Page 33081
1 Monday, 4 February 2013
2 [Open session]
3 [The accused entered court]
4 [The witness takes the stand]
5 --- Upon commencing at 9.01 a.m.
6 JUDGE KWON: Good morning, everyone.
7 Good morning, Mr. Milosevic.
8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Good morning, sir.
9 JUDGE KWON: Yes, Ms. Edgerton.
10 WITNESS: DRAGOMIR MILOSEVIC [Resumed]
11 [Witness answered through interpreter]
12 MS. EDGERTON: Thank you.
13 Cross-examination by Ms. Edgerton:
14 Q. Good morning, General. Can you hear me in a language you
15 understand?
16 A. Good morning. I hear you all too well.
17 Q. General, I want to go back to -- to begin with, I want to go back
18 to the end of your testimony in your examination-in-chief, and that's in
19 regard to your association with the SDS party. At transcript page 32815,
20 you said that the SDS or its leaders had no influence whatsoever on your
21 work, although you did have certain contacts with them, and at 32904, you
22 said in response to a question from Judge Kwon on another matter, you
23 said, "I was perceived as being a member of the Serbian Democratic
24 Party," but you said that the only party you were a member of was the
25 League of Communists.
Page 33082
1 So in that regard, I'd like to show you a document and ask you a
2 question. It's 65 ter number 06264. And the document is the transcript
3 of the 37th session of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Supreme Defence
4 Council dated, as you see here, 7 June 1995 on the cover page, but if we
5 go over -- and that should be at e-court -- thank you. That's the agenda
6 for the 37th session.
7 If we go over to page 3 in English. And to my recollection, it's
8 the same page in B/C/S.
9 The meeting was held on 13 June 1995. Now, the attendees at this
10 meeting with President Lilic, President Milosevic, President Bulatovic,
11 and General Momcilo Perisic who was chief of the VJ General Staff, among
12 others.
13 Now, if we could go over to English page 31 of this document and
14 B/C/S page 22, please.
15 Now, the context of this discussion that you see here is that
16 your army, the VRS, had put forward 12 generals for their promotion to be
17 verified, including some members of the Main Staff, and you were one of
18 them. And here General Perisic says:
19 "We do not propose Dragomir Milosevic, who is commander of the
20 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps, and who is also an SDS member."
21 So, General, it seems that General Perisic completely contradicts
22 your assertion to Judge Kwon when you say the only party you were a
23 member of was the League of Communists, does he not?
24 A. I'm afraid I haven't fully understood your question. However, I
25 hope I understood the gist of it, although there may be grounds for some
Page 33083
1 additional questions in that regard.
2 First of all, I cannot deny what Mr. Perisic said, because up
3 until this moment, I wasn't aware of what he had said. It is now that I
4 encounter this indication clearly showing that he was unaware of the
5 situation. It is my impression that he tended to use certain arguments
6 against my promotion, and he could only rely on the fact that I was a SDS
7 member, which wouldn't -- well, there seems to be a precondition that if
8 I were a member, I couldn't be promoted, and the other way round. So he
9 compared some things that I don't believe to have been useful, and still
10 he had to say something to the council at this session.
11 I can see what it reads, but I deny that. I was never a member
12 of the SDS, and that is what I can confirm. As for his words, I dispute
13 them.
14 Q. So nevertheless, you've acknowledged that you had contacts with
15 the SDS leaders and, in fact, General, in 1996, you wrote to
16 General Mladic, and you said at 65 ter number 09139, in a letter dated 19
17 May that year, you said at page 2 of the English translation:
18 "People from the inner circle of the VRS Main Staff told me that
19 I was an SDS general, a politician's general, and a Chetnik general."
20 At page 4, the second paragraph, you wrote:
21 "All people ever seem to say about me was, 'He's an SDS general,
22 and he's in cahoots with Karadzic.'"
23 So it appears even on the basis of your own correspondence that
24 your links with the SDS were rather pronounced?
25 MR. ROBINSON: Excuse me, Mr. President. I think it would be
Page 33084
1 only fair if that could be shown to the general and he can have a chance
2 look at these references before he answers the question.
3 JUDGE KWON: Yes.
4 MS. EDGERTON: Oh I'm sorry, I omitted to give the --
5 JUDGE KWON: Just a second.
6 MS. EDGERTON: Pardon me.
7 JUDGE KWON: Yes.
8 MS. EDGERTON: I omitted to give the B/C/S paragraph and page
9 reference numbers. If I can have your indulgence for one second, Your
10 Honour. If we can go over to the last -- ah, no. I see the proper
11 reference down at the bottom of the B/C/S page on the screen in front of
12 us, and that's the third paragraph from the bottom.
13 MR. ROBINSON: Mr. President, while he's reading that, just so
14 that we don't lose track, with respect to 65 ter 06264, is that going to
15 be tendered?
16 MS. EDGERTON: I didn't see a need. And now perhaps we could go
17 over to the next page in B/C/S for the general. And there should be the
18 page thereafter. Apologies. Your indulgence for a moment. It seems
19 that we might not have all pages uploaded in B/C/S.
20 I apologise for having misspoken. We did have the correct page
21 on the screen. Thank you.
22 Q. Now, General, having had a chance to look at the pages --
23 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, please.
24 MS. EDGERTON:
25 Q. Having had a chance to look at the paragraphs I've referred to,
Page 33085
1 would you be able to answer my question, which was: It appears that even
2 on the basis of your own correspondence that your links with the SDS were
3 rather pronounced, does it not?
4 A. Quite the other way around. This does not indicate that my ties
5 with the SDS were such that this would corroborate their existence. On
6 the contrary. Throughout the letter, I was trying to make a statement
7 opposing such views.
8 You asked me about it, and yet you assert that I had acknowledged
9 my contacts with the SDS. That kind of approach to this matter, which
10 implies that I had conceded to having contact with them, is something
11 that I cannot adopt, and I can't provide answers in that context. It is
12 only logical and natural that at the time I had to have had contact with
13 people but not with -- well, when it comes to issues such as the
14 activities of the SDS, that was not it. As you call my acknowledgement,
15 it wasn't an acknowledgement. It was a mere statement that I was in
16 contact. I couldn't deny that. That is what life dictated. One needed
17 to have contacts with people in order for certain arrangements to be
18 made. However, that deny -- did not imply getting involved in politics.
19 Such contacts were of different nature. That was the first thing.
20 Next, I see this conversation with Mladic here. I would suggest
21 to you -- or, actually, I would propose to answer the following way --
22 Q. General. General, let's finish off with the question that I
23 raised with you initially, and that was about your contacts with the SDS.
24 Now, you've just told us that you had contacts and you weren't -- you
25 weren't about to deny that, and did that include general contacts with
Page 33086
1 Dr. Karadzic?
2 A. If you're asking me about Dr. Karadzic, that's a separate issue.
3 The issue before, however, was of my supposed acknowledgement of contacts
4 with the SDS. Dr. Karadzic was not the SDS itself. My statement that I
5 did have contacts includes what I have already said, and yet you now want
6 me to continue discussing my contacts with Mr. Karadzic in the same vein.
7 However, as regards my contacts with him, I will gladly answer when you
8 put that question. I don't read that question in your questions thus
9 far. I don't know how you include -- how you are trying to introduce
10 that through the back door.
11 Q. I take it from the answer that you've given that you did have
12 contact with Dr. Karadzic; correct?
13 A. Of course I did.
14 Q. That's fine. And we'll come to explore that over the course of
15 your cross-examination. And we'll come back to this document again later
16 in your cross-examination.
17 Now, General, in your testimony in chief at transcript page
18 32815, Dr. Karadzic asked you whether the civil authorities of
19 Republika Srpska interfered in purely military matters, and you said you
20 never experienced that from any person or structure of the government or
21 through activities carried on by the cabinet or the Presidency.
22 "We never had an opportunity to meet, but when we did meet, we
23 never discussed combat activities to be carried out by the
24 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps and politics never influenced the military
25 situation."
Page 33087
1 So as you've just said, you did meet; correct?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. That's a yes or no answer, General.
4 A. As regards this variant of providing answers, I reject this
5 method. I would much prefer if the method used to arrive at what I have
6 to say would be a better one. There is a better way. I don't want
7 anyone to draw such conclusions. See, you had contacts. Then this
8 automatically implies certain arrangements about the system of command
9 and control in the corps.
10 When I said we had contacts, as regards the incident when there
11 was a rift between Mr. Karadzic and Mr. Mladic, at the time I went with
12 Mr. Cedo Sladoje because I wanted to establish some kind of contact
13 regarding that rift because it concerned a decision made by the president
14 of the republic to remove Mladic. If that was the contact discussed
15 here, then I can't deny it. Of course there were contacts, but in
16 situations when it had nothing to do with managing any combat activities.
17 If I had occasion to visit Mr. Karadzic, it was when Mr. Stanic arrived,
18 when he was dealing with the issue of UNPROFOR and the problems
19 pertaining to them. Mr. Karadzic ordered that I be there in order to
20 tell Mr. Stanic, "Here is the man who will work with you on dealing with
21 this problem." I include that in my contacts with him.
22 I was there. I saw two people, and in my book that's a contact,
23 but not in the light that you are trying to.
24 Q. We'll get this back on track in a minute, but I just want to
25 follow-up something that you've referred to in your testimony, and you
Page 33088
1 talk about the occasion when and Cedo Sladoje went to go and see
2 Dr. Karadzic, referring to a rift between Mr. Karadzic and Mr. Mladic.
3 Now, you talked about that with Judge Kwon during the course of
4 your testimony in chief, and Judge Kwon asked you some questions about
5 the nature of the conduct of General Mladic. He asked you whether or not
6 General Mladic wanted to be independent and not controlled by a superior
7 body and whether your answers on that subject meant that General Mladic
8 was disobedient or defiant to his Supreme Commander.
9 Now, General, you said on that day that you couldn't say whether
10 he ignored orders or declined orders because you didn't know, and you
11 weren't aware of the details of any conflict between the two people. You
12 were only discussing your general impression.
13 So are -- if that was your general impression in your testimony
14 in chief, maybe we better get to the bottom of this right now.
15 To be perfectly clear, because you weren't in your testimony in
16 chief, you've not ever seen or heard of Mladic ever disobeying an order
17 from Dr. Karadzic, have you? Never. And that, General, is a yes or no
18 question.
19 A. I am trying to answer the best way possible in my view to obtain
20 the right information. If I said yes or no, I'm afraid your impression
21 would not be the right one.
22 If I was engaged to the full concerning the situation and combat
23 activities, which included the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps and the 1st Corps
24 of the army of BH, then that was my main preoccupation. Being engaged in
25 such a large area, I never had an opportunity to see both of them in the
Page 33089
1 same area to be able to see what it was that they actually had a conflict
2 over. That was one thing.
3 Another thing, I never attended any Assembly sessions of the
4 RS Assembly. I do know that the -- such sessions were held in different
5 locations, and I do know that basically all of the generals were there.
6 However, I did not attend a single one. Whatever misunderstandings there
7 may have been, whatever discussions there may have been in regard of
8 command and control could have taken place in such situations, and yet it
9 could have been in situations where only the two of them were present or
10 some of their associates. However, I was not there. I couldn't see
11 that. I couldn't realise or pinpoint what their misunderstanding or
12 conflict was. Since I was in no situation to see it, I cannot speculate.
13 Obviously there was a misunderstanding, and I have to be so free as to
14 say that I could see something was wrong. Now, to what extent that was
15 or who initiated it, that's something I don't know.
16 I think my assertion should be enough for you, which for the time
17 figures as the only one. I have no other -- I have no other
18 explanations.
19 Q. Can we just go back to my question then. It's correct, then,
20 that you've never seen or heard of General Mladic ever disobeying an
21 order from Dr. Karadzic, have you?
22 A. Of course it's correct. If I didn't see it, how could I confirm
23 it? It doesn't mean that I'm saying that there was no recalcitrance, but
24 I'd rather not go into it.
25 Q. Now, you've just said that you didn't go to Assembly sessions.
Page 33090
1 A. Right.
2 Q. But I'd like to tell you what General Mladic, your commander,
3 said about the nature of the army's relationship with the civilian
4 authorities at the 50th Assembly session of the RS Assembly, and that was
5 on April 6, 1995, and the transcript of that is P970. The relevant
6 page -- actually, what I'll do, General, is I'll start with something
7 that General Milovanovic, your army's deputy commander and the Chief of
8 Staff, said at that Assembly session. I'll start at page 191 in English
9 and page 162 in B/C/S. And there General Milovanovic said in response to
10 a speech by Dr. Karadzic:
11 "I don't want to comment on the speech delivered by the
12 Supreme Commander. I'm not entitled to it. Yet I can claim again that
13 the Main Staff never had the intention nor does it now to place itself
14 above the state. No state where the military are in power is long lived,
15 even where a putsch had taken place, where the army did it, it was always
16 with the promise of bringing back a civilian government. The army, which
17 didn't observe this, lost both the state and army. It's not up to the
18 army to lead the state but the state to lead the army."
19 And then if we go over to page 344 in English of this document
20 and page 303 in B/C/S, there's a series of discussions that follow the
21 quote I've just read to you. General Mladic himself speaks in response
22 to and addressing Dr. Karadzic, and he says to Dr. Karadzic:
23 "I wish to tell you, you have no idea how much I understand what
24 a difficult role you, in particular, have, and every other man in a high
25 position has."
Page 33091
1 And then if we go over to the paragraph that follows, he says to
2 Dr. Karadzic:
3 "President, you don't have more competent and more honest people
4 in Republika Srpska who could give you a better, more honest and more
5 competent assessment of the army than your officers. I have nothing to
6 hide from you. It's not my army. It's more yours than mine. But most
7 of all, it's the army of the people and the state."
8 Now, General, based on this, it seems to me that your impression
9 of what you described as a rift actually reflects your lack of
10 understanding of the situation, doesn't it, because Mladic here in
11 April 1995, before an audience of the members of the Assembly, generals
12 from the Main Staff of your army, Dr. Karadzic himself, and other members
13 of the Supreme Command affirms he's a committed officer dedicated in
14 service to Dr. Karadzic and his people, doesn't he?
15 A. I don't know what you expect of me.
16 Q. I expect you to answer my questions, if that's okay.
17 A. Of course you expect that, but I don't know in what sense. Why
18 should I try to say something now in terms of see how he put it nicely.
