on the radio. Now, firstly, in your

3 2000 statement to investigators, or indeed in any prior statement, you

4 never mentioned that Sarac left the prison to go and speak on the radio,

5 did you? It's not something you've ever mentioned before.

6 A. Nobody asked me about that. There were no such questions. I

7 provided only information in response to specific questions.

8 Q. You never mentioned, did you, before that Sarac left the SUP to

9 dispose of Kukic's body? That's something you spoke of for the first time

10 when you came to The Hague.

11 A. I think it's in the statement, my statement. I think there is

12 reference to the time when Sarac left the building with Kukic's body.

13 Q. Your 2000 statement to the ICTY investigators, you think you said

14 it there?

15 A. If they asked me the question, then it's there. If they didn't,

16 then it's natural that I didn't talk about things that the investigator

17 didn't ask about. But it should be there. I'm not sure.

18 Q. It would have been -- even if not asked, if would have been an

19 important detail to volunteer that information, wouldn't it, that Sarac

20 left the prison to dispose of a body?

21 A. I'm telling you if they didn't ask me, it's possible that I didn't

22 say it because if I were to talk about everything that happened every

23 minute over those 20-something days, 21 days that I spent imprisoned, it

24 would take a month.

25 Q. Now, for this radio, this conversation on the radio, you weren't

1 present for that, for that conversation, were you, where we heard a voice

2 purporting to be Sarac's?

3 A. Yes, it was Sarac's voice.

4 Q. You weren't there, were you? You weren't present when he spoke on

5 the radio.

6 A. No. No. I was supposed to be there, but I wasn't. I heard it

7 later on the tape. The mix-up they made, they confused me with

8 Bjelanovic's uncle. So I didn't go, Sarac went. But I could tell, I

9 could identify the voice.

10 Q. In the past ten or so years before you came to The Hague and heard

11 that tape, you haven't been asked to identify his voice, have you, at any

12 time in the past ten years?

13 A. I don't remember.

14 Q. The first time that you heard that tape and claimed to identify

15 the voice of Sarac was when you came to The Hague on this occasion, wasn't

16 it, some 12 years after events?

17 A. Yes.

18 Q. Just two questions regarding the content of that interview. We

19 heard reference to Cerska. Cerska was in Muslim hands throughout all of

20 1992, wasn't it, if you know?

21 A. Yes.

22 Q. And we also heard reference to a Branko Sekulic, but he was never

23 imprisoned with you, was he?

24 A. No, he wasn't.

25 MR. JONES: And then just before the break, we'd like to introduce

1 in evidence with regard to authenticity of the tape the IIF form which was

2 disclosed to us, which indicates that the tape has not been authenticated

3 that it's not an original, that it was received from the RS state security

4 service through the RS bureau of cooperation, and the originator is the

5 famous Daj Milutic [phoen] of the RS bureau of cooperation?

6 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, the Prosecution would also like to

7 remind the Trial Chamber, as the Trial Chamber stated before, that when it

8 is stated there is not an original on the IIF or the MIF meaning that it

9 might be a copy, I think we've had this discussion about copies and

10 questions whether they were originals or not, and I would just ask

11 Counsellor to refrain from characterising people the infamous or --

12 MR. JONES: I said "famous."

13 MS. SELLERS: -- the famous, whatever that might mean, either

14 directly or indirectly. We would also not oppose Counsellor presenting

15 this document but we would like to make those statements concerning it and

16 that it is a work product of the Prosecution.

17 JUDGE AGIUS: Point taken, Ms. Sellers. And also, Mr. Jones, when

18 we say "point taken," it also relates to comments that sometimes are

19 passed and shouldn't be passed about persons who are not present here.

20 And in any case, such comments ought to be avoided in the presence of the

21 witnesses.

22 Should we take the break now or do you want to proceed with

23 further questions?

24 This is D161.

25 MR. JONES: I'll take the break now, and my apologies at my

1 attempt at levity. It wasn't meant in anything other than that.

2 JUDGE AGIUS: So we'll have a 25-minute break starting from now.

3 Basically, we will be resuming at roughly ten to one. Thank you.

4 --- Recess taken at 12.25 p.m.

5 --- On resuming at 1.00 p.m.

6 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. I understand the last document that relates to

7 the audiotape mentioned by Mr. Jones earlier on should have been D162 and

8 not 161, the reason being that it was the 2000 witness statement which is

9 161. Correct? So my mistake. D161 for this document should read D162.

