1 Monday, 13th September, 1999
2 [Open session]
3 [The witness entered court]
4 --- Upon commencing at 2.07 p.m.
5 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Please be
6 seated. Registrar, will you please have the accused
7 brought in?
8 [The accused entered court]
9 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] First, of
10 course, I should like to see whether the interpreters
11 can hear me, if everybody is ready. I see that both
12 counsel for the Prosecution and Defence are here. The
13 accused has also arrived.
14 Shall we now have the protected witness
15 introduced, and I give the floor to Mr. Nice for the
16 Prosecution to beg and to introduce his witness. If
17 I'm correct, it is Witness N [sic].
18 MR. NICE: "M" or "N"? "M," I think.
19 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Just a moment,
20 because I have two documents here. I believe it is
21 "M."
22 MR. NICE: Yes.
23 WITNESS: WITNESS M
24 [Witness answers through interpreter]
25 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you.
1 Witness M, I am talking to you. Will you please sit
2 down? Do not stand up.
3 THE REGISTRAR: No, I believe that the
4 witness can stand up.
5 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Right. If you
6 hear me, will you please stand up for a few moments?
7 First, you will check on a piece of paper, on
8 a document. You will now see whether this is your
9 name, but do not pronounce it; just indicate whether it
10 is your name or not. Is it your name? Right.
11 A. [Indicates]
12 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Now you will
13 make the solemn declaration, please.
14 THE WITNESS: I solemnly declare that I will
15 speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the
16 truth.
17 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you. You
18 may be seated now. The Tribunal thank you for coming
19 here at the request of the Prosecutor in order to
20 testify in the trial conducted by the International
21 Tribunal against accused, Mr. Goran Jelisic, who is
22 sitting to your left.
23 Let me explain to you. First you will hear
24 the questions of the Prosecution; then of the Defence;
25 and then the Judges, if they wish so, will also ask you
1 some questions at the end of the examination-in-chief
2 and the cross-examination. You will tell us what you
3 have to say. Of course, it is very difficult, but be
4 calm. If you need a break, please tell us and we shall
5 make a break for a few minutes.
6 Mr. Nice, the floor is yours.
7 Examined by Mr. Nice:
8 Q. Witness M, have you considered a summary of
9 your evidence, the first summary which was, I think,
10 distributed to the Defence, having to be amended as to
11 one paragraph, paragraph 6, and have you recently, very
12 recently, gone over that amended summary in English,
13 having it read over to you?
14 A. Yes, I have.
15 MR. NICE: If I can hand the witness a copy
16 of the amended version in English and the language he
17 understands. The Chamber already has, I think, the
18 amended versions before it. May he look at it and
19 acknowledge it as his.
20 Q. When that was read over to you today, subject
21 to the one correction that appears in the revised
22 paragraph 6, was it accurate?
23 A. I now see that I should like to make yet
24 another correction.
25 Q. Paragraph --
1 A. It is paragraph 1: "After the explosion of
2 the Sava bridge, the witness saw a body ..."
3 Not a body but parts of a number of bodies,
4 more than one body lying in the street, under the
5 bridge, and on the roofs of the surrounding buildings
6 where tiles had not yet flown off.
7 Q. Okay.
8 A. There is also the damage. There is also the
9 damage. There was a major material damage.
10 MR. NICE: Well, the witness otherwise then
11 acknowledging the statement.
12 Q. Witness M, you can leave the statement on one
13 side. You don't have to follow it. It's probably
14 better if you simply face the Judges and answer the
15 questions that I shall ask you.
16 Just dealing with paragraph 1, after the
17 explosions and seeing the body parts on the street and
18 observing the damage, did you, a couple of hours later,
19 go to work at the Bimal factory, there being soldiers
20 there who effectively occupied the factory?
21 A. [No translation]
22 Q. Indeed, at the same time, although it's not
23 in your summary, but I think there's quite a tall tower
24 nearby. Did you notice something about what the state
25 of fortification of that tower was at this early hour
1 of the morning?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. What was it you noticed on top of the tower?
4 A. I noticed that there were more than two
5 soldiers on that silo, and that was the highest point
6 in Brcko.
7 Q. What did they have by way of armaments, if
8 any?
9 A. Well, I didn't go up to see, but I realised
10 that they had heavy machine gun with them and they also
11 had their personal weapons.
12 Q. Having been sent home by the soldiers at the
13 Bimal factory -- and I think the Bimal factory
14 manufactures oil. Is that right?
15 A. Yes, it makes oil. It's not soldiers who
16 sent me home; it was my manager who told me it would be
17 best for me to go back home.
18 Q. Were you then rounded up a couple of days
19 later, on the 3rd or 4th of May, by Serb soldiers and
20 taken to what is described in the summary as a clinic?
21 Was that a medical centre?
22 A. On the 4th of May, to be precise, in the
23 afternoon, around 1.00 or half past one or perhaps
24 2.00, whatever the case, they took us all. Mauzer was
25 using a loudspeaker, calling to people, telling them to
1 come out of their homes, to raise their hands like this
2 [indicates] and to move towards the health centre,
3 towards the emergency care.
4 Q. If asked by the Judges or by Defence counsel,
5 can you give a detail of the treatment at the health
6 clinic? I'm not going to ask you for that detail.
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. The man Mauzer, did he seem to be generally
9 in charge of the operation of rounding people up?
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. Just one incident, and again it's not in the
12 summary but you might just help us with this. At the
13 emergency unit, did you see somebody writing names on a
14 piece of paper?
15 MR. NICE: For the assistance of my friend,
16 this is at the foot of the statement of the authorities
17 of Bosnia-Herzegovina, page 1.
18 Q. Did you see somebody writing some names
19 down?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. Who was it who was doing the writing, why was
22 he writing, and what was he writing?
23 A. (redacted)
24 (redacted)
25 (redacted)
1 (redacted). But when they saw that he had a
2 Muslim last name, they began to tease him and to beat
3 him, and when he was scared out of his wits, they felt
4 it and told him to write down the names of all the
5 extremists in the hallway of the emergency unit, and he
6 was doing it when I saw him there. He was sitting,
7 straddling a bench in the health centre. He was
8 writing down some names.
9 At some point, I managed to come close enough
10 to tell him not to make a mistake, just to forget that
11 my name exists, because they might kill me if he put me
12 on that list, because I had already seen some names
13 there, even though I can't remember which ones they
14 were.
15 Q. Was he writing this list happily and by
16 agreement, or otherwise?
17 A. It wasn't agreement or his will; it was
18 fear. One could read it in his eyes. And tears were
19 running down his face and his legs were shaking as if
20 he was on hot coals. His lips were all swollen.
21 Q. From the health centre or clinic, having been
22 searched and so on, were you taken to the mosque, there
23 being already some five or six hundred men at the
24 mosque when you got there?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. Were you taken back to the clinic for
2 interrogation about your background and political
3 associations?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. At that place -- and I needn't ask you to
6 deal with this in detail because the Chamber has heard
7 quite a lot about this already, but at that place did
8 you see the man named Papa being dealt with?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. Did you see other atrocious acts committed
11 while you were there which you can give detail of, if
12 anybody wants to know?
13 A. Yes, yes, I can, if anybody wishes to know.
14 Now, the question is, of course, if there is anyone who
15 wishes to know.
16 Q. Were you, yourself, beaten or ill-treated in
17 any way in the course of your interrogation?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. By whom and how badly?
20 A. In the health centre, I wasn't beaten too
21 badly, but I was kicked and punched. For about two
22 minutes, a pistol was put into my mouth and a knife
23 under my throat, and I was pushed off the chair until
24 some captain or, rather, somebody who they called the
25 captain, came and stopped that.
1 Q. Were you finally taken to Luka?
2 A. From the mosque, I was transferred with three
3 minor children: with a Palestinian, and a minor whose
4 brother was killed in the mosque when he tried to
5 escape through the window, and with another young boy.
6 I was taken to the barracks, to withstand
7 first aid really, because I had trouble with my back.
8 In the health centre they didn't have the kind of
9 injection that I needed, so they took me to the
10 barracks. They extended the first aid to me and I
11 stayed there until May the 8th; that is, I was
12 transferred from the mosque on the 6th, if my memory
13 serves me well.
14 Q. You therefore arrived at Luka on what date?
15 A. On the 8th.
16 Q. When you arrived there, did you go into the
17 hangar?
18 A. We were brought by buses which were full; as
19 many seats, as many prisoners. We had to keep our
20 hands above our head. I already showed you. I can't
21 lift my right hand because it was injured in the
22 Batkovic camp. We had to keep our heads between our
23 knees, practically, so as not to see where we were
24 being taken.
25 Q. But on arrival, did you go into the hangar?
1 A. Yes. We were getting off the bus, one by
2 one, and they had cocked rifles aimed at us, and one by
3 one we were entering the hangar in which there were
4 already people. I should say there must have been
5 around 300 of them. It was the first hangar to the
6 left-hand side as you enter Luka from the side where
7 the petrol station is to the left.
8 Q. Did somebody introduce himself to the people
9 in the hangar? If so, what did he say was his name?
10 And tell us, more particularly, what he said.
11 A. Goran Jelisic entered and introduced himself
12 as the Serb Adolf and said that nobody should be afraid
13 unless he was an extremist, because they wanted to
14 cleanse the Serbs of the extremist Muslims and balijas
15 like one cleans the head of lice. That was something
16 to that effect.
17 Q. Did he tell you what would happen to those
18 who were not extremists and what processes would be
19 applied?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. Tell us about that.
22 A. What he said was quite enough, because he
23 then turned on his heels and went out. After him, two
24 girls, young women, came in and looked at us
25 significantly and, I think, with quite a sardonic look
1 in their eyes and went out, and some of them even
2 laughed.
3 Q. Did you know any of the girls who were with
4 Jelisic or who came in after he had been there?
5 A. Yes, by sight.
6 Q. The name of any one of them?
7 A. Later on, I heard that one of them was called
8 Monika, but I did not know her personally. I only knew
9 her by sight. She was quite a number of years younger
10 than I am.
11 Q. Just back to your account of what Jelisic
12 said, did he say what would happen to those who weren't
13 extremists? Would they be allowed out? Just explain
14 that.
15 A. We saw -- as we were going into the hangar,
16 we could already see executions, and one knows what
17 happens to those who need to be cleansed.
18 Q. You say you saw executions. At whose hands
19 were people being executed when you went in?
20 A. A guy in a police uniform, I mean of the
21 Yugoslav police, and with a huge baton some metre and a
22 half long, perhaps even longer, he was taking, one by
23 one, or sometimes two at a time, of inmates, and took
24 them opposite to the office which I could see from the
25 corner in which I was sitting in the hangar, because a
1 door was left open enough to be able to have a good
2 view of the situation outside, even though we had to
3 avoid to be seen that we were looking.
4 Q. At that stage, were you able to identify the
5 man in the police uniform?
6 A. I did not know him personally, but he looked
7 like any other man; I mean quite normal, except there
8 was some particular glean in his eyes. And he was
9 brandishing this baton and saying, "Where are those
10 extremists, where are those Green Berets?" When he
11 took away brothers Zahirovic and came back when Goran
12 Jelisic had finished them off, he said, "Well, now you
13 see how extremists and Green Berets fare, and those who
14 are neither of that have no reason to be afraid."
