1 Monday, 3 November 2003

2 [Open session]

3 --- Upon commencing at 2.19 p.m.

4 [The accused entered court]

5 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Good afternoon. Madam Registrar, could you

6 call the case, please.

7 THE REGISTRAR: Yes, Your Honour. Case Number IT-99-36-T, the

8 Prosecutor versus Radoslav Brdjanin.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you, ma'am.

10 Mr. Brdjanin, can you follow what I'm saying in a language that

11 you can understand?

12 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Good afternoon. Yes, I can.

13 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you. Please take a seat.

14 Ms. Korner, appearances for the Prosecution.

15 MS. KORNER: Joanna Korner, Ann Sutherland, assisted by Denise

16 Gustin, case manager. Good afternoon, Your Honours.

17 JUDGE AGIUS: Good afternoon to you.

18 Appearances for Radoslav Brdjanin.

19 MR. ACKERMAN: Good afternoon, Your Honours. I'm John Ackerman

20 with David Cunningham, and Aleksandar Vujic.

21 JUDGE AGIUS: All right. Thank you and good afternoon to you.

22 Any preliminaries before we bring in the witness?

23 MS. KORNER: Just one, Your Honour, and that's this. Although I

24 spoke to Mr. Ackerman, but I would just like it confirmed on the record,

25 that the question of whether there would be witnesses from Glamoc,

1 Laktasi, and Srbac.

2 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Mr. Cunningham told us to expect a reply today.

3 MS. KORNER: Good or bad news.

4 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Mr. Ackerman.

5 MR. ACKERMAN: Your Honour, I've already told Ms. Korner there

6 would be no witnesses from those places.

7 JUDGE AGIUS: Thank you.

8 So before we bring in the witness, there are no protective

9 measures, Mr. Ackerman? And we are all agreed that I should give him a

10 caution before he starts testifying?

11 MS. KORNER: Well, he's Mr. Ackerman's witness, so I think perhaps

12 Mr. Ackerman should go first.

13 MR. ACKERMAN: I have no such request. If Your Honour feels you

14 should do that, go ahead. But I have not requested it.

15 [Trial Chamber confers]

16 [The witness entered court]

17 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, good afternoon to you, Mr. Radic.

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Good afternoon.

19 JUDGE AGIUS: And welcome to this Tribunal.

20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you.

21 JUDGE AGIUS: You are about to start giving evidence as a witness

22 produced by the accused Radoslav Brdjanin in this trial. And our rules

23 require that before you do so, you make a solemn declaration to the effect

24 that in the course of your testimony, you will be speaking the truth, the

25 whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

1 Madam usher is going to hand you the text of this solemn

2 declaration. That is equivalent to an oath. And I would now invite you

3 to read it out aloud.

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

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

6 JUDGE AGIUS: I thank you. Please sit down.

7 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you very much.

8 JUDGE AGIUS: This is not the first time you're giving evidence in

9 a court, no?

10 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I have testified before the OTP. I

11 have never testified before this Court.

12 JUDGE AGIUS: All right. So I'll explain to you very briefly what

13 the procedure is because giving a statement during an interview is one

14 thing. Testifying in open court is another. What's going to happen is

15 that Mr. Ackerman, who is the lead counsel for Mr. Brdjanin - correct me

16 if I am wrong, Mr. Ackerman - will be leading the examination-in-chief.

17 He will be putting to you a series of questions to which you need to

18 answer. He will then be followed by Ms. Korner, who is the lead counsel

19 for the Prosecution, in a series -- with a series of questions. And that

20 exercise we usually refer to as cross-examination. Although you are a

21 witness summoned by the accused himself, it doesn't mean to say that you

22 have come here to testify what is in favour of the accused and not what is

23 or could be against him. In fact, you are under an obligation here to

24 answer all questions irrespective of who is putting the question to you,

25 be it Mr. Ackerman or Ms. Korner, in line with the oath that you've taken

1 a couple of minutes ago.

2 Your obligation under the law is to answer each question

3 truthfully and as fully as possible. You are also one of the protagonists

4 in the events that took place in 1992, which is the period that we are

5 dealing with. And it is my duty to caution you that if there are any

6 questions put to you by whoever, that if you answer could expose you to

7 criminal proceedings before this Tribunal or elsewhere, then you have a

8 right to ask me as the Presiding Judge to be exempted from answering that

9 particular question. You do not have an automatic right. That's

10 something that Judge Janu from the Czech Republic and Judge Taya from

11 Japan will discuss as and if the question arises. And then we will let

12 you know what our decision is.

13 Otherwise, your obligation is to answer every question that is put

14 to you, although there may be instances when we ourselves will tell you,

15 "Mr. Radic, you don't need to answer this question." Have I made myself

16 clear?

17 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour.

18 JUDGE AGIUS: So, Mr. Ackerman, he is all yours.

19 MR. ACKERMAN: Thank you, Your Honour. I had -- just so you know,

20 I had prepared this examination to use the new technology provided by the

21 Sanction programme fully expecting that the technology people would have

22 installed the VGA cord that I needed here since I requested it almost a

23 week ago. It's not here. It's apparently more of a challenge than

24 they're up to. So hopefully within the next month or so, they'll get that

25 done and we can actually start using the same technology that the

1 Prosecutor uses.

2 JUDGE AGIUS: I take it that you are not asking for an adjournment

3 of a month, Mr. Ackerman.

4 MR. ACKERMAN: Well, okay, I will.

5 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Mr. Ackerman.

6 MR. ACKERMAN: I think it would be a waste of time. Thank you,

7 Your Honour.

8 WITNESS: PREDRAG RADIC

9 [Witness answered through interpreter]

10 Examined by Mr. Ackerman:

11 Q. Sir, your name is Predrag Radic?

12 A. Yes, it is.

13 Q. And Mr. Radic, you were president of the Banja Luka Assembly or,

14 as some people call you, the mayor of Banja Luka during the year 1992.

15 Correct?

16 A. Yes. When you say that I was a mayor, I wasn't. I was the

17 president of the Municipal Assembly of Banja Luka.

18 Q. You understand that many people have referred to you as the mayor

19 of Banja Luka, though, don't you?

20 A. It's a mistake.

21 Q. I'd like you to first tell the Judges about your educational

22 background, degrees you might have earned, things of that nature.

23 A. Shall I start with the beginning then.

24 Q. Yes.

25 A. I was born on the 27th of January 1941 in Gradiska. I completed

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1 my elementary education there, and two lower grades of the grammar school.

2 I completed my grammar school education in Banja Luka. I graduated from

3 the school of economics in Belgrade. Then I completed my post-graduate

4 studies at the school of engineering in Belgrade. I defended my doctoral

5 thesis at the school of economics in Banja Luka, and this is where I hold

6 a tenure, and I teach the planning in production.

7 Q. So are you an engineer or an economist or what are you?

8 A. I'm an economist.

9 Q. When were you elected president of the Banja Luka Municipality?

10 When did that happen?

11 A. At the democratic elections in 1990, I was elected president of

12 the Municipal Assembly of Banja Luka. At that time, it was not a town

13 yet. It was just a municipality. And nowadays, Banja Luka is a town.

14 Q. And what party were you a member of during those elections?

15 A. I was not a member of any party. What I was asked to do is to

16 give my consent to be put forward by the Serbian Democratic Party. But I

17 wasn't a member of any party. I was just on the list of the Serbian

18 Democratic Party at the moment of these elections.

19 Q. Were you ever a member of the Serbian Democrat Party?

20 A. After the elections, because it didn't make much sense for me to

21 be a candidate without actually being a member of the party after that.

22 Q. And are you still a member of the SDS?

23 A. No, I'm not. After the Dayton Accords, I was the presiding person

24 of the coalition of the Democratic Patriotic Bloc. After the elections, I

25 was removed from the SDS list. I was discharged of my duties of the

1 president of the assembly of the town of Banja Luka.

2 Q. And do you belong to any political party at the present time?

3 A. Yes. I was the one who actually established the democratic

4 patriotic party, and I'm its president. It is a small party, but it does

5 have seats in the parliament. It does have its representatives in the

6 city assembly.

7 Q. And today you're the head of that party. Is that the case?

8 A. Yes.

9 Q. I want to take you back now to 1992 and ask you if you recall

10 early April of 1992. I think perhaps the 3rd of April of 1992 when a

11 group called SOS set up barricades in Banja Luka. Do you remember that

12 incident?

13 A. I remember.

14 Q. And do you recall that they -- one of the requests that they made

15 was that a crisis staff be set up?

16 A. I remember that as well.

17 Q. Did that happen? Was a crisis staff set up at their request?

18 A. The crisis staff was set up, and from the documents that I had the

19 opportunity to see I know who the members of the crisis staff were.

20 Q. Could you tell the Court - and while you're telling the Court, I'm

21 going to ask that you be given an exhibit. It's -- I believe the exhibit

22 is P137. And it might help you refresh your memory with regard to some of

23 these matters. While that's coming, tell the Court who were the members

24 of that crisis staff.

25 A. I could give you the names of some of them. However, I must tell

1 you that these people were not elected. It was by virtue of their

2 positions that they became members of the crisis staff. So you are going

3 to find the judge of the district court there and another judge who is

4 nowadays a member of the constitutional court of Republika Srpska. You

5 will find the members of some MPs there. The representative of the army

6 of Republika Srpska will also be on that list. You will also find the

7 names of certain people from the police. I was also there in my capacity

8 as the president of the Municipal Assembly of Banja Luka. So those names

9 were on the list, and you will find those names in the exhibits that you

10 have at your disposal. I could give you some names. For example, Jovan

11 Rosic, Milan Puvacic, Predrag Radic, Stojan Zupljanin, Colonel and later

12 on General Kelecevic is also mentioned as one of the members and so on and

13 so forth. You have that list. I myself can't remember all of those names

14 after so much time.

15 Q. I think maybe we've gotten off the track here. I think you're

16 talking about the ARK Crisis Staff. Are you?

17 A. No.

18 Q. You're talking about the crisis staff formed --

19 A. Yes. Would you please show me the list. I'm sure you have it.

20 The list must exist because it was published in Glas newspapers, and I'm

21 sure you have taken that document from that paper.

22 Q. I think P137, and it's there to be handed to you right now.

23 A. Yes. I can actually read it, although it is cut in half.

24 Here you have on behalf of the Banja Luka Municipality Predrag

25 Mitrakovic, who was at that time the secretary of urban planning. There

1 is my name on behalf of the public security centre. Stojan Zupljanin.

2 Then Vladimir Tutus, the head of SJB, the public security service. On

3 behalf of the Banja Luka Crisis Staff, there was Milorad Sajic, Milos

4 Cesic, and Miroslav Vesic. On behalf of the judiciary, members of the

5 crisis staff were Milan Puvacic, Jovo Rosic. The Banja Luka corps was

6 represented --

7 JUDGE AGIUS: Slow down because we have interpreters having --

8 slow down please because the interpreters that have to translate

9 translating into English and then to French have to catch up with you.

10 Sometimes it's not easy when you speak so rapidly.

11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I understand. I understand.

12 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay. Go ahead.

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] On behalf of the judiciary, Milan

14 Puvacic, Jovo Rosic. On behalf of the Banja Luka corps, Colonel Bosko

15 Koljevic, Bogdan Subotic. On behalf of the political parties,

16 Dr. Radoslav Vukic and Nenad Stevandic. On behalf of the assembly of the

17 ARK Krajina, Mr. Radoslav Brdjanin who was a member of the crisis staff.

18 And obviously, those who demanded for the crisis staff to be set up,

19 members of the SOS, on their behalf, or rather they were represented by

20 Ilija Milinkovic, Slobodan Popovic, Aleksandar Tolimir, and Ranko

21 Dubocanin.

22 MR. ACKERMAN:

23 Q. All right. I want to direct your attention now to a section of

24 that newspaper you have in front of you that's headed "Serbian Defence

25 Forces Proclamation." Do you see that?

1 A. If you will allow me, please. This text that I have in front of

2 me, there are parts missing. It is not complete.

3 Q. Do you see a section that begin -- the headline is "Serbian

4 Defence Forces Proclamation"? Do you see that?

5 A. No, I don't. But if you will allow me, I have this document on

6 me.

7 Q. Well, I don't know if you can use your own document or not.

8 MR. ACKERMAN: Apparently the exhibit is incomplete, Your Honour.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: This is precisely the point. If he's saying that

10 the exhibit is incomplete, I'd like to see where it is incomplete.

11 MS. KORNER: It's not incomplete, Your Honour.

12 JUDGE AGIUS: It's probably selected. No, and it's --

13 MS. KORNER: I think he has only been given a part of the exhibit.

14 The exhibit runs to one, two, three pages.

15 JUDGE AGIUS: That's what I have.

16 MS. KORNER: But he's only got one small part of it.

17 JUDGE AGIUS: Usher, usher, give the witness my copy. And perhaps

18 he can look at it and tell me if that is complete or not.

19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, this is a complete text.

20 JUDGE AGIUS: All right. So, Witness, Mr. Radic, could you please

21 go to the part which says "Serbian Defence Forces Proclamation."

22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, here it is. That is the bottom

23 part of this page.

24 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay, Mr. Ackerman.

25 MR. ACKERMAN: All right.

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1 Q. If you go down a ways in there, you're going to find that after

2 making a statement, then it says this: "Therefore, the statement says `we

3 demand that the president of the municipality activate a crisis staff that

4 we would agree to and negotiate with so as to fulfill the following

5 demands'." And then what you see there is a list of demands. And what

6 I'd like to go is go through those basically one at a time with you and

7 ask you about each one.