19 As to those statements, issues, and his words in that particular place at
20 that particular time is not something that I'm going to judge. I'm not
21 going to take the role of a man who will say this is right and this is
22 wrong. These are issues that I have no contact with, I have no
23 connection to, apart from seeing that these are written on the paper. I
24 have no other answer but to say that this is not my comment, this is not
25 my opinion, and it shouldn't be expected of me to confirm the veracity of
Page 33092
1 this or otherwise. What is written here is apparent, but nobody should
2 expect of me to confirm other people's ideas, words, utterances, or
3 variations in their public appearances, and this is something that I
4 cannot dwell on.
5 Q. Fine. We'll move on then. Let's go back to the situation that I
6 put to you or the reference in your testimony in chief that I put to you
7 at the beginning of your cross-examination where you said when you met --
8 when you said, "I never experienced from any person or structure of the
9 government, either through any activities carried on by the cabinet or
10 Presidency --" pardon me. I'll rephrase it.
11 Where you said in respect of the government, the cabinet, or the
12 Presidency that you never had an opportunity to meet, but when you did
13 meet you never discussed combat activities to be carried out by the
14 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps, and politics didn't interest -- or influence the
15 military situation. And I want to know you another document. That's
16 P4925, and it's entitled "Amendment to Directive 6," and it's issued by
17 Dr. Karadzic on 12 December 1993.
18 Now, I think we'll probably for you, General, have to enlarge the
19 copy in your language on the left-hand side.
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. And I'm particularly interested in paragraph 2 at the bottom of
22 the page. Thank you.
23 Now, this is a directive, General, that says -- or a directive to
24 by 21 December, 1993, when Geneva negotiations are resumed, to improve
25 the SRK's tactical position - and if we can go over to the next page,
Page 33093
1 please - by, among other things, at paragraph 2, 2(a) by among other
2 things seizing Zuc and Mojmilo features to ensure the most favourable
3 position for dividing the town of Sarajevo.
4 So this document, General, is a directive ordering operations
5 specifically timed to improve your corps' tactical position by the time
6 political discussions resume. So isn't this actually a perfect example
7 of how politics influence and, in fact, dictate the military situation?
8 A. First of all, I'm not familiar personally with this directive at
9 all, and in connection with such ideas or directives, this is something
10 completely new to me apart from being able now to read it. And this
11 reference concerning improving the situation in the theatre of operations
12 that we discussed so far, the Sarajevo theatre, I cannot assess this in
13 terms of saying that this is not significant. It is. It indicates that
14 the organs of government want to create a situation which would be more
15 favourable to them and to make the life of the people living in that area
16 easier, living in the area where there are conflicting parties, because
17 if you have some certain features, if you hold certain features, this is
18 important for the defence of the area and the territory that you'd
19 already seized, that you already have.
20 Q. So you're saying that you're not familiar with the document or
21 you're not familiar with the operation that it directs?
22 A. Yes. Well, this is 1993, isn't it. As you know very well --
23 yeah. Yeah. Well, I was there. Yes, I'm -- I was made aware of that,
24 of that action being carried out, those activities concerning the feature
25 Zuc, but I did not take part personally in that, because General Galic
Page 33094
1 commanded the corps at the time. It was none of my business to monitor
2 closely at that situation apart from me being at the staff.
3 Q. Now, General --
4 JUDGE KWON: Ms. Edgerton, I'm sorry to interrupt you.
5 MS. EDGERTON: No problem.
6 JUDGE KWON: I read the transcript you referred to, i.e.,
7 transcript page 32815 -- I'm sorry, 32815. The question asked by
8 Mr. Karadzic to the witness was related to the influence by the civilian
9 authorities -- civilian authorities and especially the SDS or its
10 leaders.
11 I don't think that question also related to the president
12 himself, the Supreme Commander, and I don't think the witness ever denied
13 the role of Karadzic, the president, with respect to military affairs.
14 Could you put more directly your question to the witness with --
15 as regards this document.
16 MS. EDGERTON: Your indulgence for a moment while I look again at
17 the transcript, please, Your Honours.
18 Yes. And perhaps I've come about it in a cumbersome way. The
19 question relates to, as I read it, the general's assertion that with
20 regard to the government, the cabinet, or the Presidency, that they never
21 had an opportunity to meet, and when they did, they never discussed
22 combat activities to be carried out by the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps. And
23 I'd like to go directly to that in my questioning.
24 JUDGE KWON: Very well. Please continue.
25 MS. EDGERTON:
Page 33095
1 Q. Now, General, you've just said that you were made aware of this
2 operation being carried out, and it's true, isn't it, that you were made
3 aware of this operation because you were part of the high level
4 discussion in Belgrade on 13 and 14 December 1993, where the operation
5 was planned, weren't you?
6 A. That's correct. That's correct. I did attend in my capacity as
7 a person -- well, I did not command the corps at the time, apart from the
8 corps commander who wanted me to tag along because of possible better
9 assessing what was to come going forward, and maybe as his first
10 associate and expert co-worker. I was there just to attend. I did not
11 take part in the discussion. I did not take part in putting forward any
12 proposals, and I did not initiate any matters concerning what was to
13 unfold later.
14 Q. Now, at that meeting, from the Presidency, from the members of
15 the Presidency of the republic of Serbian people of Bosnia-Herzegovina
16 were Dr. Karadzic, Mr. Krajisnik; correct?
17 A. That's correct.
18 Q. From your army General Mladic, General Milovanovic,
19 General Djukic, General Miletic, General Maric, and Colonel Salapura, in
20 addition to yourself and General Galic; correct?
21 A. I cannot confirm for certain people, because I cannot recall
22 whether Salapura was there or not, whether Miletic was there or not. I
23 cannot recall that.
24 As for the others that you mentioned, yes, I do recall, and I
25 know that they were there. In my previous responses to you, it slipped
Page 33096
1 my mind to tell you that Mladic was the initiator of all these things.
2 He particularly tried to go through President Milosevic to create an
3 impression that there was a need for such a combat action to be carried
4 out. I now can see that this is going -- this is interpreted in
5 hindsight as the President's initiative or his proposal, but I do recall
6 Mladic's stance at that meeting. It is true, however, that Milovanovic
7 held a slightly different position in terms of that he needed more time
8 for preparations. He didn't claim that taking such action would be
9 unnecessary. And this is as far as I know about these things.
10 Q. And from the cabinet, the RS cabinet, or the government,
11 Mico Stanisic was also there, wasn't he?
12 A. I cannot confirm that. I'm not sure.
13 Q. Do you remember President Slobodan Milosevic, General Perisic,
14 Jovica Stanisic, and Frenki Simatovic taking part?
15 A. Of course I do recall President Milosevic and Mr. Perisic. As
16 for Stanisic, I -- I didn't know that person. And since there were no
17 introduction at the meeting, he may have been there, but I did not pay
18 any attention to him, because he represented a service which does not
19 want to flaunt its presence around. I cannot confirm Mr. Simatovic
20 either. So I cannot confirm that they were there.
21 Q. That's fine. Now, in your testimony in chief, you said that when
22 you met, you never discussed combat activities to be carried out by the
23 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps, at 32815. The specific purpose, General, of
24 this meeting was to plan, to discuss and plan, the operation to be
25 carried out in the area of responsibility of the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps,
Page 33097
1 wasn't it?
2 A. I think that you do not want to hear the right answer, and you're
3 trying to lead me to give you an answer which is favourable to your
4 cause.
5 I wasn't the driver of that meeting, the initiator. I wasn't
6 somebody who was meeting President Karadzic pursuant to the need to
7 resolve those issues concerning combat actions.
8 When I said I did not meet him on these matters, I mean I did not
9 meet him separately or meet him in terms of my capacity and my function
10 concerning those activities pertaining to the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps.
11 There was no such separate meeting, or there was no meeting between me
12 and President Karadzic alone.
13 For instance, if there were briefings, military briefings, such
14 briefings would be attended by President Karadzic. In my eyes, this was
15 not a discussion on how combat activities should be carried out. Such
16 briefings were used to discuss many matters, and president would receive
17 reports on what was going on within the Republika Srpska Army throughout
18 the territory. I would not treat that as a meeting concerning the issue
19 that you want me to give you an answer about concerning the Sarajevo
20 area.
21 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] In transcript, I don't believe that
22 the "vojna savjetovanja" should not be translated as "military
23 briefings." Military briefings are daily operational activities, and
24 "vojna savjetovanja" has a different -- completely different meaning.
25 JUDGE KWON: I can't help that. Probably you may ask the general
Page 33098
1 about the meaning or what it was like.
2 General, I don't remember the term, but if you could assist us.
3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honours, if it went to
4 military conferences or military meetings, I presume that this is what I
5 am supposed to elucidate upon. Of course, this is not a briefing or a
6 short meeting that would be for the purposes of exchanging brief
7 instructions or orders. Military conferences concerned military matters.
8 There were -- there were usually annual conferences. There was no
9 prescribed frequency, and they would discuss military matters and
10 developments. This would be a review of the preceding year in terms of
11 military matters and in connection with the aforesaid to take stance on
12 improvements or new solutions or correction of certain deficiencies for
13 the future period.
14 JUDGE KWON: Yes. Thank you.
15 MS. EDGERTON:
16 Q. So, General, you're referring to the annual -- the briefings on
17 combat readiness which took place at the end of January and the beginning
18 of February every year, aren't you?
19 A. I'm not discussing that, no. I said that military conferences or
20 military consultations were places where the Main Staff would find it
21 necessary to invite the president of the republic to make a review of the
22 preceding year. It doesn't have to be in January, because we're not in
23 peacetime. We could not plan certain slots for that meeting.
24 It took place when it could, when the circumstances were right,
25 when arrangements for everybody to be present allowed, and of course the
Page 33099
1 situation along the front line would dictate that such conferences would
2 take place in a completely different time period.
3 Q. Thank you. And now that we've clarified your answers at 32815 of
4 your testimony, I'd like to move on to a slightly different area but
5 still keeping this operation from December 1993 in mind.
6 In your testimony at 32576, you said your corps' objective was to
7 defend their area of responsibility, and you said that a couple of times.
8 Now, looking at this order which refers to ensuring the most favourable
9 position for dividing the town of Sarajevo, would you agree with me if I
10 was to suggest to you it's fair to say that defence of your area of
11 responsibility wasn't your sole objective? Your objective was to
12 maintain and consolidate and improve positions under control of the
13 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps; correct?
14 A. What I firmly know in terms of what was the mission of the corps
15 and the task of the corps and what the corps could and wanted to carry
16 out in terms of combat activities is what I already told you, and that is
17 engagement was throughout the area at all points, was focusing on
18 maintaining the territory that was under the control of the
19 Romanija Sarajevo Corps.
20 I know what you're after, because there's mention of division of
21 Sarajevo here. Well, I can tell you simply when it comes to the division
22 of Sarajevo, irrespective of whether anybody wanted or planned for that
23 to happen, and I know that there was not -- there were no plans for that,
24 division of Sarajevo is rubbish, is bunkum. Such activity could not be
25 done and there was no need for it to be done. And it would not be
Page 33100
1 reasonable to plan for such an activity, because it would entail huge
2 losses and casualties on both sides, and I refute such claims that we
3 were trying to enter Sarajevo to that extent that this is nothing to be
4 discussed, because we neither wanted nor could nor planned to do so. We
5 thought it would be -- made no sense and would entail huge sacrifices and
6 casualties, and this is why we did not want to go into it.
7 I -- I don't know what a kind of division is being referred to.
8 You may ask Mr. Karadzic about that. A division does not have to mean
9 territorial. There are other divisions of that.
10 Q. So despite what looks like the plain wording of this order to SRK
11 forces to set facts in place on the ground that would ensure a divided
12 Sarajevo as part of a negotiated settlement in Geneva, you're now saying
13 that division of the city was not one of the objectives?
14 A. That is all I can say, and nobody ever issued an order to me in
15 order to carry out certain combat actions for the purpose of dividing
16 Sarajevo. I did not receive anything to that effect from anyone
17 regardless of the level from which this could have come from. It could
18 have just come from the commander of the Main Staff. And so I really
19 couldn't tell you anything other than I remain by what I have said.
20 And may I add, even had anybody ordered anything like that, I
21 would have had to find a way not to accept that and to find another way
22 of opposing that. It just wasn't realistic. The forces that we had
23 available could not have made that happen, and we couldn't have embarked
24 upon any kind of adventure in that sense, no.
25 Q. So you're saying that even though the division of Sarajevo into
Page 33101
1 Serb and Muslim parts was actually identified as one of the strategic
2 objectives of the war by the Bosnian Serb leadership, that was not one of
3 your corps objectives.
4 A. Madam Edgerton, I would like to ask you and the Trial Chamber to
5 accept one of my sentences, a few words where I want to say the
6 following: I am here in The Hague in the Detention Unit, and looking at
7 my indictment when I was preparing for my trial, among other things I
8 could see that there was some strategic goals being mentioned and so on
9 and so forth. Just by chance I happened to find myself in the area where
10 Mr. Krajisnik was as well, so I went.
11 Well, if you can just try to follow me, what I want to try to
12 tell you is something that can come out from my mouth only. I don't have
13 any other information or assertions. I said, "Well, let me please see
14 what these strategic goals are." And he took that down from the
15 computer. He showed it to me. And I am telling this Trial Chamber that
16 that was the first time that I specifically heard of those strategic
17 goals, which means that during the events, the combat, throughout the
18 whole period, no one issued anything to me or to General Galic. Nobody
19 said, "Here are the goals. Go ahead, implement that." This was not the
20 case with me or anyone else.
21 We always had a way, a means of securing and protecting the
22 existing area regardless of what the goals exist -- were, if any existed
23 at all, but nobody imposed in practice for us to implement those goals
24 through actions in the field, through combat.
25 MS. EDGERTON: I'll just wait a second until the general's had a
Page 33102
1 chance to have a drink.
2 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Milosevic, could you --
3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you. Thank you.
4 JUDGE KWON: Could you concentrate on answering the question.
5 The question was this time whether it was one of the strategic objectives
6 of the war by the Bosnian Serb leadership to divide Sarajevo into Serb
7 and Muslim parts. So --
8 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] May I -- may I ask to see where it
9 is stated that these were strategic goals of the war, military strategic
10 goals? If the question is varied to imply something that is not implied,
11 then it places the witness into a difficult position. Had this been a
12 military goal, the military would have known it. This was a political
13 and strategic goal. Could we please see where it is stated that it was a
14 military strategic goal?
15 JUDGE KWON: Well, could you put your question again,
16 Ms. Edgerton?
17 MS. EDGERTON:
18 Q. The question was whether the general is now saying that the
19 division of Sarajevo, ensuring, ensuring -- and I'll go back to my --
20 I'll go back to my notes and I'll characterize it the way I had
21 initially.