10 Yes, Mr. Jones.

11 MR. WUBBEN: Your Honour, if I may.

12 JUDGE AGIUS: I apologise to you, Mr. Wubben. I didn't see you.

13 MR. WUBBEN: Next projected witness is Mr. Branimir Mitrovic. He

14 is waiting, but it's now already past 1.00. Is it possible to make an

15 inquiry as to whether he shall give testimony today?

16 JUDGE AGIUS: I should have actually asked Mr. Jones, but I took

17 it that if he didn't mention anything, the idea was to finish this witness

18 and there be enough time for the other one to start, no? That's how I

19 took it.

20 MR. JONES: Certainly from my point of view I can be finished in,

21 I think, ten or 15 minutes.

22 JUDGE AGIUS: I gathered, so --

23 MR. JONES: But it depends very much on Your Honours and the

24 Prosecution.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: It's up to you, Mr. Wubben.

1 MR. WUBBEN: Well, for the Prosecution it is also around 15

2 minutes. That will bring us past half past one.

3 JUDGE AGIUS: Then send -- I don't know if you want to start.

4 It's up to you. We are here to work. So it's up to you. If you want to

5 send him back to the hotel and we start him tomorrow, we start him

6 tomorrow. But we have 15 minutes left and you want to use those 15

7 minutes, we use them. I don't know. It's up to you.

8 MR. WUBBEN: I will certainly then use those 15 minutes.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: What I wouldn't like is that we end up with not

10 being able to even bring him in, which I would still require to do if we

11 come to that.

12 MR. WUBBEN: I'm supported by this information.

13 JUDGE AGIUS: Let's proceed, not lose more time. Mr. Jones.

14 MR. JONES: Yes. I can proceed quickly.

15 Q. Mr. Radic, you were shown a video, it's P98, on Friday, with an

16 interview with Mr. Sarac and yourself and Nevenko. You were all

17 interviewed together, weren't you, so you could all hear what each other

18 was saying?

19 A. Yes.

20 Q. And when you were interviewed, you were tired and disoriented,

21 weren't you?

22 A. If I may be allowed to say, I didn't even see the camera, and I

23 had never seen this footage before, before I arrived here in The Hague. I

24 saw a man holding the microphone but not a camera. I'm not sure where

25 this footage was taken, at the hotel in Bratunac or elsewhere, I can't

1 remember.

2 Q. Well, let's stick with when you were interviewed when you were

3 first exchanged on the 16th of October. On that occasion you were tired

4 and disoriented, weren't you, when you were interviewed? Would you accept

5 that?

6 A. I do.

7 Q. Did the people who interviewed you offer you medical assistance

8 before being interviewed? Did they give you that option?

9 A. I really can't remember that.

10 Q. Now, you told us that you later found out that the statement or

11 the -- the statement was taken by a journalist. I'm reading from Friday's

12 transcript, page 10, lines 14 to 16: "Yes, there was a man there I didn't

13 know. I later found out that he was a journalist. He put a mike in front

14 of me, a microphone or whatever."

15 Did you find out that the person who interviewed you was a

16 Mr. Celanovic?

17 A. No.

18 Q. Who interviewed you, if you remember the name?

19 A. I don't remember the name at all. The man didn't introduce

20 himself. At least, to the best of my recollection that was the case.

21 Q. Why do you say that you found out later that he was a journalist

22 if you don't know who he was? What actually did you learn?

23 A. I knew even back then that he was a journalist, but I didn't know

24 the person's name. He was carrying a microphone around so of course he

25 was a journalist, but I what I did not see were the cameras that were

1 taking the footage.

2 Q. Now, he wasn't the only person there in the room there with you

3 three, was there? At one point we heard Mr. Sarac say, "Why are there so

4 many people now?" Is it right that there were lots of other people, at

5 least at one point, in the room with you when you were being interviewed?

6 A. I don't remember that Mr. Sarac said that there were that many

7 people around. This is not something that I noticed while watching the

8 tape in that room at the hotel. But there weren't that many people.

9 There were the four of us, five including the postman who had been

10 exchanged, there was another lady, and this journalist; no one else.

11 Q. I won't pursue it with you, Mr. Radic, but it's in -- I refer to

12 the transcript where that's stated, why there's so many people now.

13 Now, did the interviewer prompt you personally and give you

14 information that, for example, Kemo's surname was Ahmetovic and that he

15 was from Pale? He told you that, didn't he? I'm looking at page 6 of the

16 transcript. You mention Kemo and he said, "All right. We have the

17 details, Ahmetovic." Isn't that right, that he told you who Kemo was?