8 If you look at the first of those, what is being requested is the

9 immediate enactment of a law on internal affairs of the Republic of the

10 Serbian People of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Now, would this crisis staff that

11 was put together have had any competence to adopt and enact a law on

12 internal affairs of the Republic of the Serbian People of

13 Bosnia-Herzegovina?

14 A. The demand is for something else within this proclamation, and you

15 will find that towards the end of this proclamation. They ask for their

16 representative in the assembly of the town of Banja Luka and in the

17 assembly of the Autonomous Region of Krajina. What they demanded was for

18 these decisions to be made by the municipalities and the AR Krajina. They

19 themselves and the municipalities, or even the assembly of AR Krajina

20 could not adopt this law. Although the demand was not for us to adopt the

21 law, but to implement it. In other words, that law allegedly had already

22 been in place, and it only had to be implemented. I don't remember what

23 this law was all about, however we could not implement this law if it

24 hadn't been previously adopted by the National Assembly of

25 Republika Srpska. This would have been beyond the competencies of both

1 the Municipal Assembly of Banja Luka as well as of the Autonomous Region

2 of Krajina.

3 Q. So your interpretation at least of that demand is that they

4 weren't asking this crisis staff to enact a law on internal affairs for

5 the entire republic, but that they were asking that the law on internal

6 affairs be implemented in Banja Luka and the Krajina. Is that your

7 interpretation of that demand?

8 A. How can something be implemented in the town of Banja Luka which

9 is part of Republika Srpska if it isn't implemented in the other parts of

10 Republika Srpska? It was, therefore, impossible to carry this out because

11 further on in the text, it says that it has to be implemented, that a law

12 on internal affairs of the Republic of the Serbian People of Bosnia and

13 Herzegovina has to be implemented, and certain markings have to be changed

14 immediately. So the assembly of the town of Banja Luka couldn't have

15 adopted this.

16 Q. The second thing --

17 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, can I assist Mr. Ackerman. I think it's

18 clearer from the actual text of the proclamation than from the Glas

19 article, if one looks at Exhibit P134. It actually uses the word

20 "implemented" as opposed to the word here, which is "enactment."

21 MR. ACKERMAN: Thank you.

22 Q. I'm going to ask you about the second demand now. The second

23 demand is for the immediate change of signs. Do you have any idea what

24 that's all about? Do you know what that demand was, what they were

25 talking about?

1 A. I can only guess what this means, since it doesn't state what

2 signs are concerned. And a lot of time has passed. I think that they

3 wanted signs -- institutions of Republika Srpska to be changed.

4 MS. KORNER: [Previous interpretation continues] ... In the actual

5 text, it's insignia, not "signs." If you go to P134, that's put in front

6 of him, I think you'll see it, rather than going --

7 MR. ACKERMAN: I think that makes sense, yes.

8 JUDGE AGIUS: Let's have P134 made available to the witness as

9 well. Perhaps you could put the English version on the ELMO because we

10 were not prepared for this document.

11 Further down, Madam usher, please.

12 MR. ACKERMAN:

13 Q. Okay, sir, you'll see there in paragraph 1 that it says that

14 "insignia" be changed immediately. Does that make more sense to you?

15 A. Yes. To immediately change the insignia, that's what it states in

16 this text here and in the other text that I have in front of me, and I

17 assume that this was insignia in institutes. They wanted insignia in

18 institutes to be changed. And for example, if it was the district court

19 or the Security Services Centre, these belonged to the Serbian people of

20 Bosnia-Herzegovina. They wanted these insignia to be changed, and they

21 wanted the Latin script to be replaced by the Cyrillic script. This is

22 probably what they were requesting because this had already been

23 implemented in Croatia and in the areas where the Bosniaks were in the

24 majority. They had replaced all signs in the Cyrillic script with the

25 Latin script. I think that is what it is about. I don't have any other

1 interpretation.

2 Q. They ask for it to be done immediately. Was it done immediately

3 or was it ever done?

4 A. It wasn't done immediately because this didn't fall within the

5 competence of the Municipal Assembly of Banja Luka. And I don't believe

6 that the ARK Assembly could have done this either. This was perhaps a

7 decision perhaps of the National Assembly of Republika Srpska, but this

8 happened a lot later and it took a long time for all the names of the

9 towns to be changed. It took a lot of time for the signs for the town of

10 Banja Luka and Zvornik to be changed and to replace them with signs in the

11 Cyrillic script. And perhaps there was a directive that was issued in

12 order to do this from the assembly of Banja Luka.

13 Q. Let's go to the next demand. "That all employees who have shown

14 through their work that they are destroyers of Yugoslavia and enemies of

15 the Serbian People be fired." What was done with that demand?

16 A. I have to say that prior to this request, there was an event --

17 there was something that provoked this entire programme. And that was the

18 referendum that was held in order to have -- obtain the secession of

19 Bosnia-Herzegovina from Yugoslavia. And the Serbs voted to remain within

20 Yugoslavia, the plebiscite. One of the constituent peoples was ignored

21 when this decision on the secession of Bosnia and Herzegovina was made.

22 This plebiscite is mentioned on several occasions, in documents, and it is

23 considered to be a betrayal. All those who did not vote in the plebiscite

24 thought that this idea of the Serbian People had quite simply been

25 ignored, and naturally as a result they called them traitors because they

1 hadn't shown any solidarity with the Serbian People as far as Bosnia and

2 Herzegovina remaining in Yugoslavia was concerned.

3 That's how we could interpret this. And naturally, they then

4 requested that such people should also be deprived of their rights, the

5 right to work. And again, this was not implemented at that time. At

6 least, not in Banja Luka. It took quite a lot of time before this was

7 made operational through subsequent decisions.

8 Q. They also demand that the same be done in the judiciary. Was that

9 done? Was that demand implemented?

10 A. Yes, but not in the judiciary immediately either. That was done a

11 little later because in the judiciary, there were still people who were

12 not Serbs, and it was a little more difficult to implement this in Banja

13 Luka because the population of Banja Luka was mixed. And in the

14 parliament, there were various parties. And in a document, you'll see who

15 there was from the Bosniaks and from the Croats, and there were even other

16 nationalities that were represented. And of course, there were Serbs,

17 too. It was a little more difficult to adopt such a decision. And

18 finally, in the executive organs, well, my vice-president was a Bosniak,

19 too. He was there until the end, until 1994 when he left. And at that

20 time, the exodus of the Serb people from the Knin Krajina seemed

21 inevitable with the agreement of Cornelio Sommaruga, they started leaving

22 the area.

23 JUDGE AGIUS: Mr. Ackerman, I do notice that the witness in all

24 good faith and definitely meaning well is giving more information than

25 he's being asked for. For the time being, I'm going to leave it in your

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1 hands to stop him when you feel it's necessary.

2 MR. ACKERMAN: All right.

3 JUDGE AGIUS: If you prefer that I will do that, then I will do

4 that.

5 MR. ACKERMAN: No, I can do that, Your Honour, if I feel it's

6 necessary.

7 JUDGE AGIUS: And addressing myself to you, Mr. Radic, please try

8 to answer the question, the whole question, and nothing but the question.

9 There may be sometimes occasions when more information is good to have,

10 but please try to restrict yourself to answering the question only, and

11 don't give more information than you were asked for.

12 Mr. Ackerman.

13 MR. ACKERMAN: Your Honour, I know that Mr. Radic has some

14 business engagements and would like to be able to leave here as soon as

15 possible.

16 JUDGE AGIUS: That would help him leave here as soon as possible.

17 MR. ACKERMAN: If he would answer the questions just as briefly as

18 possible, it will help him get out of here, I think, a little easier.

19 Q. Can I go to the next demand, Mr. Radic, and that is: "We are

20 requesting from the supreme command and presidency of Yugoslavia not to

21 break up the Banja Luka Corps and not even think about moving its assets

22 to other places." Did this crisis staff that was created have any

23 competency to issue orders to the supreme command or the presidency of

24 Yugoslavia?

25 A. No, not at all. The Municipal Assembly of Banja Luka couldn't do

1 this, and not even the National Assembly of Republika Srpska could have

2 done this. An order arrived from the main staff of the JNA requesting

3 that all officers withdraw by the 15th of May and that they be transferred

4 to Yugoslavia. Most of them obeyed this order and returned to Yugoslavia.

5 But some of them remained there. I would like to tell you that that was

6 the smallest corps in the JNA, and it consisted of about 1.500 men. I'm

7 talking about the Banja Luka Corps.

8 Q. The end part of paragraph 2 talks about officers in the Banja Luka

9 Corps who had voted against Yugoslavia and who were in high positions

10 handling valuable equipment which could easily be handed over to the

11 enemy. And they request the transfer or replacement of those officers.

12 Did this crisis staff that was created there in Banja Luka have any

13 competence to transfer or replace officers in the Banja Luka Corps?

14 A. No, they didn't have any competence, but I don't know based on

15 what they reached the conclusion that many of those officers voted against

16 Yugoslavia. These are assumptions which were supposed to provoke some

17 other sort of reaction. But this is not something that they could have

18 known. They couldn't have known that they voted against

19 Bosnia-Herzegovina remaining in Yugoslavia, the plebiscite that I've

20 already mentioned. It's more a matter of the materiel resources, the

21 military resources being kept in that corps.

22 Q. Let's look now at the third demand, number 3. It is actually the

23 10th or 11th demand, but it's number 3 on the list. "We request the

24 arrest of war profiteers and the publication of their activities and

25 names." Was that demand implemented by this crisis staff?

1 A. It wasn't implemented at the time. And the gentlemen who were

2 involved in this still are not doing this. You still have profiteers who

3 are benefitting in this way. Not even the names of those who were war

4 profiteers were made public.

5 Q. Do you know how Mr. Brdjanin felt about this demand, the arrest of

6 war profiteers? Did you ever hear him express his views about it?

7 A. He expressed his opinion on many occasions, but this was never

8 implemented for the simple reason that Brdjanin exercised a certain amount

9 of authority, that he didn't have sufficient authority to implement this.

10 On numerous occasions, on the television, on the radio, he discussed the

11 problem of war profiteers, but this problem was not solved, and it still

12 hasn't been solved to this very day.

13 Q. What kind of demands was he making regarding war profiteers if you

14 remember?

15 A. He usually said that they should be sent to the front because

16 their business was conducted through the Republika Srpska, the Army of

17 Republika Srpska. It was possible for them to pay so as not to go to the

18 front. He knew about this, so he said that the best way to get rid of

19 them is to send them to the front. These people were young people in the

20 flower of their youth. They were not old people.

21 Q. Let's go to number 4 now. "We request replacements in the banks,

22 Jugobanka in Banja Luka, and the Privredna Banka, Banjalucka Banka in

23 order to prevent a monetary shock." I have two questions about that.

24 First of all, do you know what they were talking about with regard to a

25 "monetary shock"?

1 A. I know what a monetary shock is very well because I'm an

2 economist. But here, it wasn't a matter of monetary shock. When

3 Yugoslavia disintegrated, the currency that we used was the dinar. All

4 the valueless money, all the valueless dinars came from Croatia through

5 Livno and would arrive in Banja Luka and other towns. Bags of money would

6 arrive there. And with those dinars, they would buy foreign currency from

7 private businessmen, and they would also go to banks with this currency,

8 with these valueless dinars which should have been burnt in the national

9 bank in Belgrade as soon as Croatia decided to reject the dinar as a

10 currency. They called this a monetary shock. In a certain sense it's

11 true to call it a monetary shock if you buy foreign currency with

12 worthless money. So the person who is selling the foreign currency is

13 being impoverished.

14 This happened in Jugobanka. The people who called themselves SOS

15 men, they captured two Volkswagens in which there were plastic bags of

16 such money, and there was also foreign currency in plastic bags. Foreign

17 currency that had been bought on the market or taken out of Jugobanka

18 because they had connections there. And German marks, dollars, Austrian

19 shillings, would leave the treasury. This happened when Macedonia left,

20 too. Valueless dinars arrived in that area via helicopters. By using

21 helicopters. They called this monetary shock, and this is why they wanted

22 to replace the director in Jugobanka, et cetera. And Banjalucka bank.

23 Q. Were these replacements done? When they requested these

24 replacements in banks, did those replacements happen?

25 A. It wasn't necessary in Jugobanka, as soon as he heard what was at

1 stake, he left Banja Luka. The director of Jugobanka was from Sado

2 [phoen]. This was a branch of the central office in Sarajevo. This

3 director called me, phoned me and asked me at least to return the

4 Volkswagen Golfs to him. And if possible, he asked me to release two men

5 who had been in prison because they were involved in the black market, in

6 the currency black market.

7 Q. And how did you respond to those requests?

8 A. Which ones?

9 Q. You just said he wanted you to release the vehicles and the

10 people.

11 A. I returned the Volkswagen Golfs, but I couldn't release the two

12 persons who had been arrested and against whom criminal proceedings had

13 been instituted. I didn't represent the police or the judiciary, so I was

14 not in a position to release the people who were involved in foreign

15 currency -- in foreign currency black market.

16 Q. Now, are the Privredna Banka and the Banjalucka Banka two banks,

17 two different banks?

18 A. No, they're not. The Privredna bank was a branch of the Sarajevo

19 Privredna bank. But before the war, perhaps one year before the war, the

20 Privredna bank was separated, and the Banjalucka Banka Ltd. was

21 established. It's one bank, but it has two names.

22 Q. Was the replacement requested made in that bank?

23 A. A sort of selection was made. I think Mr. Began, who was the

24 director, was replaced. And I think he was replaced by Mr. Poparic. I

25 think that's what happened, but I can't say with certainty. I think this

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1 was done, but I don't know. There was a sort of selection, and those who

2 had access to the treasury and to foreign currency, this concerned them in

3 particular.

4 Q. And the purpose was to stop the monetary shock, the speculation in

5 currencies and so forth. Is that right?

6 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I'm sorry. That is about as leading as

7 you can get on a topic which Mr. Ackerman knows is an issue in this case,

8 and that is why people were dismissed.

9 MR. ACKERMAN: I'm sorry, Your Honour. I think I was summarising

10 what he had already said. Just trying to summarise it. I think he

11 already said that was the reason for these, because of the monetary shock.

12 JUDGE AGIUS: No, I think he said, his very first answer actually

13 was in the sense that it wasn't really this. Let me take you back.

14 MR. ACKERMAN: I think I can just ask the question a different

15 way, Your Honour.