22 General, I'd like to put to you in the context of this document
23 we've been looking at and SRK operations over the course of the war that
24 your corps objective was as follows: To maintain and improve positions
25 under your corps' control which would set facts in place on the ground to
Page 33103
1 ensure the achievement of a divided Sarajevo as part of a negotiated
2 settlement in Geneva or wherever the negotiations were taking place.
3 So, General, it was your corps' job, wasn't it, to maintain the
4 area, the existing area, to improve positions of your corps from that
5 existing area which would set facts in place on the ground that would
6 ensure the division of Sarajevo at the international negotiating table;
7 correct?
8 A. Well, now it's all clear. I don't have any problem now to answer
9 this question. The basic thing is to maintain the existing situation and
10 to improve it. As for what would happen at the negotiations, what would
11 be achieved there, that was up to somebody else, not up to the
12 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps. In that sense, I can just give the answer that
13 I completely agree with the point that the task was to maintain and
14 improve the position which then makes it possible to, in negotiations,
15 come to something that suits both sides, and for one side to fight for a
16 particular status. So I would kindly ask you not to seek this as a
17 military task to go into some sort of division. If the point is to say
18 that the division was supposed to be achieved by military means, this is
19 a task that was not issued by anyone nor was it possible to carry it out
20 or to achieve by combat.
21 Q. And you were able to carry out your task because the existing
22 area, your existing area, already effectively represented a division of
23 the city, didn't it?
24 A. The term "division" is something that I'm going to leave out of
25 my answer. I'm talking about the area that is already. In my notes I
Page 33104
1 wrote this already, that at the point in time when I came to the position
2 of commander, all the issues were already, I would say, crystallised.
3 There was a balanced ratio of forces, the conflict, and everybody knew
4 what they wanted more or less and how they should manage their own
5 forces.
6 In this case, this picture of events or some sort of indicators
7 of the territory, which in the initial period and during the first months
8 of the war in 1992 and 1993 remained the same until the end, so there was
9 no longer any question of division but it was more of a question of the
10 sides staying wherever they were.
11 Q. Thank you. Now, just in regard to your reference to meeting you
12 and Mr. Sladoje, Cedo Sladoje, attended with Dr. Karadzic, and this is
13 jumping forward in time to August of 1995, you said that -- at 32887 to
14 32889 of the transcript, you talked about how you didn't attend the
15 colloquium of generals in Banja Luka because you were in combat, and when
16 you returned to your command, your associates briefed you on what had
17 happened, and you and Colonel Sladoje went to Pale where you went to see
18 Dr. Karadzic. So could you just confirm in regard to that a couple of
19 things that I think you may have left out.
20 You actually didn't attend the colloquium because Dr. Karadzic
21 told you not to go. Isn't that the case?
22 A. First of all, that is not correct. Secondly, nobody could tell
23 me to attend or not to attend, because they were not in a position to
24 convey information to me that there would be a need to go and see Mladic.
25 So I don't know if I understood you correctly, but I understood correctly
Page 33105
1 that, if I may repeat that, that Mr. Karadzic told me -- I'm sorry, can
2 you help me? What did you say that Mr. Karadzic told me, not to do what?
3 Can you just, please, just tell me again?
4 Q. That he prohibited you from attending the colloquium in
5 Banja Luka.
6 A. No, he did not forbid me. He didn't have the opportunity to do
7 that. I don't know whether this is something that he thought about in
8 his head, but the actual prohibition did not reach me, and even if it did
9 reach me, I mean, it's a question of whether anybody can tell me whether
10 to attend or not or to tell me how to conduct myself.
11 Q. And it's correct, isn't it, that you and Colonel Sladoje didn't
12 go to Pale on your own initiative. You went because you had been
13 directed to go there with him by Dr. Karadzic?
14 A. No. We did not receive any such order. I explained that when I
15 came from mount Visojevica which is an area close to the most sensitive
16 point, which was the Nisici plain, this is where I had an overview of the
17 situation. I came quite late in the evening, I would say. Actually,
18 quite late in the afternoon, around 18- or 1900 hours, and that is when
19 Colonel Sladoje, Colonel -- the security chief came and explained what
20 had happened during the day, that a meeting was scheduled with Mladic and
21 that they were not able to tell me to prepare for the meeting and to go.
22 Nothing else happened or was happening, and there was no other atmosphere
23 being created other than us at that meeting attended by Lugonja and Cedo
24 Sladoje reaching an agreement that the two of us should go to see Mladic,
25 not because anybody ordered it. We just decided that on our own
Page 33106
1 initiative.
2 Q. Could we have a look, please, at P2683. And just for the
3 transcript, at page 25, line 16, it's Nisici with an N, as in November,
4 as opposed with an M.
5 So this document that we now see in front of us signed by
6 Dr. Karadzic, General, is -- looks like it was a telegram dated 5 August,
7 1995, which was received in the corps at 5.00 p.m., directing you
8 personally, together with your Chief of Staff who -- and Chief of
9 Operations who was Colonel Sladoje, to come to the meeting in Pale in the
10 president's office at 9.00.
11 Now, you just said that nobody ordered you to go there. It seems
12 that that's not the case, looking at this document; correct?
13 A. Well, that might seem like it to you, and here it looks as if
14 this is something that's being confirmed. However, Sladoje and Lugonja
15 did not show this document to me. Therefore, I did not know about the
16 document, but I knew in this form that Mr. Karadzic -- well, this is how
17 I understood it more or less, and it remains for me just to tell you
18 that. Simultaneously -- and I don't see that from this document, by the
19 way. So simultaneously as Mladic launched the initiative and summoned
20 the generals to him, I understood from Cedo Sladoje,
21 Colonel Cedo Sladoje, and Lugonja, that the same action, the same request
22 was sent to the generals by President Karadzic, but I did not see this
23 request in this way for me and the Chief of Staff individually.
24 Let me just take a look. Evidently it states here what it
25 states, but we didn't go pursuant to this, what is written here, because
Page 33107
1 nobody showed me this. We agreed to go, to contact Mr. President in
2 relation to that problem if anything can be amortised and a better
3 solution found. So I stand by -- I mean, I'm not denying that this is
4 something that is written down on the paper. This is a paper I did not
5 have in my hand, so in agreement with the officers that I referred to in
6 my office, there was no mention of going because the president was
7 requesting it but it was our own decision. But they probably knew that
8 this existed, so then we just set off by inertia, but I'm not aware of
9 this.
10 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] In the transcript, if it's
11 important, on line 9, page 26, it says president's office, and here
12 actually it says the cabinet of the president of the National Assembly.
13 MS. EDGERTON: That's -- that's correct. If we could go --
14 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Milosevic, I find it very difficult to follow
15 you. The president sent you -- the command sent to the commander of the
16 Sarajevo-Romanija Corps urgently to come to a meeting, and how can -- how
17 could a Chief of Staff or other staff not show this document to their
18 commander? Could you assist me?
19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, it's difficult for me to help
20 you. I understand what you're saying, because that arrival of mine
21 returned to the office implied a whole situation which in its way was
22 serious, and the question of whether I should get this document or not or
23 should be informed about it was not initiated. They informed me overall
24 what was going on that day and that General Mladic was summoning people
25 to him and General -- and Mr. Karadzic was summoning people to see him.
Page 33108
1 So they did not show that in the form that this referred exclusively to
2 me, but it was understood that President Karadzic was summoning people in
3 his own way, in his own sense, to have a contact.
4 I understood from them absolutely then, and that's why I didn't
5 actually open up that question, that General -- that President Karadzic
6 was summoning all the generals, but from here you can see that as far as
7 the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps is concerned, in that case the invitation
8 referred only to me. So I don't see. But they did inform me that it was
9 a question of parallel invitations. One was making -- calling people to
10 him and the other one was doing that as well. So of course it's
11 understood that it cannot be quite clear. There was no question of to go
12 or not to go. This all took place at a late point in time, and so
13 perhaps because it was so late, perhaps it was superfluous for them to
14 point out to me that this referred only to the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps.
15 JUDGE KWON: Please continue, Ms. Edgerton.
16 MS. EDGERTON: Thank you.
17 Q. Just before the break, I'd like to move to another area, and it's
18 about your service -- it refers to your military career, and it's about
19 your service as operations officer with the Drina Corps in the spring of
20 1993. You mentioned that in your testimony in chief.
21 Now, as the operations officer, you would have been familiar with
22 Operation Udar which took place from February 14th to April 25th that
23 year in the Drina valley; correct?
24 A. A correction. I was not the duty operations officer at the
25 corps. I was the chief of the operations sector in the corps. So I
Page 33109
1 wasn't the duty operations officer. But, okay, this is not important.
2 If by this name -- I cannot remember now -- well, I was informed
3 about it. While I was there, I knew what was going on. I know that this
4 code word Udar, you would need to remind me what this Udar referred to.
5 Then I could tell you how much I knew, but I would like to underline that
6 while I was at the corps, I didn't know what was going on.
7 Q. Well, would you agree --
8 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Excuse me, in the transcript it
9 says "I didn't know what was going on," but the witness said that "while
10 I was in the corps, I knew what was going on." Line 5.
11 JUDGE KWON: Do you confirm that, Mr. Milosevic?
12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. Yes.
13 JUDGE KWON: Thank you.
14 MS. EDGERTON:
15 Q. Udar was an operation to fortify the central Podrinje area, and
16 it included operations against Cerska, Konjevic Polje, Sasa mine, and
17 Srebrenica. You remember that now, don't you?
18 A. Yes. Yes, I do.
19 Q. And the outcome of the operation was that it was quite
20 successful, and by mid-March, Drina Corps forces had routed the Army of
21 Bosnia and Herzegovina from all those areas; correct?
22 A. Yes. Well, let me just give an answer that would explain the
23 whole thing. The area that we are discussing now or that I will be
24 discussing is connected to a circumstance where the Army of
25 Republika Srpska had a section of the road from Vlasenica towards Zvornik
Page 33110
1 in this case that was cut off. This was in the area of Konjevic Polje,
2 Pobudje, and towards Srebrenica, and to the north in the sector of
3 Cerska. That area was held by the forces of the Bosnia and Herzegovina
4 army, their 2nd Corps. I think it was the 83rd Division from Srebrenica,
5 actually, and it was necessary to embark on active combat in order to
6 open up a direct route from Vlasenica and, after all, from the inner
7 areas of Republika Srpska. So because the road was cut off and the
8 forces were separated in that area around that Konjevic Polje, then you
9 would have some enclaves possibly created just like the Srebrenica
10 enclave was created. So what happened was that a plan was drafted to
11 carry out an operation from Sehovici, from the north, towards the south,
12 and in that way to open up a route through Konjevic Polje so that we
13 could have normal communication, a normal road towards Zvornik. Of
14 course, the operation took a while. Mostly it was in early 1993, from
15 March until I'm not sure when. Perhaps it was over by the end of April.
16 I cannot be certain, but it's around that period. So the -- we managed
17 to shift their forces and to open up the road.
18 MS. EDGERTON: Your Honours you, I see the time. I wonder if
19 you'd like to take the break at this moment.
20 JUDGE KWON: Thank you. We will. We will have a break for half
21 an hour and resume at 3 past 11.00.
22 --- Recess taken at 10.32 a.m.
23 --- On resuming at 11.04 a.m.
24 JUDGE KWON: Please continue, Ms. Edgerton.
25 MS. EDGERTON: Yes. Thank you. Before I continue with the
Page 33111
1 general, I just want to respond to the intervention by Dr. Karadzic, Your
2 Honours, where at page 22 he asked to see where it is stated that with
3 respect to the strategic objectives that these were the strategic goals
4 of the war, military strategic goals, and he asked where -- to see where
5 it is stated that it was a military strategic goal, and in that regard I
6 want to refer Dr. Karadzic to two exhibits that he tendered, Defence
7 exhibits, the first being the analysis of combat readiness of the VRS in
8 1992, which is D325. Because I looked for this over the break, I wasn't
9 able to identify the corresponding B/C/S pages, but Dr. Karadzic can find
10 this information at e-court page 159 in English, the first full
11 paragraph, where it says:
12 "The strategic objectives of our war which were promptly defined
13 and set before the Main Staff of the army of the RS, the commands and the
14 units, served as a general guideline upon which we planned the actual
15 operations and concerted battles."
16 And Dr. Karadzic can additionally look to another one of his
17 Defence exhibits, D825, which is a copy of a book by VRS Chief of Staff
18 General Milovanovic called "My View of the War in Bosnia and
19 Herzegovina," and at page 13 of the English and 13, in fact, of the
20 B/C/S, refers to this six strategic objectives of the Serbian people as
21 military objectives.
22 So that's just to answer Dr. -- or to respond to Dr. Karadzic's
23 intervention before we move forward.
24 JUDGE KWON: Just a second. I took his statement to be asking
25 that -- whether we can see the word strategic goal or military goal in
Page 33112
1 that document, i.e., P4925, directive number 6.
2 MS. EDGERTON: I didn't, hence my response to that intervention,
3 Your Honour.
4 JUDGE KWON: Let's move on.
5 MS. EDGERTON: Thank you.
6 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] May I explain what I meant. The
7 original document --
8 JUDGE KWON: You can take it up in your re-examination.
9 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] But it's not a matter for the
10 witness. It was by way of reply to Mr. -- Ms. Edgerton's response. I
11 asked about the original document of the 12th of May, 1992. Where in
12 that document is it stated that these are wartime goals?
13 JUDGE KWON: Very well.
14 MS. EDGERTON:
15 Q. Now, General, to go back to operation Udar, which we were
16 discussing before we had the break, you indicated at page 30 that then
17 you would have some enclaves possibly created as a consequence of the
18 operation just like the Srebrenica enclave was created. And in fact as a
19 consequence of the operation, that was exactly the case, wasn't it? The
20 enclave of Srebrenica, Zepa, and Gorazde were created completely
21 separated from each other.
22 MR. ROBINSON: Excuse me --
23 JUDGE KWON: Before you answer -- yes. Yes, Mr. Robinson.
24 MR. ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. President. Inasmuch as this doesn't
25 arise from anything in the direct examination, I'm wondering if this is
Page 33113
1 for the purpose of credibility or whether this is being offered under
2 Rule 90(H).
3 JUDGE KWON: Yes, Ms. Edgerton.
4 MS. EDGERTON: This is a matter that goes to the witness's
5 credibility, Your Honour.