15 Q. So you saw the policemen taking men out, and
16 did you see what happened to the men generally when
17 they were taken out, before we come to the brothers
18 Zahirovic?
19 A. Somebody, one of the Zahirovic brothers, was
20 hit with the baton in the back and head two or three
21 times as they were entering that other room; and
22 another one, with practically his head split up, had
23 come out of that office, and he merely finished him off
24 with one or two bullets or -- I don't know. It depends
25 on how many bullets he deemed necessary to fire into
1 the victim.
2 Q. Then I must be just a little more detailed
3 here. Dealing with the two brothers Zahirovic, were
4 these the two taken out by a policeman?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. Where were they taken first?
7 A. To the small room across. To an office. I
8 believe it was an Intersped office where I was
9 subsequently interrogated and where I saw a lot of
10 bloodstains on the walls and furniture and bookshelf,
11 and I even saw a thatch of hair, presumably torn off
12 with the skin of the head and just stayed there.
13 Q. How long were the brothers in that room
14 before they came out again?
15 A. I'm not a hundred per cent sure, but I do not
16 think that it was more than five or ten minutes.
17 Perhaps even that is too long, because everything was
18 taking place with such speed, or perhaps it seemed to
19 us that way. We were so afraid that I really couldn't
20 focus all that much.
21 MR. NICE: Sorry. If the witness could
22 initially just have Exhibit number 9, please. Then
23 I'll hand another exhibit in to the usher which will
24 become whatever the latest exhibit number is. First
25 number 9.
1 THE REGISTRAR: Prosecution Exhibit 44.
2 MR. NICE:
3 Q. If you'd look first at existing Exhibit 9.
4 If you use the pointer you'll be provided with, staying
5 in your seat, just to remind the Judges of the
6 geography, can you just point out where you went to in
7 the hangar?
8 A. Shall I show it on the ELMO?
9 Q. Yes, just point. If you use the pointer
10 and --
11 A. I don't see.
12 Q. It's not coming up on the ELMO. There it
13 is. Can you just point out where the hangar was to
14 which that you went, and where was the office --
15 A. This [indicates].
16 Q. Thank you. Where was the office to which the
17 men were taken and where you went for interrogation?
18 A. [Indicates]
19 Q. The white building at the top of the three.
20 MR. GREAVES: I've got nothing on my monitor,
21 and I can't see over the top of the monitor to where
22 he's pointing, I'm afraid. I've got absolutely nothing
23 at all.
24 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Mr. Registrar?
25 MR. NICE: We have a similar problem over
1 here. We get an intermittent picture only.
2 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] It seems that
3 the Judges are the only ones who are privileged, but
4 that is only natural.
5 MR. NICE: [Previous translation
6 continues]...
7 THE REGISTRAR: The video booth is asking
8 whether Mr. Greaves could use another monitor -- that
9 is, the one in front of Mr. Londrovic -- perhaps,
10 because this particular screen seems to be out of
11 order.
12 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Perhaps you
13 could change places. Mr. Greaves, you will be
14 conducting the cross-examination. If that is so, then
15 perhaps you should change places with Mr. Londrovic.
16 How about you, Mr. Nice?
17 MR. GREAVES: If I can stand whilst he's
18 doing this, I can actually see the ELMO. I can't see
19 it if I'm sitting.
20 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] All right.
21 Fine. Very well, but you can move closer. You can
22 move to it.
23 MR. NICE:
24 Q. Just point out again, please, the hangar and
25 the office.
1 A. [Indicates]. This is the hangar. This is
2 where the entrance to the hangar was, and I was around
3 here, around there [indicates]. I had a good view
4 through the doors, which were open sufficiently so that
5 I could see all this portion here [indicates], and this
6 is where Jasce was, around here [indicates], at the
7 kurb. This is where the grate was where the killings
8 took place, and this is where the bodies were piled.
9 MR. NICE: Yes. Now can he now have a look
10 at the next, Exhibit 44, which is taken at a later
11 date.
12 Q. Witness M, that shows, I think, the entrance
13 to the office that you're speaking of.
14 If we can move it a little to the right so we
15 can see the grate. Does this or does this not show the
16 grate that you're speaking of?
17 A. This is the grate [indicates], but you cannot
18 see it on the monitor right now. That's the one. This
19 is the office [indicates]. It was probably demolished
20 after the camp was dissolved, so that any trace or any
21 evidence would be destroyed.
22 Q. After the first brother Zahirovic went in for
23 interrogation and whatever number of minutes passed,
24 did he come out of the office and go the few steps
25 between the office door and the grate?
1 A. I believe that it was Zahirovic who first
2 arrived. He had been beaten, and his head had been
3 split open, and he was dragged over here.
4 I cannot recall all the details because it
5 was like horror movies which were playing out in front
6 of those who were there. It was even dangerous to look
7 because then you would be a potential next victim. So
8 it is difficult.
9 It was who came with his head broken from the
10 baton and who with broken arms or ribs, but it was so
11 Jelisic, whoever it was -- Jelisic killed him with a
12 single bullet.
13 Q. Where was the man's head at the time he shot
14 him?
15 A. Near the grate, but I'm not sure whether it
16 was at the grate itself or about half a metre away.
17 Q. Yes.
18 A. I was about 10 to 15 metres away from that
19 spot, so I cannot tell with precision, but he was
20 around the grate.
21 Q. The second brother Zahirovic, is what
22 happened to him the same or similar as that which
23 happened to the first?
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. Who shot him?
1 A. Goran Jelisic.
2 Q. The same way?
3 A. In the same way, but it seems to me that one
4 of the two brothers Zahirovic only got one bullet in
5 the back of the head and the other one got two, and I
6 cannot say which one. But later on, those of us who
7 eyewitnessed this later commented, and we thought that
8 it was so callous that he could kill people just like
9 that.
10 Q. Jasmin Cumurovic, called Jasce, what you can
11 tell us about him?
12 A. At that time, he remained at somewhere around
13 the door to this office after being examined. It seems
14 to me as if he had been ordered to wait there.
15 He waited there for quite awhile, and he
16 seemed as if he wasn't allowed to move while they were
17 going around beating. Horrible sounds came out of that
18 room. It was a small room, three by three or three by
19 four metres. But everybody was in great fear. Very
20 unusual.
21 Q. Now, Cumurovic. Cumurovic had already been
22 in for an interrogation; is that the position?
23 A. That I do not know, because I saw those two
24 brothers, the Zahirovic brothers, when they were
25 brought out.
1 Q. What happened to Cumurovic after the brothers
2 had been shot?
3 A. Goran Jelisic came from over here and went
4 first towards the door. I think he must have taken a
5 bottle of beer. Then he crossed the alley and came to
6 Jasce and said -- asked him to smell his hand. I
7 couldn't quite hear what he was saying. He wanted
8 to -- but I know this gesture. Then he asked him to
9 lick it. As he did, he fired one or two bullets into
10 his head.
11 Q. This is the correction I think you wanted to
12 make as who did what, Cumurovic having been asked to
13 lick his hand. What did Cumurovic do when he was given
14 that instruction to lick this man's hand? Did he
15 obey?
16 A. This is what I was just talking about. When
17 Goran Jelisic approached him, in his hand he had a
18 Scorpion with a silencer, and it was the right or maybe
19 the left hand in which he held the pistol. He put it
20 in front of him so that he would lick it, and then
21 about 10, 15 seconds, I guess, had to lick the blood.
22 There was also a glove there with cut-off fingers.
23 This must have been the blood that splattered
24 when one of the two Zahirovic brothers was killed,
25 apparently. Some blood had splattered on to the hand.
1 Then presumably he asked him to lick off some of that
2 blood or something. I don't know.
3 As he bent over, he shot him in the back of
4 the head.
5 Q. Were you later taken for interrogation
6 yourself?
7 A. After Ramiz, whose last name I don't know. I
8 know his nickname and I know where he worked. He
9 worked in the electric utility company in Brcko.
10 After that, Senad Poljo, (redacted), was
11 taken away with Ranko Cesic. When he came for him, he
12 cocked a rifle, he loaded it, and then he said, "Go
13 on. Move."
14 Five or six minutes later it was my turn. I
15 don't know how long it took. It was five or six
16 minutes. But I know when he came to get me, he looked
17 around and he told me, "Get up. It's your turn now."
18 Then he again cocked the rifle, trained it on me, and
19 then he made me cross that way and follow him.
20 Q. Who conducted the interrogation?
21 A. It was -- there was a fat man from Bjeljina.
22 Some of the camp inmates later told me where he was
23 from. He was rather heavy. He had a round face and
24 camouflage uniform. He looked too -- he was young but
25 he looked older.
1 He had a piece of paper and a pencil in front
2 of him, and there was another one across from him meant
3 for the person who was going to be interrogated.
4 He asked me who I was, where I worked. While
5 I was being interviewed, Goran Jelisic came in and hit
6 Senad Poljo with the butt of his pistol against the
7 temple and he fell off the chair. He had already had
8 his head bandaged because he had been beaten
9 previously.
10 Senad started moaning and told Goran, "I'm
11 not guilty of anything. I said everything. Ask him."
12 "Ask him," meaning me, (redacted).
13 Goran turned to me and said, "Do you know
14 him?" I said, "Yes. (redacted)." He said, "Do
15 you guarantee for him?" and I said, "I do." Then he
16 said, "Give the two of them passes." The fat one was
17 obviously not very happy. He said he hadn't finished
18 with me. Then he said that -- Goran said that he
19 should finish with us.
20 I thought that this was the end, that it
21 meant execution.
22 Q. But, in fact, were the two of you given
23 passes?
24 A. Yes, we were, but because we did not have
25 documents which had been taken away from us when we
1 entered the hangar, then the fat one, if I may call him
2 so, asked me what my personal identity card number
3 was. I told him that I didn't have it on me, that I
4 only had my driver's licence on me. Goran said that
5 they should go and find my driver's licence and Senad's
6 personal identity card.
7 I thought that this was just to sort of put
8 me at ease and that what would follow would be a bullet
9 in the back of the head.
10 Then Goran left with Ranko Cesic somewhere in
11 a car, and then this other man went to get the
12 documents and really came back with them, which
13 surprised me. He brought my driver's licence and
14 Senad's personal identity card. He said, "Here." In
15 fact, he called the fat one by his nickname, which I
16 have forgotten.
17 While he was writing down my personal citizen
18 registration number which was on the driver's licence,
19 he said that I should thank Mile and Goran. I said --
20 thanked him, but he said, "If it were up to me, you
21 would have been swimming in Sava with your head down
22 and stomach wide open."
23 At this I started shaking uncontrollably and
24 I was overcome by panic, because, one, I didn't know
25 what to think anymore, because one of them was
1 releasing me and the other one was killing me. So I
2 didn't know what was going on.
3 Then I was told that we could leave and I
4 waited --
5 Q. Just stop [inaudible]. While you were being
6 spoken to by Jelisic, did Ranko come in and say
7 something?
8 A. Ranko came in and said -- this is before.
9 Q. Yes.
10 A. Before Goran addressed me, he said, "Beat up
11 these two well, because they know everything." Then he
12 just turned and left. I think that Goran probably
13 remembers that. He could confirm it.