16 JUDGE AGIUS: In the meantime, you've made a statement. So let me

17 just --

18 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I agree with Mr. Ackerman. If

19 Mr. Ackerman just changes the form of the question, that will be fine.

20 JUDGE AGIUS: All right, okay. Then go ahead.

21 MR. ACKERMAN:

22 Q. What was the purpose of requesting these replacements? Do you

23 know why they were requesting these replacements?

24 A. In order to put an end to selling foreign currency for the

25 valueless Yugoslavia dinar, which was no longer legal tender. The krona

1 had already been introduced in Croatia. It wasn't legal tender in

2 Macedonia either. So naturally whenever a certain currency is abolished

3 in a country, it's handed over to the National Bank which burns this

4 currency. So what should have been burned was used in order to buy

5 foreign currency, and the Republika Srpska did not have much foreign

6 currency. In any case, that was the purpose. But a monetary shock,

7 that's quite another matter.

8 Q. So were these acts --

9 MR. ACKERMAN: I'm sorry, Judge.

10 JUDGE AGIUS: That tallies with what I was going to point out,

11 referring to page 18, last three lines and the first ten lines of page 19

12 of the transcript. But he's now crystallised the position, so you don't

13 need to go into further details.

14 Yes, Mr. Ackerman.

15 MR. ACKERMAN:

16 Q. Do you know if these actions that were being taken in these banks

17 that the SOS is complaining about, just if you know, were these actions

18 legal or were they illegal?

19 A. You mean selling foreign currency?

20 Q. Yes.

21 A. Illegal. They were illegal acts because if an official enters the

22 treasury and leaves with German marks after not having paid for them with

23 dinars, naturally this was an illegal act. It could not have been a legal

24 act. As far as JUG bank is concerned, it came to light that the person

25 who was the director at the time was aware of such transactions.

1 Q. All right. Let's go to number 5. "We request replacements in the

2 post office where management positions are occupied by those who voted

3 against Yugoslavia and who cannot, therefore, work in a united Yugoslavian

4 PTT." Do you know if that demand was carried out?

5 A. I think that this demand was carried out, bearing in mind the

6 nature of the post office service and bearing in mind the fact that the

7 war was already raging after the Lisbon document, Cutilheiro document had

8 been rejected. And people were afraid that the post office might be a

9 focal point where information would be gathered. And I have to say that

10 the first thing that was done in Croatia and in the federal part of Bosnia

11 and Herzegovina was to dismiss people who weren't Croats or other Bosniaks

12 from the post office, et cetera.

13 Q. Let me see if I can understand. You said, and maybe -- let me

14 find it. You said you think it was carried out bearing in mind the nature

15 of the post office. Can you expand on that? What was the nature of the

16 post office that would cause this to make any sense at all?

17 A. Well, all contact established in Bosnia and Herzegovina with

18 Serbia and Croatia, et cetera, all these contacts -- all such

19 communication would be established by the post office. And naturally, it

20 was easy to intercept conversations because there weren't very good

21 protective measures against intercepting conversations. And when I first

22 started performing my duties, my phone was tapped, and I informed the

23 director that this was being done from a centre in the post office. I

24 informed the director of this. That's what I was referring to.

25 Q. Okay. Let's look at number 6 now. "We request that the work of

1 municipal organs be re-examined because it emerged that there have been

2 abuses." Do you know what that is about?

3 A. I must say that I don't know, and I find it rather strange because

4 the executive organs of the Municipal Assembly of Banja Luka, I, as its

5 president, I acquired them as late as June 1991. I didn't have any

6 executive organs before that. And that is when I resigned, and I said I

7 wouldn't continue working without any executive organs in place. That is

8 why I'm finding it so strange to see that they might have done such huge

9 abuses. They only had nine or ten months of work behind them if they were

10 set up in June 1991, which is a fact, and the demand here was made on the

11 3rd of April 1992. So they had quite a short time to do so much abuse,

12 and for them to be removed for their positions. That's why I'm saying

13 that I did not accept any shake-ups in these organs, and people continued

14 working long after that in the municipality. That is, those who were in

15 their positions at the time when this request was made.

16 Q. All right. I want to go now to the final demand here, number 7.

17 "That extraordinary sessions of the Assembly of the municipality and of

18 Krajina be scheduled at which the crisis staff would appoint its

19 representatives to expedite these requests and at which the rights of

20 soldiers, returnees from the front, and families of fallen soldiers would

21 be adopted."

22 Do you understand that demand at all, and was anything done in

23 response to that demand?

24 A. That the SOS sends the message to the fighters to remain in the

25 front, and for us, that is the SOS, we'll look after security of the town

1 and of their dear ones, and that we will make sure that they will return

2 to their own country as heroes. If there is --

3 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I didn't get any interpretation at all

4 for the first part of his answer, and I'm not sure what's now being

5 interpreted is whether the first part of his answer or later.

6 JUDGE AGIUS: I'm actually trying to understand how to fit in what

7 he is saying with the question. And perhaps let's start from the

8 beginning and we try to make it understandable.

9 MS. KORNER: I don't think there was any interpretation at the

10 beginning of the answer, which is why it doesn't make any sense at the

11 moment.

12 MR. ACKERMAN: Your Honour, I think I put too many questions at

13 one time, Your Honour. So maybe I can break it down into a couple of

14 questions.

15 JUDGE AGIUS: If you can do that. And Mr. Radic, please take it

16 as if you have not answered this question already, and you start from the

17 beginning again. All right, this particular question only with regard to

18 number 7.

19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I didn't answer the question. I

20 just wanted to establish a link between that question and the last

21 paragraph. But let me first answer the question, and then I will point

22 your attention to the last paragraph of the proclamation.

23 MR. ACKERMAN:

24 Q. Let me break the question up into a couple of questions, and maybe

25 that will make it easier. The first part of number 7 seems to request

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1 that extraordinary sessions of the assembly - I assume that is the

2 assembly of the municipality - and of the Krajina be scheduled at which

3 the crisis staff would appoint its representatives to expedite these

4 requests. Does that mean anything to you and was anything like that done?

5 A. Yes. This is correct. They want extraordinary sessions of the

6 Municipal Assembly to be scheduled. That's their first request. Can I

7 now continue? May I continue?

8 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, go ahead. In the meantime, technicians, please

9 note that we have lost everything on our monitor, except that Judge Taya

10 has got the transcript back.

11 MR. ACKERMAN: Mine just came back.

12 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay.

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] So their request was for the

14 extraordinary sessions to be scheduled for the Municipal Assembly of Banja

15 Luka and the Autonomous Region of Krajina. At these sessions, the crisis

16 staff would appoint their commissioners, as they called them, whose task

17 would be to implement the aforementioned requests. At these sessions,

18 also rights of fighters and their families would be adopted. This,

19 indeed, was carried out. However, since they only had a minority in both

20 of these assemblies, this was not implemented.

21 And now, if you will allow me, I would like to tell you what the

22 goal was of all this.

23 MR. ACKERMAN:

24 Q. Go ahead.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, go ahead.

1 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The goal was what is contained in

2 the message, in the last paragraph. And the message was those who were on

3 the front line, stay there, and the rest of us will take care of other

4 things. We will make sure that we become an integral part of the

5 government, both in the town and the ARK Krajina, instead of being on the

6 front lines with these people. What they wanted to have was power. They

7 didn't very much care about the implementation of the ideas in the

8 proclamation, and that is the main point.

9 MR. ACKERMAN:

10 Q. What I'd like to know is why, instead of listening to these people

11 in -- this crisis staff and all these things, why didn't you just have the

12 army or the police arrest them or throw them out of town?

13 A. If you look at the date when all this was happening, you will see

14 that this was happening when the army was withdrawing from Slavonia. The

15 army was regrouped and starting to look after the deblocking of Krajina

16 which was cut off from the rest of the world. These forces were on their

17 way back. They returned. They regrouped themselves. And as we like to

18 say it, they broke the corridor towards Serbia.

19 I would like also to remind you, and I'm sure you'll find it in a

20 document somewhere, that at that time, 12 babies died in the clinical

21 hospital centre. Those were prematurely born babies. And they died only

22 because they couldn't receive the oxygen that was necessary to keep the

23 incubators running. That was the reason why the corridor had to be

24 opened. And that is when the groups were formed and when forces were

25 grouped somewhere around Doboj and how could they look after the problems

1 that started arising somewhere in Banja Luka, for example. And if you ask

2 me why the police did not intervene, I suppose that they were also called

3 to be on the strength of the army.

4 And secondly, Mr. Ackerman, I, during the war, my predecessors

5 before the war, and the mayors nowadays are not in the position to give

6 any orders to the police because they have their chain of command.

7 Whether they received any orders to that effect or not, I really am not in

8 a position to tell you.

9 Q. All right. I'm finished asking you questions now about SOS, and I

10 want to ask you now to look at Exhibit P168, please.

11 You should have in front of you a document signed by Nikola Erceg

12 dated 5 May 1992 which forms a war staff of the Autonomous Region of

13 Krajina. Is that the document you're looking at?

14 A. It is indeed.

15 Q. It lists several names there. If you look at number 5 on the

16 list, it, I think, has your name. Is that correct?

17 A. That is correct.

18 Q. Prior to 5 May 1992, were you made aware in any way that you were

19 going to be appointed as part of this war staff of the Autonomous Region

20 of Krajina?

21 A. No.

22 Q. How did you learn that you had been appointed to this group?

23 A. Well, I received this decision.

24 Q. So somehow, this decision was sent to you or delivered to you?

25 A. Not somehow. It was delivered by mail, and I received this as a

1 decision issued by the autonomous region, or better say, the executive

2 council of the autonomous region whose signatory was Mr. Nikola Erceg.

3 Q. Did you then begin attending meetings of this war staff?

4 A. I must say that I don't remember. I attended meetings really very

5 rarely, and I really didn't know what this war staff was supposed to do in

6 the first place.

7 You must bear in mind that this was already the time when the army

8 was engaged in preparing for the breakthrough of the corridor. It was on

9 the 5th of May, and these preparations were very far ahead. And I believe

10 that war operations may have even started at the time. And this type of a

11 war staff, even if they did do something, the only thing that they could

12 do was things that had to do with logistics. They could provide for the

13 necessary food, clothing, footwear, and fuel for the army vehicles. I

14 must say that the war started and that the state was not nonexistent. And

15 it was the municipalities that had to bear the brunt of the war operations

16 in terms of the supplies for the army and in terms of supplying the

17 families of those who were on the front lines.

18 So if you have any documents or minutes, I would really be curious

19 to see what was done by the war presidency.

20 Q. You raised something that I do want to follow up with you about.

21 You talked about logistics, providing food, clothing, footwear, and fuel.

22 Was that a task that was -- that was unusual? Was it specific to this

23 particular time in 1992, or was that something that had been a municipal

24 civilian responsibility in the past with regard to the JNA?

25 A. No.

1 Q. The JNA was a well-established system, and it was well known who

2 was in charge of supplying food, fuel, medicines, ammunition, weapons.

3 All the formations which were on the strength of the JNA were supplied

4 from the centralised institution. I don't know where that was, I was not

5 a soldier. But I -- there was a centralised supplies system. And that's

6 how all the units of the former JNA in Yugoslavia were supplied.

7 Municipalities were under no obligation to provide supplies for the units

8 of the JNA on their territories because a large portion of the budget of

9 Yugoslavia was allocated for the army.

10 Q. How did that become a responsibility, then, of the municipalities

11 in 1992? How did that happen?

12 A. I have just told you. A state was proclaimed, but this state did

13 not have its budget. Or even if it had its budget, it was so meager that

14 it could not provide for any financing of the war. And when all the youth

15 left Banja Luka, and a lot of them left, and a lot of them were killed,

16 then it was Banja Luka's obligation to provide these young men with

17 clothing, footwear, food, medicines.

18 And later on, it was also prescribed that the municipalities

19 should also look after their families, their wives, their children, even

20 their elderly parents. This is what we were tasked with by an enactment

21 that we received. But that was much later than this 5th of May 1992,

22 which was the early days of the war.

23 Q. Now, I want to go back now to the ARK Crisis Staff that you were

24 appointed to. How many meetings of that ARK Crisis Staff would you say

25 that you attended?

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1 A. I said few. Mr. Blagojevic, who was the secretary, says that I

2 attended once or maybe twice. But I would like to see either documents or

3 minutes that would show exactly how many times I attended. I did not

4 attend the crisis staff meetings many times.

5 Q. So you were aware that meetings were being held and that you were

6 not attending. Correct?

7 A. If I didn't go, then I would delegate my secretary to go there to

8 see what it was all about.

9 Q. Why didn't you go? Why didn't you attend all these meetings?

10 A. Well, Banja Luka is a big place, and I had other things to do.

11 The first meeting that I attended showed me that this was not an

12 institution that could be of any use to me when it came to my primary

13 tasks. And that was the protection of the town and protection of its

14 citizens. It would really be good if we could see documents and minutes

15 of the meetings. This would show us what the -- what they were involved

16 with, what they were set up to do and what they actually did during their

17 work.

18 Q. Can you recall what went on in however many meetings you

19 attended -- the one or two or however many. Can you recall what went on

20 in those meetings? What were they like?

21 A. I don't know if there was ever a meeting held that would be

22 attended by all the members of the AR Krajina Crisis Staff. There were

23 always people missing. The contents or the agendas of these meetings that

24 we had received were not the true reflection of what was really going on.

25 So I concluded that attending those meetings would be a waste of time

1 because nothing important went on there. I drew that conclusion based on

2 the documents that I had received. Even if they reached a conclusion or a

3 recommendation, then they would have to be ratified by the Municipal

4 Assembly. We would analyse the legality of such conclusions, and then we

5 would also analyse the possibility of their implementation. All in all,

6 this was basically the reason why I decided not to attend these meetings.

7 Q. Just as a general proposition from your perspective, observing the

8 work of that crisis staff, what role did that ARK Crisis Staff play in the

9 events in the Krajina between the 5th of May and the 17th of July 1992, if

10 any?