6 JUDGE KWON: Very well. Please continue, Ms. Edgerton.
7 MS. EDGERTON:
8 Q. And frankly, we could even -- General, you don't even need to
9 answer that question at this moment. I'll move on still in relation to
10 this operation.
11 General, this Chamber has heard evidence in this trial about what
12 happened in Cerska and Konjevic Polje during the course of this
13 operation, and I'm going to put something additional to you and ask you a
14 question following that, and what I'm going to put to you comes from
15 65 ter number 01219, the periodic report on the situation of human rights
16 in the territory of the former Yugoslavia submitted by the
17 Special Rapporteur of the commission on human rights, and the paragraph
18 I'm going to put to you is at page 18 of the English, paragraph 87, and
19 B/C/S page 19, but I'll read the paragraph to you. It says with respect
20 to this operation:
21 "Massive and repeated violations of the Geneva Conventions of
22 1949 were perpetrated in recent combat in Eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina.
23 These were carried out by Serb forces in Cerska, Konjevic Polje, and
24 Srebrenica, in attacking and ambushing civilians attempting to flee their
25 encirclement, in attacking the villages themselves, in refusing to allow
Page 33114
1 humanitarian aid to enter, in refusing to allow the evacuation of the
2 wounded, in attempting to link the above issues to the independent
3 question of freedom of movement for Serbs in Tuzla."
4 Now, General, you were one of the command team responsible for
5 directing this operation that Mr. Mazowiecki reported on, weren't you?
6 A. In the briefest possible terms and in an attempt to be crystal
7 clear regarding this issue, I will not comment paragraph 87 and its
8 wording. I'll come back to it at a later point.
9 I joined the Drina Corps on the 4th of February, 1993. I
10 remember that date since as today as well it is my birthday. That is why
11 I remember my entry in the corps and engagement there. It happened then.
12 You won't hold it against me if I say that as old acquaintances, I
13 expected you to congratulate my birthday to me.
14 I mentioned that because this operation, as you call Udar, and
15 indeed that was its name, it had been planned, and the concept had been
16 created for its implementation. I did not take part in the planning
17 process though.
18 As someone from the corps command, I observed the combat taking
19 place according to the plan created by someone else at an earlier point,
20 the people in question being the corps commander and his Chief of Staff
21 at the time. The units were commanded by their respective commanders, as
22 is understood, and it was implemented that way.
23 I do know that there was a range of activities undertaken by the
24 Muslim leadership in Bosnia-Herzegovina to portray Cerska as an
25 endangered town, extremely endangered as part of that combat, trying to
Page 33115
1 show that it was standard practice to attack towns in that way. I also
2 know that General Morillon wanted to see for himself, to find out what
3 that town was and what were those impermissible activities known to the
4 public. He went to the area of Cerska.
5 Q. General, with respect, you actually don't seem to have come even
6 close to answering my question, which was whether you could confirm that
7 you were one of the command team responsible for directing this
8 operation.
9 A. I can confirm that, yes. I followed the activities.
10 Q. Thank you. I want to move on now to another area, and it's with
11 respect to Sarajevo. Now, throughout your testimony, you repeatedly
12 expressly denied that your forces targeted civilians in Bosnian
13 government held Sarajevo. And that is referred to at transcript pages
14 32582, 32794, and 32833.
15 Is it your evidence, General -- actually, let me ask you this:
16 During the course of your service within the Sarajevo-Romanija Corps, so
17 that would be from 1992 through to 1995, is it the case that neither
18 Dr. Karadzic or General Mladic ever mentioned to you any of the concerns
19 expressed by the international community to them over the targeting of
20 civilians by shelling or sniping?
21 A. Of course that's not what I'm going to say, that no one warned me
22 of measures undertaken and that such activities be not permitted, that is
23 to say that civilians become targets. I confirm that in entirety. They
24 warned and asked for, et cetera. Of course, it was put to them by
25 someone else as if things like that were happening. They in turn wanted
Page 33116
1 to issue warnings and to prohibit such activity, that it should not be
2 allowed. This fits completely with my assertion, which is that such
3 activities were not undertaken by the factors in command of the SRK or by
4 those who monitored and had any influence over the events in the area, in
5 this case Mr. Mladic and Mr. Karadzic.
6 Q. All right. Then I'd like to tell you about an incident in
7 Sarajevo that took place on the 11th of July, 1995 [sic], and that was
8 just five days after you took up office as Chief of Staff, and on that
9 day Munira Zametica, a civilian, was shot twice from a firing position in
10 the tower -- from the tower of the Serbian Orthodox Church in
11 Velvina [phoen] while she was trying to get water from the Dobrinja River
12 to do her washing.
13 MS. EDGERTON: And the sources of that are D673 and transcript
14 page 29041 for the following, and the Chamber's heard evidence that that
15 church was in the area of responsibility of your corps, general, and this
16 woman's daughter, the victim's daughter came to testify before another
17 Chamber of this Tribunal, and she told the Chamber in the Galic case that
18 when she died, her mother was 47 years old, and on that day she was
19 wearing a brown skirt, and when she came to find her mother still lying
20 in the riverbed, her mother couldn't be helped or pulled to a safe area,
21 and that was because bullets were continually hitting the water around
22 here fired from the direction of the church. All right?
23 So this was a victim, a civilian engaged in a civilian activity,
24 shot not once but twice, and whose attacker continued to fire in the
25 water around her to ensure -- which had the effect of ensuring she
Page 33117
1 couldn't be saved. Now, would you agree with me, general, that this
2 evidence shows the victim was deliberately targeted?
3 A. Could you please remind me, was this on the 11th of July, 1994?
4 Q. Pardon me, 1994, yes.
5 A. Okay. Thank you. I noted down 1995.
6 JUDGE KWON: Yes, the transcript should read -- but you said
7 1995.
8 MS. EDGERTON: I misspoke.
9 JUDGE KWON: Yes. Before you answer, yes, Mr. Robinson.
10 MR. ROBINSON: I believe the date is July 11, 1993, according to
11 scheduled incident number F(3).
12 MS. EDGERTON: I completely misspoke. Correct. Thank you,
13 Mr. Robinson.
14 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] 1993.
15 MS. EDGERTON:
16 Q. You understood well, General.
17 A. Very well. Thank you.
18 Q. Do you remember my question? My question was whether you would
19 agree that this evidence shows the victim was deliberately targeted.
20 A. First of all, no victim, irrespective of the circumstances of his
21 or her killing, if that person was civilian is something I cannot deny.
22 As regards that term or that relationship, it is something I
23 can't reconcile with my presence here. I can't possibly say that it is
24 untrue. I won't even go into that. However, I will discuss the piece of
25 information that simply enough someone simply took the Velvina church,
Page 33118
1 which is in an valley, and it has an area where the church bells are,
2 providing some kind of opportunity, and then one can always say, yes,
3 there is engagement from the church.
4 I have information that there was no activity from the church.
5 It doesn't mean that I exclude the possibility of -- of late Munira being
6 fired at. In the case of her death, there is nothing that I can assert
7 other than say it couldn't have been done from the church. It was not
8 allowed. I am positive on this. It's a definitive piece of information
9 that I know. Nobody allowed any soldier to climb up the tower.
10 Q. General, my question was whether on the evidence that I read to
11 you that the been put before the Galic Chamber as well as this
12 Trial Chamber, you would agree that Ms. Zametica had been deliberately
13 targeted. And I'll just review it again. She was a civilian. She was
14 wearing a brown skirt. She was in a riverbed pulling water from the
15 river. She wasn't shot once. She was shot twice, and she couldn't be
16 rescued because her attacker continued to fire in the water around her.
17 Does that sound like deliberate targeting to you, General?
18 A. A confirmation whether that was done deliberately or under other
19 circumstances is something I cannot say or give. I exclude the
20 possibility that things developed that way. Even if they had, it did not
21 come about as a result of anyone's decision or anyone's issuing of tasks
22 to a marksman to engage civilians. If under God knows what circumstances
23 it was done by a soldier, he couldn't have been so instructed by his
24 superior or permitted to do so. That is what I can tell you.
25 Q. General, you continue to actually not answer my question other
Page 33119
1 than say a confirmation whether this was done deliberately under other
2 circumstances is something I cannot say or give, and yet you're able
3 to -- you offer evidence or information that I would submit is purely
4 speculative as to what might have gone on with respect to orders or
5 soldiers' involvement. My question was simply related to the facts of
6 what happened to this woman who was shot multiple times. If that wasn't
7 direct targeting in the circumstances I've just given to you, what is?
8 A. First of all, I wish you didn't assert that I was trying to be
9 speculative or manipulative. That is not my task here. I do not accept
10 that kind of assertion before the Court. That is why I kindly ask you to
11 refrain from doing so. That was one thing.
12 Another thing, you cannot ask me to confirm -- well, I confirm
13 that any engagement of civilians is impermissible and that as such cannot
14 be justified. I can confirm, though, what our policy and practice was --
15 Q. Now, General, let me stop you there --
16 A. -- all rules.
17 Q. -- because you've said you've given evidence about what your
18 policy and practice was over and over again, and we'll move on to another
19 incident that happened the very next day, so 12 July 1993. And it
20 happened at a well in Dobrinja where the Zametica family actually would
21 most frequently get their drinking water, and that's T 3487 of the
22 victim's daughter's evidence in the Galic case.
23 Now, on 12 July, 13 people were killed and 14 wounded when an
24 82-millimetre mortar shell was fired at a hundred civilians who were
25 waiting in line to get access to this well to get their water, and an
Page 33120
1 individual, a civilian, Rasim Mahonjic and his wife and two daughters
2 were waiting in line for water at this well when it happened, and in his
3 testimony at the Galic case in transcript page 7329 to 7240, he talked
4 about what happened. His evidence was that his two daughters went to
5 join the line at 2.00 a.m. so that they could get to the pump on time,
6 and he and his wife followed at 10.00 that morning, and they waited
7 together in line throughout the day until about 4.00 p.m., and
8 Mr. Mahonjic and his family were second in line to get to the pump.
9 There was only one family ahead of them when the shell fell, and it
10 killed his wife and his daughters among the other victims.
11 Now, General, people were waiting in line, in the water line in
12 this case, for as much as 14 hours to get to the pump.
13 Now, based on the evidence I've given you, would you agree with
14 me that that's an example of direct targeting of a group of civilians?
15 A. Ms. Edgerton, you're basically trying to extract answers from me
16 about something I am unaware of. I simply don't know. The indicators
17 that I would require would have to be much more specific and detailed
18 save for the fact that people waited for hours on end to get water. I do
19 not exclude that intention that everything had to do with water,
20 firewood, and burials, but it's a different matter to say that somebody
21 awaited someone else at a certain place in order to do something that
22 would go against acceptable conduct vis-a-vis civilians. Whatever
23 happened had to have been investigated in order to find out what happened
24 and who was to blame. That kind of procedure was within General Galic's
25 remit.
Page 33121
1 Now, to what extent and how well he did so is something I don't
2 know. The way you presented this, there's nothing else for me to tell
3 you other than to repeat that it was unacceptable --
4 Q. Well, General --
5 A. -- and that there's no other way for me to view it.
6 Q. I won't ask you to repeat yourself again, but I thought, General,
7 as a career officer who's been recognised for your service in the
8 battle-field, you would have been able to assess the evidence that I'd
9 given you about these two incidents as to whether or not they sounded
10 like examples of direct targeting. Is that the case or not?
11 MR. ROBINSON: Excuse me, Mr. President. I'm going to object to
12 this question because that's really unfair to a witness. Civilians are
13 standing in a line and there's a shelling. Unless you know whether it
14 was deliberate, whether there was an accident, which side it came from,
15 whether there were multiple rounds that were adjusted to attack the
16 civilians, you can't answer that question. So I don't think there's any
17 probative value to the question ask that you exclude it.
18 [Trial Chamber confers]
19 JUDGE KWON: Ms. Edgerton, would you like to respond?
20 MS. EDGERTON: I'd actually like to move on, Your Honours, if I
21 can.
22 JUDGE KWON: Yes.
23 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] If I may, a correction in the
24 transcript. In line 23, page 40, the witness said [in English] "that it
25 was unacceptable if it happened." "If it happened," this did not find
Page 33122
1 its way in the transcript.
2 JUDGE KWON: Thank you.
3 MS. EDGERTON: Thank you.
4 Q. Now, General, in your testimony in chief, you also repeatedly
5 denied that Sarajevo-Romanija Corps forces shelled civilian areas, and by
6 way of reference that's at transcript pages 32582, 83, and 32752. And in
7 your testimony you referred not only to areas but also used the words
8 sectors and neighbourhoods, but just with respect to that first word,
9 "areas," and when you mean to describe a civilian area, how broad is an
10 area?
11 A. Madam Edgerton, will you agree with me when I say that I finally
12 and officially -- officially treat Sarajevo in its entirety, the whole
13 town, this whole area, all settlements, as a civilian area? I am trying
14 to express myself in an original way by saying that the term "area" and
15 "zone," et cetera, whether it's civilian or not, this is something I
16 reject. For me this whole of Sarajevo is a civilian area. Why? Because
17 in that town and throughout that area, civilians resided there. That's
18 one thing.
19 Another thing, if we make -- may make a distinction between
20 military targets and everything else, a military target is a place where
21 fire is opened from and where groups and forces engage in combat from a
22 certain area. This is something we can discuss, whether there were
23 targets and could be a target at a certain point in time.
24 In this case, I'm not dealing with the term "area." I'm not
25 treating it as such whether -- irrespective of whether it's 100 metres,
Page 33123
1 1.000 metres, if it's a certain locality or not. If there is a civilian
2 there, it is deemed a civilian area. But if fire is opened from that
3 area, then an assessment will have to be made what to do with that target
4 which then constituted a military target. There would be a solution.
5 There would be a procedure put in place not to put civilians in danger
6 when it's possible. If it's not, then an absolute assessment will have
7 to be made if there would be collateral damage which would outweigh a
8 military mission to be accomplished, then this is abandoned. A parallel
9 is drawn between military advantage and success and the goal -- or target
10 which appears or if there is a situation which may lead to civilians
11 being exposed to an impermissible action if that area.
