Page 2590
1 Wednesday, 21 February 2007
2 [Open session]
3 [The accused entered court]
4 [The witness entered court]
5 --- Upon commencing at 9.01 a.m.
6 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Docherty, continue your examination.
7 MR. DOCHERTY: Good morning, Your Honour.
8 WITNESS: SEAD BESIC [Resumed]
9 [Witness answered through interpreter]
10 Examination by Mr. Docherty: [Continued]
11 Q. Welcome back, Officer.
12 MR. DOCHERTY: Your Honour, before going on, I noted yesterday
13 that I did not tender ter number 129. That's the collection of
14 photographs that we spent some time on yesterday. I tender that at this
15 time.
16 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, we admit it.
17 THE REGISTRAR: As Exhibit P264, Your Honours.
18 MR. DOCHERTY: And then if I could please ask the court officer to
19 call up the chart that we ended the day on yesterday, which is ter number
20 145B.
21 Q. Officer, do you see this chart once again on the screen in front
22 of you?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. Yesterday, we noted that there were some dimensions on this
25 chart. Can you tell us, who took those measurements, and how; what tools
Page 2591
1 they used; how they made sure the measurements were accurate.
2 A. A colleague of mine, Salko Cerimagic, prepared this sketch because
3 it's impossible for person to do that due to the sizes. So the two of us
4 did it together and did these measurements.
5 Q. Is there a measurement there from the impact crater to the curb?
6 A. Yes, there is.
7 Q. And how far is it from the centre of the impact crater, which I
8 believe is the circled 1, to the curb?
9 A. I think it's about 1.90 metres or 1.85 metres.
10 Q. And is there also a dimension noted from the curb to the wall of
11 the building up against which those two bicycles were leaning?
12 A. They're not written here, but the distance is either 2.90 or 2.60.
13 Q. All right. And so a summing up of those dimensions would give us
14 the distance from the centre of the impact crater to the wall of the
15 building; is that correct?
16 A. Yes. When you add them up, it's either 4.60 or 4.50.
17 Q. Thank you. And at this time, Your Honour, also I will tender the
18 large photo montage, which is up behind the witness, for Your Honours to
19 consult later if a very detailed photograph is thought useful.
20 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, we admit it.
21 THE REGISTRAR: As P265, Your Honours.
22 MR. DOCHERTY:
23 Q. Officer, did you write a report concerning your work at Markale
24 market on the 28th of August, 1995?
25 A. Yes. We made the markings and prepared a short forensic report
Page 2592
1 giving a short description and the number of casualties or the dead people
2 who were processed in the morgue.
3 MR. DOCHERTY: If we could please see 65 ter number 145B, e-court
4 page 2.
5 Q. And while we're waiting for that to come up, Officer, were efforts
6 made to identify those who had died at the scene?
7 A. Oh, you mean the dead persons? Though it wasn't impossible to do
8 it on the spot, but lots of papers were found on the location which we
9 photographed, and later on they were used for identification in the Kosevo
10 Hospital.
11 Q. Among the photographs that we put into evidence, are there
12 photographs of these identity documents, handbags, wallets, and so forth
13 that were found at Markale market?
14 A. Yes, a lot of identification papers and personal belongings were
15 found.
16 Q. On the page that is on the monitor in front of you, there is a
17 list of 35 names. Do you see that list of names?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. What names are these? Whose names are these?
20 A. The names of the citizens who died as a result of this projectile,
21 and they were identified at the hospital.
22 Q. Is this is a complete list of all of those who eventually died
23 from this projectile?
24 A. No. Approximately another 30 persons succumbed to the injuries
25 that they had received.
Page 2593
1 Q. And so in addition to these 35, there are some additional names;
2 is that correct?
3 A. Yes.
4 MR. DOCHERTY: I have no further questions in direct, Your Honour.
5 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you.
6 Mr. Tapuskovic.
7 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Good morning, Your Honours, and
8 thank you.
9 Cross-examination by Mr. Tapuskovic:
10 Q. [Interpretation] Mr. Witness, I am a Defence counsel of the
11 accused General Milosevic, and I would kindly ask you to give me answers
12 to certain questions that you already answered in response to the
13 Prosecutor's question and, if possible, to give me as brief answers as
14 possible in order for us to wrap up this cross-examination as soon as
15 possible.
16 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Can the witness first be shown
17 document 65 ter 1484, tendered by the Defence under number D19.
18 Q. Let's first look at -- can you see page 1 and what is written
19 here:
20 "Sarajevo, 18 November 1994. With a single sniper shot fired at
21 around 1300 hours from the aggressor positions from the Metalka building
22 at Grbavica at the intersection of Zmaja od Bosne and Franje Rackog
23 Streets, a boy, Nermin Divovic, born in 1987, was fatally wounded in the
24 head, and his mother, Dzenana Sokolovic, received a serious wound to the
25 stomach."
Page 2594
1 My question is: You took part in the investigation relating to
2 this incident?
3 A. Yes. I assisted my colleague who was this charge, and given the
4 circumstances where it happened, the two of us were sent out to do the
5 on-site investigation.
6 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Let us now look at page 3. Yes,
7 page 3. Page 3, description of the event, yes.
8 Q. I'm going to read it out to you. In order for me not to read
9 everything, I will begin where it says:
10 "Nermin Divovic, a boy born in 1987, was fatally wounded while his
11 mother Dzenana Sokolovic," born on that and that year, "was seriously
12 wounded. The bullet passed through the boy's head and then seriously
13 wounded his mother in the stomach."
14 Is that what you established on the scene?
15 A. It was impossible to establish that on the scene because the
16 casualties were not there. We only came afterwards in order to carry out
17 the on-site investigation.
18 THE INTERPRETER: Could Mr. Tapuskovic please turn off his
19 microphone while the witness is speaking; otherwise, there's overlapping.
20 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation].
21 Q. [Previous translation continues] ... established in this
22 description --
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: The interpreter has asked, Mr. Tapuskovic, that
24 you turn off the microphone while the witness is speaking; otherwise,
25 there is overlapping. And the witness is also protected.
Page 2595
1 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
2 Q. Mr. Witness, this report is not correct; right?
3 A. This report was made by an operative on the scene who collected
4 information from the people present on the spot. I didn't write this
5 report; neither did my colleague who carried out the investigation.
6 Q. But you did gather all physical evidence relating to this
7 incident, and what is written here was prepared based on the evidence,
8 among other things, based on medical record as well?
9 A. Yes, but the two of us didn't do it. Our task was to photograph
10 the scene, make a sketch thereof on the basis of the clues and the traces
11 that we found. That's our description. However, taking statements from
12 witnesses was not our duty. This refers to the processing of the scene by
13 a forensic technician. This applies to medical reports as well. This is
14 done by a forensic expert who prepares official reports.
15 Q. So this medical record served as a basis for your establishing the
16 facts?
17 A. Yes. In any case that's true, but this document is part of the
18 whole process and the procedure, and then later on it's forwarded to the
19 court.
20 Q. Can I please draw your attention to page 15 of this same 65 ter
21 document. Page 15.
22 MR. DOCHERTY: Your Honour, I object. The witness has disavowed
23 knowledge of this report, has said that he did not prepare this report,
24 has said that his colleague did not prepare this report, and while I have
25 no objection to the witness being questioned about this incident, I do
Page 2596
1 have an objection to him being questioned on the basis of this report
2 which he has said he knows nothing of more than once in response to
3 counsel's questions.
4 So my objection is lack of foundation.
5 [Trial Chamber confers]
6 JUDGE ROBINSON: We'll hear the question.
7 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Can we just for a moment go into
8 private session, please.
9 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, private session.
10 [Private session]
11 (redacted)
12 (redacted)
13 (redacted)
14 (redacted)
15 (redacted)
16 (redacted)
17 (redacted)
18 (redacted)
19 (redacted)
20 (redacted)
21 (redacted)
22 (redacted)
23 (redacted)
24 (redacted)
25 (redacted)
Page 2597
1 (redacted)
2 (redacted)
3 (redacted)
4 (redacted)
5 (redacted)
6 (redacted)
7 (redacted)
8 (redacted)
9 (redacted)
10 (redacted)
11 (redacted)
12 (redacted)
13 [Open session]
14 THE REGISTRAR: We're in open session, Your Honours.
15 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
16 Q. If I understood you correctly, you worked on collecting physical
17 evidence; right?
18 A. Right.
19 Q. Thereafter, the prosecutor's office in charge received everything
20 that you had gathered.
21 A. Yes.
22 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Can we now look at page 15 of
23 this document, please. That's a criminal report.
24 Q. And you can see this criminal report sent to the prosecutor's
25 office. It's dated the 14th of December. So after a good two months and
Page 2598
1 after everything you did, according to the laws applicable in
2 Bosnia-Herzegovina, your team submitted -- filed a criminal report; is
3 that correct?
4 A. Yes, but I wasn't involved in preparing this criminal report so I
5 know nothing about the date. Our exclusive duty was to prepare a photo
6 file, to make a sketch of the scene and the rest of it.
7 Q. It's only reasonable because it's within the competence of the
8 high prosecutor's office. But look at what it says here. It's a criminal
9 report against an unknown perpetrator. Look at the middle of the passage
10 of the statement of reasons. Let us begin with "Sarajevo" -- no, let's
11 start with "On this occasion ..." Can you see that? Can you see it?
12 "On this occasion, the bullet passed through the head of the child
13 Nermin Divovic, born 1987 in Sarajevo, and then seriously wounded his
14 mother Dzenana Sokolovic to the stomach."
15 Did the public prosecutor, based on your documents --
16 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Docherty.
17 MR. DOCHERTY: Your Honour, I do not speak B/C/S, but at least in
18 the English translation on the left-hand side of the screen, there is no
19 reference to a bullet passing through Nermin Divovic's head. It simply
20 says, and I quote: "A child, Nermin Divovic, born 1987 in Sarajevo, was
21 mortally wounded in the head, and Dzenana Sokolovic was seriously
22 wounded."
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, that is what is in the English.
24 MR. DOCHERTY: Of course, I am not competent to say what is in the
25 B/C/S, but I just point that out for purposes of the record.
Page 2599
1 JUDGE ROBINSON: Well, may I just ask the interpreter to interpret
2 that sentence for us, from B/C/S into English.
3 THE INTERPRETER: The interpreter cannot see the full line in the
4 B/C/S version. Yes.
5 JUDGE ROBINSON: You can see it now.
6 THE INTERPRETER: "A sniper bullet was firing at the passers-by at
7 the intersection of Zmaja od Bosne and Franje Rackog Streets in Sarajevo,
8 on which occasion a child, Nermin Divovic, was fatally wounded in the head
9 - he was born in 1987 in Sarajevo - and seriously wounded Dzenana
10 Sokolovic, born 1966 in Sarajevo."
11 JUDGE ROBINSON: Well, that's more or less consistent with what
12 was in English.
13 Proceed, Mr. Tapuskovic.
14 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
15 Q. Witness, since we both speak the same language, is what I read
16 correct as I read it?
17 A. Yes, it is.
18 Q. And as it is written here, is there the words "passed through" in
19 the B/C/S version?
20 A. Yes. "... passed through the head of the child." It just says
21 part of the word, the first syllable of the word, and the rest is
22 missing. Can I read it?
23 "On that occasion the bullet fired pass the through ..."
24 [Trial Chamber confers]
25 JUDGE ROBINSON: Well, in these circumstances, I'm minded to ask
Page 2600
1 the CLSS to ask for an authoritative translation of the words.
2 But before I do that, I'd like to find out, what is the direction
3 in which you are going? What is the purpose of your questioning? What do
4 you want to ask the witness about this? I allowed you to question him on
5 the report, but I've yet to see you establish its relevance.
6 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Only to establish the truth,
7 whether what the Prosecutor says is true, which trajectory of the bullet
8 was, or what was established on the scene and what the Prosecutor ended in
9 filing criminal charges. I don't think that we need to seek assistance
10 either from the CLSS or from anyone else. Let the witness read and
11 confirm what it says in the B/C/S. The interpreter cannot translate this
12 so precisely as he can read it precisely, and then let the interpreters
13 translate.
14 JUDGE ROBINSON: No, I will not follow that course, because we
15 have official authoritative interpreters in this Tribunal, and if it comes
16 to that, then we'll ask the CLSS to provide an interpretation.
17 But the Prosecutor's objection came subsequent to our allowing you
18 to question the witness on this report. So this particular -- are you
19 saying that this particular question raised by the Prosecutor is the point
20 of your examination?
21 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] The point of my examination is
22 the fact that the child was hit first and then the mother and not the
23 other way around, first the mother and then the child. That is the point
24 of all of my work, of my entire effort to discuss this. That is the very
25 point.
Page 2601
1 [Trial Chamber confers]
2 JUDGE ROBINSON: The Chamber will instruct the court deputy to
3 have the CLSS provide an official translation of the relevant passage.
4 Proceed, Mr. Tapuskovic.
5 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, because this
6 witness helped gather evidence, I would like the witness to go back to
7 page 4, if we could just please somehow conceal the fact that he was a
8 member of that team, keep it from being seen on our screens. That is page
9 4.
10 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, page 4, then.
11 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
12 Q. There, Witness. Look at the very end of this long paragraph, the
13 longest on that page. I will read it out to you.
14 "Soon after the incident, two APCs came quickly from the UNPROFOR
15 French Battalion and parked on Franje Rackog Street on the pavement, the
16 registration plates being MFPU 15224 and 8448."
17 THE INTERPRETER: Note: The interpreters don't have the document
18 and can't see the portion that counsel is reading from. We didn't get the
19 numbers. Thank you.
20 JUDGE ROBINSON: Why is that? Let us wait for a few seconds to
21 see whether the interpreters now have it.
22 THE INTERPRETER: We have the relevant page now, Your Honour.
23 Thank you.
24 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. Proceed.
25 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
Page 2602
1 Q. Is that what happened, Witness?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. If necessary, I can read that, too, the next paragraph.