18 A. I don't remember that he told me. This was maybe stated by Sarac.

19 I remember that the person's name was Kemal Ahmetovic, called Kemo, from

20 Pale. I found out after I had been exchanged. It was perhaps three or

21 four days later that Mr. Bjelanovic, the chief, told me who the person

22 was.

23 Q. The interviewer said after that -- or before, "We have the

24 details." Now, isn't it right that in fact this wasn't a journalist; you

25 were being debriefed by the Serb security services?

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1 A. If you want me to be to be quite honest, I don't know. What we

2 were told is that he was a journalist. I personally did not know the

3 person to know who they were. It may as well have been the Serbian

4 intelligence services, but I can't be sure about that.

5 Q. I want to play just a couple of very short segments of that video.

6 And we need to switch the booth for the Defence mode. And I'm going to

7 show -- it's a portion where Mr. Sarac is being interviewed, and it's just

8 before and after he mentions Naser. So if we can play that.

9 We don't have the transcript.

10 [Videotape played]

11 MR. JONES: Yes. We don't seem to have sound.

12 Well, we might need to come back to that because there are a

13 couple of clips which we will need the sound for.

14 Your Honour, perhaps I might -- this may be a technical problem

15 which we'll have to come back to. It might help to explain two things.

16 The first clip is to show that the tape skips before Mr. Sarac is asked or

17 mentions Naser. It's a point I don't necessarily have to deal with this

18 witness to get him to agree that it skips. It's a point which I can make

19 subsequently. However, at the very end there is something which this

20 witness says and we will need to hear that.

21 What I could do is carry on with some other questions and then

22 come back. Perhaps the technical booth would have solved the problem in

23 the meantime.

24 [Videotape played]

25 MR. JONES:

1 Q. Now, unfortunately, we just have that in B/C/S, not in English.

2 But I don't know if you followed what was being said there, Mr. Radic.

3 I'd ask you whether you agree that before Mr. Sarac mentions Naser, the

4 video skips. We can play it again now.

5 [Videotape played]

6 MR. JONES:

7 Q. Do you agree that Mr. Sarac says something to the effect of "So

8 much for now and you can ask more further." The interviewer says, "So

9 that means --" and then there are skips and then the interviewer says

10 something else and then Sarac refers to "Naser hitting me here."

11 MS. SELLERS: Could I ask counsel just to point us to the

12 transcript, exactly what it's referring to.

13 MR. JONES: Yes, in fact it's marked on the transcript, page 3,

14 second line from the bottom. Interviewer: "So that means --" cut. So I

15 think it's accepted.

16 Q. My question is and it may be that you can't help with this, but do

17 you know what the interviewer said, if anything, to prompt Sarac to

18 mention Naser? Is there anything which you recall the interviewer saying

19 which doesn't appear on that video? Did the interviewer say something

20 like, "Did you see Naser Oric?" Something to that effect?

21 A. Sir, believe me, I don't remember. I didn't even see a camera.

22 Q. I'm just going to play now a final segment, and this is yourself

23 being interviewed, and it's at the very end of the tape, and just for

24 everyone's benefit, on the transcript it's page 6, and the interviewer

25 says, "And where was this? Do you remember anybody else among them that

1 you knew from before and who ..."

2 I'm going to play that last segment and see if the witness agrees

3 that he says no or gives a negative answer. If we could play that.

4 [Videotape played]

5 MR. JONES:

6 Q. Do you agree that you were asked there by the interviewer whether

7 you were remember anybody else from the prison and that you were replying

8 no? We can replay that segment. It might be helpful.

9 [Videotape played]

10 MR. JONES:

11 Q. Do you hear yourself saying "ne" there?

12 A. Is this in reference to us, the prisoners, or to the Muslim

13 gentlemen? What is this in reference to, did I know anyone else?

14 Q. My question is, watching that video, did you hear the interviewer

15 saying, "Do you remember anybody else among them that you knew from

16 before, and who?" And then you were replying in the negative. And we

17 don't know necessarily what was meant, but that you were replying no. Do

18 you agree with that?

19 A. Well, I probably agree. I'm not sure what this is about.

20 Q. Well, isn't it right that when interviewed you didn't say, when

21 asked whether you knew anyone, "Well, yes, there was Naser Oric, the

22 commander of the Srebrenica forces. I saw him three times." You didn't

23 say any of that, did you, when you were interviewed?

24 A. I don't remember.

25 Q. It's the sort of thing you would have mentioned or certain thing

1 -- let me put it differently. You would remember, wouldn't you, if you

2 had said that to the interviewer, mentioned encounters with Naser Oric?