12 Q. So when you said at transcript page 32582:
13 "We were not allowed to shell a civilian area nor indeed would we
14 have chosen to shell a civilian area. The SRK didn't do that. Wherever
15 there were civilians, that was not a target for us. We never fired at
16 those areas," your evidence is now that you meant to refer to the city of
17 Sarajevo as a whole; is that correct?
18 A. I reiterate in the final analysis, wherever there are civilians,
19 that area is a civilian area, and since there were civilians throughout
20 Sarajevo, then my response coincides with this. But please, through --
21 I've been through this procedure. My attorney-at-law, my legal counsel,
22 tried to put forward an argument that the -- that Sarajevo was a military
23 area. I tried to disabuse him of that notion. I realised that the
24 Trial Chamber kept on asking him about that and that he could put forward
25 no quality answers to that. Well, even in my utterances you can find
Page 33124
1 "area" and zone, but this is a legacy of my background. Now I am giving
2 you an official explanation and distinction between area, zone, military
3 target, and civilian area. I'm sure that this is perfectly clear to
4 everybody listening.
5 Q. Were there any no-fire zones in Sarajevo?
6 A. There were. There were zones, several of them.
7 Q. Tell us what those were.
8 A. I'm not talking about zones but areas, space, parts of the town.
9 There were no incidents where fire was opened at civilians. For
10 instance, in Urijan Bedina Street there were no such incidents. On
11 Bjeliva [phoen], in Jarcedol, in Bostarici. Parts of Mejtas. Not Mejtas
12 in its entirety but parts of it. There were no combat activities or
13 firing being opened at -- be it on military structures or civilians.
14 Well, I know that area, but I cannot name it, the name escapes me. Well,
15 it was Vasin Han. I'm not sure whether I listed all of them. I've not,
16 but those were the areas where there were no incidents of shells falling
17 there or rounds.
18 Q. So let's talk about these military targets you referred to,
19 because you talked about them in different ways in your testimony in
20 chief.
21 First of all, you talked about command posts. At T2 --
22 transcript page 32553, you said:
23 "The number of command posts within Bosnian-held Sarajevo was
24 275."
25 So my question to you is: Is it your evidence that that's the
Page 33125
1 case throughout the war?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. And is it your evidence that at those times, from 1992 to 1995,
4 you observed and identified all 275?
5 A. Absolutely that is no longer an assertion whether we located each
6 and every of them. We just received intelligence about their location.
7 We knew at that there were certain command posts that were not visible.
8 Q. Is it -- is it your evidence that you shelled them?
9 A. Providing you information about the existence of such a military
10 command structure that was effective in that area at the time is
11 something else. Those were military targets, and they could not -- could
12 be targeted, but it's another matter, and it's not been confirmed, which
13 those -- which targets of those command posts were targeted and which
14 were not. If there was no danger emanating from those areas even if such
15 targets were legitimate, then we had no need to act against those
16 localities.
17 Q. Now, you've just said, as I understood you, that with respect to
18 these 275, that was on the basis of intelligence you received about their
19 location and not necessarily on the basis of observation; correct?
20 A. It's a combined effort. It's a combined process of getting
21 information. That information was obtained through intelligence or
22 through observation, and then you put together the pieces of that jigsaw
23 puzzle. Many localities, many points, were highly visible. There would
24 be frequent goings-on. For instance, 12 brigades, command post, it's
25 Dobrovoljacka Street. You could see it and you could see the frequency
Page 33126
1 of the comings in and goings out of the commanders, where shifts were
2 organised, security detail being replaced, companies and special --
3 Q. But it --
4 A. -- forces being sent from there --
5 Q. It stands to reason - and not accepting for a moment your number
6 of 275 is correct - you're not saying that these command posts were of
7 equal sophistication by any stretch, are you?
8 A. It is irrelevant how sophisticated in terms of equipment they
9 were because a company commander's command post could not be as equipped
10 as a command post of a corps or brigade commander. Of course, there are
11 differences in terms of manpower, in terms of security detail and
12 equipment, and in terms of presence of the commander at that particular
13 command post.
14 Q. And when you refer to these command posts, whether or not you had
15 observations, I take it you're generally referring to buildings, some
16 kind of structures, are you?
17 A. It doesn't need to be. Certain command posts could be in
18 shelters, in bunkers, in parts of facilities which allow them to work and
19 provide certain level of security and safety. But first and foremost,
20 they were located in economic facilities, schools --
21 Q. Now -- now, General, let's just try and focus on my question.
22 You said you didn't shell all of them. How many did you shell of these
23 structures?
24 A. You really cannot get that kind of information. Really, I don't
25 know. I don't have the information about that. I cannot even confirm
Page 33127
1 whether we shelled either. We did not shell them. But any target which
2 constituted danger, it was targeted, but if it was considered to be a
3 target in this form, then no action -- if there's no threat, no action
4 would be put in place against it.
5 Q. When you targeted those shelters, bunkers, or other facilities,
6 you targeted them with mortars; correct?
7 A. You know quite well that you fire what you have at your disposal.
8 I'm not confirming here, neither that we shelled them with mortar nor
9 with cannon or any other device. I'm not specifying the type of arms we
10 used.
11 Let me go back to my assertion that command posts mainly were not
12 targeted. No fire was opened at them. Why? Because, for instance, the
13 command post at Sedrenik was located in a coffee house, very famous
14 coffee house where certain circles gathered and spent days and nights
15 there. That command post could have been targeted by any device
16 available to us, but it never was.
17 Q. Now, General, could we go back to my question of what you
18 targeted those command structures with. When you said you fire them with
19 what you have at your disposal, do you mean to say --
20 A. We could have.
21 Q. Do you mean to say you targeted them with whatever you had?
22 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I apologise. The witness stated
23 that mainly they were not targeted. He did not say that they targeted
24 them with everything at their disposal.
25 JUDGE KWON: Will you ask the question again, or --
Page 33128
1 MS. EDGERTON:
2 Q. General, those command posts that you targeted, do you mean to
3 say, based on your answer that you fire with what you had at your
4 disposal, that you targeted them with whatever you had?
5 A. I don't think we are getting anywhere. We're not making progress
6 if we continue in the same vein. If you want me to say that this
7 happened by using a mortar, then I have to be specific about justifying
8 reasons to use a mortar. You cannot use direct fire if you fire a
9 mortar. It has a certain curve that the shell follows. I did say that
10 command posts were not targets. However, technically how this could have
11 been done is what I tried to explain to you just now.
12 If it's open area, it can be targeted with a device which can
13 fire direct -- directly, not indirectly.
14 Q. Those that were targeted, what did you target them with?
15 A. You are -- you are discussing command posts, and I said that we
16 did not use anything to target command posts.
17 Q. So in your testimony in chief, you went into a long analysis
18 based on a couple of things to come to this figure of 275 command posts.
19 So if you didn't target them, General, what was the point of the
20 analysis?
21 A. The purpose of that analysis was for you as a person in your
22 capacity to get a picture and to draw a conclusion that the type of
23 charges and assertions against me that shelling was indiscriminate and
24 merciless. My point was -- is that there were many possible [Realtime
25 transcript read in error "impossible]" targets throughout area, and that
Page 33129
1 my choice of determining the targets to be shelled was based on the fact
2 that they were endangering or threatening our defensive positions and if
3 that target constituted a threat and this was when it became a target.
4 Q. I don't want to leave that figure of 275 yet, because it seems to
5 me, General, and maybe you can confirm this, that it seems to me that you
6 arrived at that figure of 275 purely on the basis of extrapolations from
7 military doctrine. You conducted your own independent doctrinal
8 analysis; correct?
9 A. I don't see a problem in asking the question on how this figure
10 was determined in our analysis about the existence of that number of
11 command posts. They confirmed themselves the existence of such command
12 posts is implied, because there's no structure or unit at a certain level
13 which would not have its own command. Nobody can function or use units
14 without their command structure, and since they exposed their materiel
15 and their personnel, it was easy to obtain information about the
16 existence of such structure. And also, this analysis talks not about the
17 type of targets but the stage of development of command structures and
18 the way that units were being used and combat operations being carried
19 out.
20 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Transcript, if I may, intervention
21 about the transcript. Line 19, page 48, the witness did not say that
22 there were "impossible targets throughout" but "incountless" or
23 "innumerable" targets throughout the area.
24 JUDGE KWON: Thank you.
25 MS. EDGERTON:
Page 33130
1 Q. So, General, based on what I understand from what you just said,
2 it seems that your analysis to the effect that each major unit would have
3 three command posts is based to some extent on ABiH documents as well as
4 your own thinking; is that correct?
5 A. Not on my thinking but on the hard data. A division command must
6 have separate --
7 Q. Whose data? Whose data, General?
8 A. What do you mean? I did not get this.
9 Q. You said that analysis is based on hard data. Where's the data?
10 A. The data that there is a 12th Division that exists. You cannot
11 deny that. If that division exists, it must be structured in such a way
12 so that it has its operational parts which conducts combat activities and
13 logistics or the rear which performs logistics duties. And of course it
14 has to have its area of operation, because it -- they cannot follow from
15 the Dobrovoljacka Street well what is going on at Zuc if they're
16 interested in what is going on, and this is why they have three command
17 posts.
18 Q. Well, I wonder where's the data, General? Where's the documents
19 that you base this on?
20 A. First of all, the data must be with you. I don't know which data
21 you're asking me about it, because data that the 12th Division existed or
22 the 5th, I'm taking this as an example. This is not something that
23 should be re-examined. If you're questioning whether they existed or
24 not, then that's the path that needs to be taken, how things turned out
25 that way, who is dealing with the command and all of that.
Page 33131
1 Q. Well, I'd actually like to examine that a little bit, and maybe
2 we could have a look at D633. It's a document dated 25 October 1993, and
3 it's an ABiH 1st Corps command order for defence.
4 Now, if we can go over to page 3 of the English, paragraph 5.1,
5 and B/C/S page 2 in the same paragraph, please.
6 General, the end of paragraph 5.1 in this document you see in
7 respect of this operation, you see that for the 1st Motorised Brigade, at
8 the bottom of paragraph 5.1, only one command post. If we could scroll
9 down in English so we see the bottom of paragraph 5.2. Look, General,
10 only one command post for the 2nd Brigade in the Kras area.
11 Could we go over to the next page, please. The
12 102nd Motorised Brigade has only one command post in the wire factory
13 area. The 5th Motorised Brigade has only one command post in the
14 Dobrinja area. So it seems, General, based on this document that not
15 only are your mathematics off, but you relied on doctrine because it
16 actually inflates the number of command posts; isn't that correct?
17 A. I'm sure that nothing of this is in dispute, because when issuing
18 an assignment to his troops, subordinate troops, the corps commander is
19 obliged to state where their basic command post is. The other command
20 post locations is something that he does not have to specify, and he
21 doesn't need to change the location. So it doesn't have to be in the
22 place where the corps commander says it has to be, but it can stay at the
23 place where the brigade commander located it already.
24 Q. All right.
25 A. So the second thing is this is nothing that has to do with
Page 33132
1 strategy.
2 Can you please allow me to finish. You interrupted me.
3 So this is not being taken out of the context of the rules, the
4 strategy of combat. It states here what it states in some of their other
5 documents.
6 Secondly, all of these units change their structure, as you are
7 well aware, in the second half of 1994, whereas here you're talking with
8 me and asking me about documents from 1993.
9 Q. General --
10 A. My information --
11 Q. -- let me stop you right there. You specifically said, and I can
12 find you the transcript reference if you like, you specifically said, I
13 think during the first day of your testimony in chief, that the structure
14 didn't change the areas of responsibility; correct?
15 A. I want to be quite clear what we're talking about. I don't know
16 what you're thinking. It's not true that it didn't change. If I said
17 that, then I must have thought about something else. I don't know what.
18 You need to remind me what I was thinking of.
19 The Armija B and H restructuring as a whole occurred in the
20 second half of 1994, as I said. That was when so-called Caco's brigade
21 was disbanded as well as these other groups and hordes that had a
22 different connotation, and then they tried to place them under military
23 structure properly as things should be.
24 Q. All right. So then I've just shown you a document from 1993 that
25 lists the brigades as having one command post, yet you said in your
Page 33133
1 earlier answers to me that this figure of 275 was a figure that was
2 constant throughout the war. This document is evidence to the contrary,
3 isn't it?
4 A. Well, it's contrary in your opinion, because something is
5 missing. It was left out from here --
6 Q. All right.
7 A. -- in the sense of --
8 Q. All right.
9 A. -- when things are being specified.
10 Q. Let's look at one of your own documents, P5968, and by "your own"
11 I mean a Sarajevo-Romanija Corps document. It's an operations order by
12 General Galic, and it's dated 26 January 1994.
13 Now, if we could go over to page 2 in both languages, please.
14 This lists SRK data, hard data, as to the number of command posts per
15 brigade.
16 Look, General, at the bottom of the page. The
17 1st Motorised Brigade is listed as having one command post. The 2nd
18 doesn't even have one listed in this document. The 5th is also listed as
19 having one command post. The 105th, one command post.
20 MS. EDGERTON: If we could go over to the next page in English,
21 please.
22 Q. The 104th, again one command post. It seems if we're to accept
23 your evidence that something was missing from the document generated by
24 the ABiH, it seems as though General Galic is actually missing something
25 in his operations order as well, or, General, is your math wrong?
Page 33134
1 A. I don't know what your conclusion will be or how you're trying to
2 dispute the number of command posts. I stand by saying that it's quite
3 certain that these units had a developed command structure and as such it
4 had to exist and it had to function regardless of if it was written down
5 in any paper or not. You cannot manage with one. The Sarajevo-Romanija
6 Corps had its main command post in Lukavica and the rear command posts
7 in -- post in Pale. This is a requirement that nobody can leave out, and
8 you cannot merge these two structures that they would work together.
9 They have to work separately, each in its own sphere. So I don't see
10 anything of dispute here.
11 I assume that what concerns you is this number of 275 command
12 posts. If I had said that just 55 command posts there were for
13 battalions, then does that not indicate something quite significant in
14 terms of numbers? If we add company commander command posts, then the
15 numbers progress.
16 Q. Well, to progress --
17 A. So I wouldn't --
18 Q. To progress, let's look at D2792. It's a document from 11 June
19 1995, and you've seen it before. It's the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina
20 1st Corps command's attack order, and you've said a couple of times
21 now -- you've referred a couple of times to the changing structure of the
22 1st Corps in 1995. So let's have a look at that.
23 After the structure has changed and the corps has gone from
24 brigade to division formation, if you will go over to page 4 of the
25 English translation and page 3 of the B/C/S. There, starting at
Page 33135
1 paragraph 5.1 you see the first mention of two command posts, a main in
2 the Astra sector and a forward command post in Sokolje village.
3 Paragraph 5.2, again two command posts per brigade.
4 So, General, in fact it looks likes the documents from both the
5 ABiH and the SRK show that the scenario you've suggested of every major
6 formation having three command posts has never actually been the case as
7 far as the ABiH 1st Corps is concerned.