4 "There was a blood-stain on the spot where the woman and the boy
5 were wounded which members of UNPROFOR, who later arrived at the site,
6 washed with water and later covered with earth before the arrival of the
7 on-site investigation team."
8 Is that accurate? Is that what happened, sir?
9 A. I can't remember this particular detail. It wasn't a huge pool of
10 blood. It was just a very small blood-stain. I can't remember whether it
11 was washed away or covered.
12 Q. I'm putting it to you, Witness, that UNPROFOR certainly didn't do
13 that. Rather, this was something that was done by the members of your
14 team who then shifted the blame for this to UNPROFOR. That's what I'm
15 putting to you. What do you have to say, sir?
16 A. No, that's not possible, simply because that's quite a lot to do.
17 It was difficult to stay there for long. It was difficult to carry out
18 any investigations at all, even washing and covering, simply because there
19 was a lot of firing from behind the Metalka building; there was a lot of
20 sniper activity.
21 JUDGE HARHOFF: Excuse me, counsel. If I understand you
22 correctly, you are implying that the witness was involved in falsification
23 of a public report. I think you have to have a solid foundation for
24 making that allegation, and I'm asking you to provide that foundation to
25 the Chamber.
Page 2603
1 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Either this was falsified,
2 fabricated, by UNPROFOR by destroying evidence or it was someone from the
3 witness's team. It has to be that. However, what I'm suggesting is that
4 UNPROFOR would never do anything like. What I'm suggesting is this was
5 done by the team that was in charge of the investigation and they then
6 shifted the blame for this to UNPROFOR. Be that as it may, whoever
7 destroyed evidence did precious little service to the course of justice
8 and the attainment of truth.
9 JUDGE HARHOFF: Counsel, my point is that you do not have the
10 right to imply that the witness has been involved in criminal activity
11 during your cross-examination. And it seems to me that by alleging that
12 the witness was involved in falsification of a public report or mingling
13 with the truth, you are very directly implying that the witness has
14 committed a crime against justice. So unless you have a strong foundation
15 that this was, in fact, the case, I suggest you drop that allegation.
16 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, Mr. Harhoff, what
17 I'm suggesting is that this means perverting the course of justice. I am
18 doing that in the clearest possible way and with the greatest possible
19 responsibility, simply because this is the only interpretation that
20 presents itself. And that precisely is my point. It would be even more
21 dreadful if the evidence had been destroyed by UNPROFOR, which is
22 something that I refuse to believe.
23 JUDGE HARHOFF: Please proceed.
24 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] I will not be lumbering this
25 witness with another document that the OTP got later on, after everything
Page 2604
1 that had occurred in connection with these events. We'll have sufficient
2 time to deal with that and with the medical certificate that the OTP
3 obtained through their investigators in Sarajevo, having questioned the
4 witness about that. But I will be dealing with that some other time. I
5 do not wish to waste any more of your precious time now.
6 Q. Witness, do you know anything about the incident that occurred on
7 the 21st of November, 1994, since you worked on sniping incidents, when a
8 shell landed in front of a tram or something? Do you remember that
9 incident where only the driver was injured?
10 A. I don't know. I can't remember.
11 Q. Let me ask you this: Do you know the range of a rifle-launched
12 grenade?
13 A. No, I don't.
14 Q. Since you know nothing about that, I won't be asking any further
15 questions. I do assume, however, that you're familiar with Sefer
16 Halilovic's book; he was the chief of the General Staff. I submitted this
17 for translation. I'm not sure when the translation will be ready. Just
18 several paragraphs. But have you read this book? It was published back
19 in 1998.
20 A. No, I haven't read the book.
21 Q. Thank you.
22 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: Could the witness please be
23 asked to speak closer to the microphone. We can barely hear him.
24 JUDGE ROBINSON: Witness, please move closer to the microphone.
25 The interpreters are having trouble hearing you.
Page 2605
1 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
2 Q. A while ago we discussed an investigation that you were involved
3 in. Yesterday you said in reply to a question by the OTP that you had
4 attended or had been involved in a great many investigations; right?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. Was it ever the case in Markale 1 or Markale 2 or any other
7 serious incident, such as the one that occurred at the Simone Bolivar
8 school - you heard about that on TV at least - or when the TV building was
9 hit, were members of the RS army ever allowed to be involved in these
10 investigations?
11 A. It's not that this was disallowed. These people were never
12 interested in being part of an investigation, in being involved in an
13 on-site investigation. The circumstances were such that it was entirely
14 illusory for anyone to expect them to come over and be part of an
15 investigation. The town had been under continuous shelling for three
16 years, and after all, we had UN people who were trained for that sort of
17 thing at the time.
18 As far as I know, no request was ever made by anyone from the
19 Serbian side to cross the line and be involved in an investigation. The
20 same question was asked during my testimony concerning Markale 1, but as
21 far as I know, no requests by Serbs were ever made to be part of an
22 investigation. Had a request ever been made, we would have allowed them
23 access.
24 Q. You would have allowed access to the Serbian side in any of these
25 incidents, wouldn't you?
Page 2606
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. So, then, they would be able to take appropriate steps with regard
3 to people on their side who had committed these acts; is that right?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. Do you know anything about the fact that for security reasons
6 people were IDed on the street, regardless of their ethnicity?
7 A. Yes. But people were only IDed during the curfew that was in
8 force between 6.00 in the evening and 10.00 in the morning. That's when
9 people were IDed, all ethnicities alike.
10 Q. In spring-time, morning is day-time; it's no longer night-time.
11 A. I said between 2200 hours in the morning and perhaps 5.00 or
12 6.00 -- 2200 hours in the evening and perhaps 5.00 or 6.00 the next
13 morning.
14 Q. Do you know if there were any Serbs who were IDed and they would
15 walk on for 50 or 100 metres and would be shot by a sniper?
16 A. I'm not familiar with any such incidents.
17 Q. You talked about Markale 2 yesterday.
18 A. Indeed.
19 Q. The first thing I'd like to do is show you your own statement, the
20 21st of September, 2001.
21 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] The number is D00-0861. Just to
22 save time, I need one paragraph from this statement.
23 Q. Is that your statement, sir?
24 A. Yes. It's signed.
25 Q. All right. Let's move on to page 2. In paragraph 2 or paragraph
Page 2607
1 3, rather, you say this: "On-site investigations carried out during the
2 war with regard to mortar incidents normally involved the collection of
3 shrapnel and other remains of ammunition, photographing of a crime scene,
4 making a sketch of a crime scene, and a lot of other technical work."
5 You said that yesterday. That's correct, isn't it?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. In the next paragraph, you say: "Because it was difficult to
8 arrange for proper training during the war, I had not undergone any
9 official training in investigating cases of mortar shelling and artillery
10 shelling."
11 Is that right?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. How, then, were you able at all to establish what the evidence was
14 in these incidents? How could you possibly be a member of these teams
15 that were supposed to establish some sort of truth if you had undergone no
16 sort of training at all?
17 A. When one arrives at a crime scene, you find some damage, you find
18 bits of a projectile, a stabiliser fin or something like that, sometimes
19 dum-dum bullets. Whatever ended up there, we would normally find. It was
20 a step-by-step process. We would train ourselves. We would see what this
21 was about. It's no great wisdom to find a piece of iron or any
22 regular-shaped sharp object at a crime scene. So that's what we did.
23 We didn't just investigate major scenes of shelling. We also
24 investigated scenes where there was only material, physical damage, but no
25 loss of human life, where we found a great many pieces like these. So
Page 2608
1 that was one of the things. You had Markale 1, 2, Dobrinja 4, and this
2 was done by people who determined the angle of descent and drew up the
3 appropriate reports.
4 Q. We can, therefore, conclude that you knew nothing about the
5 particular features of weapons of any kind.
6 A. No, that's not something that we had been trained for.
7 JUDGE ROBINSON: One of the questions you put to the witness was
8 quoting from the report. "Because it was difficult to arrange for proper
9 training during the war, I had not undergone any official training in
10 investigating cases of mortar shelling and artillery shelling." There's
11 just a slight difference in what is in the English. It speaks of formal
12 tuition in the investigation of shelling or mortar incidents instead of
13 training.
14 May I just ask the interpreter to identify that passage and let me
15 know whether the correct translation is "tuition" or "training."
16 THE INTERPRETER: The word in the B/C/S original is actually
17 "teaching," so the interpreter believes it could cut both ways.
18 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you very much, yes.
19 Yes, please proceed, Mr. Tapuskovic.
20 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
21 Q. You then go on to explain how you got your training in this way,
22 and then you say:
23 "I, however, had the opportunity to attend many such crime scenes
24 where I observed UN officers conducting investigations. I observed the
25 methods that they used and I learned how such investigations were
Page 2609
1 conducted."
2 Is that how you eventually learned to do your job, sir?
3 A. Yes, from the UN. It was from the UN that my colleagues and I
4 learned to determine the origin of projectiles, which direction they came
5 from. We learned to distinguish different kinds of marks left by a
6 projectile. So we learned to distinguish between mortar projectiles,
7 missiles, those fired from a gun, artillery projectiles, that sort of
8 thing.
9 Q. Following that type of training, you were involved in the Markale
10 1 investigation on the 5th of February, 1994. That's what you say in the
11 next paragraph. Is that right, sir?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. In that same paragraph, I see that you said at the time, on the
14 5th of February, 1994, "When I arrived at the scene all of those injured
15 had already been taken away."
16 My question is: That was the case on the 5th of February, 1994,
17 and also on the 28th of August, 1995. Wasn't that the case, sir?
18 A. Yes.
19 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Can DD00-0861 be admitted as a
20 Defence exhibit, please.
21 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, we admit it.
22 THE REGISTRAR: As Exhibit D77, Your Honours.
23 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] The other document is DD00-0851.
24 This is your statement dated the 25th of April, 2006.
25 Q. I'm not showing the first page to keep your name from being
Page 2610
1 broadcast and to avoid going into private session, unless it is absolutely
2 necessary for you, just in case you don't remember making a statement on
3 the 25th of April, 2006.
4 A. I think I did make one.
5 Q. In that case, I'm moving straight to page 2. It's a very brief
6 statement.
7 You see it, sir, don't you?
8 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Paragraph 2, please.
9 Q. "I don't think there were any other shells landing on the Markale
10 market on the morning of the 28th of August, 1995, or the day before."
11 That's what it says, doesn't it?
12 A. Yes, it does.
13 Q. Does that mean that a single shell landed?
14 A. Yes. There was a single shell that landed on the Markale area.
15 Q. What about any other areas? Were there any other shells landing?
16 A. Not that I knew of.
17 Q. That morning you neither heard nor saw any other shell landing
18 except for the one shell at Markale, did you?
19 A. There were shells falling every day. It's possible that there
20 were shells landing. I just didn't take notice. It became something that
21 was quite usual. So when the team was called up in relation to Markale 1,
22 that was when I found out.
23 Q. So what about this one shell? What did you hear?
24 A. We were indoors in our offices. We heard explosions. We couldn't
25 immediately know where the explosions were occurring, which part of town.
Page 2611
1 But this was one that was nearby, so of course we heard the sound of an
2 explosion. When shells were falling, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, if they came in a
3 quick succession, we would be reluctant to leave our rooms, obviously.
4 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Could we please have photograph
5 number 1 on our screens, 65 ter number 00129.
6 Q. You see the photograph, sir, don't you? When you arrived at the
7 scene, this is one of the photographs that you took, isn't it?
8 A. Yes. That's looking from Tito Street in the direction of
9 Bascarsija.
10 Q. How far from this car was the first shell that landed, if you
11 could show us the point of impact, please.
12 A. [Indicates].
13 Q. Here we can see an overturned motorbike. Can you explain to me
14 how it's possible that on this car to the right there is not a single
15 trace of it being hit by anything?
16 A. That's the vehicle of our forensic unit that came there with the
17 kit and the equipment. It's an official car.
18 Q. I understand.
19 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Can we please now look at the
20 photograph behind you. I don't know exactly what number this photograph
21 is.
22 JUDGE ROBINSON: What's the question now?
23 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] I would like him to show the
24 photograph on the screen.
25 Q. But in any case, yesterday you showed that there was shrapnel in
Page 2612
1 the wall down there to the right.
2 A. Yes, you can see it here.
3 Q. Can you look now, to the left there is not a single shrapnel, to
4 the far left, not a single shrapnel.
5 A. It was impossible for them to be there. This is the exit, and
6 this whole area is where the bodies were. So they were here and the
7 detonation caused injuries and, for the most part, they prevented this
8 area being hit by shrapnel. If you look at this photograph on the
9 monitor, you will see that across -- to the left and upwards, there's
10 major damage, as I explained yesterday. The upper part of the building
11 you see, and I will show to you the dynamics of this damage here and this
12 thing up there with respect to this part where there is very few damaged
13 areas.
14 So the building opposite the market was damaged in its upper
15 part. You see the movement. These are all damage caused by the shrapnel,
16 and that's what I explained yesterday. And if the projectile fell here,
17 the shrapnel dispersed in this direction and caused injuries to the
18 people, and the other shrapnel travel in this direction causing damage to
19 the building, as you can see on this photograph.
20 Q. I would like to ask you something different. If you look to the
21 right, there's barely a few pieces of shrapnel. I didn't see a single one
22 on the other side; maybe you did.
23 A. The concentration is identical to the other one.
24 Q. Are you aware of the fact that this type of shell can produce
25 between 3 and 4.000 pieces of shrapnel?
Page 2613
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. So how is it possible that on this wall, especially on the left
3 where you see blood-stains, of the 4.000 pieces of shrapnel there were
4 just a few? How do you account for that?
5 A. The reason was because 35 people were killed instantly and another
6 30 succumbed to the injuries later and another 40 people suffered
7 injuries.
8 JUDGE ROBINSON: I'm sorry, I don't understand. How does that
9 explain why there isn't any shrapnel on the left side, the fact that 35
10 people were killed and another 30 died later?
11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I tried to explain. This was the
12 entrance point where a huge crowd of pedestrians was. It is only logical
13 that these people in this area here -- this is where the bodies were.