3 A. There were three encounters, yes. That's what I said in my

4 statement.

5 Q. Yes, but my point was that it wasn't to the interviewer, but I'll

6 move on from that subject, and we may ask for the transcript of P98.1E to

7 be corrected to reflect the last -- not now, but on a subsequent occasion.

8 Now, a final couple of questions, Mr. Radic. In July 1992, before

9 you were captured, weren't you brought into a police station for acting

10 violently in a health centre and cautioned?

11 A. Which police station; Milici or Srebrenica?

12 Q. Milici.

13 A. No. I was not even in the hospital. I was back home receiving

14 treatment.

15 Q. Are you saying on oath categorically that you were never brought

16 into Milici police station for acting violently?

17 A. I don't know on what grounds.

18 Q. My question is: Did that ever happen? Surely you would remember

19 if you were brought into Milici police station.

20 A. Yes, it did happen several times before the war, of course.

21 Q. In July 1992, which is not before the war, were you brought into

22 the police station in Milici?

23 A. I don't remember. It's possible, though.

24 Q. Surely, Mr. Radic, you've given us details here of conversations

25 and how people looked, et cetera. Surely your memory is good enough to

1 remember whether you were brought into a police station and cautioned for

2 acting violently.

3 A. I don't know who my acting violently was directed against. If you

4 bring that up, perhaps it will be easier for me to remember the specific

5 instance.

6 Q. Are you often brought into police stations, Mr. Radic? I mean,

7 surely you can remember if you were brought in in July 1992. That's what

8 I'm asking you, do you remember that?

9 A. Often, that is not the case. I was not often brought into police

10 stations. It was maybe two or three times before the war for minor

11 infractions. During the war it's possible that I was brought in. It's

12 possible, I say, but I can't remember. It's as simple as that. I refused

13 to go to the mine. I know I was brought in by the police once.

14 MR. JONES: We have a new document which will be a Defence

15 exhibit. It's a report to the police station commander Milici dated 7th

16 July, 1992. And it's ERN 01782331.

17 Q. You'll be shown a copy of that document in B/C/S. Now, according

18 to that document, Mr. Radic, and take your time. According to that

19 document, a female doctor reported that Nedjelko Radic, and you told us

20 you were the only one in Milici, was disturbing patients at the health

21 centre, making threats and firing a rifle. Making threats, that is, to

22 patients, the wounded and sick, and he was brought into the police station

23 and cautioned for it. Do you recall that incident?

24 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, if we're looking at the same document,

25 I just want to know where is counsel seeing that he was making threats to

1 patients on the document? I would not necessarily that it is true but it

2 does say making threats and firing a rifle. It doesn't --

3 MR. JONES: Disturbing patients, making threats and firing a

4 rifle.

5 Q. Now, Mr. Radic, do you remember that incident?

6 A. No. Why would I fire a rifle? It says "making threats with a

7 stick."

8 Q. Okay. Apparently the translation might have been wrong. It says

9 in this document, what we have: "Nedjelko Radic was disturbing patients

10 at the health centre, making threats and firing a rifle. The above

11 mentioned was brought into the SM police station and warned, cautioned."

12 So my question is, is that correct, that in July 1992 you were

13 brought into the police station for that incident?

14 A. I don't remember that. I know that once I refused an order to go

15 to the mine. I do remember that, but not this. Why would I have been

16 firing at patients? This is totally insane.

17 Q. Never mind why you would be doing it.

18 JUDGE AGIUS: Mr. Jones, I mean he just doesn't remember, so let's

19 -- let's --

20 MR. JONES: It's something one would remember, that's my point.

21 JUDGE AGIUS: Just leave that to us to decide. He's telling you I

22 don't remember, I don't remember. And what I don't understand, whether it

23 was a rifle or stick, because someone mentioned a stick.

24 MR. JONES: No, it's a rifle in the English.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, but in the Bosnian -- B/C/S, what is it?

1 "Pusko" is what, a rifle?

2 MR. JONES: That I can't help you with.

3 MS. VIDOVIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, this is very specific.

4 "Made threats and fired a rifle," that's what it says. There is no

5 reference whatsoever to any wooden stick or anything like that.

6 JUDGE AGIUS: And the witness is saying he doesn't remember such a

7 case.

8 MR. JONES: I'll finally try to remind or jog the witness's

9 memory.