11 A. Well, before the war broke out, there was an association of

12 municipalities. Then the AR Krajina was established. The goal was to

13 exchange information on possible problems and help each other. That was

14 the original goal. The Crisis Staff of the AR Krajina is not something

15 that just turned up. It was not something that was created in Banja Luka

16 by an individual. There is a document which reached us signed by the

17 prime minister, and according to this document, the crisis staff was to be

18 set up with certain obligations. However, this crisis staff did not carry

19 out the tasks that had been set out by that document.

20 Let me even be so bold to claim that this was just a transfer of

21 authorities. But this body was not empowered in keeping with those

22 authorities. Those people who serviced the crisis staff did not have the

23 resources to pay their salaries, for example. And although they may have

24 been perceived as the highest organ of government, however, they were not

25 in the position to influence any changes if they didn't have any material

1 resources. So what kind of a power is that? What kind of a government is

2 that?

3 The municipalities which joined the AR Krajina which had

4 representatives in the crisis staff, especially the poorest municipalities

5 amongst them, stopped attending those meetings. And that is the only

6 thing that I remember about the crisis staff.

7 Q. The crisis staff in relation to the army, did Mr. Brdjanin or the

8 crisis staff itself exercise any control of any kind over the army?

9 A. Nobody but the presidency or the first figure of the presidency

10 could exert any influence over the army or the police. Nobody had that

11 power.

12 I would like to remind this Honourable Chamber that not before the

13 war, not during the war, not even today civilian organs have had any

14 influence on the army. Not even today when there is a mayor of Banja

15 Luka, that person cannot issue any orders to the police. All he can do is

16 to issue a request, which is then forwarded to the Ministry of the

17 Interior, and then it's the Ministry of the Interior which issued an

18 implementation order. This question has already been put to me, whether

19 Brdjanin was in the position to issue orders to the police or to the army.

20 And I answered then and I'm answering now that no, he was never in that

21 position. He was never in the position to issue any order to any military

22 unit.

23 Q. And your answer also includes the police. I think you've included

24 both the police and the military in your answer, that neither Brdjanin or

25 the ARK Crisis Staff had any control or position to order. Am I correct?

1 A. I was already asked that, and I answered that he was not in the

2 position to do that. He didn't have any competencies of that kind.

3 Nobody would have obeyed any such order coming from him.

4 Q. When you say you were already asked that, I think you're referring

5 to your conversations with the Prosecutor in Banja Luka. And it might

6 help you if you understand that the Judges do not have those documents, so

7 they don't know what you've already been asked. Okay?

8 A. That is not my problem.

9 Q. It's not. I agree with that.

10 MR. ACKERMAN: I think we can take a break now, Your Honour, if

11 that's okay with you.

12 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, just before, and while Mr. Radic hears

13 this, first of all, I don't know -- Mr. Ackerman mentioned that Radic had

14 business appointments. I don't know how long Mr. Radic's thinks -- or

15 Mr. Ackerman has told him he's going to be here. And that's the first

16 question. But if he does have business appointments for this week, it may

17 be as well to cancel them.

18 Secondly, Your Honour, he said he brought with him a copy of Glas.

19 I'm asking at this stage, otherwise I can wait till cross-examination, but

20 I'm going to be asking for copies of any documents that he's brought with

21 him. And therefore, I wonder if he would be prepared to hand them over

22 now. In addition, I'm particularly interested in documents relating to

23 the meetings of the municipal crisis staff.

24 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Mr. Ackerman.

25 MR. ACKERMAN: Am I being asked a question?

1 JUDGE AGIUS: I'm wondering if you have any comment. Otherwise I

2 will direct the question to Mr. Radic.

3 MR. ACKERMAN: I don't have any comments about what Ms. Korner

4 just said other than I think Mr. Radic understands that he is here until

5 we're finished asking him questions.

6 JUDGE AGIUS: How long is your direct going to last?

7 MR. ACKERMAN: I will be finished today, it looks like.

8 JUDGE AGIUS: By and I -- if I've read you well it means that you

9 will be engaging him in cross-examination until the end of the week.

10 MS. KORNER: Well, Your Honour, I'm not-- I didn't realise-- I

11 rather assumed that Mr. Ackerman had a lot more to get through than he

12 obviously does judging by his list of the documents that he's given us.

13 If he's going to finish today, no, then the answer is I probably won't

14 take the rest of the week.

15 JUDGE AGIUS: All right. That's number 1.

16 Number 2. Mr. Radic, did you bring with you any documents apart

17 from the Glas newspaper that you mentioned earlier on in your testimony?

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, it seems to me that everybody

19 has access to this article. I've had it in my hands several times. It's

20 the same article that I have just been shown here. So I have nothing new

21 to give you.

22 JUDGE AGIUS: Is that the only document that you brought with you?

23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, it is.

24 JUDGE AGIUS: All right. Let's have a break. In the meantime, I

25 was going to suggest the following timetable for the -- for today. Is it

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1 your wish that we revert to the practice we had before, finish 6.30

2 instead of 7.00?

3 MR. ACKERMAN: Yes.

4 MS. KORNER: I mean, I'm in Your Honour's hands on that.

5 JUDGE AGIUS: If that is the case, we'll have a break now, and we

6 will resume at 4.05. Is that agreeable with everyone? And we will then

7 go for an hour and a half, until 5.35. And then we'll have another short

8 break of 20 minutes, and finish at 6.30. We start at 5.55 and we finish

9 at 6.30. Is that okay with you?

10 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, as I say, I mean, it does seem we're

11 only sitting for effectively half an hour after the second break.

12 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. We could sit straight from 4.00 -- no, we

13 would still need a break. What we could do is to shorten the break.

14 But, I depend --

15 MS. KORNER: It's the interpreters, I think, Your Honour, that

16 need -- I think it's got to be at least 20 minutes for the interpreters.

17 JUDGE AGIUS: Let's leave it at that for the time being. We start

18 at 4.05, and then we break at 5.35.

19 --- Recess taken at 3.50 p.m.

20 --- On resuming at 4.08 p.m.

21 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Mr. Ackerman. Mr. Ackerman.

22 MR. ACKERMAN: Thank you, Your Honour.

23 Q. Mr. Radic, before we broke, you mentioned something about the

24 minutes of the ARK Crisis Staff. If you have any idea where to find any

25 of the minutes of the ARK Crisis Staff, we'd sure appreciate you sending

1 them to us, because we have been looking for them, all of us, for months.

2 Do you know where there are any minutes of the ARK Crisis Staff?

3 A. You can find them with SFOR, SFOR, who took them away from the

4 archives where they had been kept.

5 Q. So to your knowledge, they were in the archives of the municipal

6 building when SFOR came and took the archives away?

7 A. They probably them took away from the archives. If they were

8 there, they took everything that they were interested in. So it would be

9 good to ask them where are those documents, whether they have those

10 documents.

11 Q. All right. Let me ask you this: Was there ever a time during

12 time of the ARK Crisis Staff when you as president of the Banja Luka

13 Assembly wanted to do something and had to get the approval of

14 Mr. Brdjanin or the ARK Crisis Staff to do it? Was there ever a time when

15 that happened?

16 A. I can't remember there ever being such situations.

17 Q. Did Brdjanin ever issue any orders to you, as the president of the

18 Municipality of Banja Luka?

19 A. I don't remember any such situations either. Perhaps they said

20 something to that effect, but it really wasn't important, so I really

21 don't remember.

22 Q. If he had ever issued any kind of orders to you from his post as

23 president of the crisis staff, would you have been legally bound --

24 duty-bound to carry out those orders?

25 A. That would have depended on the order, whether it was an order

1 that was legitimate or not. If it was an illegal order, I most certainly

2 would not have implemented it.

3 Q. What kind of a mechanism did the ARK Crisis Staff have to enforce

4 any of its decisions or conclusions? How could they enforce the decisions

5 or conclusions that were issued by them?

6 A. I really don't know. As I said, they had received some sort of de

7 jure authority. But as to whether they had authority to force someone to

8 implement something like that, I'm not aware of this.

9 Q. Do you know how many people were employed, staff persons, by the

10 Municipality of Banja Luka during the spring and summer of 1992?

11 A. There were about 350, perhaps 380 staff members.

12 Q. And do you know how many staff people were employed by the

13 Autonomous Region of Krajina Crisis Staff?

14 A. Perhaps two. Boro Blagojevic was the secretary as far as I know,

15 and perhaps there was another secretary who would take messages, et

16 cetera. But as to whether there were any other members in that crisis

17 staff, I don't think so. And I think that they're all volunteers in any

18 case because I don't know how they could have paid these people since

19 there were no funds with which to do so.

20 Q. Did the ARK Crisis Staff have offices, vehicles, anything like

21 that?

22 A. The crisis staff or the ARK?

23 Q. The crisis staff.

24 A. As far as I know, the crisis staff was located in the building --

25 in the PIK Kozara building which is where the ministry for public

1 utilities was located, and for urban planning. Its sessions were held in

2 the municipality building on occasion, and sometimes when they didn't need

3 that much space, they would hold sessions in the GIK Kozara [Realtime

4 translation read in error "Gika"], across the road from the assembly,

5 which is where Mr. Brdjanin worked before the war. But as far as vehicles

6 are concerned, I'm not aware of him having had a special vehicle. If he

7 did, it was provided to him, but he would usually use his own vehicle.

8 But I am not aware of him having a lot of vehicles.

9 Q. I'd like you to look at another document now. A bit of a change

10 of pace. I'd like you to look at P1237, please. And I think you've seen

11 this document before.

12 A. There's a mistake in the transcript.

13 Q. Could you tell us where.

14 A. Well, as far as I can see here, it says 18, 16. It says Pika,

15 P-I-K-A, instead of GIK.

16 Q. That's line 38 -- page 38, line 18. It should be GIKA [sic].

17 Right?

18 A. GIK, yes. Not PIK.

19 Q. Thank you.

20 I think you have the distinction of being the first witness in

21 months of trial to correct the transcript for us.

22 A. It's professional deformation.

23 Q. Are you familiar with this document?

24 MS. KORNER: Could we have it on the ELMO?

25 JUDGE AGIUS: Can we have the English version on the ELMO, please.

1 MS. KORNER: Because we've got 1237, not the --

2 MR. ACKERMAN: It should be 1237, I hope.

3 MS. KORNER: 1327 is what you said, sorry.

4 MR. ACKERMAN: No, 1237.

5 JUDGE AGIUS: And what is the number of that? Yes, but the

6 document you have on the ELMO, 1237. It is 1237, yeah.

7 MR. ACKERMAN: Yeah, that's the right one.

8 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay.

9 MR. ACKERMAN:

10 Q. Yes. I think you're familiar with this document, are you not,

11 Mr. Radic?

12 A. Yes, I am.

13 Q. Is there anything -- you know, from your position in government,

14 is there anything about this document that strikes you as unusual in any

15 way?

16 A. As far as this document is concerned, I don't think I was aware of

17 it until I was shown the document. It was drafted in Prijedor in the

18 public security station. And it's signed by Simo Drljaca. And it doesn't

19 say it's a decision of the crisis staff of the ARK here. Because there is

20 also a Prijedor Crisis Staff. Everything that is stated here was dictated

21 by Mr. Drljaca in the Security Services Centre in Prijedor. And as you

22 can see, it was forwarded to the crisis staff. It doesn't say

23 "Prijedor," but it was forwarded to the Prijedor Crisis Staff, to

24 coordinators of the Security Services Centre, Jesic, Majstorovic, these

25 aren't people from Banja Luka. And it was provided to the security

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1 centre, to the chief of police, to the leaders, to those in charge of

2 security, to the director of the mine Ljubija, and it was forwarded to the

3 archives, too. I was not aware of this document because it concerned an

4 entirely different town, and it was forwarded to different people. It

5 doesn't say that it has to do with the decision of the Krajina AR. If it

6 had been provided to the Crisis Staff of the ARK, it would have probably

7 mentioned the fact.

8 Q. That was going to be my question. If you look at the distribution

9 list, you don't see the Autonomous Region of Krajina or the ARK Crisis

10 Staff as part of the distribution, do you?

11 A. No.

12 Q. If you look at -- look at paragraph 15 and 16, please. What is

13 your impression of the meaning of those two paragraphs? How do you

14 interpret them?

15 A. Allow me to read it.

16 Q. Yes. Take your time.

17 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I don't like to interrupt too often, but

18 why does Mr. Radic's interpretation differ from anybody else's

19 interpretation who can read it? He says he's never seen the document

20 before.

21 MR. ACKERMAN: He said he had seen it before.

22 MS. KORNER: As I understand it, it was shown by you. He said he

23 hadn't seen it before it was shown to him. I assumed it was by you.

24 MR. ACKERMAN: No, I don't think that's the case.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: Still, I don't see why I should stop the witness

1 from answering the question.

2 Mr. Radic, when you are ready.

3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Obviously this concerns prohibiting

4 anyone from informing people of the text, of the contents of this order,

5 signed by Simo Drljaca who energetically asks that all personnel and

6 authorised officials strictly observe these instructions. I haven't read

7 through all of the instructions and I can't remember this, but that's what

8 it is about. Everything is strictly prohibited. It's strictly prohibited

9 to provide information to anyone about this collection centre. This

10 document is dated the 1st of May. The collection centre could function

11 without anyone being informed about it because this was strictly

12 prohibited. That's how I interpret this document.

13 MR. ACKERMAN:

14 Q. Well, the date is actually 31st of May, I think, if you look. Is

15 that what you said?

16 A. No. At the top, it says -- yes, I apologise. You don't see the

17 number 3. It says the 1st of May. So yes, it's May 1992. 31st of May

18 1992.

19 Q. All right. Do you know if Simo Drljaca was a person who had

20 sufficient authority that people would pay attention to things like that

21 he wrote in those two paragraphs? Were those things that would have been

22 obeyed, or did he have no authority or power?

23 A. This person is not alive now. But I would say that he had a lot

24 of authority in Prijedor.