14 That's why you don't see any blood, but there were lots of extremities in
15 this area, and it is only reasonable that there is little damage on the
16 wall. However, on the right-hand side, as you can see here and here,
17 there is something, there is a little bit more, which means that the
18 majority of shrapnel was embedded in the bodies of the people.
19 JUDGE ROBINSON: I see, okay. Can you just point to a piece of
20 shrapnel on that drawing which is behind you? Because I can't see from
21 here.
22 THE WITNESS: [Indicates].
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: That's a piece. That's actually in the wall.
24 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] It's in the wall. The impact and a
25 piece of mortar was chipped from the wall which can be better seen in the
Page 2614
1 photograph. You can see that these are fresh traces of mortar being
2 chipped out by a piece of metal or whatever.
3 JUDGE ROBINSON: And so the explanation for less shrapnel being on
4 the left side is that the shrapnel was embedded in the bodies of the
5 victims?
6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, a huge number.
7 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.
8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Excuse me, and we collected a lot --
9 lots of pieces of shrapnel were collected.
10 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Docherty, we'll have medical evidence on
11 this?
12 MR. DOCHERTY: Yes, we'll get -- we'll get that. We have got the
13 autopsy reports from the victims, and if we weren't planning to put them
14 in, we'll put them in.
15 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Tapuskovic.
16 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
17 Q. Witness, the previous witness and everybody else and you also said
18 that between 3 and 4.000 pieces of shrapnel were produced, but there were
19 not 3 or 4.000 people. There were as many people as was said before.
20 Where did, for instance, 2.500 shrapnel go?
21 A. Believe me, I don't know. It doesn't mean that each piece hit
22 somebody. It doesn't mean that the bodies had absorbed all the 3.000
23 shrapnel. The fact is that we found lots of pieces on the scene, and this
24 has been shown in the photograph. However, where the rest had gone,
25 believe me, I don't know.
Page 2615
1 Q. In response to Judge Robinson's question, you explained why these
2 two bicycles were upright and that people were standing in front of them;
3 is that right?
4 A. Yes, it is.
5 Q. Is that correct?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. And you also said that the stalls were there with vendors selling
8 cigarettes right on that side.
9 A. No, there were no stalls there. People were just standing there
10 and selling various commodities, butter, sugar, et cetera.
11 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] I would like, if possible, you to
12 show photographs 2, 3, 4, and 5 so that you can see pieces of extremities,
13 which indicates that people were standing there when the detonation held;
14 that the tissue was torn and that accounts for the less damage. However,
15 there was bigger damage to people's extremities. Therefore, I would like
16 for to you show me photographs 2, 3, 5, and 4. If the Prosecutor decides
17 to do so, we can do it later.
18 Q. Explain to me: If there were so many people there selling
19 cigarettes and other commodities, where are these items there? Does this
20 mean that the cigarettes and other commodities sold by those people who
21 would die there were removed from the scene?
22 A. No. You can see here a certain quantity of cigarettes.
23 Q. Very well. But where are these body parts in this photograph?
24 Can you show me at least one?
25 A. I think that this is a leg, a foot; this is another foot. I also
Page 2616
1 believe that there's another part but it's not very clear. As far as I
2 can remember, those were -- numbers 2, 3, 4, 5, and maybe 6 were the
3 markings of body parts and tissue.
4 Q. Actually, my question was why were the people who were definitely
5 dead removed from the scene before your arrival?
6 A. Of course, those who were dead were taken to the morgue. One
7 couldn't leave them lying in the street for two or three hours. And then
8 the wounded were taken care of. It was only natural. I believe that it
9 was only a normal thing to do.
10 MR. DOCHERTY: Your Honour.
11 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Docherty.
12 MR. DOCHERTY: Excuse the interruption, but before counsel moves
13 on, can I ask that the photograph on the monitor be saved. I wish to
14 tender that as a Prosecution exhibit either now or during re-direct
15 examination if Mr. Tapuskovic is not going to. And I just want to make
16 sure that it's preserved before the markings go away.
17 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. Well, the court deputy will see to that.
18 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] I would like to expedite my
19 cross-examination in order to complete it at the end of this session.
20 Can we please look now at photograph number 8.
21 JUDGE ROBINSON: Please remember to save this before we move to
22 the other.
23 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] This can also be tendered as a
24 Defence exhibit; I have no objection to that.
25 MR. DOCHERTY: It doesn't matter to me. Just so long as it's in
Page 2617
1 evidence one way or the other. Thank you.
2 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. Well, that's very cooperative. We will
3 admit it as an exhibit.
4 THE REGISTRAR: As D78, Your Honours.
5 MR. DOCHERTY: And my thanks to Mr. Tapuskovic for making the
6 offer.
7 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
8 Q. Witness, based on the photograph and what you have shown us, would
9 it be fair to say that the characteristics of this shell has been
10 spreading in the form of a circular funnel?
11 A. You can see a better concentration here.
12 Q. No, I'm asking you a completely different thing. I put it to you
13 that the spreading caused by this shell and the shrapnel is in the funnel
14 shape, and this is precisely what is shown in this photograph, that they
15 flew upwards into the air. Maybe I'm not right.
16 A. No, you're not right.
17 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Mr. Docherty. I would
18 have forgotten to tender this photograph into evidence.
19 Can we please now move to photograph number 8. Yes, here it is.
20 Q. Are you aware of the most basic principle and the duty not to
21 tamper with anything at the location where there was an explosion or any
22 such thing happening?
23 A. This was in the course of the investigation. We photographed the
24 scene as we found it. However, since there was a lot of material there,
25 it was impossible to definitely determine the direction of the shell. And
Page 2618
1 as standard procedure, we went on to remove the rubble in order to get an
2 accurate and clear picture of the direction from which the projectile
3 came.
4 Q. That's exactly what I'm asking you. Why did you do anything at
5 all? Why did you clear the scene before the arrival of the investigating
6 judge?
7 A. Well, no, no, one cannot start an on-site investigation without
8 the presence of the prosecutor and the judge. They give us the green
9 light to do that, to proceed with the investigation. No one else has the
10 right, without the signal from the judge, to go ahead with any procedure.
11 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Witness, what the counsel was asking you was
12 why did you clear the scene before the investigating judge arrived? The
13 question wasn't whether you started the investigation without the approval
14 of the investigating judge, but why did you clear the scene before the
15 judge arrived? What's the answer to that?
16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No. That's not true, that we
17 cleared the scene without the presence of the judge. The judge was there
18 while we were doing it.
19 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
20 Q. I cannot find this particular statement of yours that you made
21 yesterday, but I do understand your reply. The witness who testified
22 before you, on page 2415, lines 12 to 15, said the first thing would be to
23 locate the stabiliser fin of the shell in order to establish the type of
24 shell. In most cases, we found markings of the manufacturer from Serbia,
25 such as KV, which stands for "Kraljevo" in Serbian.
Page 2619
1 My first question is: Did the army of Bosnia-Herzegovina have
2 these type of shells?
3 A. I have no knowledge about the weapons of the BH army. I was a
4 police officer, I was doing the police business, and I wasn't a member of
5 the BH army.
6 Q. Let me ask you another thing with regard to the stabiliser. It
7 was retrieved at the distance that you mentioned and indicated.
8 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] And if we can look at photo 28 --
9 no, 26 would be better.
10 Q. Yesterday you said that the stabiliser, which is a good indicator
11 of the incoming direction, was flattened.
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. And that you presumed that there were some individuals who
14 probably moved it, wanting to take it with them as a souvenir.
15 A. It could easily have happened because there was a commotion and
16 there was a huge need to take care of so many wounded and dead people.
17 However, it is a portable trace, and given that it was between 25 and 30
18 metres away from the scene, that's where we found it but we never moved
19 it.
20 Q. You know that in Markale 1 this fin was in the crater itself.
21 A. Yes. It was embedded in the asphalt, or, rather, penetrated the
22 thin layer of asphalt and got embedded into the earth underneath and
23 that's where I found it.
24 Q. Well, it's the same surface; it's not far away.
25 A. No. Here you have two or three layers. This is a very busy
Page 2620
1 street, with heavy traffic; heavy-duty trucks pass through it. So it was
2 difficult for it to penetrate the asphalt surface.
3 Q. Before the event itself, the explosion, there were no trams
4 running down this street, but cars, buses and pedestrians were normally
5 using the street; is that correct?
6 A. Yes, it is. I believe that there was some tram service on and
7 off, depending on the situation.
8 Q. So that means that people were not standing on the driving lane;
9 is that correct?
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. How is it then possible that there was not a single vehicle, a
12 car, a bus, because as you say it was a busy street, that was not hit?
13 Can you explain that?
14 A. A motorcyclist was hit. He was passing down the street at that
15 moment. It wasn't such a busy street that you would have a queue of
16 several vehicles. I would say that a couple of vehicles would pass at a
17 time.
18 Q. All the people were on the pavement, which is barely 1 to 1.5
19 metres wide.
20 A. Over 2.5 metres wide.
21 Q. Would it be fair to say that the damage, that the flatness of this
22 tail fin, given the quality of the material that it's made of, cannot be
23 deformed by a car? In order to make it look like this, you would need a
24 tractor or something else.
25 A. I don't think that these fins are so robust. Their thickness is
Page 2621
1 probably between .6 up to a maximum of 1 millimetre, so it is possible for
2 it to be flattened by a bigger vehicle.
3 Q. In order not to dwell on this any longer, for the moment, I'd like
4 to put it to you that, in my opinion, this shell was planted at this
5 specific location and in some possible way then exploded or made to
6 explode.
7 A. No, that is absolutely impossible.
8 Q. And that it was possible that only a few people who happened to be
9 there fell victims to this shell, whereas all the others were brought to
10 the location in the aftermath of the explosion.
11 A. No, that's not true.
12 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] I have no further questions.
13 JUDGE ROBINSON: Where would they have been brought from,
14 Mr. Tapuskovic? I'm trying to understand your case.
15 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Those were the people killed in
16 fighting and subsequently brought to the place where dead people are
17 normally kept before being buried. But most certainly it was impossible
18 for so many casualties. Here now we heard the figure of 60 dead, 30
19 instantaneously and 30 later, and the indictment speaks about 30, or,
20 rather, 43 dead as a result of this incident.
21 In any case, in view of what I said, I put forward this claim with
22 the conviction that that is what actually happened, and I would not tackle
23 any other incidents other than those that we tackled so far and in which I
24 also believe that the same practice was put in place.
25 JUDGE ROBINSON: When you speak of the place where dead people are
Page 2622
1 normally kept before being buried, do you mean a morgue?
2 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Precisely so.
3 JUDGE ROBINSON: So your case is that they were brought from a
4 morgue and placed at the scene of this incident.
5 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Yes. And they were quickly
6 removed from the scene in order to preclude the possibility of
7 establishing the time of death and for other reasons that expert witnesses
8 are going to talk about. I regret that the Prosecutor failed to show us
9 the bodies on the scene while they were still there for you to see how it
10 looked like and to judge whether it is possible for a single shell to
11 cause such devastation, because it normally cannot kill more than ten
12 people, unless all of these people were in one barrel.
13 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Docherty.
14 MR. DOCHERTY: Just very briefly, Your Honour. Thank you.
15 To begin with, what I propose to do is simply tell the Chamber
16 which photographs show severed body parts. I do not plan on displaying
17 those publicly, if that would be acceptable, rather than have the witness
18 look at them one after another. And if the Chamber feels the need to look
19 at these, I will have given the e-court numbers. Is that acceptable,
20 rather than question and answer with the witness? I would simply like to
21 avoid a public display of some truly gruesome photographs.
22 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. I don't want to see gruesome photographs,
23 but if there is an evidential point, then you must assess whether you have
24 to show them.
25 MR. DOCHERTY: I understand. I would draw the Chamber's attention
Page 2623
1 to the following e-court page numbers, from the exhibit that is the
2 portfolio of photographs.
3 E-court page 10 shows a severed human foot with the evidence
4 placard from the police "2" placed beside it, and that will allow you to
5 locate that on the chart that is already in evidence in which those
6 placards -- numbers appear in small circles. E-court page 11 shows a
7 severed human foot; the evidence placard is number 3. E-court page 12,
8 the evidence placard there is number 5. E-court page 14, the evidence
9 placard there is number 4. E-court page 15, the police evidence placard
10 there is number 5.
11 And now I do have just a couple of questions for the witness.
12 JUDGE ROBINSON: Just a minute, please.
13 MR. DOCHERTY: Yes.
14 [Trial Chamber confers]
15 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Docherty, I regret to say that this informal
16 procedure doesn't meet the evidential requirements. If you are going to
17 ask us to look at the photographs and draw from the photographs an
18 inference that would be favourable to your case, then they must be in
19 evidence.
20 MR. DOCHERTY: Your Honour, with respect, they are in evidence.
21 JUDGE ROBINSON: They are in evidence?
22 MR. DOCHERTY: They are in evidence. I'm sorry if I was not
23 clear. There was a portfolio of 44 photographs. They were all -- it was
24 65 ter number 00129. They were all moved. But I published to the Chamber
25 a selection of those photographs, and it is from those photographs that,
Page 2624
1 for example, the montage behind the witness appears, that the photograph
2 of the building appears with the bicycles against it, and so forth. I did
3 not show all 44 photographs, but I did put all 44 in. And the witness has
4 testified that these all photographs he took at Markale on that day, and
5 what I'm suggesting -- I will show them. I do not want to, but I will do
6 it if the Chamber tells me to --
7 JUDGE ROBINSON: No. If they are in evidence, that is perfectly
8 proper.
9 But, Mr. Tapuskovic, you must note that these photographs are in
10 evidence.
11 What are the questions that you have.
12 MR. DOCHERTY: Just briefly
13 Re-examination by Mr. Docherty:
14 Q. Officer, you recall that when you were being cross-examined,
15 Mr. Tapuskovic asked you a question about where all the cigarettes and
16 other things that the vendors had been selling disappeared to. Do you
17 recall that question and your answer to him?