14 As we were leaving this small room, in the
15 room where we were to be beaten and perhaps killed,
16 which I assume was the wish of the person who was going
17 to be -- who was going to interrogate me -- but I just
18 forgot something. When we came to Mile, the
19 stonemason, he asked me where I had been the last three
20 months. I said that I had been working and that I was
21 spending most of the time with (redacted) and that
22 we were inseparable, like brothers.
23 This is probably how Goran Jelisic knew me.
24 I was too afraid to even look at him, so I didn't even
25 recognise him. But this moment I will never forget.
1 It was -- even today it sometimes appears in my
2 dreams. He says --
3 Q. What I was asking you was did Ranko come in
4 and tell Goran anything about what he, Ranko, had been
5 doing at any stage of the interrogation?
6 A. I didn't understand the question.
7 Q. Did Ranko come into the office at any stage
8 and say to Goran something about what he had been doing
9 or was doing; he, Ranko?
10 A. Ranko, as I said, at one point entered and
11 said only that Senad and I should be beaten up well
12 because we knew everything, and he then left. I only
13 saw him carrying a crate of beer with Goran Jelisic.
14 And Goran Jelisic, as we were leaving, said, "Take a
15 beer," which I did not do.
16 Q. Just to be quite clear, do you have any
17 recollection of Ranko saying anything about his having
18 been doing some shooting; he, Ranko?
19 A. Yes, yes. My apologies. I'm too excited as
20 I'm recalling all this.
21 He called him outside to show him how he
22 can -- how this rifle is a good rifle. He was shooting
23 pigeons. Then he, that day, gave me this pass for
24 life, as they called it. And then on the way out, they
25 offered me some beer from this crate which they were
1 carrying.
2 I'm grateful to you, sir, for being reminded
3 of this, because I tried not to bring back all these
4 memories. But still, thank you.
5 Q. Before you left Luka, did you see the
6 movement of dead bodies?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. How many?
9 A. During my stay there on the 8th of May, my
10 neighbour, (redacted)
11 (redacted)
12 (redacted)
13 (redacted)
14 (redacted) -- he took his brother to this
15 heap behind the building. When he came back, he was
16 shaking, and he said, "I just put my brother on that
17 heap. If at least I could have buried him."
18 Q. Did you see other bodies being moved? Just
19 "Yes" or "No" will do.
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. Were you allowed, in theory, to look at the
22 movement of bodies?
23 A. [No translation]
24 THE INTERPRETER: Could the witness please
25 repeat the answer?
1 MR. NICE: I think I heard an answer.
2 Q. Did you say "No"?
3 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Would you like
4 to take a break, Witness M? I see that you're very
5 shaken by these reminiscences. Would you like a break
6 of a few minutes?
7 Mr. Nice, are you going to go through the
8 whole list? What are you planning to do?
9 MR. NICE: I'm intending to summarise the
10 rest of the witness's evidence, and as to the list, as
11 I've already explained to Mr. Greaves, I'm going to
12 deal with them in another way, because they are
13 particularly distressing for the witness. The way I
14 was going to deal with them would take a very short
15 space of time indeed. So it might be prudent to try to
16 get to the end of his examination-in-chief
17 straightaway.
18 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Right, yes.
19 But Witness M, the Judges do understand that you're now
20 talking about horrible things that you experienced.
21 Would you like a five-minute break, and the Victims and
22 Witnesses Unit will take care of you? Would you like a
23 break of five minutes to recover, or do you prefer to
24 continue and have it done with? It is up to you.
25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I would prefer
1 to deal with it in one go.
2 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] All right.
3 MR. NICE:
4 Q. Just to summarise the position until this
5 stage, Witness M, had you -- just running through the
6 events very quickly, at the clinic, had you seen
7 beatings; "Yes" or "No"? In the first place when you
8 went to the clinic, had you seen beatings; "Yes" or
9 "No"?
10 A. Yes, and I can also tell you the number of
11 people who were beaten up --
12 Q. Yes, but --
13 A. -- before my very eyes, and probably there
14 were additional ones who were beaten after I wasn't
15 present anymore.
16 Q. Had you seen killings at the clinic, "Yes" or
17 "No", actual killings?
18 A. No.
19 Q. Had you, at any time in the clinic, seen or
20 found bodies; "Yes" or "No"?
21 A. Yes, but I only saw several dead, actually --
22 for instance, I saw some legs. A door couldn't quite
23 be closed. I guess the body had been dragged, and
24 there was a trail of blood. Then in the basement there
25 was also a pharmacy.
1 Q. At the mosque there may have been two men
2 killed in the course of an attempted escape, but apart
3 from that, did you see any other actual killings at the
4 mosque; "Yes" or "No"?
5 A. Apart from that, no.
6 Q. Did you see beatings at the mosque?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. At Luka, you saw and you've described Jelisic
9 killing three men. Did you see any other killings
10 yourself, "Yes" or "No", actually see them?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. Roughly how many?
13 A. I wouldn't want to say roughly. I'd like to
14 say the exact number, which would be guesswork.
15 Q. Who did you see doing the killings?
16 A. Goran Jelisic, alias Serbian Adolf.
17 I want to point out that I did not know his
18 name, his real name. When I was exchanged, I became
19 convinced that this was his real name and last name,
20 because at the camp, I didn't fully believe that
21 because a lot of them gave false names, and we didn't
22 dare talk much about that in the camp.
23 Q. These other killings, were they before or
24 after the killings of the Zahirovic brothers? Or can't
25 you say when they were; you can simply say that they
1 happened?
2 A. I am sure that the Zahirovic brothers'
3 murders were the first ones, because I arrived there in
4 the afternoon. I was there until about 9.00.
5 Actually, we were released at 8.30 because the curfew
6 was at 9.00, so we only had 30 minutes to reach this
7 neighbourhood which was about 1,5 kilometres from
8 there. I apologise for the confusion.
9 Q. [Previous interpretation continues]... that
10 followed the Zahirovic and the Cumurovic killings?
11 A. Brothers Zahirovic, yes. Sorry. After
12 Cumurovic's murder, was it -- yes, yes, it's quite all
13 right. I'm sorry. I'm sorry about this. Yes, it's
14 quite all right, yes. That is quite correct.
15 Q. [Previous interpretation continues]...
16 similar to the killings of the brothers Zahirovic, or
17 were they different in any way?
18 A. I heard a word which was used and which I
19 remember leaving a tremendous impression on me and
20 frightening me. I know you are Europeans and you know
21 what the term "selective murder" means, but they used a
22 word which meant all but one -- I can't remember that
23 particular word, even though it did stick in my
24 memory.
25 Q. What was the meaning of this word that was
1 used?
2 A. I just told you: selective selection. It
3 means a choice, and what you've selected, you can
4 either drown or leave it on the surface.
5 Q. You can answer these questions, if I can
6 suggest it to you, you can answer them "Yes" or "No".
7 With your pass, provided in the way you described, were
8 you able to return from the camp initially to the
9 communities -- at the Es community?
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. When you were there, did you see Jelisic on
12 one occasion with a girl when he offered you a drink?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. [Previous interpretation continues]...?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. Were you returned to camp on a later date?
17 Were you returned to the Luka camp eventually on a
18 later date?
19 A. With those from Brezovo Polje, with people
20 from the village to which I went into circumstances and
21 where I stayed, because that was practically an open
22 camp, an open prison.
23 Q. When you went back to the camp in whatever it
24 was, July, did you see anything of Jelisic there or did
25 you not see anything of him?
1 A. I never saw him again, because after the 15th
2 of May that I learned that, and those selective murders
3 stopped, orders had come to take care of us so that we
4 could be used for the exchange of prisoners, dead, and
5 such like.
6 Q. I'm going to ask you to look at, but without
7 going through in detail, two lists which will become
8 Exhibit 45, and I want you simply to confirm, when they
9 are before you -- so that the Judges can understand how
10 we're going to deal with this, yes, both at the same
11 time -- did you, at the request of the Prosecution, go
12 through these lists, marking the names of those you
13 recognised as people who, to your understanding, have
14 been killed in the course of this overall conflict?
15 A. I am choosing my words, but it is quite true
16 that you are using that term "people". But it was only
17 civilians who perished, and I think you should put it
18 down on record, because you are not talking about
19 civilians, you're not referring to civilians.
20 Some people thought us to be, as I already
21 said that -- I'm sorry, I'm sorry. My brain went blank
22 for a moment.
23 Q. Don't worry. All I'm going to ask you to do
24 is to simply look at this exhibit, which is the two
25 lists, and simply to tell us if this is the list marked
1 either by you or in your presence with ticks and one or
2 two other little bits of writing to indicate those
3 civilian men who you knew and who, to your
4 understanding, were killed. Just quickly look at the
5 list and tell me if what I've suggested is correct.
6 A. Yes, that is the list.
7 Q. And then the other list?
8 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] I think we
9 should take a break.
10 MR. NICE: This is the last question, Your
11 Honour.
12 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] It is the last
13 question. All right, if it is the last one. If not,
14 then we shall take a break. This is the last
15 question?
16 MR. NICE: I think he understood that this is
17 the list he marked.
18 A. I do apologise. Yes, it is. I even
19 supplemented some of the letters which were missing in
20 this list. I hope they were at least given a proper
21 burial.
22 MR. NICE: Thank you. I'm very grateful for
23 the Court for allowing us to run through, but it seemed
24 sensible to get through this exercise before we took
25 the break. There's nothing else I need to ask the
1 witness.
2 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] There is only
3 one more question. Would you like to finish with
4 that? What would you rather do?
5 THE WITNESS: It will be all right.
6 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] It will be
7 perhaps preferable to finish with the questions of the
8 Prosecution before the break, because after that, there
9 will be questions from the Defence. But it's up to
10 you.
11 The last question?
12 MR. NICE: I have finished the questioning.
13 He's acknowledged both lists, I think, as marked by
14 him.
15 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] All right. So
16 you recognised both the lists, I understand.
17 All right. Now, I think we are going to take
18 a break, and I hope somebody from the Victims and
19 Witnesses Unit will take care of Witness M. We shall
20 take a 30-minute break, I believe.
21 The session is adjourned.
22 --- Recess taken at 3.10 p.m.
23 --- On resuming at 3.47 p.m.
24 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] We are
25 resuming. Will you bring in the accused, please.
1 [The accused entered court]
2 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Witness M, have
3 you had a good rest? If you wish, you may look at the
4 accused. We may also ask you if you can identify him,
5 but I'm interested in your mental health. Are you all
6 right? Are you better now?
7 A. Thank you very much. It was simply the list,
8 because there is a man on the list and he was more than
9 a brother to me when I was a small boy. So I saw it,
10 and I felt terribly distressed at seeing it because I
11 do not know where his bones lie. I do not know where
12 he is. It would mean a great deal to me if I knew
13 where he was.
14 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] But we do
15 understand that, of course. Now, will you please focus
16 on the questions that will be asked by the counsel for
17 the Defence? Don't be too distressed. The accused has
18 the right to a defence, whatever you might think.