25 Q. All right. I want to go to a completely different subject --

1 A. And he most certainly would have been obeyed by the people he

2 forwarded this to, the chief of police, security personnel, et cetera.

3 They had to obey him.

4 Q. All right. I want to go to a completely different subject now. I

5 want to ask you about a person by the name of Jovan Cizmovic. Do you know

6 of Jovan Cizmovic?

7 A. Yes.

8 Q. I want you to look at the document DB306, please.

9 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, this is also already exhibited. I mean,

10 there are mistakes, but to re-exhibit already exhibited documents... This

11 is P23262. I mean what --

12 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, can you check that, Mr. Ackerman. And if you

13 agree, then we can refer to the already exhibited document.

14 MR. ACKERMAN: Well, Your Honour, I don't know if it's in its full

15 form. This comes up a lot, Your Honour, and I'm going to explain this so

16 you'll understand what's going on. I'm not deliberately making Defence

17 exhibits out of what I know are Prosecution exhibits. The problem is that

18 we have an electronic system, and we have gone through rather traumatic

19 staff changes in the course of this trial, and some things have just not

20 gotten done the right way because we keep having to change the people that

21 are doing them. So if our system doesn't show that it's an exhibit in the

22 case, then we think it's not an exhibit in the case. And that's why this

23 happens. And I'm sorry that it happens, and I wish there was a way for me

24 to solve it. But I can't solve it without having someone who is willing

25 to put in a couple of weeks checking all of our records. And I don't have

1 anybody that can expend that kind of time.

2 The Prosecution has a surplus of people. Maybe they would loan us

3 somebody to do that. That would be very helpful.

4 MS. KORNER: Only too happy.

5 MR. ACKERMAN:

6 Q. The part of this document I want to draw your attention to is

7 right at the very end. It's the last decision in this Official Gazette of

8 the Serbian People in Bosnia and Herzegovina dated 21 December 1991. Do

9 you see the decision I'm talking about? It involves an appointment of

10 Mr. Cizmovic?

11 A. On the appointment of the coordinator of the governors and

12 executive bodies of the Serbian Autonomous District and the Autonomous

13 Region of Krajina, Jovan Cizmovic is hereby appointed coordinator of the

14 Executive bodies of Serbian Autonomous Districts and the Autonomous Region

15 of Krajina. The present decisions shall enter into force on the day of

16 its adoption and the date of the adoption's decision was the 21st of

17 December 1991. Yes.

18 Q. Can you tell us what kind of role he would have played in that

19 coordinator position with regard to the executive bodies of the Autonomous

20 Region of Krajina? Do you know anything about the role he played?

21 A. You know, it's difficult to see that on the basis of this document

22 alone. I wasn't a deputy. That decision was signed by

23 Mr. Momcilo Krajisnik. It doesn't say what his competence is. I can only

24 draw analogy to come to a conclusion because I was also appointed as

25 coordinator, as a representative of the Municipal Assembly. Someone from

1 Trebinje was to control me and to inform me of what I was doing in Banja

2 Luka. Naturally, he was supposed to give me suggestions because someone

3 might have thought that I should have proceeded in a different manner. So

4 it is probably that this coordinator, but this occurred at a higher level,

5 it is probable that he had the same role and had to control matters and

6 inform the person who had appointed him of matters, and he -- his role

7 would be to influence the work of the executive bodies of the Serbian

8 autonomous districts and the Autonomous Region of Krajina. I assume that

9 that could have been his role. The person who appointed him would have to

10 receive information from him and also to provide him with information as

11 to what he should do in Krajina in order to carry through some of their

12 conceptions. This is what I assume. But one should ask the person who

13 signed this decision because it doesn't state what the duties of this

14 person were.

15 Q. Well, he won't talk to me.

16 You said -- the transcript indicates that you said that you were

17 appointed as coordinator. And I think what you really said, that a

18 coordinator was appointed to sort of watch over you. Isn't that true?

19 A. I couldn't be my own coordinator. They sent me a coordinator from

20 Trebinje, a certain gentleman who appeared and spent a week with me. And

21 at the end, he apologised and said that he couldn't work in the way that I

22 worked. He left, and he thanked the person who sent him there from

23 Trebinje. He went to Banja Luka.

24 Q. This document that you have been referred to appointing Jovan

25 Cizmovic says that he's appointed coordinator of the executive body of

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1 ARK, for instance. Now, the executive body would be that executive

2 committee headed by Nikola Erceg. Is that what that's referring to, or

3 not?

4 A. Yes. The legislative body was the ARK Assembly, and the executive

5 body, that was the president of -- the president of the ARK executive body

6 was Mr. Nikola Erceg. There must have been something they didn't like, so

7 they sent a controller, coordinator in to control things. I haven't had

8 the opportunity of seeing this Official Gazette, but I have seen an

9 Official Gazette in which they appointed a coordinator for myself.

10 Q. All right. I want to ask you a little bit about Banja Luka during

11 1992. What was life like in Banja Luka during 1992? Was it a dangerous

12 place to be?

13 A. Banja Luka was sealed off, cut off from the world at the period

14 that we are constantly discussing. From April to June, Banja Luka was

15 completely cut off from the rest of the world, and I would like to point

16 out that at the time we had that tragedy of the children I have already

17 mentioned, with the babies I have mentioned. I turned to the UN

18 commission to ask them to allow me to bring in oxygen. They referred me

19 to Alija Izetbegovic and Franjo Tudjman and said they should provide me

20 with this. But they were the ones who were preventing this from being

21 supplied. This was an area which was completely encircled by the forces

22 that were opposing us. So I don't know what you mean when you say

23 "dangerous." Perhaps life was difficult because food, fuel, and medicine

24 wasn't being supplied, and there wasn't any oxygen to save those children

25 with. So could you please explain in what sense you mean "dangerous".

1 Q. Let me ask you this: Would it be accurate to describe Banja Luka

2 during 1992 as a ghetto for non-Serbs?

3 A. We were all living in a ghetto at that time. It's enough to say

4 that we were encircled from all sides, and why should one say that only

5 non-Serbs were living in a ghetto? The question was what were the

6 checkpoints? Why were they set up in the direction of Jajce and Derventa?

7 The Croatian and Bosniak forces were there, or towards Vlasic. We were

8 surrounded by enemy forces until a corridor was opened up. We didn't have

9 an exit towards Serbia then until that time. So why should you say that

10 some people felt that they were living in a ghetto and that we weren't

11 living in such a ghetto?

12 Q. All right. I want you to look at another document now. This is

13 P259. Mr. Radic, the only part of this document I'm really interested in

14 having you look at is the very first page. This document is abridged

15 minutes of a session of the Municipality of Banja Luka of 23 June 1992.

16 This is seven weeks or so after the ARK crisis staff is formed, 24 days

17 before it ends. And what I'm interested in are the 87 assembly members

18 that attended that session. You see a list here of people who did not

19 attend. Do you see that?

20 A. I apologise. I can't see the list. I can only see the names of

21 those who attended, 87 -- no, no. Yes, I can see that. But I can't see

22 the list of those 87 who attended. Yes, you're right.

23 Q. The only list this provides is the ones who did not attend.

24 Correct?

25 A. Yes, correct, yes.

1 Q. Now, just glancing at that list, there are persons who are members

2 of the SDA, persons who are members of the HDZ among that list. Also,

3 some SDS people. But do you know why the people from the SDA and the HDZ

4 were not in attendance on 23 June at that meeting?

5 A. I can't tell you exactly when it was that the SDA adopted a

6 decision on nonattendance. As for the HDZ, they never adopted a

7 nonattendance decision, and they stayed our members until the very end,

8 that is, members of the assembly. However, when I look at this list, and

9 I have to remind you of the date when this happened, for reasons unbeknown

10 to me, a number of SDS members are missing. A number of members of the

11 socialist -- those were reformists actually. Again, those were Serbs, and

12 they, however, did not attend. I don't know why. And also, there are --

13 none of those who seceded communists. I really can't tell you why they

14 did not attend. But those from the SDA to remain until the end, Emir

15 Basatlic -- and I can't remember the second name, these two in the

16 assembly on behalf of the SDA remained until the very end, and the HDZ

17 attended the sessions of the assembly all this time. I can't tell you why

18 these people were not present at this particular session, but I would say

19 that there are more SDS members and Serbs who belonged to other parties

20 who were missing. Why they were missing, I don't know. I can't tell you.

21 Q. All right.

22 A. I must also say that some of these people on the list of Serb

23 ethnic background were on the front line. I can see here the name of one

24 those who were killed, Bogdan Maric. They were at the time on the front

25 line, so obviously they could not for that reason attend a session.

1 Q. Okay. I want to go to a completely different subject now. I want

2 to ask you some questions now about a visit that you made along with some

3 other people to the Prijedor Municipality in July of 1992. Do you recall

4 going to Prijedor in July of 1992?

5 A. I remember.

6 Q. And do you remember who accompanied you on that trip? Who went

7 with you to Prijedor at that time?

8 A. There was nobody. It was a joint visit by the people who were

9 mentioned in the Kozarski Vjesnik. I can't give you all their names. I

10 know there was Mr. Brdjanin, there was Mr. Vukic, there was myself. I

11 really can't tell you who else was with me. But you can read it in

12 Kozarski Vjesnik. I agree that the names of those that are mentioned in

13 Kozarski Vjesnik were really with me in that joint visit to Prijedor. It

14 was upon the invitation --

15 Q. I'm going to have you look at P1496 [Realtime translation read in

16 error "P496"]. That will help you. Now you were just trying to tell us

17 it was on the invitation. Do you want to finish that answer?

18 A. Yes. What I am saying is that the invitation came from the people

19 from Prijedor, the president of the Municipal Assembly, and all those who

20 were members of the Prijedor government. And we responded to that

21 invitation and went there.

22 I believe that invitation was sent to Mr. Brdjanin, who then

23 invited all of us to go there together.

24 Q. Now, you should have an article from Kozarski Vjesnik dated 17

25 July 1992.

1 A. No, this is 29 May 1992, so I suppose that is not that. It's a

2 part of a diary, I think.

3 Q. That's the wrong document. P1496. Is that 1496?

4 MS. KORNER: P284 is the article.

5 MR. ACKERMAN:

6 Q. Did we get the right one this time?

7 A. Krajina representatives in Prijedor. I don't know what the

8 document is. You have to tell me. Don't you? Let me just see here. As

9 far as I can see, there's no date. What kind of a mark is this? This is

10 00319239. Is that the document that we were referring to?

11 Q. Well, something's wrong here.

12 MS. KORNER: It should be -- 319212 is the original.

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, here at the top I can see

14 319 -- yes, now I can see it at the top and some names are mentioned.

15 Yes. Krajina representatives were Radoslav Brdjanin, Radoslav Vukic,

16 Stojan Zupljanin, Predrag Radic, they met with members of the crisis staff

17 and representatives of the public security station and so on and so forth.

18 Yes, that is that. This is what you asked me about.

19 MR. ACKERMAN:

20 Q. Now, the Kozarski Vjesnik, are you aware of whether that was a

21 daily newspaper, a weekly newspaper, or what it was? Do you know anything

22 about this newspaper?

23 A. It is a local newspaper, a Prijedor newspaper. I don't know

24 whether it is a daily or a weekly. Judging by this here, it doesn't say

25 what the publication day is. If it was on the 17 of July, and if it was

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1 then published on Wednesday. It is possible that it was a daily or maybe

2 a weekly. In any case, it is a local newspaper which very few people may

3 have received in Banja Luka. But in any case, it says here that this is a

4 war issue of Kozarski Vjesnik.

5 I don't know whether this newspaper is still published in Prijedor

6 at all.

7 Q. Was it circulated outside Prijedor, to your knowledge? Was it

8 available in locations in the Krajina, or was it just a Prijedor paper?

9 A. I never saw it in Banja Luka, whether it was circulated elsewhere,

10 in some smaller towns. It is possible. Maybe in Kozarska Dubica, which

11 is also -- or possibly in Gradiska. I don't know. I didn't look for it

12 Banja Luka, so I can't tell you for a fact whether it was circulated in

13 Banja Luka or not, or anywhere else. In any case, this paper dealt with

14 the problems of Prijedor. Yes, sessions of the municipal SDS board, the

15 regional boards, problems with people moving out of -- from Prijedor

16 Municipality. So this newspaper dealt predominantly with problems in

17 Prijedor.

18 Q. All right. In connection with this visit to Prijedor on that day,

19 did you have occasion to visit a place called Omarska?

20 A. Yes. My impression was that this was the reason why we were

21 invited to go there. There was an initiative which came from the Prijedor

22 authorities to move these detainees to a prison in Banja Luka, or maybe

23 even to Stari Gradiska, which is across the River Sava. Obviously, this

24 was not feasible because the capacity of the prison in Banja Luka was too

25 small, and Stara Gradiska was rejected by the army. It was very risky to

1 send people there because this was the area where there were still war

2 operations being underway.

3 Q. I want you to look at a photograph. I don't know the exhibit

4 number, but I'll hand the photograph I have to the usher and it can be put

5 on the ELMO, and maybe the Prosecutor can help me with the exhibit number

6 at some point.

7 Do you recognise what's in that photograph? It's easier for you

8 to see if you look over on the ELMO probably.

9 A. I was there only once, in Omarska, that is, on that one occasion.

10 And it seems to me that this here is the administrative building and --

11 thank you very much.

12 So this is the administrative building, and this is the so-called

13 separation. I don't know what they actually called this particular

14 building. I'm not sure because the photo is rather blurred. I did not

15 have the opportunity to see these two buildings on the left. I don't know

16 which road we took to get there, whether we came from behind or whether we

17 took this road in front of the building. But I believe that we took this

18 road in front of the building. It's very difficult for me to say for a

19 fact that I recognise this building in such a blurred photo. And I was

20 there only once. But I should think that this is what I visited on that

21 day.