18 A. All the items that were found, such as personal documents, were
19 taken by the police and were later returned to those who had been injured
20 or the families of those who had been killed.
21 MR. DOCHERTY: If we could, from the portfolio of photographs, see
22 first e-court page 13, I will have a question about that; and then e-court
23 page 33.
24 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Tapuskovic.
25 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, I'm not sure how
Page 2625
1 long this re-examination is going to take - I'm not entitled to speak
2 after that, regardless of re-examination - if I could please be excused
3 from the rest of today's hearing, since my learned friend will be taking
4 over the next witness.
5 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, but let me just say something before you go.
6 [Trial Chamber confers]
7 JUDGE ROBINSON: Before you go, Mr. Tapuskovic, I just wanted to
8 let the parties know of the procedure that I'll follow when the CLSS gives
9 us the translation of that disputed passage. When we have the
10 translation, I will allow the parties to make very brief submissions on
11 it.
12 So you may go, Mr. Tapuskovic.
13 And remember now, we're well past the time for the break.
14 MR. DOCHERTY: Your Honour, I have this photograph and then one
15 more, and then I will tender one other item of evidence.
16 Q. Officer, do you see the photograph on the monitor in front of you?
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. Besides blood, what's in the gutter there?
19 A. Packs of cigarettes scattered all over the tarmac, obviously.
20 MR. DOCHERTY: If we could now see e-court page 33.
21 Q. Officer, do you see that photograph on the screen in front of you?
22 A. Yes. This is a wallet with an ID card and with lighters. This
23 probably belonged to a person who was selling lighters.
24 Q. And this was a photograph taken by you --
25 A. Yes.
Page 2626
1 Q. -- at Markale market on August 28th, 1995.
2 A. That's right. This and at least a dozen others like this.
3 MR. DOCHERTY: Your Honour, that's all the questions I have for
4 the witness. Before I sit down, I would like to tender - I neglected to
5 do this in my examination-in-chief - the officer's report with the list of
6 the dead. It is 65 ter number 145B. I neglected to tender it at the
7 close of my examination-in-chief, so I ask to do that at this time.
8 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, we admit it.
9 THE REGISTRAR: As Exhibit P266, Your Honours.
10 JUDGE ROBINSON: Now, the photograph that was there before, that's
11 already in evidence?
12 MR. DOCHERTY: These are all in evidence, Your Honour. As I say,
13 there were 44 and I think I had the witness actually show and talk about,
14 I don't know, 12 or 13 of them. But all 44 went into evidence after he
15 said that he had looked at all 44 before court and that they were all
16 photographs he had taken at Markale on August 28th, 1995.
17 JUDGE ROBINSON: I asked because that one shows the shrapnel marks
18 which I'm not able to see looking at the drawing which you have at the
19 back of the court.
20 MR. DOCHERTY: And then lastly, for the Chamber's benefit, I was
21 asked about medical evidence of victims absorbing shrapnel, and I have
22 been informed that these were put into evidence already through the two
23 doctors who testified, who put in large volumes of medical reports, and we
24 can highlight for the Chamber which of those relate to Markale market.
25 But they are already in evidence.
Page 2627
1 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you. Thank you.
2 Witness, that concludes your evidence. Thank you for giving it,
3 and you may now leave.
4 We'll adjourn for 20 minutes.
5 [The witness withdrew]
6 --- Recess taken at 10.39 a.m.
7 [The witness entered court]
8 --- On resuming at 11.03 a.m.
9 JUDGE ROBINSON: The next witness, Mr. Whiting, I see is here.
10 Let the witness make the declaration.
11 THE WITNESS: I solemnly declare that I will speak the truth, the
12 whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
13 WITNESS: JOHN JORDAN
14 JUDGE ROBINSON: You may sit.
15 And you may again, Mr. Whiting.
16 MR. WHITING: Thank you, Your Honour.
17 Examination by Mr. Whiting:
18 Q. Good morning, sir. Could you please state your name for the
19 record.
20 A. My name is John Jordan.
21 THE INTERPRETER: Would the speakers please observe the pause
22 between questions an answers for the interpreters.
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: Did you hear that? You are asked to observe a
24 pause between question and answer in the interests of interpretation.
25 MR. WHITING:
Page 2628
1 Q. I think it will also assist the interpreters, as well as the court
2 reporter, if we do not -- if we take care not to speak too quickly. And
3 also I'm going to ask you to please try to keep your answers as brief as
4 possible, though try to answer the question completely. Do you
5 understand?
6 A. Yes, sir.
7 MR. WHITING: With the assistance of the usher, I'm going to show
8 the witness his statement, and I have copies also for the Trial Chamber in
9 case you don't have copies with you. Defence counsel, of course, has the
10 statement in English and in B/C/S.
11 Q. Mr. Jordan, is this your statement?
12 A. Yes, it is.
13 Q. Did you have an opportunity to review this statement before coming
14 to court today?
15 A. Yes, I did.
16 Q. Could you look, please, at paragraph 45 of your statement. In
17 that paragraph you describe an incident where you saw two snipers in a
18 building in Grbavica. Having reviewed this paragraph, do you want to make
19 a correction to that sentence?
20 A. Yes. There were three, now that I remember right; two on one
21 floor and one on another.
22 Q. Aside -- excuse me. Aside from that correction, is the statement
23 true and accurate, to the best of your knowledge?
24 A. Yes, sir, it is.
25 Q. If you were to testify here and asked about these matters, is this
Page 2629
1 what you would testify to here in court?
2 A. Yes, sir, it is.
3 MR. WHITING: Your Honour, this is 65 ter number 2835. I don't
4 believe there is a need to call it up on the e-court, but I'd ask that it
5 be admitted into evidence.
6 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, we admit it.
7 THE REGISTRAR: As P267, Your Honours.
8 MR. WHITING: Thank you, Your Honour.
9 Q. Mr. Jordan, could you briefly tell us your military background.
10 What military background do you have? That is, before 1992.
11 A. I was on active duty in the United States Marine Corps from 1973
12 to 1978; I was an enlisted man. I left with the rank of sergeant. My
13 last job was Chief Scout Sniper of the 1st Battalion, 4th Marines.
14 Q. Now, sir -- I'm sorry, did you have more --
15 A. I did some marksmanship instruction training in a number of
16 countries friendly to the US but never held a rank or title in anyone
17 else's military.
18 Q. And that was after you left the marines in 1978?
19 A. Yes, sir.
20 Q. Mr. Jordan, when did you first go to Sarajevo?
21 A. November 1992.
22 Q. And when did you leave Sarajevo for the last time?
23 A. I believe my last visit was in September or October of 1995, in
24 that area. I don't remember exactly.
25 Q. Between those two dates, what's the longest period of time that
Page 2630
1 you were away from Sarajevo?
2 A. The longest gap was in the spring of 1995. It was about four or
3 five weeks, and it was in the early spring. I believe I was back in
4 Sarajevo by the beginning of May.
5 Q. Other than that period of time, were you essentially in Sarajevo
6 continuously except for brief trips outside of Sarajevo?
7 A. I was either in Sarajevo, on my way out to pick up equipment, or
8 on my way back in with equipment.
9 MR. WHITING: I'd like to show now a brief news clip of a story
10 that is about you, and I hope you're not embarrassed about it, but I think
11 it summarizes what you were doing. We're going to show it on the Sanction
12 so we need to switch over to the Sanction, and I believe by clicking on
13 the e-court button that's how you can watch it.
14 The clip is in English. There is a simultaneous text in B/C/S
15 which will be underneath, and the French booth is already prepared to
16 translate this in French. So if we can show that now.
17 [Videotape played]
18 MR. WHITING:
19 Q. Mr. Jordan, is that you in the video clip?
20 A. Yes, about a thousand years ago.
21 Q. That was my next question. What is the date, if you recall, when
22 that was made and broadcast?
23 A. I believe that was March or April of 1993. It would have
24 coincided with the congressional fire an emergency services dinner, which
25 was where it occurred.
Page 2631
1 Q. In the video clip you make a reference to what people in the hills
2 around the city were doing. Who were you referring to when you
3 say "people in the hills"?
4 A. That would be the BSA forces surrounding the city.
5 Q. And when you say "BSA," what is that a reference to, just so we're
6 clear?
7 A. Forces other than the Bosnian government, which was -- who held
8 the town. We just called them the Bosnian Serb army.
9 Q. I just needed what the initials stood for. Thank you.
10 A. Okay.
11 Q. Why, in this clip, did you refer to them as the "people in the
12 hills" and not as the Bosnian Serb army?
13 A. By that time, March of 1993, I had been there long enough to see
14 things in not so much a black-and-white way, so I didn't want to label a
15 whole country or a whole ethnic group or a whole anybody with a particular
16 label. The anger in the city seemed to be focussed around its
17 peripheries, so that's the way I did it.
18 Q. Were you working or trying to cooperate with the Serb side at that
19 time?
20 A. I had a number of informal meetings with the BSA liaison, a Major
21 Indic and I believe there was a Captain Branic. They were still at the
22 PTT within the city of Sarajevo at the time. And it took a while for them
23 to warm up to the idea of us assisting fire-fighters on both sides of the
24 line. That didn't actually occur for -- probably until the summer of 1993
25 when I finally got our own vehicle in and I did not have to count on the
Page 2632
1 UN driving me up to Lukavica.
2 MR. DOCHERTY: Your Honour, could this clip that was shown be
3 admitted into evidence, please.
4 JUDGE ROBINSON: We admit it.
5 THE REGISTRAR: As Exhibit P268, Your Honours.
6 MR. WHITING:
7 Q. Mr. Jordan, when you were -- during your time in Sarajevo, did you
8 only fight fires or did you do other things?
9 A. We fought fires. We did what medical emergency response we could.
10 Because we had vehicles and fuel, we tried to assist the locals in any
11 other way we could. We often were involved in everything from body swaps,
12 prisoner exchanges, assisting other NGOs that had no mobility to transport
13 everything from supplies to water.
14 It's not so much a European tradition, but in the US, firemen
15 typically don't say no to anything. We try to justify our existence and
16 people's tax dollars by doing anything the community needs. The local
17 fire departments did not do medical; we tried to change that.
18 Q. Would you respond to shelling and/or sniping incidents?
19 A. Yes, we would do this both in an after-the-fact situation, in
20 other words, if we heard a shelling, we would respond to the sound. If
21 somebody called us and said somebody was shot, we would also respond. We
22 would also pre-position equipment and personnel in areas where, on any
23 given day, snipers were particularly active. They came out a lot in nice
24 weather. People came out, made it a target-rich environment, and the
25 snipers got busy. So we would pre-position in areas of known locations.
Page 2633
1 Q. Could you tell the Trial Chamber where your fire station was
2 located in 1994 and 1995?
3 A. By then we were located in the centre of municipal Sarajevo, in
4 Cengic Vila. We were on a small off-road just off the main road, 6th
5 Proletariate Brigade Boulevard, in what was a former supermarket which we
6 turned into the UN's first fire station.
7 Q. Was that in an area under Bosnian army, Bosnian government
8 control, or under the control of the Bosnian Serb army?
9 A. That would be under Bosnian government control.
10 Q. Where in Sarajevo did you do your work? What neighbourhoods?
11 What areas?
12 A. We responded to fires and medical emergencies everywhere from the
13 Vogosca automobile plant all the way over to Lukavica, but the vast
14 majority of our responses were in the area, I would say, east of the
15 station and within Bosnian government-controlled areas to the east of us.
16 That seemed to be where the majority of our responses were.
17 Q. Could you -- I'm sorry. Could you look, please, at paragraph 11
18 of your statement.
19 In that paragraph you state that you began receiving applications
20 from volunteers from all over the world. Did you have volunteers in your
21 organisation from countries other than the United States; and, if so, can
22 you tell us which countries?
23 A. Because of media coverage and coverage in different fire and
24 emergency medical trade magazines, we began very early in 1993 to get
25 resumes from fire and emergency medical personnel in different countries.
Page 2634
1 The number of countries, I could not tell you, as far as how many we
2 received, because the pile of resumes was about as tall as I am. The
3 folks that we did deploy to Sarajevo were American, Canadian, British,
4 French, German, Czech, Lebanese, and one Spanish kid. I think that's it.
5 Q. Please look at paragraph 15 of your statement. In that paragraph,
6 and it also occurs in paragraph 32 of your statement, you explain what you
7 would do if you went to the scene of a fire or another incident and there
8 was shooting at you.
9 Could you please just briefly describe for the Trial Chamber what
10 the procedure was that you would follow if you went to a location and you
11 were coming under fire. What would you -- what steps would you take?
12 A. It is important to first describe the genesis of that procedure.
13 Q. Briefly.
14 A. The UN had troops in Sarajevo; it did not have fire service
15 personnel, other than at the airport. The UN was not specifically
16 protecting local fire-fighters on other side of the confrontation line.
17 The fire-fighters on both sides were being wounded and killed. We decided
18 the first thing that had to be addressed was their safety. We convinced
19 the UN to protect the local fire-fighters in a symbiotic way, because once
20 the UN agreed to protect the firemen, the firemen then agreed to respond
21 to fires in UN structures. So basically they were finally doing a little
22 good instead of ignoring each other.
23 So the procedure evolved to where we knew the city better than UN
24 troops. UN troops' typical deployment was 90 days. They operated in
25 convoys, strict routes. They didn't know the alleys, the back streets,
Page 2635
1 the fastest way from point A to point B.
2 So we would go to the fire with the locals, whichever side. Then
3 we would determine if the building that was on fire was being shot at. If
4 it was, our first order of business would be to determine if there was a
5 reason the building was being shot at. In other words, if there was a man
6 on the roof firing uphill or downhill with a gun, in that environment he
7 got shot back at and the people who lived there just had to endure it. If
8 we arrived and there was a building on fire, gun-fire going into it and no
9 military activity in the building, coming from the building, then we would
10 contact UN headquarters. We would give the UN military observers a grid
11 coordinate of where the gun-fire was originating from and a description of
12 the weapon.