19 Therefore, his lawyer will now ask you questions.
20 Please focus on these questions and try to be as
21 precise as possible.
22 Mr. Greaves, the floor is yours.
23 MR. GREAVES: Thank you very much, Your
24 Honour.
25 Cross-examined by Mr. Greaves:
1 Q. Mr. M, can I just start by saying two things
2 to you, please? The first is this: If you don't
3 understand my question, stop me, tell me to do it
4 again. All right? Will you do that for me?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. The second thing is if you feel yourself
7 becoming distressed, please don't worry; just stop,
8 take your time, and I'll keep an eye on you and match
9 your feelings as far as possible. All right?
10 A. [Inaudible]
11 Q. Now, I've got to ask you some questions and
12 I'll make it as quick as I can for you. All right?
13 A. [Inaudible]
14 Q. Mr. M, I just want to ask you briefly --
15 THE INTERPRETER: Could the witness please
16 come closer to the microphones or could the microphones
17 be brought closer to him?
18 MR. GREAVES: I think one of the microphones
19 is not on. Thank you.
20 A. My monitor. I have no image on my monitor.
21 MR. GREAVES:
22 Q. All right?
23 A. It's okay.
24 Q. I think one of your microphones keeps going
25 off, and I don't know how that will affect the ability
1 of the interpreters to hear you.
2 A. Is it all right now? It is. It is now.
3 Yes, it's all right.
4 Q. Mr. M, can you please answer this about
5 yourself: Prior to the war, did you engage in any way
6 in the political life of your community?
7 A. No.
8 Q. Have you -- did you do so either during or
9 have you done so since the war?
10 A. No.
11 Q. I'd like to ask you, please, about the day
12 when the bridges over the Sava River were blown. On
13 the day that they were blown, at 7.30 in the morning,
14 did you go to the area and see some of the results of
15 that incident?
16 A. It was when I started for work. I turned
17 back, because when you drive a car, that was
18 practically the only way I could take to get to work.
19 At any rate, which was nearer so that I did stop at the
20 bridge for awhile.
21 When I saw all that horror, I almost was
22 sick, but I was in a hurry to get to work, so I really
23 had no time to think about that.
24 Q. Is this correct: that you were able to see
25 that there had been casualties, both in terms of
1 wounded and killed, as a result of that incident?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. I don't want to know the detail of how any
4 person had been killed, but what sort of quantity of
5 people had been killed or wounded? Was it hundreds or
6 tens or what?
7 A. I won't go into statistics. I will say what
8 I heard from other people, because that morning two
9 buses had arrived from Vienna, in Austria, with our
10 migrant workers, and only that bridge, because at
11 Orasje the bridge had already been demolished, so that
12 all had to take this Gunja bridge in Brcko.
13 That morning there were a lot of fatalities.
14 It was a matter of hundreds rather than dozens or tens,
15 as you said.
16 Q. Thank you. I'd like to ask you now, please,
17 about May the 1st. On that day, I think that soldiers
18 started taking over various public buildings. Did you
19 present yourself and assist in the organisation of
20 patrols in your area?
21 A. On the 2nd of May and on the 3rd of May I was
22 patrolling in my street. I don't know if I should
23 mention the names of other people I was patrolling the
24 street with. (redacted)
25 (redacted)
1 (redacted)
2 (redacted)
3 (redacted)
4 (redacted)
5 Yet -- I mean, the first day might be ugly until the
6 Serbs took the positions they wanted for themselves,
7 but after they did this everything would go back to
8 normal, as before.
9 So all the neighbourhood communities
10 patrolled the town, because of possible robberies
11 rather than possible entry of Serb forces, because they
12 were already stationed in the barracks around Brcko,
13 but not in Kolobara and not towards the exit from Brcko
14 to the Brka, because that was the majority Muslim
15 population there, so that they flinched away from it or
16 perhaps they had a plan which we knew nothing about.
17 On the 2nd or 3rd of May, we, therefore, had
18 our patrols. I was a part of that on the 2nd and 3rd
19 of May. Those were street patrols or, rather, looking
20 after houses and property of those who had left
21 Bosnia-Herzegovina already.
22 I believe there were about six or seven
23 families, Muslim families, which had left, and that was
24 why we organised that. It was -- it was nothing
25 terrible. We practically were simply trying to protect
1 ourselves against thieves, because at that time cars
2 were stolen on a large scale in Brcko at that time
3 already.
4 Q. Is this correct: that the patrols were
5 organised by Papa, and he had been appointed by the SDA
6 to do that?
7 A. I cannot say that this is not true. I cannot
8 deny that fact, but I know that he was appointed on
9 behalf of the SDA because he was a member of the party
10 of SDA and he was the most -- how shall I put it? He
11 was the first one in that business. He was appointed
12 by the SDA as the mayor of the neighbourhood community
13 of Kolobara.
14 So this was -- that is, they simply appointed
15 the man to the right place, I suppose, even though I
16 wasn't particularly happy with his appointment to that
17 post.
18 Q. Just one final question about these patrols.
19 Did he, in fact, provide one of the weapons that were
20 used by the patrols?
21 A. During those night patrols, those two night
22 patrols in which I took part -- and I could lose my
23 head because of that, he said -- but I was issued with
24 a hunting rifle, a two-barrelled. That's an older one,
25 the type that was once used for hunting. But at that
1 particular time, it could be used for anything, I mean
2 short of my own shooting of my leg if it went off. I
3 mean it could be used to intimidate perhaps somebody,
4 but never to reject an attack if it happened. It was
5 nothing, really.
6 We usually -- we patrolled in threesomes, and
7 each one of us would have a piece of a weapon which
8 Papa had provided for us. That is true, and that is an
9 incontrovertible fact, and I really don't know who he
10 received those weapons from or where he procured them.
11 Q. Thank you, Witness M. I'm going to move on
12 now to the time when you were taken to the clinic.
13 There was one man in particular there who I
14 think came to your attention, the man Mauzer. Was he
15 responsible for organising things at the clinic and
16 interrogating people?
17 A. Yes. He organised the eviction of civilians
18 from their houses, from their yards, from their
19 shelters, their cellars. The way they did it, they
20 came from the centre of the town across the Brka to the
21 bridge. I don't know whether they forded this small
22 river, this riverlet [sic], the Brka. It was swollen
23 in those days, so you would need a boat to cross it
24 unless you used the bridge. But below the cay, they
25 had already entered in the morning of the 4th of May,
1 but they did not advance towards the health centre
2 because some seven or eight hundred metres from the
3 Zenski Bridge or, rather, the women's bridge, as we
4 call it, from Kolobara, that is, (redacted) -- sorry,
5 I'm trying to give you the right picture of how the
6 land lies there.
7 He was the chief of command, but everybody
8 called him Mauzer because he sort of took pride in this
9 name, and he used to say the civilians should feel
10 privileged, honoured, as he put it, to have Arkan's men
11 with them. Arkan's were there to guard us. They sort
12 of protected us so that nobody would kill us until the
13 interrogation and this whole treatment was over; that
14 is, "Where is your neighbour, where is your brother,
15 where is your uncle, where is your father? Was this,
16 was that? Was your weapon -- what kind of arms did you
17 have? Who did you buy it from?" and so on and so
18 forth. It all came down to provocation, practically,
19 and nothing came out of it. But be that as it may, he
20 headed them, and he was issuing instructions as to how
21 they should work.
22 If -- how we put it -- if he identified
23 somebody who -- if he spotted somebody who was more
24 afraid than others, then he would take him for
25 interrogation first, realising that that person perhaps
1 was not so stable, and that through him he would be
2 able to discover who had weapons or who was smuggling
3 weapons, because there was all sorts of stories
4 circulating about how weapons were smuggled from
5 Croatia. So that would be, for instance, one sign of
6 identification.
7 Then just hitting people. I wasn't hit then,
8 but I saw how he hit my neighbour with the butt of his
9 rifle -- butt of his pistol; not hit very hard; sort of
10 tap him on the head, for instance, with the butt of the
11 pistol. "You're the one, so where is your radio
12 station?" and things like that.
13 I mean that was one of the methods they used,
14 and that was one of the things that I witnessed, and
15 about 100 of my neighbours who were sitting in front of
16 the emergency unit on the pavement with their hands
17 above their head. I already tried to show it to you,
18 but I have problems with my right hand.
19 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Will you please
20 try to be as concise as possible? Of course, you are
21 telling us some important things, but will you please
22 try to answer the questions to the point, if you can?
23 MR. GREAVES:
24 Q. Witness M, if you do it as quickly as
25 possible, of course, you'll be finished more quickly.
1 So if you can remember that. I know you've got things
2 to tell us, but as far as possible, I'm trying to focus
3 your mind on what I'm trying to deal with. All right?
4 Was there an occasion, during your stay at
5 the clinic, when Mauzer and another soldier went to
6 each detainee in turn and asked to examine their
7 hands? Can you remember that?
8 A. Mauzer had a man with him who was smelling
9 hands, because he said allegedly that that's the way
10 you could tell whether somebody was a sniper or not,
11 because then he could smell oil or gunpowder on his
12 hands.
13 Q. Indeed, I think the soldier went as far as
14 actually to sniff at the hands. Is that right?
15 A. Yes, myself included; everyone.
16 Q. Amongst the people in whom Mauzer was
17 interested, was there somebody -- and I don't want to
18 have the name of the person -- was there somebody who
19 was accused of being in possession of a radio
20 transmitter? Don't tell us his name.
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. Was he in particular trouble because he was
23 suspected of using the radio and of having caused the
24 deaths of some Serbian soldiers?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. He had caused it, to make it clear, because
2 the radio transmissions had interfered with military
3 transmissions? That was the accusation?
4 A. Could you please rephrase your question?
5 Q. Yes. I'm sorry. Was the focus of their
6 anger because he was alleged to have caused the deaths
7 because his radio had interfered with military radio
8 transmissions?
9 A. That's correct, because this was just used as
10 a pretext to beat him, because there was no electricity
11 then and a radio transmitter is electricity run.
12 Q. Help us about this: When you were at the
13 mosque, were the guards there what you describe as
14 Arkan's soldiers?
15 A. The guards were Arkan's soldiers, whereas
16 Mauzer's men worked at the medical centre. They were
17 shooting from windows at Klanac, where this resistance
18 movement was on the Federal side. Those who had
19 opposed, on the 2nd of May -- or rather on the 1st of
20 May, they offered resistance. The situation changed a
21 bit on the 2nd. But there was a kind of conflict in
22 which even the Yugoslav air force fired against these
23 positions.
24 At the medical centre, they were shooting
25 from the windows, and they kept us as a human shield.
1 I was part of that human shield. I had to clean the
2 broken glass so that they could kneel and shoot
3 properly, and if I did not stand straight enough, they
4 would hit me so that I would be a living target.
5 Q. In that fighting, were there casualties, both
6 from firearms or from artillery or bombing runs?
7 A. The artillery did not fire, there was no
8 bombing, but I think light arms were used. I don't
9 know. I don't know. I just saw them flying over, but
10 on that day no bombs were thrown. Over there, I mean
11 the place that I spoke of, Klanac, there were no bombs
12 from aircraft that day. There was street fighting.