8 A. Quite the contrary, it was always the case, especially as far as
9 forward command posts are concerned. Therefore, those commands and the
10 commanding officers cannot do anything or monitor anything from the
11 centre of the city unless they have a forward group of people who would
12 monitor and direct action from a forward command post. This is a rule
13 that I think we will not really get far if you don't take that rule into
14 account.
15 As for the operational part of the command --
16 Q. Well --
17 A. -- and the rear command --
18 Q. -- General --
19 A. -- right at the beginning, this is something that is separate.
20 Q. You asked -- you indicated -- when I asked you for the hard data,
21 you indicated that we probably had it, and I've now shown you the hard
22 data about the number of command posts for the different military
23 formations within Sarajevo, and the hard data shows that even up until
24 1995, the major formations never had more than two command posts. So
25 you're contradicted by the hard data, aren't you, General?
Page 33136
1 A. I don't agree with that, but ultimately I can say that even that
2 is no longer an issue, whether they had three or two. Don't forget,
3 Ms. Edgerton, that they had to have had more locations and axes, because
4 I as corps commander had to have one forward command post at Nisici, one
5 forward command post at Trnovo, and one main basic command post in
6 Lukavica.
7 Q. Well --
8 A. The need --
9 Q. We'll move on, because -- without spending any more time on the
10 numbers, recalling what you said, your assertion earlier that you didn't
11 target most of these in any case. But still on the subject of targeting,
12 you talked about -- at 32581, you talked about ABiH forces using civilian
13 facilities including the Kosevo Hospital, schools, nurseries, commercial
14 buildings, shops, and private homes for military purposes, and at 32700,
15 referred to essentially the same thing. So my question about that is did
16 you fire at those facilities? And let's go through one by one. Did you
17 fire at the Kosevo Hospital?
18 A. No.
19 Q. Did you fire at schools?
20 A. No.
21 Q. Did you fire at nurseries?
22 A. No.
23 Q. Commercial buildings?
24 A. No.
25 Q. So hearing that, I want to ask you then would you agree that the
Page 33137
1 reason you didn't fire at those facilities is because of the risk to
2 civilians?
3 A. Choice of targets is a completely different action. When you
4 choose a target, then you establish everything, and I think I mentioned
5 this several times already, you mention the degree of threat, the level
6 of fire from it, the area around it, how many civilian -- of the civilian
7 population are there around it, how much of a threat the target is to our
8 positions. I think that you understand that very well. All the things
9 that we had to note in order to make an assessment whether one was
10 permitted to fire at the target or not. And mostly this indicates that
11 these schools from where somebody was in command, we didn't fire at them,
12 but if there was a school where on the roof of the school there was a
13 device with sandbags, meaning that there was fire over the heads of one's
14 own units, then that fire was that much of a threat that we had to
15 neutralise it by our own fire.
16 You asked here about command posts. They were mostly not fired
17 at, but perhaps we can differentiate a little bit from -- between general
18 targets, fire targets, and command posts. Then no, no, no, no, means no
19 at a school if officers are having a meeting there. But if there is
20 coming -- fire coming from there, that is a completely different
21 circumstance and it's a different type of target. It's not the same kind
22 of fire.
23 Q. So I asked you whether or not you fired -- I specifically asked
24 you whether or not you fired at schools and you said no, but your answer
25 now is yes. So my question is: How would you respond to mortars being
Page 33138
1 fired from a school?
2 A. First of all, you cannot fire from a school. A mortar cannot be
3 fired from a building. It's a question -- doesn't take it wrongly, but
4 it's not a professionally put question. You cannot place a mortar in a
5 school and fire it from a school. It can be near a school, behind a
6 school, and so on and so forth. And then the situation is different in
7 terms of that mortar than when we're talking about a building.
8 Q. How would you respond to mortars being fired within, as you said
9 in your testimony in chief, 100 metres from a school?
10 A. Again, I would like to suggest that we cannot really proceed this
11 way, but this is your methodology, and I respect that.
12 If I said 100 metres, I am trying now to ask you to forget those
13 100 metres. It's possible that I wasn't precise enough. However, it all
14 comes down to, I repeat, and I don't know if it's rational to keep
15 repeating that one studies a target to see what sort of a danger it poses
16 and what is around it. The main factor in adopting a position is that
17 there are no civilians near the target which could be the object of fire
18 when one fires at the target. So this is something that is avoided
19 unless we're talking about -- well, it all comes down to one mortar here.
20 That one mortar was never the issue, but it was a mortar battery
21 numbering four to six weapons when you would get quite heavy fire from
22 there. And then one would evaluate such targets and see when and how one
23 would fire at such target. But even in such a case, it was absolutely a
24 thing to avoid having civilian casualties by firing in the vicinity of
25 civilians.
Page 33139
1 Q. So is your answer that you would -- you would respond to mortars
2 being fired from within 100 metres of a school with mortars?
3 A. I don't know where you get that I would respond by mortar fire or
4 that I said that the choice of weaponry would be a matter of what
5 weaponry was available at the given moment. I did not say that we would
6 respond to mortar fire with mortar fire from our side. It's something
7 that I didn't say nor can this be exercised in the field nor should it be
8 done in this way. It doesn't have to be.
9 Q. Are you excluding by your answer that you responded to mortar
10 fire with mortars?
11 A. No. No, I'm not ruling that out. It just means that you
12 shouldn't hold me to these 100 metres. I understand what you're trying
13 to say by using the 100 metres and then if you miss then you hit a
14 different target. This is not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about
15 the type of fire that we would respond to their fire. This is up to the
16 commander who is endangered and up to the weapons that he had at that
17 time. I mean, we didn't have enough weaponry to be able to choose we're
18 going to use that or something else. They can be also hit by
19 anti-aircraft weaponry operating from the ground if there was a firing
20 line and a situation where he could silence that mortar. But these
21 things are not necessarily connected.
22 Q. If you don't want us to hold you to the 100 metres, let me ask
23 you this: How near a civilian or a civilian object would you fire?
24 A. I hope that you're not expecting an answer. I don't have a
25 different answer. Choice of target cannot be such that the civilian
Page 33140
1 structure suffers from our fire. That decision cannot be made.
2 I'm not ruling out at all the possibility of it happening for
3 different reasons, but in making the decision and issuing the task to
4 open fire, that action could not happen by saying, well, let's hope it
5 won't happen and taking a certain risk. One would aim to hit a target as
6 a result of which the population would not suffer. Innocent civilians
7 would not suffer.
8 MS. EDGERTON: Your Honour, I'm just looking at the time. I'm
9 wondering if -- this is time for the break.
10 JUDGE KWON: Yes. We'll resume at 17 past 1.00.
11 --- Recess taken at 12.33 p.m.
12 --- On resuming at 1.19 p.m.
13 JUDGE KWON: Yes, Ms. Edgerton.
14 MS. EDGERTON: Thank you.
15 Q. General, when we left off before the break, we left off before
16 the break with you giving evidence of your efforts to avoid civilian
17 casualties in Bosnian-held Sarajevo and the scrupulous proportionality
18 assessments you made in that regard when it came to shelling. And you
19 said that the choice of target cannot be such that the civilian structure
20 suffers from our fire. And, General, with respect, the weight of
21 evidence the Chambers of this Tribunal have heard is completely to the
22 contrary, and I'm going to put some of that to your recollection and I'm
23 going to ask you a question.
24 They have heard with respect to Bosnian-held Sarajevo that the
25 whole city was peppered with damage from shelling or gunfire. Almost no
Page 33141
1 building had windows, many of the larger buildings had holes in them, and
2 they were splashed from shrapnel from mortar rounds. Areas of the city
3 that had not been militarily contested were often scattered with
4 pockmarks from shelling or gunfire. They have received evidence that
5 throughout the war, forces, SRK forces, made no distinction --
6 MS. EDGERTON: Pardon me, and the source for the first quote is
7 P820, paragraph 27.
8 Q. They've received evidence that throughout the war SRK forces made
9 no distinction between military and civilian targets. Anything that
10 moved, including civilian pedestrians, came under fire. Hospitals,
11 schools, and historical buildings received direct artillery, tank and
12 mortar fire on a regular basis, while houses, apartments, and gathering
13 places such as markets and waterlines would be shelled without seeming
14 pattern. Nobody knew when and where a shell would hit, so every place
15 was dangerous. And that's transcript page 8170 in this trial,
16 General Brigadier General Fraser.
17 They have heard, the Judges in this Tribunal have heard the
18 testimony of individuals who saw random and indiscriminate spelling by
19 your forces throughout Bosnian-held Sarajevo. One witness, a Dutch
20 military officer, said:
21 "It's the fact that I saw that we, my team, I myself and my
22 people, we witnessed falling rounds, especially mortar rounds, throughout
23 the city in a random pattern, not in a way that you combat military
24 targets with."
25 And further on he continues:
Page 33142
1 "It is what I witnessed during those periods. I don't know why
2 the Serb commanders did it. I don't know what orders they had, but the
3 fact is what I saw is that they were random firing with single rounds or
4 a few rounds on areas where there were no military targets whatsoever."
5 And that's transcript page 9345 to 46 in this trial, the evidence
6 of Lieutenant-Colonel Konings.
7 And similarly, Major Pyers Tucker saw artillery under the control
8 of your forces being used on one hand in support of attacks by your
9 infantry but also saw it being used to fire all over the city at targets
10 that had nothing to do with the actual attack. The impression he gained
11 was that the purpose of this shelling was in order to intimidate the
12 population of the city in general and the government in power and to
13 break their will to resist, and that's P4203.
14 Another witness described the most common form of shelling he
15 experienced during his time in Sarajevo as shelling that was constant but
16 a relatively low bombardment by your forces with no identifiable military
17 purpose. It seemed intended to keep the civilian population of Sarajevo
18 locked down, vulnerable, fearful, and isolated. It wasn't entirely
19 random. Sometimes targeting certain neighbourhoods from one day to the
20 next but otherwise there was --
21 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I wonder -- I wonder, your
22 Excellencies, how one can answer a question as complex as this.
23 JUDGE KWON: Yes. The Chamber was discussing this. So shall we
24 stop there and hear from the witness or will you put a question.
25 MS. EDGERTON: Can I ask a question?
Page 33143
1 JUDGE KWON: Yes. If the general is able to answer the question.
2 Yes, what is your question, Ms. Edgerton?
3 MS. EDGERTON:
4 Q. General, the weight of the evidence before this Tribunal as to
5 the shelling by your forces and targeting of civilians in Sarajevo is
6 massively contrary to the evidence you've given today, isn't it?
7 MR. ROBINSON: Excuse me, Mr. President. That's absolutely an
8 impossible question. First of all, to spend two pages of transcript to
9 ask a question is absolutely unacceptable and unheard-of, but then to
10 finally ask a question about the weight of evidence in this trial. He
11 has not been sitting through this trial. He has no way to answer that
12 question. We've just wasted about 10 minutes, and I hope you'll consider
13 that if they ask for additional time.
14 MS. EDGERTON: May I rephrase?
15 JUDGE KWON: Yes.
16 MS. EDGERTON:
17 Q. General, this evidence shows that your forces were doing exactly
18 what you said they weren't; correct?
19 MR. ROBINSON: Again, Mr. President, I don't think he can comment
20 on evidence he hasn't heard in total. I don't think it's appropriate for
21 him to be asked to comment on it. There's a more direct way to ask these
22 questions. I think you should instruct the Prosecutor to do that.
23 JUDGE MORRISON: Ms. Edgerton, to simply read out the transcript
24 and turn it into effectively an enormous compound question, it's very
25 difficult because you then asked a question at the end which in a sense
Page 33144
1 demands a yes or no answer, Does it contradict that which I've said.
2 It's putting the witness into an extremely difficult position. It might
3 be better to formulate it something like this:
4 General, bearing in mind the thrust of the evidence that's been
5 read out to you, if the Chamber found it was accurate evidence, wouldn't
6 that contradict your statement that there was no indiscriminate fire?
7 JUDGE KWON: That was the question from the Prosecution.
8 Could you answer the question then, Mr. Milosevic.
9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, with all due respect
10 to the people who testified, and the questions or assertions put forth by
11 Ms. Edgerton, my answer would be that I was hoping for this situation to
12 arise so that I can address the issue.
13 Neither Ms. Edgerton nor the esteemed gentlemen who came to
14 testify had an opportunity to view the entire situation in its full
15 complexity and the way both sides had to assess it, on the one side the
16 SRK and the other the 1st Corps of the army of BH. I think I will be
17 sufficiently precise if I said that if things had taken place indeed the
18 way it was portrayed here, that events unfolded without measure, Sarajevo
19 would have been razed to the ground. The area itself could not sustain
20 it if this were proven to be true. It was not. Such engagement did not
21 come about. And it does not fall within the concept of what our position
22 or policy was.
23 What I know only is that we did not allow such activity, such
24 behaviour. For the most part, without interpreting things in any other
25 way as regards my period between 1992 and 1995 --
Page 33145
1 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's correction: 1994 and 1995.
2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] When engaging targets, that is
3 something I want to discuss here to confirm and whether we actually
4 engaged in such conduct. There is nothing to hide. We didn't behave
5 this way, and things did not develop this way. No atmosphere was created
6 to the extent that people were being driven crazy there. One cannot put
7 such assertions that our activity, our engagement went along those lines.
8 Such a procedure, such conduct did not take place, and it cannot be
9 accepted that every part of town was targeted like that every day and
10 that the procedure was something that went on day after day.
11 It was all portrayed in such a way as to show that we enacted a
12 campaign of terror against the population while setting aside all the
13 other aspects such as standing ground and opposing the other side, their
14 1st Corps. This kind of position, this kind of thesis cannot be
15 sustained, and I am ready to address it from a number of viewpoints.
16 However, if one wants to create an anathema as regards the military
17 conduct of the SRK, such as that it was a bestial organisation, it's
18 certainly not a good way to try and prove anything.
19 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] The last line, actually line 3,
20 should be "bestial," and just above that I believe he mentioned terrible,
21 a terrible situation, a terrible atmosphere which did not make its way
22 into the transcript I'm afraid.
23 JUDGE KWON: Thank you.
24 Q. Now, General, I'd like to show you a document you drafted. It's
25 P2668. And, General, you've just said in answer to this question that it
Page 33146
1 cannot be accepted that every part of town was targeted like that every
2 day and procedure, the procedure we were discussing, was something that
3 went on day after day.