13 At that point, the UN would look for the UN military observer who
14 was responsible for that particular area. He would then contact the local
15 force commander and tell him that, Look, we have UN firemen in the
16 building; you're shooting at a building that has no military significance;
17 please stop --
18 THE INTERPRETER: Please speak slower for interpretation, sir.
19 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] I apologise, but I believe that
20 this is a bit too fast and the interpretation into French and in B/C/S is
21 difficult because the witness is speaking too fast. So it's difficult for
22 us to follow the translation, so could the witness please speak slower.
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, we all heard the request of the interpreter
24 and Ms. Isailovic.
25 Speak slower.
Page 2636
1 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
2 JUDGE ROBINSON: And you should be bringing this answer to a close
3 now. Generally, I prefer short answers.
4 MR. WHITING: I take responsibility for this one, Your Honour,
5 because the question I asked for, really, a long answer. So I'll break it
6 down.
7 Q. Once you called the UN and told them the grid reference where the
8 gun-fire was coming from and the description of the weapon, what would
9 they do, to your knowledge?
10 A. They would attempt to contact a local commander and ask him to
11 cease fire based on our report that the fire was in a civilian structure
12 with no military significance.
13 Q. And what then would happen? What would be the result, if any, of
14 that call?
15 A. In the vast majority of cases, the gun-fire ceased.
16 Q. And to your recollection, when this procedure was followed, were
17 the grid references from which the fire was coming on the Bosnian Serb
18 army territory, Bosnian government territory, or both?
19 A. Bosnian Serb army territory.
20 Q. And can you tell the Trial Chamber how many times you went to a
21 location and you determined that it was a military target?
22 A. Well under 5 per cent. Rarely.
23 MR. WHITING: Could we look at paragraph --
24 JUDGE ROBINSON: Sorry. What was the criterion that you used?
25 THE WITNESS: Uniformed armed military personnel within the fire
Page 2637
1 ground, storage supplies, like a lager or bivouac area, or gun-fire coming
2 from within the fire ground, the building on fire.
3 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Whiting.
4 MR. WHITING: Thank you, Your Honour.
5 Could we turn to paragraph 19, please.
6 Q. In this paragraph you describe an incident when you were hit in
7 the chest with a bullet in November of 1994. I just have a few brief
8 questions about this incident.
9 Did it happen during the day or at night?
10 A. Daylight.
11 Q. How do you know that -- you say that it came from a Serb
12 position. How do you know that? How did you determine that?
13 A. Because I knew where the Serb positions were in relation to where
14 I was standing. I know where the bullet hit me and where I went after
15 that. The bullet had to come from positions occupied by the BSA.
16 Q. At the moment that you were hit by the bullet, were you out in the
17 open or were you somehow not visible?
18 A. I had momentarily exposed myself, moving from point A to point B
19 in the course of fighting a fire.
20 Q. And can you describe --
21 JUDGE ROBINSON: Were there any other troops in the area, apart
22 from the Serb troops? Any Bosnian government troops?
23 THE WITNESS: There were some within 50 metres of where I was at,
24 because there was a trench line nearby. But I was wearing fireman's
25 equipment and I was carrying a rolled hose. I was fighting a fire in a
Page 2638
1 building occupied by civilians on one side and, unfortunately, military on
2 its back side. That was the nature of the conflict.
3 JUDGE ROBINSON: Why are you able to rule out the possibility that
4 the shot came from those forces?
5 THE WITNESS: They were all hiding, and the shot came from well
6 above me. It hit me at a down angle and drove me to the ground. And I
7 believe I might have heard the muzzle blast; it was that close. It was a
8 single, well-aimed round from a position above me.
9 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Whiting.
10 MR. WHITING: Thank you, Mr. President.
11 Q. Mr. Jordan, can you describe briefly what you were wearing, what
12 your fireman outfit looked like.
13 A. I was wearing a typical fireman's ensemble, but it was coloured
14 blue, much like UN colours, with glossy white reflective patches, a blue
15 shiny white fireman's helmet with "UN" on it, and not camouflaged in any
16 way. My flakjacket was also blue.
17 Q. Could we look, please, at --
18 JUDGE MINDUA: [Interpretation] This blue uniform, Mr. Witness, was
19 that the UN colour or was it the U.S.? Wasn't it going to be a little bit
20 confusing and wasn't there a possibility that you could confuse it with
21 the military or the police uniform?
22 THE WITNESS: No. My uniform could not be confused with military
23 or police by any rational individual.
24 MR. WHITING:
25 Q. Why do you say that, Mr. Jordan? Can you just be more specific?
Page 2639
1 A. It was not camouflaged in any way, shape or form. Again, it was
2 like the UN blue, very bright, glossy white reflective patches on it so
3 that one sees one's partners in the smoke. My blue fireman's helmet was
4 also a shiny gloss blue helmet, nothing camouflaged about it. The BSA
5 firemen wore green uniforms; the Bosnian government firemen wore black.
6 There was no way to mistake me for anything other than what I was.
7 Q. Could you turn, please, to paragraph 22 of your statement. In the
8 middle of that paragraph, you say: "The majority of fire against us came
9 from the Bosnian Serbs."
10 Then in the next paragraph you describe an incident that occurred
11 in July of 1995 where you suspected that mortars that landed around you
12 were fired from the Bosnian Muslim side.
13 My question is this: Aside from that incident that you describe
14 in paragraph 23, were there any other occasions where you believe or
15 suspect that fire came on you from the Bosnian Muslim side?
16 A. Not while on their territory, no.
17 Q. Did it occur while you were not on their territory; and, if so,
18 where?
19 A. On one occasion we were on a hill above the south-eastern part of
20 Sarajevo. We were fighting a fire in a home on BSA territory, and a
21 couple of random rifle rounds were fired at us and it just stopped. We
22 never got a grid. We never ceased fire operations. A couple of random
23 rounds and then it stopped.
24 Q. Did it happen on any other occasion?
25 A. Not that I remember.
Page 2640
1 Q. Did you ever hear -- did you ever witness or hear of Bosnian
2 government forces either shelling their own people or firing sniper fire
3 on their own people?
4 A. Those rumours circulated constantly among UN personnel, media
5 personnel, and particularly among folks on the BSA side.
6 Q. And did you yourself, during your time there, lend any credence to
7 those rumours? Did you believe them?
8 A. No.
9 Q. Why not?
10 A. I didn't think the Bosnian government forces had the ability to
11 pull that off without everyone knowing it, on the one hand. On the other
12 hand, if they were doing it to elicit sympathy or some reason, it was
13 obviously a failed policy because the sympathy they were looking for never
14 showed up. So those are the two reasons, I think, there was nothing to
15 that.
16 Q. When you say in paragraph 22 that "the majority of fire against us
17 came from the Bosnian Serbs, usually high ground or from a building known
18 to be under their control," can you tell the Trial Chamber how it is that
19 you determined that? How would you know that fire against you was coming
20 from the Bosnian Serb side? What things would you take into account to
21 make that determination?
22 A. We had to be alive to help people, so it was our job to constantly
23 monitor what buildings were under whose control and presented what manner
24 of threat to our operations on a daily basis. I don't like to use the
25 expression "common knowledge," but one gets to know the neighbourhood they
Page 2641
1 live in and the demographics of any given neighbourhood. We had to know
2 the violence potential in any given neighbourhood. That was our job.
3 Q. Now, you have explained to the Trial Chamber how it is that you
4 knew who controlled what areas, but when fire was coming on you, either
5 sniper fire or shelling, how would you determine that that firing was
6 coming from the Bosnian Serb areas, when you made that determination?
7 What sort of factors would assist you in making that determination that
8 that's where the fire was coming from?
9 A. We employed the same tactics and techniques of military forward
10 observers with the difference being we tried to call fire off as opposed
11 to calling fire down on a target. Basically, we used the same skills one
12 teaches military forward observers to identify targets. We used them to
13 identify threats and pass that information on to the UN. Same tools, same
14 skill-set, different intent.
15 Q. But I'm going to ask you to be a little bit more specific. Just
16 imagine -- just try to cast your mind back to occasions when you were
17 under fire, either gun-fire or shelling. What specific things would you
18 look for to tell you where the fire was coming from? How would you make
19 that determination? Maybe it seems like a basic question to you --
20 A. Pardon me.
21 Q. -- but it would assist us. How can you tell where shooting or
22 shells are coming from?
23 A. When you see three men on an anti-aircraft gun 2.000 metres away
24 and they are pointing the gun at a building and shooting, and you know
25 where they are on the map and you can see them loading the gun and firing
Page 2642
1 the gun, you can see them. That was it half the time. At night it would
2 be based on muzzle flashes. But most of the time it was direct
3 observation. If we did not know, we did not say.
4 Q. The incident that you describe in paragraph 23, can you tell us
5 where that occurred?
6 A. We had responded to a fire in a single family dwelling on the
7 Bosnian government side of the line, right near the Jewish cemetery, which
8 was an area of what we called "high incident" because of proximity of the
9 opposing forces.
10 Q. How close to the front line was that location, if you know?
11 A. I would say we were within 100 metres or so of the area between
12 the forces, that area expanding and contracting as the opposing forces'
13 lines approached each other.
14 Q. Please look at paragraph 29. You describe seeing mortar tubes
15 well dug in on the Serb side. Are you able to tell us specifically where
16 that was on the Serb side?
17 A. The hill road from -- on the way to Lukavica, you could go up --
18 you would be on the high ground above the south side of Sarajevo. That
19 road was dotted with positions, bunkers, where men lived. It was just
20 back from the front line. But there were support weapons in those
21 positions in a number of places with vistas of Sarajevo below it.
22 Q. And can you describe what a mortar dug in looks like. What would
23 you observe in terms of the mortars dug in?
24 A. Well, one can set up a portable mortar anywhere. But when one
25 wants to be really accurate, you put it in a position and you put out
Page 2643
1 things that look like a surveyor's kit, what we call triangulation
2 equipment - aiming stakes, levels, little things that make what you're
3 trying to do more accurate. We would see some of them.
4 Q. And just to be clear, you saw that on the Serb side in the
5 location that you identified.
6 A. Yes, a number of times.
7 Q. In paragraph 35 you say: "I saw the Bosnian Muslims use a
8 portable mortar from the hospital in late 1994."
9 First of all, do you know which hospital that was?
10 A. I always mixed the hospitals up. It was the one that was in the
11 compound -- not the one that the media always focussed on. Pardon me, I
12 always mixed the two hospitals up. It was the one that had like a complex
13 of buildings.
14 Q. Well, there is the State Hospital building, which is kind of a
15 white building that stands in the middle of the city, and then there's the
16 Kosevo Hospital, which is something of a complex. Are you able to --
17 A. That would be it, then.
18 JUDGE ROBINSON: Ms. Isailovic.
19 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] Sorry, I believe that Mr. Whiting
20 is testifying. Maybe the witness can just answer the questions.
21 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Whiting, that was a little leading.
22 MR. WHITING: I was trying to give the choice of the two hospitals
23 in the city, which I don't think there is any dispute about.
24 Q. In any event, in your own words, why don't you describe the
25 hospital and its location.
Page 2644
1 A. There are two hospitals in Sarajevo. One was a single cube-like
2 structure sticking up on its own, much photographed by the media because
3 of the damage to it. The other hospital was in a complex that had other
4 buildings around it, in more like a university setting.
5 Again, pardon me, I always mixed the two up, but I know which one
6 I saw the Bosnian government forces fire a mortar from, and that was the
7 one that was complex-like.
8 Q. And are you able to tell us, if can you recall, how they are
9 situated in relationship to each other by direction? Which one -- is one
10 to the north, to the west, to the east, or is that something you cannot
11 recall?
12 A. Yes, I can recall that. The much-photographed one was not far
13 from the main drag. It was east of the former Tito barracks. The other
14 one kind of up in the back, going up towards the Olympic stadium, kind of
15 up in that neighbourhood. I could find them both on a map, if I had to,
16 but ...
17 Q. I actually think you've been sufficiently clear, so I'm not going
18 to take the time to do that, but thank you.
19 Now, how many times -- you say you saw the Bosnian Muslims use a
20 portable mortar from that hospital in late 1994. How many times did you
21 see that?
22 A. I saw it once and thought I heard it happen on a couple of other
23 occasions.
24 Q. Turn, please, to paragraph 38, where you talk about air bombs, one
25 of the paragraphs you talk about air bombs, and you say: "There is no way
Page 2645
1 the Bosnian Muslims could have had something that big without us knowing
2 about it."
3 Can you explain that statement, please.
4 A. By "us," I mean everybody. A weapon that large would be the size
5 of a small drilling rig. You could not use it without the whole
6 neighbourhood knowing it. It wasn't a question of myself and my personnel
7 being so well informed. It would be the equivalent of a group of guys
8 driving a large drilling rig, setting up in a neighbourhood, launching
9 something and nobody seeing anything. I do not believe that was possible.
10 Q. Look, please, at paragraph 41, where you describe the corps
11 headquarters at Lukavica. How many times did you go to that headquarters
12 in Lukavica?
13 A. At least half a dozen. We visited it before -- we usually visited
14 Lukavica -- before visiting the local firemen or meeting with someone in
15 Pale, we would usually stop in Lukavica, just to stop and say hello before
16 we went about our business.
17 Q. In paragraph 44 you describe an incident where UNPROFOR soldiers
18 came under attack where you were present. Do you know, were you able to
19 tell, on that occasion where the firing came from?
20 A. Yes. We were on our way to the US embassy for a country team
21 meeting prior to the arrival of President Carter, and a spasm of shooting
22 started in front of the Holiday Inn that included small arms, automatic
23 weapons, a couple of mortar rounds, a couple of RPGs. Just a 10-,
24 15-minute flare of random violence that came and went.
25 Q. But my question was: Were you able to determine where that fire
Page 2646
1 came from?
2 A. Yes. It was coming from the BSA-occupied buildings to the south
3 of the museum.