13 Mauzer's men put a tank between the main
14 building and the post office, and the tank was facing
15 Klanac, and they used the tank to shoot with light
16 arms, mostly snipers, as well as heavier arms.
17 The man who was sniffing at our fingers, he
18 climbed up on the mosque, and he was shooting from the
19 mosque at Klanac.
20 Sorry. I hit the desk now. Sorry.
21 Q. Thank you. I had digressed slightly because
22 I had wanted to ask about that and I had forgotten.
23 Just returning to the mosque, did you
24 overhear or hear one of the soldiers there saying
25 something along these lines: that you would not be
1 hurt if you were not guilty of anything and would be
2 released if there were no problems? Do you recall
3 hearing that?
4 A. (redacted)
5 (redacted)
6 (redacted)
7 (redacted). I also did other
8 things.
9 Quite a few Muslims from the area of Leman
10 were killed for no reason whatsoever, just because they
11 were Muslims, and a young man recognised me at the
12 health centre. He went to school with my sister. He
13 tried to make things as easy as possible for me. It
14 could not have been easy, because they would hit us in
15 passing whenever they could. So he could not help me
16 altogether when I was being interrogated by Mauzer's
17 men, but this captain who was in front of the mosque
18 with us, he was in charge of the military. He was not
19 in charge of civilians at all, but he was considerate
20 towards the elderly and towards children and towards
21 the sickly. So he defended me at a given point in
22 time, so I am really grateful for that.
23 Not everybody should be condemned for certain
24 things. Not everybody is guilty for those things. I
25 condemn what was done, not a man as a man.
1 Q. Of course. If I can just draw you back to
2 the focus of my question. One of the soldiers, it's
3 right, isn't it, whilst you were at the mosque -- and
4 this may well have been someone who was aware of you or
5 something -- said you wouldn't be hurt if you were not
6 guilty of anything, that you would be released if there
7 were no problems?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. What did you understand from the phrase "not
10 guilty of anything"? What did you understand that to
11 mean in the context of the way it was said?
12 A. If I did not have any contact with weapons,
13 as such, that is to say the procurement of weapons, the
14 buying or selling of weapons, if I was not in the SDA
15 party, then I could have been at peace and I didn't
16 have to worry about anything.
17 Q. Thank you, Mr. M. From the mosque, a number
18 of detainees were taken for interrogation at the
19 clinic. Do you remember that?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. In particular, do you recall them
22 interrogating the man who had the radio? Again, don't
23 tell us his name.
24 A. Yes. Yes.
25 Q. Whilst they were interrogating him about the
1 signals he'd passed and the codes that he's used and
2 the organisation he was working for, whilst that was
3 going on was he being beaten?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. Is it right that the focus of that beating
6 was the fact that he had -- that they suspected that he
7 had been involved in some form of communication with
8 the resistance?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. There was another man sitting next to you.
11 Again, I don't want to repeat his name. He was writing
12 out a list; is that right?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. As far as you could tell, was that names of
15 people who were SDA party members and people who had
16 weapons and people who were involved in the supply of
17 weapons?
18 A. Quite possible, and it's quite logical. The
19 young man was born there and he knew everyone.
20 Q. When you were interrogated, Mr. M, again, was
21 the focus of that interrogation -- put aside for the
22 moment anything that was done to you, but the
23 questions, did they focus again on the issue of
24 weapons, the SDA, and who was organising resistance,
25 and topics of that kind?
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. At one point, did you yourself come under
3 suspicion for having been involved in the blowing up of
4 the bridge?
5 A. No.
6 Q. If I can just refresh your memory. I think
7 you were interviewed by the Office of the Prosecutor
8 in 1995 and a statement was drawn up but you never
9 signed it. Is that correct? That's a document you've
10 been taken through in the last couple days or so?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. There was a captain, I think, interrogating
13 you, and at one point he pushed a soldier away and
14 suggested there was a description of someone who was
15 involved in blowing up the bridge, a description which
16 you fitted. Does that refresh your memory about that?
17 A. That wasn't written out properly. I did not
18 say that I was personally being blamed for it. All
19 those who had longish hair and who were skinny were
20 candidates, so to speak. But they were aware of the
21 fact that they had done it; they had blown up the
22 bridge, not anyone from the Croatian side or the Muslim
23 side. It was just used as a pretext for beating.
24 Q. I want to ask you now, please, about the last
25 time that you saw Papa and three brothers called
1 Terzic, who, I think, had been interrogated at the
2 clinic. Do you recall that?
3 A. I recall that. When I was a living target,
4 when I was cleaning up glass, they made all three of us
5 go into that room. I think Redzep Sakic or Senad was
6 with me at the time. I don't know exactly anymore, but
7 at any rate, they were making Muhamed Terzic, one of
8 the three brothers, to jump on his chest from a table
9 that was this high [indicates].
10 Papa was laying on the floor, and they made
11 this man to jump from the table onto Papa's chest.
12 They forced him to do it. They forced him at
13 gunpoint. They put a knife and a gun, they put on his
14 chin, and they made him do it. This man was crying and
15 he said, "Oh, but I can't do it," and the other man was
16 in a terrible state. He was all bloody and ripped up.
17 Q. Are you all right? Do you want a moment?
18 Just pause for a moment.
19 A. It's all right.
20 Q. All right. If I can just help you with
21 this. During this incident, were some rifles or some
22 weapons brought in, apparently from Papa's house, and
23 was one of those weapons one of the ones that you'd had
24 on patrol?
25 A. All rifles, all hunting guns are the same. I
1 had not really known anything about rifles until then.
2 I only had one rifle that I used while doing my
3 military service. So I probably would not have
4 recognised the rifle that I had on duty, because I
5 didn't carry it around all the time because we took
6 two-hour shifts. It's not that we had weapons
7 throughout the night.
8 Q. All right. But can you confirm they brought
9 in the weapons?
10 A. Yes, they brought in the weapons, but
11 probably it wasn't those weapons. I mean, maybe they
12 could have been those weapons, because the young man
13 who was writing things down on the bench, he was with
14 us on these night-duty shifts, but then -- I don't
15 know. I can't say for sure. I can only tell you what
16 I know for sure, one hundred per cent.
17 Q. I want to turn now briefly to your detention
18 at the Luka facility. Was it your recollection that at
19 one stage during the day, the 8th of May, Goran Jelisic
20 apparently said something along the following lines:
21 that you were to be questioned, that those who were not
22 guilty should not worry, that those who were clean and
23 not extremists will get passes and be freed, and that
24 they were going to find the snipers amongst you? Do
25 you recall that?
1 A. Possible snipers, yes.
2 Q. Possible snipers. And as to the rest of it,
3 that's correct, is it?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. The word "clean," what did you understand the
6 word "clean" to mean in the context of what was being
7 said to you?
8 A. Well, it depends in what context you're using
9 that word. "Clean" can mean cleaning a floor, and
10 "clean" can mean cleaning a window, and it is
11 well-known fact what "cleansing" by the Serb people
12 meant.
13 Q. This wasn't cleansing in that context. Would
14 this be right: that what it referred to was if you're
15 not involved in the SDA, if you're not in the
16 resistance, you're not extremists, you're not snipers,
17 then you've got nothing to worry about? Would that be
18 a fair summary of what it meant?
19 A. Well, listen, I imagine that would suit
20 someone, but you should be aware of one thing, that
21 quite a few killings occurred. And if anyone told a
22 Bosnian orthodox person that he was a thief or if he
23 quarrelled at the football game or if they had a fight
24 while they were drunk, that was -- that was sufficient
25 for him to be killed. He'd be called a murderer, a
1 sniper, whatever.
2 Q. Can you help me about this, please, Mr. M:
3 During the course of the day, the 8th of May, would it
4 be right that there were large numbers of people both
5 coming into the Luka facility and leaving it? By that
6 I mean detainees rather than military personnel.
7 A. Yes. Yes.
8 Q. Are we talking about hundreds coming in and
9 hundreds going out? Would that be fair?
10 A. Yes, one could say so. You must bear in mind
11 the fear, all that fear that weighed upon us. So I
12 don't really think that anyone exaggerated. I think
13 these figures are realistic.
14 Q. Thank you. You yourself were released later
15 that day. Were you released alone or in a large group
16 of people? Can you help us?
17 A. Well, I was among the last to receive a pass
18 for my life, around 8.30. At 9.00 there was a curfew,
19 and we had a maximum 15 to 20 minutes to find a safe
20 place to be in, or otherwise, we would end up at the
21 SUP again, or Posavina, that was also full of
22 civilians, or at the nuclear shelter, or again back at
23 Luka.
24 As a matter of fact, I was told I should not
25 go to Kolobara because those who were coming from the
1 front line could even kill me. Who did not know me
2 could see that I was a Muslim and could kill me. That
3 is what I was told by a man. I think he knows Goran
4 very well.
5 Q. Just to complete that part, were you part of
6 a group that was released, as I asked, or did you get
7 released alone? A group?
8 A. No. I was in a group that numbered about 70
9 people, perhaps up to 100, because all of us stood by
10 the hangar, from the beginning of the hangar, so to
11 speak, to the middle, because the hangar is about 100
12 metres long, perhaps less, a bit less. So say there
13 was a 50-metre line of us, two by two. So there were
14 about 100 of us who were supposed to be released, but I
15 cannot give the exact figure. I told you that we all
16 had to keep our heads bowed down.
17 It depends who behaved in what way. Some
18 people came and let the minors clean firearms. All of
19 them were thieves, and they were shooting in the
20 streets, and they tried to see who was a better
21 marksman, who could hit a person who was moving and
22 things like that.
23 Q. Mr. M, I want to ask you now about this,
24 please: When you were subsequently -- just give me a
25 moment, please -- released from detention completely in
1 1992, did you have an interview with the security
2 services in Bosnia-Herzegovina?
3 A. Yes. If possible, could I say something
4 before you do about this interview, with your
5 permission, please?
6 Q. Of course. Please tell us what you can.
7 A. Yesterday or, rather, today, today I had a
8 look at the list and I'm not satisfied with it. I gave
9 that list in November 1992 or, rather, this interview,
10 this paper, and some of my words were changed.
11 I personally was never, well, ethnically
12 conscious, so to speak. I don't know if you've heard
13 of the notion of fraternity and unity. That's the way
14 I was brought up. So although I went through all these
15 horrors and terrors and tortures and camps, I did not
16 look upon all in the same way.
17 However, there were some people who took this
18 down and corrected some things. It's not the way I
19 put. You know, the words that are used there,
20 "Chetniks," whatever. There weren't many Chetniks;
21 two or three. They called themselves Vojvodas. Goran
22 Jelisic said that he was the "Serb Adolf." If he
23 considers himself that, well and fine, it's for him to
24 say, but those are not the words that I used. But I
25 signed this probably because I was fed up.
1 I'm sorry if someone is offended by what I
2 just said.
3 Q. Not at all, Mr. M. It's very helpful, and I
4 may just ask you one or two more questions about it.
5 You've been through that document here in The Hague,
6 haven't you?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. And --
9 A. Today. Today, I saw it today.
10 Q. Thank you. At the end of the statement, did
11 you append your signature to it?
12 A. I did, but this statement was read out to me
13 by a person, and I just glanced at it and signed it.