10 Q. Could it be these patients were in fact wounded Muslims, wounded

11 in ethnic cleansing operations, probably from Nurici, Sadici, Kratine and

12 Toljina [phoen] and that you went and threatened them and fired your rifle

13 at them because they were Muslims and because of an animosity which you

14 have toward Muslims?

15 A. No. There were no Muslims at the Milici hospital at that time.

16 At least, that's what I remember. How would I have been allowed to enter

17 a hospital carrying a rifle, in the first place, to fire at patients?

18 There was security there, police. They would not have allowed me to enter

19 a hospital carrying a weapon.

20 Q. Does the name Hasim Becirovic, son of Ralf [phoen], from Polem

21 Besici [phoen] familiar to you?

22 A. No.

23 Q. He and his brother were taken to the health centre around that

24 time and never seen again. Has that got anything to do with you going

25 there and discharging a rifle?

1 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, now I will object. I mean, I think

2 we've taken a big leap from making threats to someone disappearing out of

3 a hospital because someone was there making threats. I would ask

4 counsel --

5 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, objection sustained, Ms. Sellers.

6 MR. JONES:

7 Q. My suggestion to you, and this is my final question, and you will

8 no doubt disagree but I put it to you nonetheless, is that this did occur

9 and that you had no compunction, back then, about threatening wounded and

10 sick Muslims in a hospital and that you have no compunction about saying

11 falsehoods to this Tribunal in order to get Oric, another Muslim, indeed a

12 symbol of Srebrenica's Muslims, in trouble before this Tribunal, and that

13 you've told so many untruths you can no longer keep track of them. That's

14 my suggestion to you.

15 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, I would state that it appears the

16 witness is having a bit of difficulty answering what appears to have been

17 possibly a statement and not question. If counsel has a question, might

18 we have that more directly put?

19 JUDGE AGIUS: I will put the question myself.

20 It's been put to you, Mr. Radic, that you have been consistently

21 lying to us, knowingly lying to us, simply because you want to see

22 Mr. Oric, Naser Oric, convicted and sentenced by this Tribunal. Do you

23 agree with that?

24 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No. I would never have Mr. Naser

25 Oric convicted if it were up to me. If it were up to me, I would set him

1 free right now and I would dearly like to see Kemo in Mr. Naser's place.

2 I was never in favour of anything like that in relation to any person,

3 including Naser Oric. Naser Oric never caused me any harm. That's all I

4 can say. I definitely disagree with that.

5 MR. JONES:

6 Q. Thank you for that answer.

7 MR. JONES: And I should ask for that last document to be given an

8 exhibit number.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: It will being given Exhibit number D163. Now we

10 have 15 minutes, 16.

11 [Trial Chamber confers]

12 JUDGE AGIUS: Keeping in mind that we have got two questions,

13 Ms. Sellers, and I would also need a couple of minutes to explain to the

14 next witness why we kept him here waiting without even letting him in the

15 courtroom. So do you think you can finish in less than 15 minutes?

16 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, I will try my very best.

17 Re-examined by Ms. Sellers:

18 Q. Mr. Radic, the last comment you made concerning Naser Oric and

19 Kemo, is it true that you have been telling the Trial Chamber the absolute

20 truth to the best your recollection in terms of the person purportedly

21 called Naser Oric?

22 A. Yes.

23 MS. SELLERS: I would like to ask the Trial Chamber if we could

24 make two small corrections to the record.

25 Q. Mr. Radic, on two occasions, and I can point specifically at the

1 points of the transcript where you mentioned October 25th as the day

2 before you were released, were you referring to the 15th of October and

3 not the 25th of October, 1992?

4 A. It was the 16th of October when we were exchanged, not the 26th or

5 the 25th.

6 Q. And day before you were exchanged is the 15th October 1992? Isn't

7 that correct?

8 A. Yes, that's correct.

9 Q. Very briefly, Mr. Radic, could you please tell the Trial Chamber

10 if at any times during your stay at the prison whether you or any of the

11 other inmates had cigarette burns placed on parts of their body.

12 A. I did not. I don't know about the others.

13 Q. When you were at times hit with the blows of the pieces of wood,

14 would you raise your hand in order to attempt to stop such blows?

15 A. Yes.

16 Q. Were there times that your lands hit instead of having your body

17 hit because you were successfully able to stop the blows that were coming

18 at you?

19 A. Yes.

20 MS. SELLERS: I would like to go to Sanction very briefly and show

21 a part of the videotape, the part that shows Mr. Sarac. I believe that's

22 Prosecution Exhibit 98.

23 [Videotape played]

24 MS. SELLERS: We have transcript. I don't see sound for the

25 purpose of Mr. Radic. I'd like to know, could we have sound on that part.