22 Q. Can you remember where you parked when you got there?

23 A. We parked on the flank of that building, on the side of it.

24 Q. Can you point to the flank that you're referring to.

25 You have to point over on the ELMO.

1 A. I believe that the entrance was here. Somewhere here. And that

2 we stopped here on the flank of the administrative building. Somewhere on

3 its side, on its flank.

4 Q. All right. If you can return that photograph to me?

5 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, it's 1128.17, the exhibit number, for

6 the purposes of the transcript.

7 JUDGE AGIUS: Is the 1128.17 that you have any clearer?

8 MS. KORNER: No, it's worse.

9 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay, thank you.

10 MR. ACKERMAN: 1128.17.

11 Q. And just for the record, what you referred to as the place you

12 parked was just to the right of the large red building shown in the centre

13 of the photograph.

14 Just as a general proposition, what did you see when you arrived

15 there at Omarska that drew your attention? What did you see there?

16 A. I saw people who were standing there. And something that

17 irritated me, and I told them that, was the fact that they had three

18 fingers raised up in the air and that they were singing the song "who is

19 saying, who is lying that Serbia is a small land." When we entered the

20 administrative building or the headquarters, I told them that this was

21 humiliation of these people. I was very cross because this was something

22 that should not have been done to the detainees. It was a form of

23 mistreatment or mental abuse of these people. They were Bosniaks. And

24 they should not have been asked to sing those songs. They told me that

25 they did it with pleasure. I doubted it sincerely. I doubted they did it

1 with a lot of pleasure. We didn't stay there too long. And as I was

2 leaving, I was very, very angry having seen what was being done to these

3 people there.

4 Q. Were those songs that might be called Chetnik songs?

5 A. No, these were not Chetnik songs. There are other songs that are

6 considered Chetnik songs. This song was sung by the Serbian fighters in

7 the First World War, the Serbian army sang that, which liberated Serbia

8 from Austro-Hungarian, and then this is what they sang. Who's saying

9 whose lying that Serbia is a small land. It is not small. It waged three

10 wars. At that time, there were no Chetniks when that song was sung during

11 the First World War. However, this song was sung by the Serbs, and this

12 was not a song typical of the Bosniak people, and this was not the right

13 thing to do, to make them sing this song.

14 Q. You believed it was humiliating to make them sing it. Is that

15 what you said?

16 A. Absolutely.

17 Q. Could you make any observations about the condition of the people

18 that you saw there? Did they seem to be healthy, unhealthy? Could you

19 draw any conclusions about their condition?

20 A. It was very hot, and they were standing outdoors. Whether they

21 were all there, whether some who were ill were kept indoors, I don't know.

22 However, those that I saw did not look exhausted to me. However, what I'm

23 saying is that I believe that there were more of them indoors, and the

24 conditions in there were not very good. The people that I saw did not

25 look exhausted to me. I did not get that impression.

1 Q. Did you think there were people there who might have been in worse

2 shape who were kept indoors and you didn't see? Is that what you're

3 saying?

4 A. What I'm saying is that there were people indoors whom we couldn't

5 see. Only some of them were lined up in front of the building. The

6 others were indoors, so I can't say what the conditions of those people

7 who were kept indoors was.

8 Q. Now, you made your feelings known, you said, to the people when

9 you went inside, to the people that were there running the camp, about the

10 humiliation that you saw. Did you -- while you were there that day,

11 either inside or outside as you were leaving, did you react in any other

12 way to what you had seen in there?

13 A. First I told them inside that this was not a way to treat

14 prisoners of war. That was my first observation. And secondly, when I

15 stepped outside, I looked at those people again. There was a stone in

16 front of me. I kicked it very hard. And they realised that what they

17 were doing to these people was not the right thing to do, that this is not

18 what should have been done. I repeated that when we went to the building

19 of the municipality, and they promised that they would do their utmost to

20 move these people as soon as possible to a safer and more humane place

21 than that one.

22 Q. You say you kicked a stone. What -- I mean, why did you kick a

23 stone? Was that an expression of some kind?

24 A. How else could I express my feelings? When you kick a stone, when

25 you kick something with your foot, you know what expression -- what

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1 feeling you may be expressing. It was rage. I could have maybe done

2 something else, but I chose to kick that stone. And members of my

3 delegation noticed that, and they realised that something was amiss. They

4 did not expect such a strong reaction on my part, and especially they did

5 not expect me to tell them what I told them when we went to the Municipal

6 Assembly building.

7 Q. Did Mr. Brdjanin see your reaction to what you'd seen there?

8 A. I suppose so. Because he later told me that he had noticed this

9 and that he also could see that I was very angry. I don't know whether he

10 will also remember having said that to me.

11 Q. Did he disagree with your anger? Or did he agree with it? Or did

12 he do anything?

13 A. I don't know what he was supposed to do.

14 Q. Did he kick any rocks?

15 A. I didn't see it. He may have. He may have reacted in that way,

16 but I didn't see it. I only know that when we returned to Banja Luka, he

17 did say that he had noticed me having been very angry and reacting in the

18 way I did.

19 Q. And did he say that in a way to make you believe he thought you

20 were wrong or right or what? Or do you know?

21 A. The mere fact that he mentioned it, that he told me that means

22 that he agreed with me and that he also agreed that the way those people

23 were treated was not right. That is my assumption.

24 Q. Independent of that, do you have any knowledge about Mr.

25 Brdjanin's feelings with regard to non-Serb people? Did he -- in his

1 actions, things he did, did you see anything that would let you know how

2 he felt about non-Serb people?

3 A. Well, let me tell you, you have to draw a line between the

4 Brdjanin who appeared on TV and the Brdjanin in private life. On TV, he

5 appeared as if competing with other individuals to see which one of them

6 would say more things addressed to other people. That is his TV persona.

7 In private life, he did things that only have been surfacing

8 recently. The other day, Mrs. Halima Miskin from Mostar contacted me.

9 She is a Bosniak lady. She told me that if need may be, she would come

10 and testify before this Honourable Chamber as to how he had helped her.

11 Those are the things that he did. And if you ask me why he didn't make it

12 public, I have just one plausible explanation, and that is he did not

13 dare. He did not dare make it public that he did good deeds by Bosniaks,

14 by Croats, because it would have cost him his ministerial position and all

15 the other things. And maybe some other unpleasant things would have

16 happened to him. This is my impression about Mr. Brdjanin. At that time,

17 when this was happening, I didn't have a clue that he was doing good

18 things. This lady, Halima, contacted me of her own will. They were

19 expelled from Mostar. They came to our Mesa [as interpreted]. Brdjanin

20 helped them, found them accommodation, and she told me, therefore, if they

21 want me to testify, I will testify on his behalf. This is what I can tell

22 you about Mr. Brdjanin.

23 There is written word. There are video and other footages, and

24 Mr. Brdjanin cannot deny any of these things. But also there are

25 witnesses who are ready to confirm that not everything about him was as

1 black as it is being portrayed. I don't know whether it is okay for me to

2 say this, Madam Prosecutor. I said to representatives of the OTP, and

3 this was recorded, that this person never killed anybody. He never raped

4 anybody. He did not participate in the creation of concentration camps or

5 whatever you may want to call those places. But he did talk a lot, and I

6 can vouch for that. He talked quite a lot. That is my opinion of

7 Mr. Brdjanin. But he never killed anybody, he never raped anybody. He

8 never incarcerated anybody himself.

9 Q. After this visit to Omarska, you went back to Banja Luka. Did you

10 do anything about what you'd seen at Omarska when you got back to Banja

11 Luka?

12 A. The representative of the international Red Cross committee was

13 Mr. Beat Schweitzer. I had very good cooperation with him throughout the

14 war what he was in that position. I invited him and I asked him to meet

15 me, and I asked him to do whatever is in his power firstly to record these

16 people, and secondly, to find a solution for them, for them to be moved

17 from that particular place. And he did that. It took a while. That is a

18 fact. However, he negotiated with the army, and he secured a place for

19 these people because the army was the only organisation that had such huge

20 places, barracks. But all the troops were on the front line. People were

21 then recorded, and then they were shipped by planes to various

22 destinations all over Europe where they still reside. Many of them are

23 not returning because they don't have anywhere to go back to. They don't

24 have jobs to go back to. And the same applies to the Serbs. There are

25 Serbs in Croatia who also don't have jobs. They don't have anywhere to

1 live. And that's why they're not returning. And the Serbs in Croatia,

2 who emigrated to Croatia, they also go back to Europe if they can because

3 there's no livelihood for them here.

4 Q. How long was it after you got back to Banja Luka from Omarska

5 before you got in touch with Mr. Schweitzer? Was it the same day, next

6 day, when, if you recall?

7 A. Well, you know, you can't call him now. He was engaged. It was a

8 matter of a day or two. And after that, I met him and spoke to him, and

9 he reacted very rapidly.

10 Q. Why didn't you ask Mr. Brdjanin to simply order that Omarska be

11 closed and instruct the Prijedor authorities to close the Omarska

12 structure? Why didn't you ask Mr. Brdjanin to do that? Could he have

13 done that?

14 A. First of all, why didn't I make such a request. It's

15 understandable. I was president of the Municipal Assembly of Banja Luka,

16 and the authorities were there in Prijedor. But as to why Mr. Brdjanin

17 didn't do that, the idea of suggesting this to him didn't even occur to me

18 because he didn't adopt the decision that you showed me a minute ago here.

19 This was a decision adopted by Simo Drljaca, so no one asked him about

20 this affair. There was the Prijedor Crisis Staff, and it was forwarded --

21 from there, it was forwarded to the CSB, the Security Services Centre, and

22 you will never find that it was forwarded to the crisis staff and to

23 Radoslav Brdjanin personally. And if I had even mentioned this to him, he

24 wouldn't have been able to do anything because he had no such authority

25 because if he had had such authority he could have told them not to detain

1 these people there. So the idea of suggesting this to him didn't even

2 occur to me. I don't know whether this idea occurred to Mr. Brdjanin.

3 You should ask him about that. But if he didn't make such a request, the

4 only reasonable explanation I could provide is he had no such authority.

5 Q. Well, did Mr. Brdjanin have authority over the people in Prijedor?

6 Could he order those people to do things and not do things? Did he have

7 that kind of authority?

8 A. No, he didn't.

9 Q. All right. I want you to look at DB - this is another subject

10 now - DB286, please.

11 MR. ACKERMAN: I do.

12 MS. KORNER: Can we have it on the ELMO? We don't seem to have it

13 either.

14 MR. ACKERMAN: Somewhere. It should have been in the batch of

15 documents that was delivered today, but it has been an exhibit before. I

16 just couldn't find the number. But here it is.

17 Here's an English one you can put on the ELMO. Unfortunately,

18 I've got some marks on it.

19 Q. This is a document that I've shown you before, Mr. Radic. It's

20 dated 23 August 1992. It's a document authored by Colonel Vukelic, and it

21 regards an attempted visit to Manjaca by Tadeusz Mazowietski. Now I know

22 you have a long version of the story about this document. I'm really more

23 interested in the short version. It's the case, isn't it, that

24 Mr. Mazowietski didn't actually get inside Manjaca on that day that he

25 came there?

1 A. Is that a question?

2 Q. Yes.

3 A. No, he didn't enter the camp.

4 Q. What was your role with regard to this visit by Mr. Mazowietski?

5 Why are you mentioned right there at the very beginning of the document?

6 A. Because as it says in this document, the ministry of foreign

7 affairs, Mr. Bula, and Mr. Koljevic and Mr. Karadzic the vice-president

8 sent me a protocol for the visit of Mr. Tadeusz Mazowietski in which it

9 said that when he entered the territory of Republika Srpska at the River

10 Sava near Gradiska, it's stated who he should meet in Banja Luka, in

11 addition to myself, who was to receive him. He was supposed to meet

12 Bishop Komarica, his holiness from the Orthodox church. And he was

13 supposed to visit Mufti Ibrahimovic, a Mufti representing the Islamic

14 religious community. Mr. Mazowietski appeared. I merely tried to address

15 the matter of the protocol and ask him whether he agreed with it. He

16 refused to discuss the protocol that had been signed either by Koljevic or

17 Buha. That he requested that he go to Manjaca immediately. I told him

18 that there was a protocol and that I couldn't authorise him to visit a

19 military facility because I'm a civilian. I was a civilian, not a

20 military person.

21 He asked me what should be done. I said that the military

22 authorities had to be consulted, or the military organs. I informed the

23 staff command of the matter. They forwarded the affair to the General

24 Staff, to the Main Staff, and then they attempted to reach an agreement.

25 While trying to reach the agreement -- well, Mr. Mazowietski was finally

1 authorised to go up there. He was received by the military organs, and

2 the person who signed this, Mr. Milutin Vukelic, the colonel who drafted

3 this report and sent it to the command of the 1st Krajina Corps, in the

4 end, they didn't let him in because it was -- the night was falling.

5 People had been taken to their accommodation, and they didn't want to let

6 him in. And there was this protocol, and this wasn't in accordance with

7 the protocol.

8 That's why I'm mentioned, because this was forwarded to me. I

9 received this, and the gentlemen in the 1st Krajina Corps also received

10 it. And they knew what the protocol had provided for.

11 Q. All right. If you look at the very last page of that document,

12 there's a paragraph that begins: "Regardless of the consequences..." And

13 right at the end of that, it says: "... Which can be confirmed by those

14 representatives of the government of the Autonomous Region of Krajina who

15 were present and who spoke with him." Can you recall who was present and

16 who spoke with Mazowietski from the Autonomous Region of Krajina on that

17 day?

18 A. I'm pretty certain that Mr. Brdjanin wasn't present. But as to

19 whether Mr. Erceg or someone else was present, I don't know. But he says

20 that we can confirm this, but we didn't confirm this because I can't judge

21 whether he came to visit for intelligence or humanitarian reasons. He as

22 the security official could judge this. But because he didn't appear in

23 the territory where I was the president of the Municipal Assembly, this

24 was a military facility and a civilian can't enter such a facility without

25 authorisation. His conclusions, his conclusions they are not mine,

1 although as I say it's odd that a diplomat of his rank doesn't respect the

2 protocol that he accepted and he signed and set off on this visit in

3 accordance with the protocol. He didn't see the Mufti, he didn't see the

4 Vladika, the priest from the Orthodox church. But he came to this bishop

5 in a strange way and after a long time had passed, when he should have

6 already left the territory of Republika Srpska. We should bear in mind

7 that the war was raging at that time. It was on the 23rd of August.