14 Sorry. The statement that I gave and that was of great
15 strategic importance, because I knew where the heavy
16 howitzers were, those that were facing the free
17 territory where they were only civilians, where there
18 were no military men or military facilities, well, that
19 statement's not there.
20 Later on, I was so sorry that that hadn't
21 reached this place too. For me, that was the most
22 important thing.
23 Q. Is this right: that the conclusion of the
24 statement that you made to the Bosnia-Herzegovina
25 authorities says this:
1 "At the end, I declare that I quoted my
2 personal observations and that everything I said
3 conforms to facts which I certificate with my
4 autograph."
5 I think that means signature.
6 "I'm prepared to repeat everything I said
7 here in court or before any international organisation
8 which might be interested in the matter."
9 Do you remember that as being the final
10 paragraph in the document?
11 A. I think that that is partly all right, but I
12 do not recall all the details that you just mentioned.
13 After all, quite a few years have gone by, and I have
14 experienced so many things that I cannot really recall
15 every little detail.
16 Q. Of course, and I've read it out just to
17 remind you of the detail of it, rather than asking you
18 if you can specifically remember having done that.
19 The first thing I want to ask you is this,
20 Mr. M: You've told us in evidence today about a number
21 of things which Mr. Jelisic was supposed to have done,
22 and in particular, introducing himself at Luka as
23 "Adolf," about him talking about the cleansing of
24 Muslims, and of Ranko Cesic inviting him to see how he
25 was shooting.
1 You do not mention any of those incidents or
2 remarks in the statement you made a few months after
3 you were released. Can you explain why it is that you
4 didn't say anything about those statements at the
5 time?
6 A. In '92 I recorded a tape or, rather, our
7 television made an interview with me, and it was quite
8 a complete testimony, as this one here, with all the
9 detail, perhaps even more so, but that one was for the
10 state security. It meant nothing to me. I never
11 relied on it.
12 It was only after I gave it to the United
13 Nations, when I was interviewed in Tuzla, it was only
14 then that I went back to a passage in my life. I was
15 simply trying not to live with it anymore. My life
16 started again in November '92 when I came out.
17 I wanted to come here to make certain things
18 clear for myself, to come to terms with myself, because
19 I was also damaged. I suffered many other damages. A
20 lot of my family perished, only because they were
21 Muslims, and could I not choose who my parents would
22 be, whether it be a Serb, a Muslim, or a Croat,
23 whoever. So will you please bear that in mind?
24 I'd really like you, if possible, not to rely
25 on that document that you have before you. It will be
1 best to tear it up.
2 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] I do not think
3 you can say that to the counsel.
4 A. I'm sorry.
5 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] You cannot say
6 that to the counsel for the Defence. He has to do his
7 job. Thank you very much.
8 A. I do apologise. I do apologise, but at a
9 given moment they asked from me something that could
10 simply be a boost to them, which could provide a
11 different picture, even worse than the one that was
12 really happening. That's what they wanted, and I'd
13 rather say something which is. Some people found it
14 worse in the camp when they were shaved to the skin.
15 What was worse for me was when they made me defecate by
16 the body of a dead man. Different things happened and
17 perceptions are also different. So let's leave that.
18 MR. GREAVES:
19 Q. Let me turn to another subject, Mr. M. The
20 Zahirovic brothers, you saw both of them being shot?
21 You saw the shots being fired at them, both men being
22 killed?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. Why did you tell the Bosnia-Herzegovina
25 authorities this: In relation to one of the brothers
1 you said:
2 "I could see them beating the Zahirovic
3 brother who was between the sidewalk and the road, but
4 I could not see the other one because he was near the
5 hangar, out of my sight. So I watched them beating
6 some two minutes the brother who was between the
7 sidewalk and the road.
8 I later heard three gunshots, and although I
9 didn't see it, I suppose 'Adolf' killed the other
10 brother which was leaning against the hangar, crying
11 and screaming in pain, and after those gunshots there
12 was no more crying."
13 You then describe the second brother being
14 killed with three bullets. Why did you say that to the
15 Bosnia-Herzegovina authorities, Mr. M?
16 A. You have to understand one thing. I spent
17 eight months in the camp, and I went through a certain
18 crisis when I forget -- when I began to forget the
19 names of my family, of my relatives. Well, not my
20 mother's and my sisters' but say my cousin's name. I
21 simply forgot it. It took me 24 hours for me to
22 remember it. I thought I was going crazy.
23 At some point I weighed only 48 kilograms,
24 because they'd broken my jaw and I couldn't eat. When
25 I went to see a doctor, they said that they would take
1 all my blood and then throw me into the dump -- into
2 the dump yard with all the other corpses. So I'm just
3 beginning to recover.
4 The more I dream, the more things begin to
5 repeat. Nightmares I have are beyond description.
6 Sometimes after I have one of those nightmares, it
7 takes me three or four days to fall asleep again. You
8 simply cannot understand that.
9 So I'm saying that statement which I gave
10 immediately after I came out, I go by my statement
11 which I gave to the United Nations when they
12 interviewed me in Tuzla for over three hours. I think
13 it was worse than going through another hell. This one
14 is the third or the fourth time I'm going through a
15 hell, and really, I came here to say what I saw.
16 Yours, of course, is to question me and mine is to
17 answer those questions.
18 Q. Mr. M, I'm not, therefore, in view of what
19 you said, although I don't necessarily accept it, I'm
20 not going to go into any more detail about your
21 statement to the Bosnia-Herzegovina authorities.
22 I would like to turn now, please, to
23 something which caused you some distress earlier, and I
24 just ask that we can go into private session, please,
25 in connection with the list.
1 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Right. Private
2 session, can we, registrar?
3 MR. GREAVES: I understand from Mr. Registrar
4 we're now in private session.
5 THE REGISTRAR: Yes, we are now in private
6 session.
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2 (redacted)
3 [Open session]
4 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] All right. We
5 are now back in public session, so, Mr. Nice, you now
6 have the --
7 MR. NICE: I have a couple of questions, and
8 they won't be very long, Witness M.
9 Re-examined by Mr. Nice:
10 Q. The first question: Papa, you said that you
11 weren't particularly happy with his appointment. It
12 may not matter, but just in one sentence, if you can,
13 why weren't you happy with his appointment?
14 A. Because (redacted)
15 (redacted) I knew what kind of a burden
16 this is, what kind of a responsibility that is. And a
17 neighbourhood community is even more important,
18 particularly at times like that when one could already
19 glean that something was looming ahead like Bijeljina
20 or something, and I did not think that he was the best
21 person to occupy that post.
22 Had he been more adequate politically, he
23 would have informed his people in time about what was
24 going on, and then those who thought they should stay
25 there would have stayed, and others would have left and
1 thus be saved. He was a victim of his own politics
2 that first day, but unfortunately he took another ten
3 also people with him.
4 You had other witnesses from whom you could
5 hear about him, because many people knew who Papa was.
6 Of course, I am sorry for him as a man, but I
7 did not approve of what he did. If he had some
8 weapons, then he should have either defended at that
9 moment -- he should have either defended his
10 neighbourhood community or just turned in the weapons
11 and not allow that these weapons be found on him.
12 Q. You spoke of Muslims from a location
13 beginning with "L". I can't remember the exact
14 spelling of the name, but you spoke of some Muslims
15 from that location whom you said were killed just
16 because they were Muslims. Can you explain that to us,
17 please?
18 A. Could you repeat that question, please?
19 Q. Yes. You spoke of witnesses from a
20 particular location who you said, in your evidence,
21 were killed just because they were Muslims. We'll find
22 the location, if necessary, and if you can't remember
23 that piece of evidence, I'll come back to that. But
24 you spoke of Muslims being killed just because they
25 were Muslims. Can you remember the example you had in
1 mind?
2 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Mr. Nice,
3 perhaps it was a long time ago when this question was
4 answered. Perhaps you could help him by referring to
5 the transcript, or I'll ask you to move on to another
6 question and then come back to it.
7 MR. NICE: Yes.
8 Q. Similarly, you were asked about the apparent
9 criterion or test for selection in Luka camp that was
10 spoken of by a soldier on your arrival; extremists, and
11 passes for those who weren't, and so on. But can you
12 just tell us this: When groups of men were selected to
13 move bodies, were they selected at random or were they
14 selected according to some questioning technique?
15 A. No, they did not apply any technique. It was
16 simply, "You and you and you," as soon as they would
17 enter the hangar. They wouldn't even look into faces.
18 They would just point at two or three. For a while
19 they were asking for volunteers, but since nobody
20 volunteered, that's what they did.
21 At such moments, if two would go, then one of
22 them would come back, or sometimes none of them would
23 come back. At times, seldom one would come back, but
24 two, I don't think, ever returned, (redacted)
25 (redacted)
1 (redacted)
2 (redacted), and what I said is quite enough, I believe.
3 Q. Sorry. Those who did not return, to your
4 knowledge, had not been identified by any test or
5 criterion to be killed; they were simply people killed
6 at random?
7 A. Random, yes.
8 Q. I've now found the name, and indeed it
9 matches my note, but I didn't believe it. Is there a
10 location called Leman, something like Leman or Lemon?
11 L-E-H-M-A-N is the way it's spelled in the transcript.
12 What you said was, "Quite a few Muslims from
13 the area of Leman were killed for no reason whatsoever,
14 just because they were Muslims." Then you went on at
15 this part of your evidence to say, "And a young man
16 recognised me at the health centre." This was in a
17 passage of your evidence where you had just spoken of
18 (redacted), so if the
19 transcript has got the location incorrectly recorded,
20 that might help you.
21 A. Believe me, I don't know. Perhaps it's
22 because I'm so upset today, I can't really concentrate,
23 and I cannot even recall. I don't know. I don't know,
24 honestly.
25 Q. Very well. I shan't take you any further on
1 that.
2 A. Most probably, it was the kind of mistake
3 like the one that I had to correct in that document.
4 Q. Very well. You were asked questions about
5 suspicion of blowing up the bridge. So far as you were
6 aware, from your discussions with others at the time,
7 were the Muslims in any way responsible for blowing up
8 that bridge?
9 A. No, not really. At first, the Serb Radio
10 Brcko had made its first announcements by the barracks,
11 and it is from the barracks that they set out to take
12 the radio station, the medical centre, the medical
13 emergency centre, the PTT post office.
14 I'm sorry, I'm really so upset I simply can't
15 concentrate. Could you just put your question once
16 again, please?
17 Q. The question was whether, from your
18 discussions, there was any truth in any suggestion that
19 the Muslims had had anything to do with blowing up that
20 bridge. Who was responsible, as you understood it?
21 A. Yes, thank you. Now I know. They did not
22 say that the Muslims had blown up the bridge, because
23 it was well known that they had done it. There was a
24 patrol of ours that was guarding the bridge, and Jasko,
25 an active policeman, was at the bridge, and he was
1 taken away at around 3.00. I saw him after I was
2 released from the camp. He told me himself that a
3 special unit, members came from Belgrade, and he said
4 we were told to go home, to do whatever we wanted to
5 do, to go home and to "let us take over", so they are
6 the ones who did this. And what -- they just wanted to
7 beat someone up.