4 Q. Did you -- now this is a question that does not pertain to a
5 specific paragraph in your statement. Did you become aware of a tunnel in
6 the area of the airport?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. And could you just briefly describe that. Did you yourself go
9 into that tunnel?
10 A. Yes, five times altogether.
11 Q. Could you just briefly describe it for the Trial Chamber.
12 A. The tunnel could have benefitted from a good engineer; I would
13 recommend Vietnamese myself. It was particularly narrow; half the time
14 full of water; one-way traffic; had a small rail system to put carts on
15 that constantly fell apart; lights that constantly went out; a ventilation
16 system that was inadequate. A ratty little water-filled tunnel.
17 Q. Another topic. Did you ever hear of Bosnian government sniping
18 positions at the museum?
19 A. The Bosnian government maintained sniping positions opposite their
20 protagonists just about everywhere in Sarajevo. Never heard of them in
21 the museum itself but out back.
22 Q. Did you ever hear of those snipers at the back of the museum
23 firing on their own people, that is, firing on people on the Bosnian
24 government side?
25 A. Yes, I heard about that all the time but never saw it myself, nor
Page 2647
1 do I believe it to have occurred, since that was one of the areas where we
2 would pre-position ourselves quite often. And if I'd seen or believed
3 that to be occurring for one second, I would have pulled my people out and
4 informed authorities that that's what was happening, just like I did with
5 the mortar.
6 Q. Finally, I'm just going to show you a few brief clips and perhaps
7 one document to finish up.
8 MR. WHITING: If we could switch to the Sanction and look at clip
9 number 2.
10 Q. And I'm going to ask you, sir, when this occurred and maybe one or
11 two other questions about it.
12 [Videotape played]
13 MR. WHITING:
14 Q. Mr. Jordan, to your recollection, when did that occur?
15 A. That was December 1993.
16 Q. And approximately where in Sarajevo is that?
17 A. It was a residential district just north of the PTT building.
18 Q. On that occasion, did the -- after the building collapsed and
19 while the rescue was going on, was there any -- did the rescuers come
20 under any shelling or sniping?
21 A. They did not come under sniper fire. There was a lengthy
22 inconsistent artillery, i.e., rockets in this case. It was a rocket that
23 brought the building down. The rescue of the child would not have been
24 possible had we not been in contact with the Lukavica barracks via PTT,
25 who, when we told them that it was a residential area, that there were
Page 2648
1 children trapped, could they please cease-fire, they did. And that's when
2 the UN troops were sent up to assist us with their heavy equipment.
3 MR. WHITING: Could this clip be admitted into evidence, please.
4 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.
5 THE REGISTRAR: As Exhibit P269, Your Honours.
6 JUDGE MINDUA: [Interpretation] Witness, did you shoot that video
7 or was it the UN?
8 THE WITNESS: I believe the video was given to us by whichever
9 international journalist happened to shoot it. I cannot say I remember
10 who.
11 MR. WHITING: Thank you, Your Honour.
12 Could we look at the next clip. It's clip number --
13 JUDGE ROBINSON: Ms. Isailovic is on her feet.
14 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] I'm sorry, Your Honour. Maybe
15 something needs to be clarified, because I have only one video clip on my
16 list and I believe that this is the clip that we've just seen. In order
17 to be able to refer back to the evidence, is this the same video with
18 another 65 ter number? And will it have various numbers afterwards as
19 exhibits? For the future, in order to be able to refer back to these
20 documents, I need some clarification.
21 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Whiting.
22 MR. WHITING: Yes, Your Honour. These are all clips from one
23 video, and we've isolated clips. And as I play them and move them into
24 evidence, they will get new exhibit numbers -- I mean they will get, I'm
25 sorry, individual exhibit numbers.
Page 2649
1 If we could look at the next clip. It's clip number 3.
2 [Videotape played]
3 MR. WHITING:
4 Q. Mr. Jordan, do you know when this event occurred that is in this
5 video clip?
6 A. That incident is from the fall of 1994. I believe Trevor Gibson,
7 one of our personnel there, got shot in the butt that night.
8 JUDGE ROBINSON: Who was speaking in it?
9 THE WITNESS: The gentleman speaking is Mark Anderson. He was
10 Acting Deputy Chief of GOFRS at the time.
11 JUDGE ROBINSON: GOFRS being your NGO.
12 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
13 MR. WHITING:
14 Q. Mr. Jordan, it says that this occurred -- in the video clip it
15 says it occurred at 4.30. Do you know if that's 4.30 in the morning or
16 4.30 in the afternoon?
17 A. Afternoon.
18 MR. WHITING: Could this be admitted into evidence, please.
19 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.
20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] As Exhibit P270, Your Honours.
21 MR. WHITING: And finally the last clip is clip number 4.
22 [Videotape played]
23 MR. WHITING:
24 Q. Mr. Jordan, were you yourself present when that occurred, when
25 what we see on the video clip occurred?
Page 2650
1 A. No.
2 Q. Were men who worked under you, for your organisation, present?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. Did they tell you at the time what had happened there?
5 A. Yes. They were in a -- in front of the museum. It was a nice
6 day, so the snipers were active. Prior to this incident, a number of
7 people had been shot and wounded, so we set up to deal with any further
8 casualties. The young boy who was killed had just been talking to one of
9 my fire-fighters, Todd Bayly, and had asked him for candy. Todd told him
10 told, "Nema bombons," no candy, and he walked away with his mother. And
11 within a couple of metres, a single round killed the child and wounded the
12 mother. That's when the boys pulled the ambulance between the source of
13 the gun-fire and the child to recover his body, and later on evacuated the
14 wounded mother and the little girl.
15 Q. Did the people on location tell you anything about where the
16 source of fire came from, if they knew, if they had any information about
17 that?
18 A. Yes. Again, it was a nice day, and that seemed to bring out the
19 snipers. So the building behind the museum across the river, it was just
20 an active day for them. Again, not to be redundant, but on nice days, the
21 snipers came out. That's just the way it was.
22 Q. And did you speak with Todd Bayly in the past few days and confirm
23 your recollection about what he told you about what had occurred there?
24 A. Yes. It was the first time I had spoken to Todd in ten years. My
25 recollections were correct. The impetus in calling Todd was just to
Page 2651
1 answer a technical question about where the boy was standing, to the left
2 or right of the mother, which, to me, was moot. But I thought it might
3 help the Court in some manner, so we gave Todd a shout.
4 Q. And was Todd able to answer that question?
5 A. I don't remember. Was he? Yes or no? I don't know. I forgot.
6 Q. Okay. Fair enough.
7 MR. WHITING: Could this clip please be put into evidence, Your
8 Honours.
9 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.
10 THE REGISTRAR: As Exhibit P271, Your Honours.
11 MR. WHITING: Could we look now at 65 ter number 2960. And if we
12 could -- it's the same picture on both sides. If we could blow it up.
13 Q. Does this photograph pertain to the incident that we just saw the
14 clip about?
15 A. Yes. It was shot by an Associated Press photographer who was on
16 scene. It shows Todd Bayly of Canada right next to our vehicle. The
17 other gentleman is Trevor Gibson of Scotland. They have just pulled away
18 from the museum and put the -- that's our armoured ambulance between the
19 child and the gun-fire. You can see, I believe, the crosswalk is still
20 there.
21 Q. And what is the building that you can see behind there in the
22 upper right of the photograph?
23 A. That would be the museum.
24 MR. WHITING: Could this photograph be admitted into evidence,
25 please.
Page 2652
1 I'm sorry, one last question.
2 Q. I think you have already addressed this, but just to be clear,
3 what is the significance of where the vehicle is located?
4 A. The vehicle is between the child and the man who killed him,
5 straight down that street to the high buildings controlled by the BSA.
6 JUDGE ROBINSON: Have you finished or you want it admitted?
7 MR. WHITING: Admit it, please, Your Honour.
8 JUDGE ROBINSON: Did he say what GOFRS means?
9 MR. WHITING: I believe it's in the statement, but he can say.
10 THE WITNESS: It means Global Operation Fire Rescue Services, sir.
11 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you.
12 THE REGISTRAR: Your Honours, we'll admit this as Exhibit P272.
13 MR. WHITING: And finally, I've gone a little bit over time, but
14 with the indulgence of the Court, just one last document. It's 65 ter
15 number 2961.
16 Q. Do you recognise this?
17 A. Yes, sir.
18 Q. What is it?
19 A. It's basically an "ata boy" from General Rose, a complimentary
20 letter.
21 Q. Thank you.
22 MR. WHITING: Could this be admitted into evidence, please.
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.
24 THE REGISTRAR: As Exhibit P273, Your Honours.
25 MR. WHITING: Thank you, Your Honours.
Page 2653
1 Q. Thank you, Mr. Jordan. I have no further questions.
2 [Trial Chamber confers]
3 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Ms. Isailovic.
4 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour.
5 Cross-examination by Ms. Isailovic:
6 Q. [Interpretation] Good morning, Mr. Jordan. I'm Branislava
7 Isailovic, an attorney with the Paris Bar, and I'm defending General
8 Milosevic, accused here in these proceedings. And with you, I'm going to
9 ask you a few questions. I'm sure my colleague told you about the
10 procedure. We're going to examine you about -- especially on your
11 statement, the statement that you gave to the OTP on August 22nd, 23rd,
12 24th, 2006. A number of questions have already been dealt with. And I'm
13 also going to use a number of documents that have to do with the
14 statement.
15 So, first and foremost, Mr. Jordan, I would like to start with
16 this organisation of yours. It's an NGO; right?
17 A. Yes, ma'am.
18 Q. If I understood you right, this NGO is under American law, right,
19 was established under American law?
20 A. That would be correct, for tax purposes.
21 Q. And regarding authorisations to perform missions on the Bosnian
22 territory, it depended on the Bosnian government, I guess.
23 A. Yes. We needed their permission to operate in their areas of
24 control and BSA permission to operate in their areas of control.
25 Q. My question is on the administrative procedures that you had to go
Page 2654
1 through. I guess that, according to Bosnian law, you had to register your
2 company with some kind of authority. Did you do that?
3 A. I had dropped off paperwork about our organisation with the
4 Bosnian government a number of times. Their administrative procedures
5 are -- how can I say? If I can't say anything nice, I probably shouldn't
6 say. But that would probably best describe their administrative
7 procedures.
8 Q. And this administrative procedure, was there some kind of official
9 document about your NGO that eventually was drafted or something? Was
10 there any kind of official paper?
11 A. There had to be at one point or another, but because we were under
12 UNHCR and because we carried UNHCR ID, it was kind of a blanket thing.
13 Even though the Bosnian government did afford us with ID in the early days
14 before we became part of the UN, a lot that occurred during UNHCR and
15 UNPROFOR operations in this area was ad hoc. They were doing things they
16 had never done before, and from what I've learned, they have done things
17 they have never done since.
18 Q. So to try and help us continue with other evidence, could you tell
19 us exactly when exactly you -- when exactly you became part of the UNHCR?
20 When did you come under their auspices?
21 A. The UNHCR had two levels of auspices. They gave out UNHCR ID
22 cards to hundreds of organisations from 1992 to 1995. This was, in
23 effect, the UNHCR telling the warring parties that these organisations are
24 legitimate. The next level was what was called implementing partner
25 status. An organisation received implementing partner status with the
Page 2655
1 UNHCR when it accepted funding from them.
2 We had operated on our own from November 1992 until, I believe it
3 was, March 1993, the first time the UN offered us funding. That did not
4 actually occur until, I believe, May or June, when the paperwork was
5 worked out. At that point, GOFRS, which was our organisation, implemented
6 what we came to call the UN Fire an Emergency Medical Service, UN Fire
7 EMS. I'm not sure anyone told Boutros-Ghali, but that is the way it was.
8 Q. Yes, Mr. Jordan, on this last question regarding all this, on the
9 videos I noticed that you were still -- you still had your NGO emblems.
10 Was that true, after you became part of UN?
11 A. Our uniforms, station uniforms, if you will, were the dark blue
12 ones with white "UN Fire EMS" on the pocket and "GOFRS" on your shoulder,
13 the equivalent to when WHO puts its logo on aircraft. Even though it's
14 part of the UN, UNHCR is part of the UN, they put "UNHCR" on their
15 aircraft. Basically in that venue.
16 Q. And financially, did you have donations? Did this NGO get
17 donations?
18 A. Yes, we received donations from the international fire-fighting
19 community, primarily the US as far as dollars went. Different European
20 fire-fighting agencies donated many vehicles and equipment which was
21 compatible with that which the locals on both sides used in Sarajevo. We
22 delivered three trucks in one day once; a red one for the Bosnian
23 government, a green one for the Bosnian Serbs, because their equipment was
24 green, and a white one for UNHCR, all from Europe and compatible with the
25 equipment in use.
Page 2656
1 Q. These donations to the two sides, as well, to the UNHCR, were
2 they -- was it donated to your organisation and then you gave them, turned
3 them over, or how did the parties eventually get those trucks?
4 A. We didn't give anything to the UNHCR. We gave everything to the
5 locals on both sides based on need. Say, for example, on one occasion we
6 had, like, 400 pairs of boots come in. We actually divided them up by
7 size in the Sarajevo Bosnian government firehouse, the old one on
8 Jablanica Street, and the local firemen there helped us sort it out. And
9 I think we took 100 sets of boots over to Grbavica because they had less
10 firemen than the locals. It was a question of dividing stuff up.
11 JUDGE ROBINSON: Ms. Isailovic, we're going to take the break for
12 20 minutes.
13 --- Recess taken at 12.21 p.m.
14 --- On resuming at 12.44 p.m.
15 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, please continue.
16 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation]
17 Q. Mr. Jordan, let's continue. Let's go back to what we were talking
18 about before the break.
19 You did not show the funding act of your NGO, nor did you show the
20 balance -- the balance sheet of your NGO to the Prosecutor; am I right?
21 A. That would be correct. Yes, ma'am.
22 Q. Do you have them at home?
23 A. I don't think so. Anything ten years old -- I haven't been in the
24 States much since then, so I don't think I have got them laying around.
25 Maybe one of the other guys does.
Page 2657
1 Q. Thank you. Now, let's move to something you mention in your
2 statement, something you also discussed today regarding your military
3 career. You joined the US Army when you were 17; is that correct?