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1 [Videotape played]

2 MS. SELLERS:

3 Q. Mr. Radic, is it possible that Mr. Sarac did have cigarette burns

4 on his hand as a result of having stayed in the prison?

5 A. I don't know whether they extinguished cigarettes on his hand.

6 The marks on his hands were from cleaning the toilet, I think. As for

7 cigarettes, I'm not sure. If they did extinguish cigarettes on him, they

8 did it when I was not around.

9 Q. Mr. Radic, isn't it true that when you went in to be interrogated,

10 you mentioned that there was someone who was a Croat in addition to the

11 chief of police, Mr. Mrki Mirzet, that during that interrogation you've

12 testified that you were kicked in the face and it caused bleeding at least

13 in the room, the interrogation room?

14 A. Yes.

15 MS. SELLERS: Now, I would like to -- the name I referred to Mrki,

16 or Mirzet, it might be a mispronunciation on my part, I'm sure the Trial

17 Chamber understands.

18 I would like you to look at this next part of the videotape again,

19 and I hope that the sound is up, Your Honours, for this portion.

20 [Videotape played]

21 MS. SELLERS:

22 Q. Now, Mr. Radic, you testified earlier that you were not in the

23 room where Mr. Sarac was being interrogated by the man from Croatia and

24 from the chief of police. But isn't it possible that he too was hit in the

25 face --

1 MR. JONES: Asking him to speculate. If he wasn't there, he

2 doesn't know. Simple as that.

3 JUDGE AGIUS: That would be pure speculation.

4 MS. SELLERS: Let me rephrase that, Your Honour.

5 Q. Mr. Radic, do you remember when Mr. Sarac came from the

6 interrogation, having been interrogated by the man from Croatia and the

7 police of chief [sic] that he too had marks on his face or possibly on his

8 head, as described in this video?

9 A. I don't remember. I think he had a bruise on his face, and he was

10 holding tight onto his head, the top of his head. I don't -- didn't

11 notice anything else. I wasn't there. I didn't see what went on in

12 there.

13 Q. Thank you. Mr. Radic, another part of the video there was mention

14 of some sexual violence, and Mr. Sarac states, and this is on page 3 of

15 the transcript: "They beat you --" and he replies something like

16 electricity --

17 MR. JONES: I didn't cross-examine on this. I don't see how this

18 arises from cross-examination. It may be something the Prosecution has

19 thought of subsequently but if they're going to raise it, I will have to

20 re-cross-examine on it.

21 JUDGE AGIUS: That's a valid point.

22 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, I believe --

23 JUDGE AGIUS: You did ask --

24 MR. JONES: Nothing about electricity, though.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, but the witness did mention that he doesn't

1 agree with what Sarac said because, according to him, there was no

2 electricity but that was in reply to one of your questions.

3 MR. JONES: That was in examination-in-chief.

4 MS. SELLERS: That was in examination-in-chief, but Counsellor did

5 bring up whether Mr. Sarac had on several occasions, and Mr. Radic noted

6 that he might not have been forthcoming and truthful on the tape, and I'm

7 leading back into an area might have been -- Counsellor might have been

8 referring to as being untruthful.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: But it wasn't an area that counsel referred to as

10 regarding Sarac being untruthful, it was the witness himself.

11 MS. SELLERS: This is true on direct, but on cross-examination

12 counsel tried to have the witness state that Mr. Sarac might have been

13 untruthful at parts in the video.

14 MR. JONES: It was at a different point.

15 JUDGE AGIUS: Which the witness didn't agree with because he said

16 it could be one way or it could be the other.

17 MR. JONES: He's also going to be asked to speculate about this

18 matter because he doesn't have any personal knowledge --

19 MS. SELLERS: I'll withdraw the question, Your Honour.

20 JUDGE AGIUS: -- arises out of the cross-examination.

21 MS. SELLERS: I'll withdraw the question.

22 Q. Mr. Radic, you were interviewed by the Office of the Prosecutor,

23 and that has now become Defence Exhibit 161. That was an interview that

24 we've established took place in May of 2000, May 25th. Now, during that

25 interview, you've testified -- I'm sorry. You stated that Mr. Naser Oric

1 began kicking and beating Sarac, and that's in reference to the third time

2 you saw Mr. Oric. Do you remember that part of the interview?