4 Now, this document was issued by you on the 19th of July, 1995,
5 and it relates to the rational expenditure of ammunition. If you go to
6 page -- paragraph 2 of this document, about halfway through the paragraph
7 it says:
8 "That is why we very often fire at inhabited settlements and
9 specific buildings when there are no combat actions whatsoever spending
10 vast quantities of ammunition without paying attention to the fact that
11 we will not have anything to stop the enemy when it comes to mounting a
12 decisive defence."
13 And if you go over to the next page in both languages, I think
14 paragraph 4 on page 2, this reads:
15 "In order to achieve a surprise effect and inflict the highest
16 enemy losses, produce strong, planned, concentrated fire from several
17 weapons from different directions at a specific time instead of firing
18 one or two weapons for an hour at the same target.
19 So, General, this document represents -- is actually an
20 acknowledgement that your forces were indeed targeting the city in the
21 way you've just said they weren't.
22 A. I see that there is no map. It is my conclusion that you lost
23 sight intentionally or unintentionally because, of course, it is your
24 goal to lead me into providing a wrong answer.
25 The SRK covered a specific area that these warnings referred to,
Page 33147
1 and they also referred to such areas where there were no settlements or
2 where there were very small abandoned settlements which housed only their
3 forces, that is, when we are discussing some rural areas just outside
4 Sarajevo.
5 You are now putting all of this in the context of Sarajevo and
6 its residential buildings, but it definitely doesn't mean that.
7 If you would kindly return the first item on the screen. I think
8 I was cautioning them not to do it unnecessarily. Well, whoever is
9 receiving an order needs to be told clearly that they should not open
10 fire unnecessarily, that it may be detrimental if one even ponders
11 opening fire in the context that doesn't require it. That is why I said
12 that there should be no pointless targeting of inhabited areas.
13 One could only conclude the following, that we didn't need to and
14 that we had to in order to achieve success, as my people would do it, as
15 if we were just beating around the bush to act pointlessly. For such
16 kind of activity, while we didn't have that much ammunition and we didn't
17 act that way because, as it says here, that conditions needed to be
18 created for a specific moment in time which may pose a much greater
19 threat in terms of enemy breakthrough.
20 So all of our instructions and all of our enforcing of regulation
21 revolved around the concept of proper conduct in the right manner, in the
22 right spirit. That's what I was trying to say.
23 Q. General, this --
24 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] The witness said that that's what
25 the document is trying to show and that it wasn't the witness who was
Page 33148
1 trying to say it.
2 JUDGE KWON: Very well. The document was authored by the
3 general. Let's continue.
4 MS. EDGERTON:
5 Q. General, with respect, as much as the warning cautions your
6 forces against spending vast quantities of ammunition as if they had it
7 in abundance, if you look, if you go back over to page 1 in both
8 languages, if you look at paragraph 2, it refers -- it specifically says:
9 "That is why we very often fire at inhabited settlements and
10 specific buildings when there are no combat actions whatsoever."
11 On its face, General, the document doesn't lend itself to any
12 other interpretation than inhabited settlements were being targeted when
13 there was no combat action underway; correct?
14 A. Incorrect. If I may, I'd like to present my approach to this.
15 When issuing orders to my units, I have to warn them in such a way which
16 would put them in the right situation, because they don't know whether it
17 referred to their specific activity or the activity of a unit that is
18 adjacent to it in terms of the SRK. And they should receive their own
19 information or caution that if a specific person or a unit should try to
20 engage targets in that way, that it simply cannot be done randomly or
21 blindly, if I may put it that way. It may appear to be that way to you,
22 but I do know that those units had to be cautioned and provided with
23 instruction in different ways so as not to find themselves in a situation
24 where they would behave like that and not to make it a practice.
25 Actually, they always had to bear in mind that it was simply not allowed.
Page 33149
1 MS. EDGERTON: Your indulgence for just a moment.
2 [Prosecution counsel confer]
3 MS. EDGERTON:
4 Q. We'll just move on to another area, General, and it's an area you
5 spent a lot of time dealing with in your examination-in-chief, and it's
6 about air-bombs and the air-bomb shelling you ordered on 6 April 1995.
7 Now, General, you clearly know something about these air-bombs,
8 don't you, and how they operate, because as a commander ordering their
9 use you would be required to be familiar with these assets. Isn't that
10 the case?
11 A. Yes, I know them.
12 Q. These air-bombs are really area assets, aren't they? Area
13 weapons.
14 A. Both from the air and from the ground, yes.
15 Q. They're -- let me rephrase. These air-bombs, like -- not unlike
16 mortars, are meant as area weapons; correct?
17 A. It doesn't have to be that way. If you're targeting a specific
18 target which is stronger and profitable target with large number of
19 people, we are not discussing area here.
20 Q. Now, with respect to the air-bombs incident on Dositejeva Street,
21 you said, and it was at transcript page 32780, that if it had indeed
22 fallen there, it would have caused much greater destruction than it did.
23 So maybe given that, you can tell us exactly with a kind of destructive
24 power these bombs had.
25 A. This is an asset containing a large quantity of explosive, and
Page 33150
1 its effect covers a larger area, and it produces more effects than
2 mortars or other pieces of artillery.
3 Q. And what kind of quantity of explosive does it contain? How
4 much?
5 A. There are two types of such bombs. 100 kilograms one and 250
6 kilogrammes the other. That quantity does not refer to the quantity of
7 explosives but the total mass of the asset. I could not confirm here
8 whether 250 kilogrammes or 100 kilogrammes would be 100 kilogrammes or
9 250 kilogrammes of explosive. These are technical specifications. What
10 I know are the types of air-bombs. What I don't know is what precisely
11 they contain.
12 Q. All right. And you obviously know a little bit about their
13 accuracy, because in your evidence in chief at transcript page 32773,
14 when Dr. Karadzic asked you where the bombs were fired from, you said
15 they were fired from your corps area of responsibility behind the lines
16 of the units in the trenches, and if there were residential areas on the
17 axis, these bombs would go across those areas, but those situations were
18 mostly avoided and your forces chose localities where such aerial bombs
19 would have to overfly only your units and those were circumstances, you
20 said, that required caution, and it had to be made sure that there was a
21 high degree of precision, otherwise the bomb may have landed on your
22 forces.
23 So clearly based on your evidence, you were aware of a certain
24 measure of risk with regard to the launching and landing of that
25 air-bomb, a risk to your forces and Serb-held areas; correct?
Page 33151
1 A. I don't know why you misunderstood that utterance. If it is said
2 that one of the reasons why accuracy has to be achieved and high level of
3 precision, it is that very reason. If there's no accuracy and precision,
4 they could fall on our forces, on our territory. This is not in
5 contravention, neither does it change the situation which shows that we
6 were working on upgrading those air-bombs, introducing electronics and
7 expertise of experts, calculating the tables so that they may be turned
8 into a reliable assets when used.
9 Q. I don't think there was any misunderstanding, General. You were
10 clear in your evidence that situations where the bombs might fly across
11 residential areas were mostly avoided. That's because the bomb might
12 have landed on them, isn't?
13 A. Yes. Naturally I know what you're after.
14 Q. Now, we also talked -- or you also discussed in your evidence in
15 chief at 32776 and 32777 some of the other air-bombs incidents apart from
16 the incident on 7 April 1995. In particular, you talked about the one on
17 Majdanska Street on 24 May. At transcript page 32778, you said that the
18 distance in this case, the Majdanska Street incident, 130 or 140 metres
19 to the residential building was far enough to be safe. It couldn't be
20 damaged by your action. People would be unhappy about it, but there were
21 no casualties. So 130 to 140 metres is your acceptable safe radius for
22 the use of these bombs. Is that what you're saying?
23 A. For me it is acceptable that whoever finds himself 100 or more
24 metres, that that person would not be in danger. One hundred metres from
25 the place of detonation. There's no doubt about that. But let's not
Page 33152
1 lose sight of the fact that I was in the vicinity of detonation sites
2 when NATO air-bombs fell, and I survived without a scratch. I know what
3 those air-bombs effect was when they tried to destroy certain facilities,
4 in this particular case military facilities. Without a direct hit, their
5 effect is just to -- to dig a crater. I'm not trying to belittle the
6 effect of those air-bombs, but these are not assets that would have
7 unlimited destructive power.
8 I ventured into those craters of eight NATO air-bombs at Hadzici
9 and Jahorinski Potok and at bridges, et cetera, et cetera. For instance,
10 they could not destroy those bridges using those air-bombs, for instance.
11 Q. We'll get to your presence at Sarajevo around the time of the
12 NATO bombing a little bit later, but I want to stay for the time being a
13 little bit earlier in 1995 at the time of -- around the time of these
14 incidents.
15 I actually on the subject of the safe radius would like to show
16 you a document. It's P1299, and it's dated 26 April, 1995. And it will
17 be two quick documents in succession.
18 So this is an extremely urgent piece of correspondence to you
19 from General Mladic asking for an explanation, saying you're to inform
20 him -- saying he's in possession of information that you are planning to
21 use two air-bombs against enemy targets and settlements in the area of
22 Sarajevo in the evening of 26 April, and directing you to inform him
23 whether this information is correct, who ordered it, why, the planned use
24 of the weapons, and the beginning of the operations in Sarajevo.
25 Now, once you've had a chance to look through that document, I'd
Page 33153
1 like to go to another one related to this. And do you see actually,
2 General, on the top right-hand corner of the document handwritten there's
3 a notation that Colonel Tadija gave a partial reply? That would be
4 Colonel Tadija Manojlovic your chief of artillery, wouldn't it?
5 A. Yes, yes. Yes.
6 Q. Just let us know when you've had a chance to look at this
7 document, General, and we'll go on to the next one. And General, if you
8 ever need to have this enlarged, all you need to do is say, because our
9 colleagues here can enlarge the image on the screen in front of you so
10 that you can see it more clearly.
11 A. That's all right. I understood. But no further enlargement is
12 necessary. This is sufficient.
13 Q. All right. Let's go now to Colonel Manojlovic's partial reply.
14 It's P1310, also dated 26 April, 1995.
15 A. Could you please enlarge a bit.
16 Q. Now, Colonel Manojlovic in his response to General Mladic's query
17 says that he abandoned the planned firing of the modified air-bomb
18 because through measuring with instruments they established that two
19 UNPROFOR points are at most 200 metres away while your own defence line
20 was 500 metres away, and the risk to both should the weapon be fired was
21 too great. So your own -- the safe radius of your own head of artillery
22 is actually almost five times what you said was acceptable in your
23 comments with regard to the Majdanska Street incident, isn't it?
24 A. What chief of artillery assessed as an expert is a measure. It
25 is something which constitutes an additional consideration to absolutely
Page 33154
1 make sure that safety is achieved. Had UNPROFOR position been even
2 further away, because of their relative vicinity, it was not justified
3 nor would it be wise to use an air-bomb against the target being
4 discussed here, and the target was the area of Donji Kotorac. Therefore,
5 this is not an error, neither is it any action which would run contrary
6 to my assertion. I maintain my efforts to explain to you that if an
7 air-bomb exploded and somebody would be 100 metres away from the
8 detonation site, that person would not be affected or threatened. It
9 wouldn't be -- become a casualty, wouldn't be destroyed.
10 It doesn't mean that this assessment was so strict if somebody
11 would be 100 metres away we would no longer observe that. We took into
12 consideration whether the same degree of threat would be the same for
13 that person and for -- for the target, and this would not be a
14 counter-argument that we should expand that radius to 200 to 850 -- 500
15 metres. The degree of caution expressed by this artillery expert is
16 justified, and I acknowledge his assessment because he's the expert.
17 There were no other intentions behind this decision except for safety.
18 Q. And just to go back to what you said in the earlier part of your
19 answer, you said had the UNPROFOR position had been even further away, so
20 even further than 200 metres, because of their relative vicinity, the use
21 of the air-bomb would not be justified.
22 So the question I want to ask is do you have any idea, General,
23 how far UN Sector Sarajevo headquarters was from the impact site of the
24 air-bomb on Majdanska Street?
25 A. Of course. It was distant enough not to be threatened. This
Page 33155
1 case we are consisting which required a different approach and Majdanska
2 are two separate matters. When it comes to Majdanska, the target needed
3 to be fired upon because of our general jeopardy of -- the general danger
4 that we were exposed to.
5 MS. EDGERTON: Your indulgence for a moment.
6 [Prosecution counsel confer]
7 MS. EDGERTON:
8 Q. Now, let's go over to -- more specifically to the situation in
9 Hrasnica and the air-bomb shelling of 7 April. You said at T 32791, you
10 talked about the size of Hrasnica and said it was covered in totality by
11 forces that were deployed or that opened fire from within or were on
12 furlough or there were reservists who were on standby, and you also said
13 that the locality itself, the territory of the neighbourhood, was
14 encumbered by the military factor and artillery assets, i.e., mortars,
15 120-millimetres which opened fire from that area. So when you refer to
16 mortars which opened fire from that area, do you mean to refer to mortars
17 in the town proper?
18 A. Mortars not in the town. It wasn't a town. It was a settlement,
19 an open ground close to certain buildings, in parks, in public parks and
20 such areas.
21 Q. All right. Just in that regard, maybe we could have a look at
22 another -- at an order drafted by you. It's D779. It was drafted by you
23 on 27 March 1995, for an operation called Lukavac 1995. So this is about
24 11 days before this incident. And if we go over to the bottom of page 3
25 of the document in English - and with your indulgence, I'll just try and
Page 33156
1 find the B/C/S page reference. I think the corresponding page is the
2 second page in B/C/S, but at the bottom of page 3 of the English, we see
3 information that you have about the deployment of the armaments of the
4 4th Motorised Brigade. You see 120-millimetre mortar platoon in the zone
5 of Vrhovi. Now, that's not in the settlement of Hrasnica, is it?
6 A. No, it's not, no.
7 Q. And on the next page in English, same page in B/C/S, you see
8 reference to a 105-millimetre howitzer in zone of Radeljevaca.
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. An [as interpreted] 82-millimetre mortar in the zone of Vrhovi,
11 an 82-millimetre mortar in Bijela Kosa, and a mixed mortar platoon in
12 Kotarni Cari [phoen]. Now, none of these weapons placements are --
13 reflect -- or are locations in the settlement of Hrasnica at all, are
14 they? They're actually above and behind Hrasnica centre.
15 A. Yes. Well, could you please return to the page where the date of
16 the Lukavac document is listed.
17 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Intervention into the transcript.
18 In line 19, it says "an 82-millimetre mortar." It wasn't a single piece
19 of mortar. It was a platoon of mortars.
20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, it's okay. I've seen the
21 date.
22 MS. EDGERTON:
23 Q. All right. Now, this document also doesn't mention any
24 facilities for weapons manufacture as being in the town or in the
25 settlement, does it?