4 A. No, ma'am. I joined the US Marines when I was 17.
5 Q. I see. I don't know much about this, but isn't that part of the
6 US Army?
7 A. No, ma'am. It's actually -- pardon me. It's actually within the
8 department of the navy.
9 Q. Okay. I have just received an explanation from my French
10 interpreter. But you were a platoon head or sniper, as a sniper?
11 A. Yes, ma'am. My last job was Chief Scout Sniper of an infantry
12 battalion. That fell within the STANO platoon, STANO meaning
13 surveillance, target acquisition, and night operations.
14 Q. But am I right in saying that from 1993 -- I'm sorry, no. 1973,
15 yes, that's what I meant. When you were 17, you started your military
16 career, so to speak, as a marine or as a soldier at least.
17 A. Yes, ma'am.
18 Q. If I understood correctly your statement, you specialise in
19 sniping.
20 A. Yes, ma'am.
21 Q. And your task in Sarajevo had to do with fire, and of course this
22 could be understood in different ways. You were a fire-fighter, so you
23 were fighting against fire and fires; right?
24 A. Yes, ma'am.
25 Q. And to be more specific, in paragraph 15, and I believe this is a
Page 2658
1 paragraph you discussed with Mr. Whiting a moment ago, paragraph 15 of
2 your statement, you referred to this other type of fire, mainly shooting.
3 Is that correct?
4 A. Yes, ma'am.
5 Q. And in a way, your task in Sarajevo was also to fight snipers, if
6 I understood correctly.
7 A. It did evolve into that, ma'am.
8 Q. Mr. Jordan, were you aware of the Anti-Sniping Agreement which was
9 signed by the warring factions?
10 A. I had heard of it, yes, ma'am.
11 Q. And did you know that the French Battalion, I believe, was in
12 charge of this anti-sniping fight?
13 A. I know they were in charge of it at one time. I believe the duty
14 rotated among UN forces. Whoever had reaction duty would respond to
15 sniping, but we found the vast majority of UN forces reluctant to actually
16 do what they said they were going to do on paper.
17 Q. In a sense, what they were supposed to do on paper was done by you
18 in practice.
19 A. Our mission was to assist the fire-fighters on both sides in
20 whatever way we could. We found that they were very -- on both sides,
21 they were very competent fire-fighters, they used similar equipment, but
22 their biggest need after equipment was protection and fuel. So it fell to
23 us as part of the overall job.
24 Q. If I understood, when you arrived in Sarajevo, you had a specific
25 task which was, in fact, to protect fire-fighters. Wasn't that the case?
Page 2659
1 A. No. My first -- when I first arrived in Sarajevo, it was to see
2 what they needed. I was quite surprised to find out that the primary need
3 of fire-fighters on both sides was protection. I was ignorant of UN
4 operations. I had never been involved in one, so I thought the UN was
5 protecting the firemen and didn't find out until I got there that they
6 really weren't.
7 Q. Yes, that's what I was driving at when I asked the question. You
8 realised then that UNPROFOR was not protecting these people; is that
9 right?
10 A. Not consistently, ma'am, no.
11 Q. And specifically in this case of fire-fighters who were just doing
12 their job; right?
13 A. Yes. In the course of doing their normal duties, firemen on both
14 sides would be targeted and were taken casualty.
15 Q. And at that stage your mission, so to speak, changed a little bit
16 and became more a fight against snipers than the protection of
17 fire-fighters. Am I right in saying so?
18 A. It was an element. We still did an awful lot of fire-fighting,
19 medical, and transport of supplies. We did an awful lot of talking with
20 both side to keep lines of communication open, and that minimised the
21 violence against both sides. The UN protection order of September 1993
22 drastically reduced the violence against both sides' firemen.
23 When we did have to respond, we did so with reluctance, not
24 relish. It became a focus of people, like the media, but we never
25 considered it the biggest part of what we were trying to do. We tried to
Page 2660
1 reduce the violence in many ways.
2 Q. In paragraph 15 of your statement, a moment ago you referred to
3 this procedure; I'll call it the spotting procedure, when you were trying
4 to spot snipers.
5 A. Yes, ma'am.
6 Q. Very often you located snipers and then you would convey that
7 information to UNPROFOR; is that correct?
8 A. Yes, that was what we tried to do.
9 Q. You see, before this Trial Chamber, we've seen a lot of sitreps,
10 or situation reports, emanating from UNPROFOR. I myself did not realise
11 that your mission was in fact defined on those situation reports. Do you
12 know more about this?
13 A. I am not at all surprised that there may be little to no
14 documentation of exactly what our job evolved into. Even with regards to
15 the September 1993 paperwork from UNPROFOR, because UNPROFOR troops in
16 Sarajevo generally only spent 90 days there, there was a constant rotation
17 and there was -- in the military, one makes an effort to pass on
18 information to the person who relieves him. This was severely lacking in
19 UN operations. We were constantly having to reintroduce ourselves to
20 every new UN unit that came in, and some of them told us right to our
21 face, No, the French wrote this; we're not going to do it. So we just
22 handled it ourselves and no one ever told us not to.
23 Q. You did it of your own accord, then.
24 A. Not so much of our own accord. When the system broke down because
25 of UN reluctance to do what it said it was going to do, we merely
Page 2661
1 exercised our right of self-defence. We never got involved in what I
2 would call real estate deals, i.e., combat, trading lives for real estate,
3 to control a piece of ground. That was never something we did. We were
4 also careful not to allow either side to manipulate us into being a force
5 multiplier for them. We were very careful of that.
6 Q. Yes. So you also did some stand-by duty on a number of
7 locations. On the days when the weather was good, you said that you were
8 on stand-by duty.
9 A. Yes. Again, different days snipers would be active.
10 [French on English channel]
11 MR. WHITING: Excuse me, we're getting French on the English
12 channel.
13 JUDGE ROBINSON: We are getting French.
14 THE INTERPRETER: Any English now on the English channel?
15 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.
16 THE INTERPRETER: Sorry, there was a little glitch.
17 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation]
18 Q. So those people were people belonging to your NGO. Those people
19 were on stand-by duty. It was your staff.
20 A. Yes. When we saw the violence level increase in any one area for
21 whatever reason, we would pre-position folks there to reduce our response
22 time to casualties.
23 Q. Who made those decisions regarding the intensity of combat? Who
24 was there to estimate the level of combat violence so that you would go
25 to -- be on stand-by duty?
Page 2662
1 A. The casualties made that decision. When we heard somebody had
2 been shot and needed assistance, we would respond. If, in the course of
3 taking that person to the hospital, we found that another person had been
4 shot in the same location, it was the indicators. It was -- it was the
5 violence equivalent of looking up at the clouds and deciding it's probably
6 going to rain today, that kind of thing.
7 Q. So, if I understood you right, the source of your information were
8 mainly the casualties that you encountered when you were going to the
9 hospital. Is that it?
10 A. No. We wouldn't be going to the hospital and then seeing
11 casualties. If there were multiple casualties in a given area, that is a
12 good indicator that the snipers are busy. So we would then -- instead of
13 going back to our station after dropping of a casualty, we would go back
14 to the area where the casualties seemed to be turning up.
15 Q. Yes, but those casualties, did they come to see you, or was it you
16 who went to see them? That was the question.
17 A. In the majority of cases, we responded to the casualties. We had
18 a few, what we call, walk-in patients at the fire station, but the
19 majority of folks who had been shot were in no position to walk. So we
20 would go to them, particularly if they were wounded in an exposed
21 position, because our ambulance was armoured. The locals had no armoured
22 ambulance.
23 Q. Mr. Jordan, can we agree to say that the place where -- this
24 museum that we mentioned earlier was part of those hot spots, if I could
25 say so?
Page 2663
1 A. That would be entirely correct, ma'am.
2 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] I would like my case manager to
3 display photograph 2819 in the 65 ter list. It's already been tendered as
4 P88, has already been tendered into evidence as P88.
5 Could the usher please come and help Mr. Jordan to show him how to
6 work the electronic pen.
7 Q. Mr. Jordan, here on the screen we have an aerial view of Sarajevo,
8 a part of Sarajevo. Do you recognise it?
9 A. Yes, ma'am.
10 Q. Can you find your way in this photograph? Do you know what is on
11 the photograph?
12 A. It's relatively familiar to me. Yes, ma'am.
13 Q. Let's start with Miljacka? Do you see it on this photograph, the
14 river Miljacka?
15 A. One cannot actually see the river, but it's in the line of trees
16 between the museum and this line of flats here. It runs right along here.
17 Q. Thank you. Could you please mark this with an M, like the river,
18 Miljacka, M.
19 A. [Marks].
20 Q. Now, the bottom part of the picture, is this Grbavica?
21 A. Part of it, yes, ma'am.
22 Q. Could you show us the delineation of Grbavica. You said it's only
23 part of it. Could you show us where it is. Show us where Grbavica is in
24 relation to that line.
25 A. Yes, ma'am. I believe the actual part of Grbavica is the low part
Page 2664
1 down here, here and here, that way, I think, with that building being
2 split because it was split among the forces. The higher ground actually,
3 I think, has a different name, if I remember right. But this was Grbavica
4 and it kind of stuck out from the kidney-shaped rest of the area.
5 Q. Yes. So when you're saying there is a split building, could you
6 expand on this, please, and mark it.
7 A. I believe it was this building right here, where I have this other
8 line, that actually had both sides' forces in it at one time. It was not
9 really an area where we would go because there was no civilian activity
10 there. We did work up to the front lines on a number of occasions where
11 there were residences near the front lines. But this whole area here was
12 basically a no-go area for us because there was nothing but troops down
13 around there and that wasn't our end.
14 Q. Could you be more specific on those troops? Where were they
15 stationed? Could you tell us where they were located, those troops?
16 A. Again, we didn't concern ourselves with the actual specifics. We
17 knew the areas they were in. For example, in front of the museum up here
18 is where we would position ourselves to protect folks moving up and down
19 the main drag, because they would be fired on -- this was probably the
20 busiest zone right here. But to go down where the troops were actually
21 looking at each other was not our end of it, so we did not do that.
22 Again, we had no business right where the troops were facing each other.
23 We only came in proximity to them where maybe a building was partially
24 occupied by military.
25 Q. Yes. But could you show us that place on that photograph. We
Page 2665
1 can't see it here. What part of the photograph are you talking about when
2 you're saying that there were troops? I haven't really understood where
3 those troops were.
4 A. It was my understanding that the Bosnian government had troops on
5 their side of the river here, and I know that the BSA forces occupied some
6 of these higher structures because that's where they would fire from.
7 Presumably, the Bosnians engaged them from back here, but I couldn't see
8 that because we stayed up here. Again, we had no business running around
9 back here.
10 Q. Thank you, Mr. Jordan. Could you mark where you put the several
11 lines. Put "ABiH" for, you know, the Bosnian government army.
12 A. [Marks].
13 Q. Sir, earlier you mentioned snipers who were behind the museum, in
14 the back of the museum. Could you show that exactly on the map, on this
15 photograph. I'm sure that you see the museum in the buildings, so could
16 you tell us where the snipers were, those who were in the back of the
17 museum?
18 A. I could not, ma'am, because I never went back there. That, again,
19 was not our end. There were no civilians living in those structures, and
20 if -- if the military had any casualties there, they evacuated them
21 themselves because we didn't. We were up here where the civilians were,
22 the front line. Again, while there were some houses where the back of the
23 house was the front line and the other side of it was where civilians
24 lived, that's where we would get in proximity. But this is not an area
25 where any of my guys would be messing around, unless he wanted to get
Page 2666
1 fired.
2 Q. So if you could please mark the split building with a letter. Put
3 a D, as in "Daniel," on that split building, please.
4 A. Is a circle good enough? That's the building I seem to remember
5 was split.
6 Q. On this photograph, do you see other buildings that would be below
7 the Miljacka but that were on territory controlled by the BiH army?
8 A. Well, again, it's not the area we went, but one can assume that
9 since the river was the boundary here to some point over here - and again
10 I wouldn't know where that is right over here - it would be -- I mean, one
11 could assume that the Bosnian government had folks in buildings along
12 here, but I can't say I know.
13 Q. We'll come back to that. But before tendering this photograph,
14 could you please tell me on this photograph the place where the incident
15 we mentioned occurred, you know, where the little boy was killed with his
16 mother.
17 A. At that intersection.
18 Q. Could you please place a number 5 here, because this is our
19 incident number 5. Maybe draw a line to the circle so we can see that the
20 5 has to do with that circle at the intersection.
21 A. [Marks].
22 Q. And now this street that runs parallel to the river and that goes
23 in front of that yellow building, do you know that avenue?
24 A. I don't know the name of it, ma'am, no.
25 Q. But isn't it the avenue that used to be called "Sniper Alley"?
Page 2667
1 Isn't that the one?
2 A. Ma'am, in my experience, there were a number of places referred to
3 as "Sniper Alley." A very large lack of consistency with names of things
4 in the town.
5 Q. First, before we actually tender this photograph, could you tell
6 me if you see two high-rises that are in the top right of this photograph?
7 A. Yes, ma'am. It would be the Unis towers, I believe they were
8 called.
9 Q. According to your memory, did BiH snipers -- were BiH snipers
10 located in those towers?
11 A. I think it would be correct to assume so. Can't say I saw any. I
12 think it's a lousy sniping position, to tell you the truth.
13 Q. Could you mark these high-rises with the letter U, letter U, like
14 "Unis."
15 A. [Marks].
16 Q. Do you see the government's building?
17 A. Yes, ma'am, the old parliament.
18 Q. And could you place a letter G on this building.
19 A. G, ma'am?
20 Q. Yes.
21 A. [Marks].
22 Q. The other building that's not quite as high, was it also part of
23 the government building, as far as your memory goes?
24 A. I don't remember, ma'am, if that was actually part of the
25 government complex or something else.