8 Q. I think we're finished with that document. I want to change now

9 to a new subject. I'd like you to look at P255, please. You should have

10 in front of you a decision of the crisis staff of the Autonomous Region of

11 Krajina of 22 June 1992. And while we're looking at a document from the

12 crisis staff, I'm wondering if you have had occasion to look at documents

13 issued by this crisis staff and pay any attention to whether they were all

14 signed by Mr. Brdjanin or not. Do you have any knowledge about that at

15 all?

16 A. As you can see here, this has been obscured, and especially the

17 part where it says "the president." As far as I know, this isn't

18 Brdjanin's signature. It's not his signature. I don't know how you

19 interpret this. I don't know whether you think someone could interpret --

20 could sign this on his name. I don't know whether someone had this

21 authority. But the document such as it is -- well, I don't know what

22 you're interested in in this document.

23 Q. I'm not very interested in what I just asked you about, but I was

24 interested whether you knew anything about it or not.

25 What I do want to ask you about was the material that's contained

1 there in I about posts not being held by employees of Serbian nationality

2 who have not confirmed by plebiscite or who in their minds have not made

3 it ideologically clear that the Serbian Democratic Party is the sole

4 representative of the Serbian people. It sounds like what that decision

5 is saying, that you have to be a member of the SDS to hold one of these

6 more important positions. That seems to be what it's saying. Were you

7 aware of this decision around the time that it was issued?

8 A. Well, it's not that I was aware of it, but in the third paragraph

9 where it says that those who did not vote in the plebiscite for

10 Republika Srpska, those who were outvoted in the referendum, or it would

11 be better to say were excluded from everything that was taking place.

12 Well, I ask myself how someone with proof that he had not voted in the

13 plebiscite since this was done in secret. But that the SDS is the only

14 representative, this has another consequence because they also tried to

15 replace directors of Serbian nationality who were not SDS members. I

16 managed to find out about this, but these people who were directors but

17 weren't SDS party members, they were most involved in logistical matters,

18 in supplying the families of combatants in Banja Luka and in supplying

19 clothes and footwear, and even the director of the footwear factory was

20 involved in this. Thanks to Mr. Karadzic, I managed to prevent these

21 people from being replaced.

22 But as far as the rest is concerned, would you like to ask me the

23 second part of your question? I've responded to the first part of your

24 question and I told you what I thought about this.

25 Q. You just said something that makes me very curious. You talk

1 about people who were not -- people who were heads of institutions -- I

2 can't remember your -- people who were directors who weren't SDS --

3 A. Companies --

4 Q. -- Who were not SDS members, and you say: "Thanks to Karadzic,

5 they were not replaced." Tell me about that. What's that mean?

6 A. That means that preparations had already been made for their

7 replacement because they were not SDS party members. I always believed

8 that it was important for a director to know how to do his job well. It

9 wasn't important for him to be a member of this party or that party. So

10 at a joint meeting, I informed -- I introduced these people to Karadzic.

11 I informed him about these people, and he said that they should not be

12 affected, although they were not party members, because these were

13 directors of the footwear company, of the brewery, of Incel, et cetera,

14 and these people were supposed to be replaced. But I have to say that

15 this was not just Brdjanin's opinion [as interpreted]. I have said that

16 the term -- the differentiation of personnel was a euphemism. They have

17 come up with a pretty word for something that is ugly. The

18 differentiation of personnel, and this doesn't apply only to Banja Luka;

19 it applies to Republika Srpska as a whole. Rationalisation living

20 quarters was also a euphemism, and that was a term that covered many

21 things, moving people out of their flat. Such things occurred because

22 socially owned flats were taken over by people, and combatants from those

23 companies would end up on the front line, and these companies would exert

24 pressure in order to find accommodation for their children.

25 But these people have got their flats back. It was nothing new.

1 This is something that happened in Sarajevo, too. And to this very day,

2 there are still people in Sarajevo who haven't got their flats back. The

3 situation is the same in Zagreb. You have Serbs who have not been able to

4 return to their flats or houses. So nothing new happened as far as this

5 so-called differentiation of personnel is concerned. Call it what you

6 will.

7 I have to say that recently I had a document in my hands in which

8 I was criticised for not conducting such a differentiation, for not having

9 replaced people in banks. I thought that the people who were employed in

10 these banks were good at their jobs, and this is why they remained there,

11 at least to the extent that this would have been in my power.

12 Q. Mr. Radic, the transcript, I think, has an error in it. Page 65,

13 line 5, it says -- you were talking about all these efforts being made to

14 replace these people that were not SDS. You say, "But I have to say that

15 this was not just Brdjanin's..." The transcript says "opinion." But I'm

16 told that what you said: "I have to say that this was not just Brdjanin's

17 product." Which is correct, opinion or product?

18 A. That was his specialty [as interpreted]. That was the case

19 throughout Republika Srpska. He had to receive an order to do this, and

20 Banja Luka was always inspected, and they would always say there was

21 something that we weren't doing what was done elsewhere. So this was not

22 his specialty. This was a general a rule, not just in the Republika

23 Srpska, but also in the federal part of Bosnia-Herzegovina, in Croatia,

24 and so on. People from the federal part would come to us from Croatia,

25 and they would tell us how they had lost their jobs and their flats only

1 because they were Serbs.

2 Q. We've got it wrong again. On line 66, page 8, it says: "With

3 regard to Brdjanin, you said this was his specialty", according to the

4 transcript, said "this was his specialty." And I'm told that what you

5 said was "this was not his specialty." You said "not," didn't you?

6 A. It was not his specialty. He didn't have authority to adopt such

7 decisions. He had to receive such decisions, and this was done throughout

8 Republika Srpska, not just in the crisis staff where Brdjanin was the

9 president.

10 Q. Okay. I'm going to ask you one more question before we take the

11 next break. I want to ask you this - and I don't know; I'm just curious

12 about this because it came up the other day - would it make any difference

13 with regard to this document whether or not it was published in the

14 Official Gazette? If it was never published in the Official Gazette, does

15 that make a difference?

16 A. Well, when it says the decision was adopted on the -- entered into

17 force on the day of its adoption -- when it says that it enters into force

18 on the day of its adoption, and it will be published in the Official

19 Gazette of the autonomous region, well, this is the rule. And that's why

20 I said I find it very strange that the president's signature is not on

21 this document. I don't know what the reason for this is.

22 Q. What happens if it's not published? Does that make any difference

23 as to its effect? If it just isn't published, does it make any

24 difference? I know it says it's going to be. But assume it wasn't

25 published. Does that make any difference?

1 A. Well, it does make a difference obviously. For example, the

2 second paragraph here, I didn't allow it to be implemented. It depended

3 and varied from municipality to municipality. In some cases, people could

4 hardly wait to follow such instructions. But I had people who were not

5 SDS members, and I did not allow them to dismiss people and have them

6 replaced with someone else. But from the legal point of view, whether

7 it's a difference because here it says that it enters into force on the

8 date of its adoption, and it will be published in the Official Gazette,

9 this isn't a good way to put it either. A good way to put it would be

10 that eight days after its publication in the Official Gazette, it would

11 enter into force. But if this is what it states, then it means that it

12 can enter into force without being published in the Official Gazette,

13 which is not right. What is the purpose of the Official Gazette?

14 Q. You said you didn't allow this to be implemented in Banja Luka.

15 What kind of trouble did you get for not implementing it? Did you get in

16 a lot of trouble?

17 A. I had -- I could have had problems. But as I said at that

18 meeting, at that common meeting where the president of Republika Srpska

19 was also present, and those from his core circle who participated in that,

20 well, he quite clearly told him that that shouldn't be done. If he hadn't

21 said so, perhaps I would have suffered the consequences. But again, as I

22 said, this could have only been forwarded from a higher level than the one

23 that I received instructions from. Why did the army come to Banja Luka to

24 try to discipline us? There were no mass graves. There was no massive

25 destruction, et cetera.

1 MR. ACKERMAN: All right. This would be a good time, Your Honour.

2 JUDGE AGIUS: We'll take another break now of 25 -- 20 minutes.

3 So we will reconvene at -- 20 minutes from now anyway. 5.53.

4 --- Recess taken at 5.35 p.m.

5 --- On resuming at 5.56 p.m.

6 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. Just to inform you, Judge Janu had to attend

7 to something urgent of a personal nature that came up unexpectedly. So we

8 are proceeding, Judge Taya and myself, in virtue of Rule 15.

9 MR. ACKERMAN: So are you prepared to certify that it's not

10 because I've bored her to death.

11 Your Honour, can we go into private session for a moment and can I

12 ask that the witness leave the room for just a moment. It's a matter I

13 really want to discuss privately.

14 JUDGE AGIUS: Mr. Radic, there's a matter that we will need to

15 discuss not in your presence, so please, Madam usher is going to escort

16 you out of the courtroom for a while, and then we'll continue afterwards.

17 Yes. Do we need to stay in open session?

18 MR. ACKERMAN: Private session.

19 JUDGE AGIUS: Private session.

20 [Private session]

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5 [Open session]

6 JUDGE AGIUS: Usher, could you please reaccompany the witness.

7 And I'm going to explain the witness that this had absolutely nothing to

8 do with him so that he doesn't get carried away with the idea that

9 something is happening.

10 Mr. Radic, I am so sorry for the interruption and the fact that

11 you had to leave the courtroom. We needed to discuss something has got

12 absolutely nothing to do with you. It's something strictly procedural and

13 not involving your testimony. So my apologies once more. And we can now

14 proceed.

15 Mr. Ackerman.

16 MR. ACKERMAN: Thank you, Your Honour. I need the witness to be

17 shown Exhibit P80, please.

18 JUDGE AGIUS: Do you think you'll finish in half an hour?

19 MR. ACKERMAN: No, I won't finish today, Your Honour. Contrary to

20 prior expectations, I'll probably be -- looks like maybe one session

21 tomorrow to get finished.

22 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes.

23 MR. ACKERMAN:

24 Q. Mr. Radic, you've seen this before. It's the Statute of the

25 Autonomous Region of Krajina. I want you to first look at Article 35.

1 You said at one point in your testimony earlier today that a decision of

2 the ARK Crisis Staff had to go and be approved by the individual

3 municipalities before it could be implemented. Is that in effect what

4 Article 35 says, that decisions, conclusions of the assembly are only

5 binding once they have been approved by the assemblies of the

6 municipalities? That's correct?

7 A. Yes.

8 Q. The other -- and you also said that with regard to this June 22nd

9 decision we have been looking at, that you didn't implement it in your

10 municipality. And do you believe that -- that this Article 35 gives you

11 the right to make the decision as to whether to implement a decision or

12 conclusion or not?

13 A. The last paragraph says: "The decisions and conclusions of the

14 Assembly shall become binding for the member municipalities once they have

15 been approved by the assemblies of the municipalities." In other words,

16 until it has been approved by the Banja Luka Assembly, that decision

17 cannot be implemented.

18 Q. Now I'd like you to look at Article 38, and I just want you to

19 take a look at the procedure that the statute sets out for how it can be

20 amended, the procedure by which the statute is amended.

21 And once you've become familiar with that, then I want you to look

22 at P258, and keep P280 [sic] with you because we'll be using it again.

23 A. Yes. An opinion has to be obtained, i.e., after a lapse of a

24 certain period of time, the assembly shall consider the proposal for the

25 amendment of the statute and will submit it to the assemblies of the

1 municipalities in order to obtain their consent. Having obtained the

2 consent referred in the preceding paragraph, the assembly shall declare

3 the amendment to be adopted. I don't know what your question is. What

4 are you asking me.

5 Q. I just want you to become familiar with you. I want you to look

6 at P258. She has got it there. She can show it to you. I want you to

7 look at decision 42, it's down closer to the end of the document. Number

8 42 dated 15 June 1992.

9 A. 42. I'm having a problem here. I can't find it. Is that it?

10 JUDGE AGIUS: It's in your language, you look at the bottom of the

11 page, bottom right-hand corner, you have a number 00389000. It's --

12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] 389. All right. Decision on

13 amending the statute of the Autonomous Region of Krajina, Article 1,

14 Article 35, paragraph 2, on the statute of the Autonomous Region of

15 Krajina; Article 35, paragraph 2 of the statute of the Autonomous Region

16 of Krajina, in brackets, the Official Gazette of the Autonomous Region of

17 Krajina, number 1/92 is hereby amended and shall read as follows: "The

18 decision and the conclusions of the assembly are binding for the

19 municipalities." And that is Article 1. Article 2: "This decision shall

20 come into effect on the day of its passing, and it shall be published in

21 the Official Gazette of the Autonomous Region." And that is it. That's

22 the end of it.

23 Q. Now, bearing in mind what Article 38 of the ARK Statute says, do

24 you have an opinion as to whether this decision of the ARK Crisis Staff

25 effectively amends the statute of the Autonomous Region of Krajina, or

1 does it not?

2 A. If there was a previous consent of the municipalities, and if the

3 assembly of the AR Krajina passes and adopts these amendments, then what

4 it says here, the decision and the conclusions of the AR Krajina assembly

5 are binding for the municipalities, and this decision shall come into

6 effect on the day of its adoption and shall be published in the Official

7 Gazette of the autonomous region. I don't know. I'm not a legal expert,

8 and I can't see any changes here, Mr. Ackerman. I don't know what is the

9 change, the difference here. If a previous consent from the municipality

10 has indeed been obtained, then already here it should read that the

11 decisions and the conclusions are binding for the municipalities.

12 Q. And there was no previous consent, then it would not have been

13 properly amended. Is that what you're saying?