Page 33157
1 A. First of all, let's be on the same page. This document was
2 drafted in a completely different time when it was foreseen that we will
3 have to engage our forces to carry out Operation Lukavac. However,
4 certain changes occurred which put this document out of force, both the
5 decision and the order and further plans of ours to carry out this
6 activity concerning the area of Igman and the area of Treskavica. I'm
7 familiar with this area. And when it stated where mortars are
8 positioned, the reference is made to the region of Vrhovi, well, this is
9 the first indication that they did not have at their disposal just one
10 platoon of mortars and that they placed them and deployed them at Vrhovi.
11 They had artillery pieces both at Vrhovi and within Hrasnica itself.
12 Furthermore, these dates do not match. The change of firing
13 position is such a simple activity and that is carried out by units, in
14 this case our enemy. It was easy to do. Even if it weren't for the same
15 mortars which was not the case because they had sufficient mortars to
16 cover both Vrhovi location and Hrasnica itself. This is what I can tell
17 you. Those two documents cannot be connected in terms of they were there
18 and we thought they were in Hrasnica. This was not so.
19 Q. Now, same question on this as I asked you with respect to the
20 number of command posts. You've referred to a change in firing
21 positions. Where's the hard data for that, General? Where's the
22 document? Because this is your own document dated only ten days
23 beforehand.
24 A. I didn't understand you, what you meant when you said where is
25 the data. Which data? What sort of data do you mean?
Page 33158
1 Q. Well, you referred in your evidence in chief to documents you had
2 in your possession. Do you have a document that establishes firing
3 positions other than what you set out in your order of 27 May 1995
4 existed or that firing positions were changed from what you set out in
5 your order of 27 May -- pardon me, 27 March.
6 A. In Hrasnica?
7 Q. Yeah.
8 A. I still didn't understand, because I don't need any other
9 document. This is an assessment, an evaluation that we had about the
10 deployment of the enemy in order to plan the Lukavac operation. If it
11 was planned as such and executed or was supposed to be executed, then the
12 data was gathered and this is what we had at our disposal when we needed
13 it. I don't know how I can add to that or to confirm the data in this
14 situation except for what is already written there.
15 Q. All right. Now, you said that between 27 March 1995 and the date
16 of the incident on the 7th of April, Bosnian firing positions changed and
17 moved to the town centre of Hrasnica. So let's look at another document,
18 and it's a document dated 7 --
19 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Excuse me, please. Can we have the
20 information when this was stated? Quite the contrary. The witness said
21 that they did have enough to have that at the same time in Hrasnica and
22 in the hill.
23 JUDGE KWON: Ms. Edgerton.
24 MS. EDGERTON: I think Dr. Karadzic is actually correct. I think
25 I might have misunderstood the witness who said:
Page 33159
1 "The change of firing position is such a simple activity and
2 that's carried out by units, in this case our enemy. Even if it weren't
3 for the same mortars which was not the case because they had sufficient
4 mortars to cover both Vrhovi location and Hrasnica itself."
5 So, yes, I apologise. My misunderstanding of the witness.
6 JUDGE KWON: Thank you.
7 MS. EDGERTON: Nevertheless, I'd still like to go to the document
8 dated 7 April 1995, and it's P5943, and it's a VRS Main Staff report to
9 Dr. Karadzic.
10 A. Could we please zoom in on the document.
11 MS. EDGERTON: Maybe one more magnification for the general,
12 please.
13 Q. Now, if you go over in this document and the numbering is
14 difficult in the B/C/S. Let me just see if I can scan it. I want to go
15 over to paragraph 6, and its kind of jammed together on the B/C/S.
16 A. I don't see that paragraph, the number 6, anywhere. Could you
17 perhaps tell me how the text begins?
18 Q. It's on --
19 A. [In English] Mm-hmm, okay. [Interpretation] I see.
20 Q. It's on B/C/S page 3 and it's paragraph 3 I'm after.
21 JUDGE KWON: Yes.
22 MS. EDGERTON: My apologies. And English page 4.
23 Q. Now, this paragraph says at 6.00 a.m. that morning, the enemy
24 opened up heavy fire from Gradina, Igman, and Lasica. So would you --
25 A. Yes.
Page 33160
1 Q. -- agree with me that all these locations are up in the hills or
2 in the case of Lasica that's right next to the confrontation line by the
3 Famos factory?
4 A. Correct. Correct, yes. Lasica is in the town, in the
5 settlement.
6 Q. Now, this document says that -- pardon me. So then the origin of
7 fire for the launching or in response to which this 250 kilo air-bomb was
8 launched, and that's at sub-heading B, under paragraph 3, actually was
9 outside of the settlement centre, whereas the bomb was launched in the
10 town centre, General. The fire, according to this report that the bomb
11 responded to actually had nothing to do with ABiH activity from Hrasnica
12 centre at all. Isn't that the case?
13 A. No. No, that wasn't like that. You didn't give me an
14 opportunity to say what the circumstances were and what the situation was
15 in Hrasnica. I must give an explanation that the commander of the
16 Ilidza Brigade had for a long time insisted that a solution be found how
17 to prevent the mortar and artillery fire from the Hrasnica section. The
18 Ilidza area and the entire part from Stojcevci across the basins, the
19 pools, the institute, the spas, and the villas were threatened by this
20 fire coming from Hrasnica. He didn't start to show it to me and to look
21 for a solution. For example, if there was fire on the 7th, he didn't ask
22 for it on the 5th, but it would be a few days before.
23 I had to be in the situation, because from where I was, I
24 couldn't see Hrasnica from Ilidza. So in order to have confirmation of
25 what was actually happening there and whether that corresponded to what
Page 33161
1 the commander was saying. There was an area called Siljak. It was above
2 Ilidza, and these are already the slopes of Mount Igman. That is
3 where -- from where we could see the force that was inside and the
4 assets, how they were deployed. The basic thing is that there were
5 mortars and firing positions there deployed in the same way as they were
6 at Vrhovi. Let me add this as well: The image and noting the indicators
7 was at the same time when there was firing. It just happened by chance.
8 They weren't aware that somebody was monitoring what they were doing in
9 that particular time. So I ascertained that there was fire in that area,
10 and I could then see how much under threat the commander and his sector
11 was by that fire. And on the basis of that, I had to agree with him to
12 neutralise that fire.
13 I can tell you later or I can tell you right now how things went
14 on from there.
15 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Line 5 in the transcript, the
16 witness was misunderstood. He didn't say that it would be a few days
17 before. He said "even," it would be even more than a few days earlier.
18 That's what he said.
19 MS. EDGERTON:
20 Q. So the timing of the fire was not in -- the timing of the fire of
21 the air-bomb was not in any way proximate in time to the mortar fire
22 you've referred to.
23 A. I don't know why that would be so and where the misunderstanding
24 comes from. I gave an explanation as to what was seen at another time,
25 but this fire continued, and somehow now we cannot come to the conclusion
Page 33162
1 that you would like to draw that since it happened on the 7th that would
2 be when actually nobody was firing at all. There would not have been any
3 fire on the 7th either -- or, rather, on the 6th, is that right? If
4 there had been no fire before that at some point, this is what happened
5 then, that at some point the air-bomb was used.
6 I hope that you understood that nothing was left to chance
7 because that Hrasnica was too active and it's forces as well, that we
8 were firing whenever we felt like it. We had a lot of patience as well
9 as attempted to thwart it in a different way than it would be done, but
10 in this case they weren't pardoning themselves at all, never mind us.
11 Q. So your evidence is this air-bomb was fired to neutralise a
12 mortar; correct?
13 A. Not mortar but mortars. Artillery weapons. Actually, in this
14 case there were four of them. I mean, it wasn't a question of one
15 mortar. You wouldn't retaliate for one mortar.
16 Q. Now, still on the subject of this incident, you also in your
17 evidence at 32796 said that the Aleksa Santic school was a place where
18 they made hand grenades and rifle grenades in Hrasnica. Did you know
19 that a Serb resident of Hrasnica actually came to testify in
20 Dr. Karadzic's defence and specifically said that there was no production
21 going on in the school and the only thing going on was melting in the gym
22 and the manufacturing process took place somewhere else? And he said
23 that at transcript page 32087.
24 A. What I said was based on data that I was given by certain people.
25 That connection, movements, contacts, they were not so exclusive so that
Page 33163
1 somebody from Hrasnica would not be able to come to provide information
2 about what was going on in Ilidza and that this data could then be
3 offered up.
4 I do acknowledge the testimony of that witness, but as far as
5 he's concerned, if he had better information at disposal, then -- our
6 information also was grounded.
7 Q. Well, if it was, where were the mortars positioned?
8 A. I said that the mortars were located in open areas, in areas that
9 could be described as parks or locations where there were no buildings.
10 They were next to buildings, in the vicinity of buildings.
11 Q. Let's just -- and did you receive information that the mortars
12 had been neutralised?
13 A. Well, let's understand the following first: When the decision
14 was given to use the air-bomb, the order was sent to the hands of
15 Colonel Radovcic [phoen], and in the order it stated, which usually is
16 there, it's a rule that has to be applied, that the air-bomb or some
17 other asset, but the air-bomb in this case has to be prepared. It has to
18 be ready to act. Once it's prepared, when the information is confirmed
19 that the asset is prepared, the information would reach me, then there
20 would be a couple of checks so that we make sure that it's no longer
21 technical preparedness but that we would need to check what the situation
22 was in the location where the asset is supposed to be fired, and then the
23 information was that the target was still visible, the target was still
24 active, and that the asset can be fired, and all of that would then stop
25 at this check and making sure that everything was as it is, and then we
Page 33164
1 would wait for my order for the fire to go ahead.
2 As for some more immediate indicators, then I would perhaps
3 receive further such information or data about the situation as it was.
4 Q. Well, General, with respect, the evidence that we've discussed
5 today suggest that it would be impossible to pinpoint a target with these
6 air-bombs. You've said that the air-bombs weren't fired over Serb
7 residential areas because they might land on them. Your chief of
8 artillery wouldn't fire air-bombs on a target within 500 metres of your
9 own forces because of the risk that the bomb might land on them, and I
10 would suggest to you, General, that whether or not the target was
11 visible, it was impossible to pinpoint something like that with this
12 weapon without risk of civilian casualties.
13 A. Well, the assessment isn't made in the way as to guarantee that
14 there would be absolutely no civilian casualties. The risk is calculated
15 on the basis of an estimation of possible collateral damage compared to
16 the option of halting these assets that were endangering us. I don't
17 know if you can see in view of the locality the area. Those same assets
18 are so easily fired at Vojkovici without any restraint at Grlica and at
19 parts over there around the Famos factory, and in the same way they fired
20 at Ilidza. These are not two opposite sides. So it was simple to direct
21 fire.
22 These assets, these weapons from Hrasnica were not threatening
23 just a sector of the front but a broad sweep of the area for manoeuvring
24 an action. So the calculations had to take into account what had to be
25 done so that the civilian population would not suffer if the target was
Page 33165
1 engaged. Calculations were made so that the target would be destroyed
2 without destroying a large number of people.
3 Q. General, your own orders explicitly refer to the probability of a
4 miss when you used these air-bombs. Let's have a look at P1309. It's
5 your order dated 21 April, 1995, for the operation called Talas. Talas
6 1, in fact. And in both languages, we can go over to page 2, paragraph
7 2.
8 This orders -- this is your order. It says:
9 "Proceed forthwith to prepare launchers to make sure that four to
10 six aerial bombs can be launched simultaneously against the designated
11 target, the condition being that they must hit the target, which means
12 that the provisions have to be made for more bombs so that in the event
13 of a miss, the next projectile lands on the target."
14 General, you actually had an expectation that these bombs
15 wouldn't hit the target as evidenced by this order and you still fired
16 them against Hrasnica and other areas of Sarajevo where civilians were
17 found?
18 A. Excellent question, and you will get my answer. It's not a
19 question here of firing. It's -- it's -- we're talking about firing at a
20 target here. It's a question of terminology.
21 THE INTERPRETER: In the B/C/S, interpreter's note.
22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, it's not an artillery battery
23 but a launcher. So immediately prepare a launcher and ensure that the
24 selected target is hit by four to six air-bombs on condition that they
25 hit the target. It cannot be permitted that the crew -- well, not the
Page 33166
1 crew but the commanding officer controlling the assets prepares to such
2 an extent and makes such a calculation that they -- the target would be
3 hit. This is one thing.
4 Secondly, the commander -- and here I officially note that the
5 commander cannot know everything, and my people who understand this much
6 better said to me immediately that you cannot fire more than one air-bomb
7 at a time because the firing is followed by preparation, namely once one
8 is fired and it does not hit the target, then a lot of time is required,
9 and I think they told me that it's about two hours, to prepare a new one.
10 The two hours would imply completely revealing the asset, which is quite
11 large, and it would be out of the question to keep it where it was,
12 because then it would be exposed to enemy fire. So in essence, we did
13 not change the contents of the regulations, but we nuanced and detailed
14 so that everything would come down to the use of one air-bomb calculated
15 in such a manner that it's to the target. Contrary to that, the
16 professional controlling the fire and overseeing the precision of fire
17 would not even proceed to firing point unless he could rely on this
18 precision. So he tried to stick to what was there as closely as possible
19 without changing the rules and the text of the content.
20 MS. EDGERTON: Your Honour, I see it's 2.45.
21 JUDGE KWON: Yes. We'll continue tomorrow, but before we
22 adjourn, I briefly have two matters, Mr. Tieger.
23 Would you like to respond to the Defence motion for a request
24 Mr. Krstic's lawyer to be present in the courtroom?
25 MR. TIEGER: I think an e-mail was just sent on that,
Page 33167
1 Mr. President, and I won't pre-empt the contents, but I believe we don't
2 have a problem with that.
3 JUDGE KWON: And do you have any observation about the Defence
4 motion to -- Defence response to your motion to exclude the evidence of
5 Snezana Kovac in which the Defence wants to tender those remaining
6 relevant paragraphs pursuant to Rule 92 bis?
7 MR. TIEGER: On that one I think I'm behind the curve and I'll
8 have to check.
9 JUDGE KWON: So if we could hear your response as soon as
10 possible.
11 MR. TIEGER: As soon as possible, of course, Mr. President.
12 JUDGE KWON: The hearing is now adjourned. We will begin --
13 we'll resume tomorrow at 9.00.
14 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 2.46 p.m.,
15 to be reconvened on Tuesday, the 5th day
16 of February, 2013, at 9.00 a.m.
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