Page 2668
1 Q. Do you remember whether BiH snipers were located in the government
2 building?
3 A. I don't know. I never saw any shooting from there. Our
4 relationship with the snipers on both sides was restricted to whether or
5 not they engaged us. We didn't seek a relationship with them and didn't
6 get to know them.
7 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I would like to
8 tender this annotated photograph into evidence.
9 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, we admit it.
10 THE REGISTRAR: As Exhibit D79, Your Honours.
11 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation]
12 Q. Mr. Jordan --
13 JUDGE HARHOFF: Counsel, while we are still at that photo, could
14 you please ask the witness to explain just why he thought the Unis
15 building would be a bad sniping position.
16 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, according to what I
17 heard in my headphones, I didn't hear really well the witness, but I
18 believe what he said was quite the opposite. But I can put the question
19 again to the witness.
20 Q. Mr. Jordan, a moment ago we talked about the Unis towers. You put
21 the letter U on those buildings. Judge Harhoff wanted me to put the
22 question to you again: Was this place a good sniping location or not?
23 A. Personally, I wouldn't use it because it's a tall, cold, isolated
24 building, and if you tried to take a shot out of it, anybody within 2.000
25 metres and a good thermo-sight would know you were moving about the
Page 2669
1 building. It's actually too high, in my opinion. It should be a little
2 closer to the ground with access in and out. The building being isolated,
3 largely glass all the way around, no, I wouldn't pick it.
4 Q. Yes, it is a glass building now. But you could have used other
5 storeys in the building, less high than the top of the building.
6 A. The idea of the sniper way up in the building, the sniper way up
7 in the tree, is propagated largely by Hollywood. Snipers like to stay
8 close to the ground. It gives you more options. If you do have to get up
9 in a building with this equipment that is available today, and would have
10 been available then, I would avoid something like that myself, but that's
11 just me.
12 Q. So it's, in fact, an idea that laypeople have, people not
13 specialised in sniping. We believe that you have to be high up somewhere
14 to be able to shoot properly. Is that a false impression that we have?
15 A. You can shoot properly from up high, but you stand the chance of
16 isolating yourself. There have been a number of unfortunate incidents in
17 my country of men shooting from buildings. Those men generally wind up
18 dead because they can't get out of them before the police arrive. It's
19 much the same in a military environment. One always leaves himself a way
20 out. If you are in a tall building like that, shooting out the top of it,
21 and eventually you're going to have to leave when people try to counter
22 you, you're going to have to go through all those cold floors where
23 somebody with a thermo-sight can spot you and ruin your day. That's just
24 me.
25 Q. If I understand you right, if somebody is waiting for you
Page 2670
1 downstairs, your friends, then there's no particular danger.
2 A. You've got to get to them. Again, it's just -- it's just me. To
3 say that -- that somebody not 100 per cent properly trained would do it,
4 that's on them. I'm only giving my opinion here.
5 Q. Thank you very much.
6 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] We will keep that photograph. Can
7 we have an exhibit number, please.
8 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.
9 THE REGISTRAR: That will be D79, Your Honour -- I'm sorry,
10 Exhibit D80.
11 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] Thank you.
12 Q. If you remember, a moment ago you discussed a particular incident
13 with the Prosecution, an incident which took place on the 18th of
14 November, 1994. We've just shown the location.
15 A. Yes, ma'am.
16 Q. I'd like to have displayed on the screen, first of all, a report
17 that we reviewed this morning as well.
18 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] This is 65 ter 1484 admitted as
19 Exhibit D19.
20 Q. While we're waiting for that exhibit, Mr. Jordan, do you remember
21 that you said that several of your colleagues were there that day?
22 A. Yes, ma'am.
23 Q. Maybe I could reed your statement. This is paragraph 12.
24 [In English] "Trevor Gibson from Scotland, Randy Henderson and
25 Mark Anderson from the USA ..."
Page 2671
1 [Interpretation] Were these people on site?
2 A. I believed Todd Bayly was also there and I don't see his name.
3 Q. Yes, it is here. The first one to be mentioned, Todd Bayly from
4 Montreal, if this is the same person we're talking about.
5 A. The document I'm talking at --
6 Q. No, no, no. Look at your own statement. Paragraph 12. I'm
7 sorry.
8 A. Pardon me, ma'am. I was looking at the monitor.
9 I'm at paragraph 12, ma'am.
10 Q. Well, somewhere in the middle, Todd Bayly, Trevor Gibson, Randy
11 Henderson and Mark Anderson are mentioned.
12 A. Yes, ma'am.
13 Q. These were the only members of your NGO, as far as you can
14 remember, who were there at the time.
15 A. Yes, ma'am, they were the four men on duty.
16 Q. Did the information you receive on that particular incident come
17 from them as well?
18 A. Yes. I had spoke to all of them about the incident and they all
19 gave me their versions, which varied slightly. But, yes, I spoke to them
20 all about it.
21 Q. Did these men agree on the specific location of the incident?
22 A. The location of the incident was consistent with all the men.
23 Yes, ma'am.
24 Q. Is that the place that you've just encircled, put a circle around,
25 on the photograph that we were looking at a moment ago?
Page 2672
1 A. Yes, ma'am, the one I identified with a number 5.
2 Q. Is that the place you saw on the photograph which was shown to you
3 by the Prosecutor, where the poor kid can be seen on the ground?
4 A. Yes, ma'am.
5 Q. Will you agree with me to say that this was on a zebra crossing?
6 A. I believe in the photo it shows the child down right on the white
7 crossing marks. Yes, ma'am.
8 Q. As far as you can remember about this incident and the memories
9 you have of other incidents, do you remember the relationship you had with
10 the local police?
11 A. I would have to say: Which local police? It was a bit of a joke
12 with us that you never knew which local police you were going to be
13 dealing with. The BiH forces did not have consistent command and
14 control. I could have a pass saying that I could operate at night all
15 over from one guy and go to respond to a fire at night and I would get
16 stopped by somebody else's police. The police were inconsistent. You --
17 you know, they were like a box of chocolates; you never knew what you were
18 going to get from them.
19 Q. Mr. Jordan, normally when incidents took place -- we've heard here
20 a lot of policemen who came to testify before this Chamber and they
21 brought with them the reports that they'd established on the occasion of
22 such incidents. Do you remember a specific incident which you
23 witnessed -- first of all, do you remember any incident during which you
24 personally were there at the time when the police came?
25 A. Some form of police would just about always show up. But as far
Page 2673
1 as a police officer taking statements, pulling out a clipboard and doing a
2 job like a police officer would do somewhere else, I literally cannot
3 remember that happening. The only times I remember anything like that
4 happening was when they were trying to give us a hard time about
5 something, you know, a person -- we took a person's body out of a fire and
6 took it to the morgue and dropped it off, and the next day they were at
7 the fire station alleging some kind of incompetence on our part, you know,
8 wanting details, and I basically told them to go to hell; you should have
9 shown up at the fire. The police were, in my mind, nothing less than
10 unprofessional. So no, I never saw them do anything like that.
11 Q. Very well, Mr. Jordan. We'll deal with what we have. We have a
12 report, among others, a report that is now being displayed on the screen.
13 There is a translation in English as well. I would like us to focus on
14 page 5 first, page 5 of this report that we have.
15 Mr. Cerimagic Salko and Pilav Sulejman, the two drafters of this
16 official report, and they're talking here about Mr. Joshua Wooding with
17 UNHCR accreditation, a member of the GOFRS NGO, G-O-F-R-S. This is your
18 colleague, Joshua?
19 A. He was one of my personnel, yes. Josh.
20 Q. So how do you explain the fact that they found Joshua and that
21 Joshua didn't say anything about this incident to you, if I understood
22 correctly?
23 A. Well, Josh probably did at one point or another. I just didn't --
24 it's 11 years. And as far as police reports go, a lot of these reports
25 were generated after incidents that some of these cops weren't even at. I
Page 2674
1 guess the best example is the Bosnian fire chief himself attended a
2 function in Prague in 1995 and made a point of saying the west had
3 completely abandoned the Sarajevo fire department, which I found a little
4 bit miffing after three years of being involved and trying to do things.
5 They developed reports to suit their agendas, not reflect the facts, in my
6 regard.
7 Q. Well, maybe we should leave that document aside, but let me
8 continue nevertheless. It is very interesting. Maybe it does confirm
9 what you just said in fact.
10 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] Let's have a look at the English
11 text because it's easier to read. In the B/C/S version, this is the page
12 that is currently on the screen, and the corresponding paragraph is on the
13 next page in the English version. Yes.
14 Q. Can you see the paragraph starting with "There was ..."?
15 A. Yes, ma'am.
16 Q. Can you read it?
17 A. Yes. Would you like me to read it out loud?
18 Q. Yes, please.
19 A. "There was a blood-stain on the spot where the woman and the boy
20 were wounded which members of UNPROFOR, who later arrived at the site,
21 washed with water and later covered with earth, before the arrival of the
22 on-site investigation team. The interview conducted at Sarajevo KCU
23 admissions and triage dispensary yielded information --"
24 Q. That will do, thank you. About that particular paragraph, it is
25 quite unbelievable, isn't it, for people coming from normal countries, so
Page 2675
1 to speak?
2 MR. WHITING: I'm going to object. I don't think there is a
3 foundation for this witness to start commenting on whether a report like
4 this or what's recounted in the report is unbelievable or not. The
5 witness was not at this event and the witness was not involved in law
6 enforcement activities. He was involved in fire rescue activities. For
7 him to comment on law enforcement procedures is really beyond his
8 capacity. And so I think it's a question that is -- it goes way beyond
9 his capacity and is irrelevant for that reason.
10 [Trial Chamber confers]
11 JUDGE ROBINSON: We'll allow the question.
12 THE WITNESS: Actually, I'm not surprised that UNPROFOR personnel
13 did that. There was an incident where we responded to an accident
14 involving UN personnel whose tire had been shot out, and there was a car
15 that went out of control and one man was killed and one was injured. We
16 noted bullet-holes in the tire rim at the time of the accident, and when
17 we went to look at the car the next day, the wheel was gone. So for
18 whatever its own reasons, UNPROFOR -- you know, what doesn't happen they
19 don't have to react to. They did that on occasion. I can't say they
20 didn't because we just saw them do it.
21 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] I believe that this line of
22 questioning was started by the Prosecutor on that specific incident, so
23 I'd like to continue on, on that particular incident.
24 Q. You know that on the spot a photograph was taken of this poor kid.
25 A. Are you referring, ma'am, to the Associated Press photo?
Page 2676
1 Q. Yes, yes. This is the photograph showing the kid as well as two
2 of your men --
3 A. Right.
4 Q. -- on site where the incident took place.
5 A. Yes, ma'am, I have seen the photo.
6 Q. Maybe we could see this picture and discuss it for a moment.
7 MS. ISAILOVIC: [Interpretation] This is P272, 65 ter 2960.
8 Q. From what I understood - I have it here on paper, while we're
9 waiting for it to be displayed on screen - this photograph was published
10 the next day, the day after the incident took place, in the Providence
11 Journal. Did you know that?
12 A. If you saw so, ma'am. I didn't see it in the Providence Journal,
13 but it could have happened.
14 Q. Would you please have a look at the upper part of -- maybe we
15 could enlarge the picture a little.
16 A. I see it, ma'am.
17 Q. Is this the Rhode Island Journal, this place where you come from?
18 A. Providence is the capital, and because our organisation originated
19 in Rhode Island, a lot of our activities were quickly passed on to Rhode
20 Island for local consumption. So I'm not surprised.
21 Q. Do you, by any chance, remember how this picture was sent to the
22 newspaper?
23 A. No idea, ma'am, how these things occurred. But the media being
24 the media, it wasn't my end.
25 Q. According to you, nobody from your NGO got in touch with a
Page 2677
1 journalist from the Providence Journal.
2 A. As far as I know, no. I'd have a problem with them if they did.
3 Q. This picture confirms what you said earlier, i.e., that the
4 location where the incident took place is indeed the zebra crossing. This
5 is shown on the picture; right?
6 A. Yes, ma'am.
7 Q. As far as you remember and according to the conversations you had
8 with your colleagues, did anyone move the body of this poor kid at one
9 stage or another, except, of course, when it was put into the van and
10 brought to the morgue?
11 A. It is my understanding that the child fell where he was hit and
12 was not moved again until the guys put him in the ambulance after
13 realising he was dead. It was a through-and-through gun-shot wound to the
14 head, so there wasn't much question of that. As far as I understand, he
15 fell where he was hit.
16 Q. And, indeed, one of your colleagues saw him, talked to him a
17 moment before, and saw him falling to the ground.
18 A. Yes. The child had stopped by the fire truck and had talked to
19 our guys. Yeah.
20 Q. Mr. Jordan, in your answer to the Prosecutor's question, let me
21 ask the question again: The building in the background, is it the museum
22 building?
23 A. Yes, ma'am.
24 Q. Is this the same building as the one we saw on the other
25 photograph, the one you put some markings on?
Page 2678
1 A. I think I marked the museum, yes, ma'am.
2 JUDGE ROBINSON: Ms. Isailovic, I'm going to dismiss the witness
3 for today. There's a matter I want to raise in private session.
4 So, Mr. Jordan, you may leave now and return tomorrow at 9.00 a.m.
5 THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
6 [The witness stands down]
7 [Private session]
8 (redacted)
9 (redacted)
10 (redacted)
11 (redacted)
12 (redacted)
13 (redacted)
14 (redacted)
15 (redacted)
16 (redacted)
17 (redacted)
18 (redacted)
19 (redacted)
20 (redacted)
21 (redacted)
22 (redacted)
23 (redacted)
24 (redacted)
25 (redacted)
Page 2679
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2 (redacted)
3 (redacted)
4 (redacted)
5 (redacted)
6 (redacted)
7 (redacted)
8 (redacted)
9 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 1.46 p.m.,
10 to be reconvened on Thursday, the 22nd day of
11 February, 2007, at 9.00 a.m.
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