3 You'll have to say yes for the record.

4 A. Yes.

5 Q. And you testified that it appeared that the person purporting to

6 be Naser Oric slid his -- slid his leg up -- I'll just try and get the

7 quote. "Slid his leg up the man's body," referring to Sarac. Could you

8 please explain to the Trial Chamber, after the man purporting to be Naser

9 Oric slid his leg up the man's body purported to be Mr. Sarac, was

10 Mr. Sarac injured or not injured from this contact between the man

11 purportedly Mr. Oric and the leg of Mr. Sarac? Were there injuries that

12 ensued?

13 A. Well, there was an injury to his face. I believe I said so today

14 and before. He hit him once. And I believe later he sort of put his leg

15 up against him, and Sarac fell against his leg and he was hurting, I don't

16 know from what.

17 Q. When Mr. Sarac fell against his leg, and I imagine meaning the leg

18 of the person referred to as Naser Oric, did it appear that Mr. Sarac was

19 injured or hurt from having fell against his leg?

20 A. Well, he had no visible injuries, but he must have been injured

21 since he fell on the floor, and he probably felt pain in his leg.

22 MR. JONES: The witness said yesterday that Sarac didn't fall at

23 all. I might have to re-cross examine on this.

24 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, I believe the witness said yesterday

25 that after he was hit he remained standing. Now we're talking about a

1 second contact that I believe came up with cross-examination and that

2 concerned the contact with the leg, and I just wanted to clarify that.

3 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Go ahead and let's bring it to an end,

4 Ms. Sellers, please.

5 MS. SELLERS: I will just go to my last three sets of questions.

6 Q. In the interview that you gave to the Office of the Prosecutor,

7 you stated that you answered questions that were asked of you; isn't that

8 correct? And did you try and answer those questions as thoroughly as

9 possible, those that were asked to you?

10 A. Yes.

11 Q. Were you --

12 A. As far as I remember, yes.

13 Q. Were you asked at that interview to give a description of the

14 person that we have referred to today as Naser Oric?

15 A. I was.

16 Q. I would like to read to you from page 7 of Defence Exhibit D161,

17 and it concerns a description of the person purported to be Naser Oric.

18 MR. JONES: I asked the witness to confirm that description

19 yesterday and he did. So I don't know if -- we can probably skip that

20 question.

21 JUDGE AGIUS: This precisely entitles the Prosecution to

22 re-examine --

23 MR. JONES: I mean, he's being asked the same question again.

24 JUDGE AGIUS: I don't know what the question is. She hasn't --

25 she hasn't put the question as yet.

1 MS. SELLERS:

2 Q. Mr. Radic, did you --

3 JUDGE AGIUS: If it's the same question, I will stop.

4 MS. SELLERS:

5 Q. Mr. Radic, did you inform the Office of the Prosecutor the

6 following: "I will describe him for you. Naser Oric had a strong build.

7 He was not tall, maybe 160 centimetres. He had dark brown hair and was

8 clean-shaven. I think Naser Oric had blue eyes. He was quite young. I

9 don't think he was even 30 years old at the time, which was in 1992. He

10 was dressed in a yellow khaki beige-green camouflage uniform which is

11 called an American uniform. On the left breast pocket of his shirt he

12 wore a patch and -- that had lilies on it. It was a special uniform.

13 Only he and Mrki, FNU or LNU, wore uniforms like that. Later I met

14 another commander named Mrki, FNU or LNU. Naser Oric also carried a

15 pistol on his right hip."

16 Is this the type of character detail -- characteristics, physical

17 and dressing, that you gave the Office of the Prosecutor during that

18 interview?

19 A. Yes, from what I saw, and I confirm that statement. I'm only

20 slightly confused about the hair. He had a short haircut, but for the

21 most part I can confirm that description. It tallies with my later

22 sightings of Mr. Naser Oric.

23 MS. SELLERS: And Your Honour, my last two questions.

24 Q. Mr. Radic, during that same interview, on page 11 of that

25 interview, were you asked whether you would be able to recognise Naser

1 Oric again, the person purported to be Naser Oric? Do you remember

2 whether you were asked whether you would recognise the person purported to

3 be Naser Oric again? And isn't it true that you told the interviewer that

4 I will --

5 JUDGE AGIUS: Let's take them one by one first because he hasn't

6 confirmed --

7 MS. SELLERS: I'm sorry, Your Honour, he nodded to me.

8 Q. Could you please say yes or no for the record because of the

9 transcript.