8 Q. Yes. Therefore, any suggestion that you or
9 any other Muslim was involved in the blowing up of the
10 bridge, was that, in your judgement, a genuine
11 allegation or not?
12 A. No, no. It was just make-believe. "Yes, you
13 fit the description. We're going to beat you, and then
14 we're going to ask you something else. And if you can
15 take more of it, then we're going to beat you some
16 more."
17 Q. Two more questions only. The first relates
18 to what you were asked about your sightings of the
19 killings at the grate, and I'm only asking this
20 question, as the Court will understand that I'm not
21 sure whether the killings by Jelisic are admitted or
22 not.
23 Just help us, please. When you came into
24 court today, did you think you would be able to
25 identify the person you saw doing those killings if you
1 were to see him here today or not? Do you have a
2 view?
3 A. Believe me, I didn't think about it at all,
4 nor do I need that. You know what? The man who was
5 supposed to kill you actually released you. From the
6 moment I got into Luka, I was supposed to be the fourth
7 or the fifth person. Perhaps I'm going to be haunted
8 by that. Perhaps all these nightmares will finally be
9 over.
10 Q. I'm going to take you back, though, to the
11 question. Did you think you'd be able to identify the
12 person if you were to see him again?
13 A. I told you that I did not think about it at
14 all. That would only be an additional burden for me.
15 Q. In the event having been in this courtroom,
16 have you been able to identify the person who you saw
17 doing the killings or not?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. And where is that person?
20 A. [Indicates].
21 Q. Is that the person who killed both the
22 brothers and the other man who had to lick his hand?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. The last question, Witness M, relates to what
25 you said, I think twice now, about people being left
1 alive and then being used for the exchange of
2 prisoners.
3 Was this something that was explained as a
4 policy, or was this something that people discussed or
5 guessed about or worked out? Help us, if you will,
6 with how you offer that as an explanation.
7 A. When I came -- I don't know exactly which
8 date this was in May, it's so hard for me to
9 concentrate, but when I came to Luka, Kosta, Kole -- I
10 know him personally, but I can't remember his last name
11 -- he was in charge of the Luka camp then. He was
12 head of the camp. He was surprised how come I was
13 there, how come that I hadn't escaped someplace.
14 I was, in a way, protected by him. We were
15 together in Banja [phoen] and Gradacac. He had a
16 problem. He was a house painter, but he fell off the
17 ladder and broke his leg or something, and I had
18 problems with my back, so we were in this spot
19 together.
20 He told me that there was no reason for me to
21 be afraid, that it wasn't the 8th or the 15th or the
22 1st of May, that from the 15th onwards the systematic
23 killing had stopped and that now all were being kept
24 alive for all. That's how he had put it. There was
25 supposed to be some kind of an exchange across the Sava
1 River and he put me on that list for an exchange.
2 However, nothing came out of this exchange because they
3 couldn't reach agreement on it ultimately. So most of
4 the information I had I got precisely from those people
5 who kept us detained.
6 Q. The information about exchange coming from
7 them, did they --
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. -- explain where they heard it from, how high
10 up in the line of authority they heard this information
11 from, or not?
12 A. Well, probably -- I think that it was someone
13 from their command.
14 Q. This is the difference between guessing
15 and --
16 A. Because they started viewing us as
17 civilians. I'm sure of what I'm saying. My assessment
18 of the situation never brought me into trouble, so I
19 stand by what I say.
20 Q. Very well.
21 MR. NICE: No other questions in
22 re-examination. Thank you.
23 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you,
24 Mr. Nice. I shall now turn to my colleagues. Judge
25 Riad has a question, I believe.
1 Questioned by the Court:
2 JUDGE RIAD: Thank you, Mr. President. Thank
3 you, Mr. President.
4 Witness M -- I can't call you by your name,
5 so I just say good afternoon, Witness M.
6 If it is no strain for you, you can just
7 talk, and you can just help me understand perhaps some
8 of your assertions or declarations, if you can help me
9 see it more clearly.
10 You mentioned that just as a matter of course
11 and of fact, that it is known what cleansing by the
12 Serbian people meant. It is known what cleansing by
13 the Serbian people meant. What is "known"? Can you
14 just tell us this in your words? It's a very jealous
15 [phoen] statement and very important.
16 A. Well, I understand myself when I'm talking,
17 but you probably have a bit of difficulty in
18 understanding what I'm saying. It so happened that the
19 president of the Republic of Serbia, the ex-Yugoslavia,
20 Slobodan Milosevic, wanted to make a Greater Serbia out
21 of all ex-Yugoslavia. He didn't succeed in doing that,
22 so he wanted to do it at least by taking half of
23 Bosnia, attaching it to Serbia and turning it into a
24 Greater Serbia.
25 So that's what I refer to when I said
1 cleansing the others by the Serbs. They would kill
2 part, and the remainder would be used as slaves, and
3 the rest would be expelled.
4 You can find that in documents that were
5 available to the public. I saw this on CNN. I watched
6 this on television. After all, this is not a public
7 secret. I mean, it's no secret. It's a factual state,
8 because that is why Serbia was bombed by NATO.
9 I'm sorry to be reacting in this way but, you
10 know, when they started bombing them, I felt as if I
11 were bombing them, believe me.
12 JUDGE RIAD: Thank you. But the CNN is not
13 one of our sources. You are our source, so you have to
14 tell us what is your first-hand experience.
15 A. I just said what you have available to you,
16 especially this kind of testimony. You have a victim,
17 a victim who was a victim and still is a victim and
18 hopefully will stop being a victim, but there are a lot
19 of people who cannot get rid of this burden, people who
20 even die from -- die and still bear it. I know a lot
21 of people who committed suicide on the free territory
22 after the camp because they couldn't live with it any
23 longer.
24 JUDGE RIAD: I'm sorry to hear that. You
25 also mentioned, as a matter of fact, that there was
1 some kind of selective murder. You called it selective
2 murder. When there is a selective murder, what is --
3 "selection" means that there is a basis for the
4 selection. Was a basis for this selective matter?
5 You said that they were all civilians. So
6 what was the basis?
7 A. I'm very glad that you took me back to this
8 in order to clarify it to you. It so happened that
9 three days before the bridges would be blown up I went
10 to the SDA club to (redacted)
11 (redacted), because that is one of the things I
12 did inter alia.
13 Later on, when I heard what had happened to
14 our people, I saw this document that was at Klanac, and
15 that is practically why the war had started before the
16 Serbs were supposed actually to attack us. And there
17 was a list, and at the very top of this chapter it said
18 all people who had university degrees, who were
19 doctors, teachers, professors, directors -- do you
20 understand what I mean -- all of these who held these
21 high positions, they were selectively killed. It was
22 no longer a question whether he was a member of the SDA
23 or not. He was simply supposed to be killed.
24 Those were the ones who were killed during
25 this first wave, and this first wave involved such a
1 great number of casualties that it is simply
2 inconceivable.
3 And these three lists that I react to so
4 emotionally, I feel like dying when I have a look at
5 them. I feel awful. It hurts so bad. But there is
6 this list that I can only guarantee to you that is ten
7 times longer; not only for Brcko, but all of Bosnia;
8 not ten times longer, but a hundred times longer.
9 Our people still don't know where these
10 people are, because they're not in other states and
11 they're not there, and after all this first selection,
12 I mean, to go back to that now, so that is this first
13 selection of the most highly educated, then the
14 richest.
15 I know what was done. I can go on about this
16 endlessly. That is not the point. The point is for
17 you to understand what they did to us.
18 The third thing was simply looting. When
19 they had nothing else to loot -- I mean, the lowliest
20 population, but there wasn't anybody who was really
21 lowly. I mean, everybody had a job. Whoever wanted to
22 work could have a job. I had three jobs; one, two,
23 three. I was a universal man. But that's not the
24 point. The point is that it was only Muslims.
25 Look, Goran Jelisic is not the one and only.
1 There are quite a few Goran Jelisics, but I only know
2 him. Look at statistics. Look at how many people were
3 killed in Brcko in addition to the things that he was
4 involved in. But that's not that Goran Jelisic, and
5 it's not only one Hitler. There are many other
6 Hitlers, small Hitlers.
7 But that wasn't the problem. The problem is
8 if you're a Muslim and if they are afraid of you, then
9 they have to eliminate you one way or the other.
10 They're either going to terrify you and you're going to
11 flee to a third country on your own, or you're going to
12 stay there and they're going to exterminate you
13 somehow.
14 So that is this selection. That is this
15 selective treatment of Muslims. To tell you the truth,
16 what they did to us they portrayed as if we were doing
17 it to them. They were talking about some kind of list
18 that we had made that Serbs were supposed to be
19 slaughtered, et cetera, also that Alija Izetbegovic did
20 not want to take us when they would exchange us. I
21 mean, they were simply trying to evade the issue.
22 JUDGE RIAD: We're going out of the real
23 question. Start from the top and going down. Start
24 from the top, the people representing the society, the
25 people who had power in their hand, the money in their
1 hand; is that right? And the method was mainly to
2 exterminate or to transfer, because you said cleansing
3 included many things. You are apparently well
4 informed. So was it mainly exterminating or just
5 inviting them to leave?
6 A. That's the way it turned out, that it was a
7 kind of ethnic cleansing that later gained great
8 momentum, and then they practically remained on their
9 own. When they had no one else to loot, then they
10 started looting themselves. So you have to bear that
11 in mind.
12 Sorry that I'm speaking this way, but I hope
13 that you understand what I'm trying to say. They
14 simply wanted to be on their own as a nation. They
15 didn't want to have any Muslims, they didn't want to
16 have any Croats around.
17 However, it's easier to reach agreement with
18 the Croats because the Croats have a country of their
19 own too, and we bother them. If necessary, they would
20 buy that part of Bosnia that belongs to them and then
21 they would remain on their own.
22 Do you see what my point is? That is what
23 ethnic cleansing means. I'm sorry if you didn't
24 understand my point.
25 JUDGE RIAD: I did. Thank you very much.
1 A. You're welcome.
2 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Judge
3 Rodrigues? Thank you, Judge Riad.
4 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Thank you,
5 Mr. President. Witness M, good afternoon. I should
6 like to go back to this matter of selection and to look
7 at it from another angle. I should like to ask you
8 what was the ethnicity of people who were detained or
9 kept in the mosque?
10 A. That is a question that I expected from the
11 very outset. It was put, but perhaps I didn't clarify
12 things sufficiently.
13 At the mosque, most of the people were
14 Muslims. The majority were Muslims. If there were any
15 Croats, perhaps there were two, three, or four of them,
16 because they were immediately separated from us and
17 they were taken to the military barracks. From the
18 military barracks, they went to free territory, or to
19 Croatia, or someplace, or they were kept for
20 exchanges.
21 I don't want anybody to be offended by this.
22 I was told by Kosta, Kole, that their price was high,
23 that they were worth more because they could get more
24 for one of them. So the point was they could do
25 whatever they wanted to us.
1 So let me tell you, the worst thing that
2 could happen to me -- perhaps I'm speaking at great
3 length -- but they made us relieve ourselves in the
4 mosque. I cannot forgive these leaders for that, this
5 person Mauzer. I think that even animals would not do
6 that worst thing. I mean, if you can house-train a cat
7 -- I'm sorry. I'm begging your pardon, but --
8 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] So in the
9 mosque, the majority were Muslim and there were three
10 or four Croats. How about the barracks? What was the
11 ethnicity of people who were taken to the barracks?