14 A. In that case, decisions and conclusions of the AR Krajina assembly

15 shall not be binding for the municipalities. They cannot be binding for

16 the municipalities.

17 Q. Okay. We're looking at 15 June of 1992. Do you have any idea

18 why, if municipalities are respecting the decisions of the ARK Crisis

19 Staff, why the ARK Crisis Staff would feel it necessary to try to amend

20 the statute? Does that make any sense at all?

21 A. I really wouldn't be able to tell you. But I don't see this being

22 contrary to Article 38.

23 Q. All right. Can we go back, then, to P80. I want you to look at

24 that again.

25 A. This now, P80.

1 Q. The statute is what I want you to look at.

2 A. Statute, yes.

3 Q. And this time, I want you to look at Articles 10 and 11. And

4 first of all, tell us what Article 10 provides.

5 A. Article 10: "Other municipalities may join the Autonomous Region

6 of Krajina.

7 Paragraph 2: "A municipality wishing to join shall submit a

8 request to do so to the Assembly of the Autonomous Region of Krajina.

9 Paragraph 3: "Before deciding, the Assembly of Autonomous Region

10 of Krajina shall obtain the opinion of all member municipalities." Do you

11 want to hear an opinion on this?

12 Q. No, I think you've answered my question. It says that "other

13 municipalities can join ARK," right, and gives the conditions under which

14 that can happen?

15 A. This was not my response. This is what it says in Article 10.

16 This reminds me of another article of the association of municipalities

17 that existed before the war. Not every municipality had to be a member of

18 the association. Those who wished to join, they joined. If they wanted

19 to join subsequently, they could do that. So with slight modification,

20 this is the exact copy of a document which regulated the relationship

21 within the association of municipalities of Bosanska Krajina because such

22 an association used to exist before the war.

23 Q. And if you look at Article 11 now --

24 A. 11 is the same. 11 is the same. Every municipality can leave the

25 autonomous region, and such a municipality which wishes to leave the

1 autonomous region shall inform the autonomous region and the assembly of

2 the associated municipalities. And you can leave the autonomous region

3 only upon the lapse of one calendar year.

4 Q. So bearing that in mind --

5 A. And I need to read the end: "The request to the leave the

6 Autonomous Region of Krajina shall be submitted no later than six months

7 before the lapse of one calendar year. A municipality wishing to separate

8 from the Autonomous Region of Krajina is required to fulfill its

9 obligations towards the Autonomous Region of Krajina."

10 Q. So let me ask you this: Is this organisation being described

11 here, is this an association or is it a government?

12 A. A government is a government. It is an executive body, and an

13 association is something else. This is the association of municipalities

14 of the Autonomous Region of Krajina. A government is an executive body of

15 the assembly of this Krajina which was the Autonomous Region of Krajina.

16 Q. But the association itself, with its executive committee and

17 its -- at one point its crisis staff, the whole thing, does it have the

18 characteristics of a government, a political entity that governs, or is it

19 just a voluntary association of municipalities? That's my question.

20 A. It transpires from this that this is a voluntary association of

21 municipalities. At the moment you have an option whether you can join or

22 not. It is voluntary. So the moment you can separate from an

23 association, then this association is a voluntary association of

24 municipalities. It is not fixed. So it is the free will of any one

25 municipality whether to -- they will join or not.

1 Q. All right. Let's look at DB292. And I'm still basically talking

2 about the 22 June decision of the ARK Crisis Staff regarding the dismissal

3 of personnel.

4 Now, what you should have before you is a -- part of a newspaper

5 article, page from a newspaper. And it talks about a session of the

6 executive municipal board of the Banja Luka Municipality. I want to

7 direct your attention to the second paragraph. And it reads as follows:

8 "Anton Ruzic who reacted to the decision of the Crisis Staff of AR Krajina

9 on realisation of personnel policy. By that policy, it has regulated

10 among other matters that only those Serbs who proved their loyalty by

11 taking part in the plebiscite and who think that SDS is the only

12 representative of the Serb people can hold the most important functions in

13 business companies and institutions, working on behalf when we will be

14 held responsible for certain decisions in the economic and social life" -

15 that's Ruzic - "and added that regional government can request certain

16 decisions from municipal bodies but not that they could work instead of

17 the municipal executive board."

18 Now, who is Ruzic?

19 A. Anton Ruzic was the vice-president of the executive board of the

20 Banja Luka Municipality. He is a member of the HDZ.

21 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I'm sorry, could I ask -- is this Glas?

22 It's not clear from what we have been given.

23 MR. ACKERMAN: I'm quite certain it is, Ms. Korner. I'm quite

24 certain it's Glas of June 22nd, 1992.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: Perhaps you could verify that and let me know

1 afterwards, please.

2 MR. ACKERMAN: I believe the record I have indicates that it comes

3 from Glas, Your Honour. I'm just certain that it's from Glas.

4 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay, let's proceed. So I take it that Mr. Ruzic

5 was a Croat by ethnicity?

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, Your Honour.

7 MR. ACKERMAN:

8 Q. And on June 26th, 1992, Mr. Ruzic is still participating in the

9 government as vice-president of the executive board. Is that right?

10 A. Yes.

11 Q. And he's criticising this personnel decision of the ARK Crisis

12 Staff saying that his view is they can make requests of municipal bodies,

13 but they can't control municipal bodies or work instead of them. Correct?

14 A. That's correct.

15 Q. Then the document reports the remarks of Rajko Kasagic who was the

16 president of the executive council. It says he gave numerous examples

17 from the previous war when Germans and Japanese were removed from the

18 Australian and American state bodies, and he reminded that Slovenia was

19 the first to start such an approach on the Yugoslav territories, and

20 Croatia was following that example, "that it is no better in

21 Bosnia-Herzegovina where Serbs simply observed how were the others doing

22 it," said Kasagic. And then go down, he says: "Besides I am against that

23 Crisis Staff takes over the power in Banja Luka more so, since the other

24 smaller municipalities in the Autonomous Region of Krajina are not putting

25 into effect its decisions." Do you see that?

1 A. Yes, I do.

2 Q. It appears that Mr. Kasagic is aware that the municipalities in

3 the Autonomous Region of Krajina are not -- are basically ignoring the ARK

4 crisis staff. Were you also aware of that?

5 A. Mr. Kasagic probably knew it, but even more important than that

6 was that Banja Luka municipality itself did not implement this decision of

7 the crisis staff. Otherwise, Mr. Ruzic would not have been vice-president

8 or would Mr. Kusmic, a Bosniak, who is not mentioned here, would have been

9 the secretary of the inspection services, not to mention a number of

10 others who still worked in the Municipal Assembly.

11 However, Mr. Kasagic says another thing here. He is not in favour

12 of the crisis staff taking over in Banja Luka. The more so because these

13 decisions are not implemented by other smaller municipalities. He doesn't

14 mention the names of these municipalities. However, it seems that he was

15 against the crisis staff interfering with the policies of the biggest

16 municipality in the territory of Republika Srpska. That is obvious from

17 this passage.

18 Q. As you sit here today right now, can you think of any decision of

19 the ARK Crisis Staff that was implemented by the Banja Luka Municipality,

20 even one?

21 A. Could you please show me these decisions. A decision which was in

22 keeping with the law would be implemented as a legal decision. What was

23 not in keeping with the law, I must say that I disregarded it. I did not

24 implement it. Sometimes I would even tear it apart, and I didn't suffer

25 any consequences because of that.

1 Q. Well, but my question is as you sit here right now --

2 A. I can't remember any such decision. I can't.

3 Q. All right. Staying on this subject of implementation of this 22

4 June decision, look at P272 again now. This is a document dated 1 July, I

5 believe, of 1992. It also has the date 6 July on it. It's addressed to

6 all of the SJBs by the head of the CSB, Mr. Stojan Zupljanin. Do you see

7 that?

8 A. Yes, I do.

9 Q. If you look at the remarks of Mr. Zupljanin after he has set out

10 the decision, and take your time reading it if you want to, is he

11 saying -- what is he saying there about whether the various SJBs were

12 required to implement this decision or not? Is he saying that they have

13 to implement it, or is he saying that they should not?

14 A. If you will just allow me to read it quickly.

15 Q. Please, take your time.

16 A. The interesting thing is what it says under paragraph 3. "People

17 cannot be dismissed from work without the CSB being aware of that." This

18 was done in some public security stations. Some other adequate solutions

19 have to be sought for their removal to the tasks and jobs which are not

20 contrary to paragraph 1 of this decision.

21 In other words, this limits the execution of this decision which

22 was adopted by the crisis staff, and he wants to have the control. Or

23 maybe not him, but the public security station to control the employment,

24 the dismissal, and the replacement of these people. This is nothing new

25 under the sun. Let's have that clear. The public security station in

1 Banja Luka was very autonomous in these dealings. And the only superior

2 to this body was the minister of the interior in Pale. I as mayor did not

3 have any authority. Mr. Brdjanin, as the president of the AR Crisis

4 Staff, I don't know. But I as mayor could request them to do something.

5 Whether they did it or not depended very much on the consent of the

6 Ministry of the Interior. So this is nothing surprising when it came to

7 the Security Services Centre.

8 MR. ACKERMAN: I suppose this is the place we stop for the day,

9 Your Honour.

10 JUDGE AGIUS: Okay.

11 Mr. Radic, we are stopping here for today. We will continue

12 tomorrow, and we'll finish with you by the end of the week. So we will --

13 Madam usher, you can escort the witness.

14 MR. ACKERMAN: I have one matter I want to bring to your attention

15 before we rise.

16 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes.

17 Okay, Mr. Radic, you may leave. Thank you.

18 [The witness stands down]

19 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes, Mr. Ackerman.

20 MR. ACKERMAN: Your Honour, we had understood from the Prosecution

21 that we should schedule this witness for the entire week, so that's what

22 we did. And then I think it was Thursday of last week, Ms. Korner

23 indicated that we might not take the entire week. So at that point, we

24 made efforts to get another witness brought here. It was quite difficult,

25 but we managed to accomplish it. That witness has been rescheduled and

1 will arrive here on Thursday and will be prepared to testify on Friday.

2 So I just wanted you to know that that's what we have done.

3 JUDGE AGIUS: Is he Witness Number 5?

4 MR. ACKERMAN: That would be Bojinovic. 17.

5 JUDGE AGIUS: You confuse me. Okay. But you confused me a little

6 bit. And you intend to finish with him on Friday?

7 MR. ACKERMAN: We hope so.

8 JUDGE AGIUS: Because I'm telling you why, because originally you

9 had said two days.

10 MR. ACKERMAN: We've gone through that.

11 JUDGE AGIUS: And you've gone down to half a day.

12 MR. ACKERMAN: We've gone through that.

13 JUDGE AGIUS: And then it's two to three days.

14 MR. ACKERMAN: You've got to stop reading those numbers, Judge.

15 It's just make you uncomfortable.

16 JUDGE AGIUS: But I am presiding, Mr. Ackerman, not you.

17 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, I don't know whether Mr. Ackerman -- do

18 you mean you will take one day in chief as opposed to -- because I thought

19 you had given us a whole lot of documents, and if all those documents are

20 going in through them, then he won't finish on Friday.

21 MR. ACKERMAN: They will go in through him very rapidly, I think I

22 really think -- we may not finish him on Friday, but at least he's here.

23 If we have to carry on until Monday, that's fine.

24 JUDGE AGIUS: So the next witness is not number 5, but number 17.

25 MR. ACKERMAN: I don't have the numbers here.

1 JUDGE AGIUS: I have them. We stand adjourned until tomorrow,

2 2.15, in the same courtroom.

3 MS. KORNER: Tomorrow, isn't it, Your Honour that we're finishing

4 early?

5 JUDGE AGIUS: At 5.00. Or 5.30. If you want to start earlier, we

6 can start earlier tomorrow if there is a room available. We will finish

7 before 1.00 tomorrow in the other case.

8 MR. ACKERMAN: Judge, I've now found my numbers. Witness Number 5

9 we tried to bring, and she is one of those who is caught up in the we've

10 run out of passports problem in Bosnia. They don't have any passports, so

11 she can't come.

12 JUDGE AGIUS: If there is a way. I am sitting in the morning in

13 the Nikolic sentencing hearing. But I don't think we'll take up to 1.00

14 tomorrow. I think we'll finish early. So we could start, say, at quarter

15 to 2.00, if there is a -- or half past 1.00. If we could start at half

16 past 1.00. I am available, and I will just consult with Judge Janu who is

17 not here and doesn't know what I am saying. But I am pretty sure that she

18 will not have any objection.

19 But you have to find a courtroom. We are sitting in Nikolic. We

20 are sitting in Courtroom III in the morning, and we finish at 1.00.

21 THE REGISTRAR: Courtroom 2 is available for the whole day.

22 JUDGE AGIUS: Then we can start at half past 1.00 here. If -- I

23 don't want to force anyone. Don't misunderstood me.

24 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, we're entirely in Your Honours' hands.

25 JUDGE AGIUS: Well, what I mean to say is if we can together

1 cooperate to send this gentleman back home --

2 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, if Mr. Ackerman is only going to take

3 another hour and a half, then I'm pretty certain that I would conclude by

4 Thursday.

5 JUDGE AGIUS: If we gain an hour or so tomorrow Ms. Korner, then

6 that would ultimately mean that perhaps Witness Number 17 won't need to

7 stay here the weekend. So, it's up to you.

8 MS. KORNER: Your Honour, he's not arriving until Thursday, so, as

9 I understand from Mr. Ackerman.

10 JUDGE AGIUS: Yes. But if he's arriving Thursday --

11 MR. ACKERMAN: We can't put him on before Friday. It's not

12 possible.

13 JUDGE AGIUS: Exactly. He will testify Friday. I see, I see.

14 It's not going to make a difference. I thought we would gain a day. But

15 we are not going to gain a day. So we'll remain the same. Okay. Thank

16 you.

17 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 6.35 p.m.,

18 to be reconvened on Tuesday, the 4th day of

19 November, 2003, at 2.15 p.m.

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