10 A. Yes.

11 Q. And didn't you tell the Office of the Prosecutor at that time, "I

12 will be able to recognise Naser Oric, Zulfo Tursunovic, Kemo Ahmetovic,

13 Mrki first name or last name unknown, and Cude, if I ever saw them again."

14 Wasn't that what you told the Office of the Prosecutor?

15 A. Yes, I did.

16 MS. SELLERS: Your Honour, I have no further questions.

17 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. Thank you. Judge Brydensholt, I take it you

18 don't have questions.

19 JUDGE BRYDENSHOLT: No.

20 JUDGE AGIUS: Judge Eser.

21 JUDGE ESER: I will limit myself to one question.

22 Questioned by the Court:

23 JUDGE ESER: Mr. Radic, have you ever been told why you have been

24 captured or why you have been kept in the prison? Was there ever given

25 any reason for this?

1 A. No. No. I knew the reason I was captured and I was kept there,

2 but nobody came to tell us why we were there.

3 JUDGE ESER: And while you were being beaten, did these people

4 talk to you or did they do it silently, without saying anything?

5 A. No. There were insults, slurs directed at us. They told us,

6 "Chetniks, you are firing at our children, throwing grenades," and then

7 the beatings followed. They wanted us to admit to being Chetniks, which I

8 didn't do because I wasn't one in the first place, and secondly, it was an

9 insult. I thought "Chetnik" and "Ustasha" were equally bad.

10 JUDGE ESER: So is it correct to conclude that you never have been

11 told that you might be exchanged?

12 A. Yes. I said that Hrustic also came to see us once at the cell

13 before he was killed. I believe it's in one of my statements. He told us

14 we would be exchanged, and we would be treated according to the Geneva

15 Conventions. I believe it is somewhere in my statement.

16 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. Mr. Radic, that brings your testimony to an

17 end. I thought it would last less, but it didn't. But at least we're

18 finished. So you're free to go, go back to your country. On behalf of

19 the Trial Chamber and on behalf of Judge Brydensholt and behalf of Judge

20 Eser, I'd like to thank you for having come over to give testimony. You

21 will be assisted by members of my staff, and we'll do our best to

22 facilitate your return back home as soon as possible. Once more, I thank

23 you, and I wish you a safe journey back home.

24 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you, too, Your Honours. I

25 also wish to thank everybody else in the courtroom.

1 [The witness withdrew]

2 JUDGE AGIUS: Do I have the indulgence of everyone? We know that

3 we have overstepped by at least five minutes, but I would like, out of

4 courtesy, to say a few words to the witness so that I apologise to him and

5 explain to him why we haven't started with his testimony. It will only

6 last a couple of minutes.

7 THE INTERPRETER: It's okay with the interpreters, yes.

8 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. Thank you. And his name is ...

9 MR. WUBBEN: Your Honour, his name is Branimir Mitrovic.

10 JUDGE AGIUS: Do you think we will finish with him tomorrow, this

11 witness? No, I suppose not. No.

12 MR. JONES: I thought I'd probably be quite short with him, not

13 more than an hour and a half.

14 [The witness entered court]

15 JUDGE AGIUS: Mr. Mitrovic, good afternoon to you.

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Good afternoon.

17 JUDGE AGIUS: It's a good feeling to see you smiling, because for

18 a moment I thought you would be a little bit angry with us because we've

19 kept you waiting here for hours without starting with your testimony. I

20 do feel -- I do feel sorry for that, and I do apologise to you. However,

21 I would like you to know that this was not capricious. What happened is

22 that the previous witness, with whom we should have finished last week, we

23 didn't finish with him last week. We continued today, and we were hoping

24 to finish with him after about two or three hours, not more than that, but

25 unfortunately we couldn't finish with his testimony until a couple of

1 minutes ago. So please do accept my apologies and those of the Tribunal.

2 We will be starting with your testimony straight away first thing

3 tomorrow morning at 9.00, and we will do our level best this time to try

4 and see -- make sure that you go back home as quickly as you can, maybe a

5 little bit earlier than anticipated.

6 Once more, I thank you for being patient and for your

7 understanding, and you will be escorted and given all the attention that

8 -- and assistance you require and then we'll meet tomorrow morning at

9 9.00. Thank you.

10 [The witness withdrew]

11 JUDGE AGIUS: So that's it. I think we can adjourn, and once more

12 I should like to thank all the staff, the technicians, the interpreters,

13 and the courtroom staff, plus of course counsel, Prosecution and parties,

14 for your indulgence and we'll meet tomorrow morning at 9.00. Thank you.

15 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 1.53 p.m.,

16 to be reconvened on Tuesday, the 18th day of

17 January, 2005, at 9.00 a.m.

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