12 A. Your Honour, all these Croats were already
13 warned on time, either by the Serbs or the Croats from
14 Croatian. Very few of them had remained. If they did
15 stay back, they stayed on their own, because if
16 somebody had told me what was in the making and if I
17 had someplace to go, I probably would have gone. But
18 very, very few of them remained. A surprisingly small
19 number remained at that.
20 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] And now the
21 same question but as regards Luka. How about Luka?
22 A. The same. I would say that there were very
23 few of them, as many as fingers on one hand. When they
24 asked whether there were any volunteers for the Serb
25 army, one of the Croats volunteered, and he joined the
1 artillery because he was an artilleryman while doing
2 his military service, I imagine, so he went. There
3 weren't very many of them. Five or six. I'm sorry.
4 In my hangar where I was, that is.
5 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Yes.
6 Right. My last question with which I'm trying to get
7 the whole picture, were there more Croats in the mosque
8 or at Luka? Excuse me --
9 A. There were fewer Croats at the mosque. If
10 you're talking about the percentage, I think it is more
11 or less the same, but in terms of actual numbers --
12 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] No, no. I
13 really want to know if this idea of selection was
14 applied at different stages in the -- from the
15 beginning to their ending up at Luka. It seems, from
16 your evidence, that they took everybody from the
17 mosque, or almost everybody, and after that a selection
18 took place.
19 I don't know if I'm right or not, but you
20 have answered my questions. But if we take the same
21 persons in the beginning, was there a selection? Did a
22 selected number or group of people reach Luka or later
23 on? Luka, I guess, was worse than the mosque. So it
24 was mostly this general question, whether in practice
25 one could really follow this selection.
1 A. Yes.
2 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] How?
3 A. Yes. You see, there are four or five
4 improvised camps where people were brought together,
5 and they were so crowded that they couldn't even sit.
6 They had to stand by one another. That was the
7 Posavina Hotel. I said it was the nuclear shelter.
8 Then Partizan, the gym Partizan in Brcko; then Laser,
9 the transportation company, the bus company, you know;
10 then -- I can't remember the name, but Bimeks. It was
11 a Bimeks outlet, a farm or something. At the farm,
12 yes, there was a complex there, and that is where the
13 hospital was for the wounded Serbs.
14 On the other side, there were detainees,
15 Muslims and Croats. Luka was the main centre for
16 executions and for releases; that is to say that
17 everybody came to Luka. Some of them were sent back.
18 It depends.
19 For example, two or three buses would come
20 per day. Fortunately, I was there only for one day,
21 but some people, who unfortunately were there from the
22 beginning of May until the 24th or 25th when we were
23 taken to Batkovic, I can just tell about things I
24 heard, and that's only logical.
25 In Luka -- in Luka, it was the last stop.
1 Luka was the last stop. Either you would get executed
2 or you would be transferred to, say, Batkovic, as
3 happened to me.
4 Also, there was selection. I mean names were
5 called out in Luka, because they did not know what the
6 exact number was and then they counted everybody, and I
7 don't know what all.
8 So for example, they'd be looking for a man
9 and they'd start -- they'd -- they could not find him
10 because perhaps they mispronounced his name or
11 surname. Later on, when they would realise that there
12 was a mispronunciation involved, when they would
13 finally find him, then they'd beat him even worse.
14 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] To
15 conclude, after your description, could one say that
16 one could find Croats at the mosque but it was very
17 difficult to find Croats in Luka? Would that be
18 correct?
19 A. No, that is not correct. There were Croats
20 in Luka. However, there were quite a few of us.
21 In my opinion, though, in my hangar there
22 were three, four, to five persons, but they left
23 quickly. Either a friend, a Serb friend, would come to
24 get them out or they'd simply leave. Hardly any of
25 them were killed, although some were killed.
1 For example, they wouldn't want to take a man
2 to the camp or anywhere, they'd simply go to his home
3 and kill him.
4 JUDGE RODRIGUES: [Interpretation] Okay.
5 Thank you, Witness M.
6 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you,
7 Judge Rodrigues.
8 Right. I believe this is the end. Did you
9 speak freely? Did you tell us all you wanted? You
10 said that you could talk until tomorrow. We do
11 understand that, but you answered questions. Is there
12 something you would like to add?
13 A. I would like to thank you for being so
14 considerate and for allowing me to say more than you
15 asked me to say. However, I was so upset today, and I
16 think I've relaxed a bit by now. Perhaps I'm a bit
17 more stable now. I don't know how to put it.
18 I wanted to portray all of this for you, but
19 it's not possible. It is different for listeners and
20 it is different for the actual players who were
21 involved. It's like at a football game. You can be
22 there as a fan, but it's different when you're actually
23 running around and playing football.
24 As for me, I am not anyone's judge. I don't
25 condemn Goran Jelisic. I condemn the things he did.
1 If he is guilty, it is a well-known fact who he will be
2 held accountable by; God first and then you.
3 If he can sleep peacefully, then that is his
4 own affair. I do not -- I cannot sleep peacefully and
5 I haven't touched anyone.
6 I thank you, at any rate, and I thank this
7 entire organisation. I hope that in this way, I
8 managed to get some things away from me personally.
9 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Thank you. And
10 that you, who did not put your finger on anyone, that
11 you will find the peace that you deserve, evidently.
12 Will you please stay here for a while?
13 It is now quarter to 6.00. Mr. Nice, is the
14 next witness here? Would you start him today or would
15 you rather that we begin tomorrow, that he begins to
16 give his evidence tomorrow? We shall perhaps have two
17 or three days next week. How do you think we should
18 now --
19 MR. NICE: The next witness is here. He's a
20 protected witness, and he's to be taken by
21 Mr. Tochilovsky. We are, of course, content to start
22 him this evening, and we are in the Chamber's hands.
23 Maybe ten minutes is the maximum we would achieve.
24 MR. GREAVES: Your Honour, there is a matter
25 I want to raise that rises out of the re-examination of
1 the witness. It is a point raised by my learned
2 friend.
3 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Well, perhaps
4 we shall tell the witness that his testimony's
5 finished. I do not think there is time to call the
6 next witness. I believe the interpreters are tired
7 too, and if we're going to have a debate now, perhaps
8 we'll have to yet make another break.
9 Mr. Greaves, you know that you do not have
10 the right to re-examine. There is a principal, there
11 is the right of answer, and then Judges ask their
12 questions, and that is that.
13 MR. GREAVES: I didn't want to ask any
14 questions. I want to raise a matter that's been raised
15 before, and I wanted to --
16 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Right. Right.
17 Yes. All right. All right. Yes, but shall we wait
18 for the witness to leave, please?
19 Witness M, thank you very much. You'll now
20 be escorted from the courtroom with all the protective
21 measures as due.
22 THE WITNESS: Thank you once again.
23 Goodbye.
24 [The witness withdrew]
25 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Yes,
1 Mr. Greaves. You have the floor.
2 MR. GREAVES: During his re-examination, my
3 learned friend made an observation, which was more
4 comment than anything, about the killings at the
5 grate. Can I remind Your Honour of the agreed factual
6 basis for the guilty pleas to be entered by Goran
7 Jelisic, a document which was created at the request of
8 the learned Judge, Judge Riad, which says in respect of
9 the killings of Huso and Smajl Zahirovic, as follows:
10 Counts 20 to 21, which refers to the number, in fact,
11 given to the second indictment --
12 THE INTERPRETER: Could you please slow down
13 for the translation?
14 MR. GREAVES: Of course. I'm sorry. Reads
15 as follows:
16 "Goran Jelisic will plead guilty to
17 Counts 20 and 21 and admit that on or about the
18 8th of May, 1992, he took two Muslim brothers, Huso and
19 Smajl Zahirovic, outside the main hangar at Luka camp
20 and shot and killed one of them."
21 That is a document that is signed by the
22 Prosecution and Defence.
23 There is more. In the second amended
24 indictment, that killing has now been altered to
25 Count 16 and 17, and the actual indictment reads as
1 follows:
2 "On or about the 8th of May, 1992, at Luka
3 camp, Goran Jelisic took two Muslim brothers from
4 Zvornik ..."
5 and names them:
6 "... outside of the main hangar building
7 where he shot and killed one of them."
8 That's an agreed state of affairs as between
9 the Prosecution and the Defence.
10 This witness claimed to have seen both of
11 them. It is for that reason that I challenged him as
12 to his ability to properly recall the details of that
13 matter, and it's for that reason that I cross-examined
14 the witness in that way.
15 Your Honour, what I'm concerned about is that
16 the Prosecution is allowed to re-examine witnesses on
17 the basis which seems to be, on the face of it, one
18 they do not adhere to themselves if this document is to
19 be accepted by them.
20 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Mr. Nice, I
21 believe that I've already said that the witness is not
22 here, so he cannot repeat. But he tried to show, for
23 the Prosecution, and when he turned to the Defence, to
24 answer to you, and he was testifying here about the
25 crime of genocide.
1 Yes, Mr. Nice?
2 MR. NICE: I have nothing very much to say by
3 way of answer, save this: There is a difference
4 between those killings that are charged as specific
5 counts in the indictment and other killings which are
6 relied upon for the case generally and the particular
7 count of genocide that you are trying.
8 The agreement that he killed one brother as
9 the base of a particular count in the indictment
10 doesn't exclude his direct or indirect culpability for
11 the killing of the other brother, and at the end of the
12 evidence, you will have all the evidence from all the
13 witnesses, and you will either find, in relation to
14 that other brother, that he killed him directly
15 himself, therefore it is additional to that which is
16 the subject of the indictment as a specific count, or
17 you'll find that he didn't, or you'll find he was a
18 participant through the hands of someone else.
19 But the questions that I asked are
20 nevertheless correctly asked when the whole basis of
21 the evidence that he gives is being tested. His
22 evidence was, and it will be for you to judge his
23 evidence, that he saw Jelisic kill both of them. If
24 that is the evidence and it's good evidence, then it's
25 evidence that I'm entitled to explore.
1 I'm not seeking to undue any agreement, but
2 there is no agreement that he didn't kill the other
3 brother.
4 I'm just checking with Mr. Tochilovsky, who
5 was, of course, present at those agreements when I
6 wasn't, to make sure I understood them correctly.
7 [Trial Chamber confers]
8 MR. NICE: Nothing further to add. Thank
9 you.
10 JUDGE JORDA: [Interpretation] Right. I
11 believe the Judges have nothing to add to this.
12 Mr. Greaves believed that the Judges have
13 nothing to say. Your observations are on the record.
14 I shall repeat that we are here to judge Goran Jelisic
15 for his responsibility for the genocide.
16 Right. But now we shall be able to give a
17 five-minute break which we took away from the
18 interpreters. Now we will have it, because we are five
19 minutes early today.
20 We shall resume tomorrow at 10.00.
21 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at
22 5.55 p.m., to be reconvened on
23 Tuesday, the 14th day of September,
24 1999, at 10.00 a.m.
25