(srpskohrvatski / english)
0. Sloboda: Reagujte dok ne bude prekasno!
Milosevic "Trial", 15--25 July 2003:
1. Dealing With the "Hostile" Insider Witness
by Judith Armatta, 15 July, 2003 - http://www.cij.org/
2. SYNOPSIS OF THE JULY 22, 2003 PROCEEDINGS AT THE HAGUE TRIBUNAL
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg072203.htm
3. SYNOPSIS OF JULY 23 HEARINGS AT THE HAGUE TRIBUNAL
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg072303.htm
4. ANOTHER SYNOPSIS OF THE JULY 23, 2003 PROCEEDINGS AT THE HAGUE
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/martinovic072303.htm
5. SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC: HISTORY TEACHER, July 24
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/martinovic072403.htm
6. "TRIAL" HALTED DUE TO PRESIDENT MILOSEVIC'S ILL HEALTH
Milosevic war crimes trial to resume August 25
=== 0 ===
Da: "Vladimir Krsljanin"
Data: Mer 30 Lug 2003 16:42:10 Europe/Rome
Oggetto: Sloboda: Reagujte dok ne bude prekasno!
SAOPSTENJE ZA JAVNOST
Udruzenje "Sloboda" - Jugoslovenski komitet za oslobodjenje
Slobodana Milosevica ukazuje domacoj i medjunarodnoj javnosti da se
zbog opasnog i zlonamernog nepostovanja medjunarodnih standarda o
zastiti ljudskih prava od strane ilegalnog tribunala u Hagu, stanje
zdravlja Predsednika Slobodana Milosevica stalno pogorsava. Predsednik
Milosevic svojom borbom za istinu trijumfuje u procesu bez presedana u
istoriji, izlozen svakodnevnim nadljudskim naporima i nehumanim
zatvorskim uslovima.
To traje vec vise od dve godine. Iako su dosadasnji malobrojni
specijalisticki pregledi i medicinske analize nesumnjivo utvrdili da
uslovi kojima je izlozen predstavljaju opasan faktor kardiovaskularnog
rizika, tribunal odbija cak i da obezbedi redovne specijalisticke
kontrole njegovog zdravstvenog stanja.
Udruzenje "Sloboda" zahteva da se Predsedniku Slobodanu Milosevicu
omoguce neophodni pregledi i oporavak u nasoj zemlji i da u ovom
procesu ucestvuje sa slobode. To je jedini primeren nacin da se zastite
njegov zivot i zdravlje.
UDRUZENJE "SLOBODA" - JUGOSLOVENSKI KOMITET ZA OSLOBODJENJE SLOBODANA
MILOSEVICA
Beograd, 30. jula 2003. godine
SLOBODA urgently needs your donation.
Please find the detailed instructions at:
http://www.sloboda.org.yu/pomoc.htm
To join or help this struggle, visit:
http://www.sloboda.org.yu/ (Sloboda/Freedom association)
http://www.icdsm.org/ (the international committee to defend Slobodan
Milosevic)
http://www.free-slobo.de/ (German section of ICDSM)
http://www.wpc-in.org/ (world peace council)
http://www.geocities.com/b_antinato/ (Balkan antiNATO center)
=== 1 ===
(NOTE: This Lady Armatta, after expressing concern about how
"accusation" witnesses turn in favor of Milosevic in
cross-examinations, claims that in "modern" proceedings such
cross-examinations must be forbidden. Milosevic would have "a nearly
hypnotic effect" thus "it makes it difficult to get at the truth", she
says - she is right, since only HER truth is meant.)
http://www.cij.org/
index.cfm?fuseaction=viewReport&reportID=361&tribunalID=1
Dealing With the "Hostile" Insider Witness
International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia (ICTY)
Milosevic Trial - The Hague - Court Room Three
15 July 2003
THE HAGUE - An attorney cannot impeach a witness he or she has called,
according to traditional trial practice rules. The rule is based on
the assumption that a party calling a witness vouches for the witness's
credibility. Only when the party can show that a witness has surprised
him or her with their testimony is there an exception. In this
situation, an attorney may ask the court to declare the witness
“hostile” and allow the attorney to impeach his or her own witness,
i.e., attempt to show the witness is lying. Traditionally, judges did
not favor this procedure and tended to tell attorneys they take their
witnesses as they find them. If they “go south” (change their stories)
on the stand, it is just one of life’s risks.
The more modern approach is to recognize that attorneys do not have
unlimited choice of witnesses. Not infrequently, a witness with
important information may also be untrustworthy. That is often the
case with certain witnesses in war crimes trials, especially where the
charge is involvement in a joint criminal enterprise. The best
witnesses in such cases are insiders. They can also be the worst.
Geoffrey Nice has been struggling with this problem since the beginning
of the Milosevic trial, as the Trial Chamber appears to favor the
traditional rule. The recent appearance of Zoran Lilic, one-time
President of the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY), was only
the latest challenge.
On the stand, Lilic showed himself a devotee of Slobodan Milosevic, the
Accused who he had come to testify against. Like other insider
witnesses, such as Rade Markovic, Dragan Vasiljkovic and protected
witness B-1775, once confronted by his old-time boss, Lilic rolled over
like a cur before the alpha dog. Milosevic’s aura was too strong for
him. Lilic (and Markovic, Vasiljkovic and B-1775) willingly and
unashamedly agreed to whatever Milosevic asked, with some exceptions.
It is not unusual for authoritarian leaders to surround themselves with
“yes-men,” but it makes it difficult to get at the truth, particularly
if the hostile witness rule is applied.
Lilic provided important testimony on direct examination about:
Milosevic's central role in getting the Bosnian Serbs to lay down their
guns; the primacy of Milosevic's Serbian police (MUP) over the VJ
(Yugoslav Army) and the direct subordination of MUP chiefs to him; the
FRY's financial support of the Croatian and Bosnian Serb armies, and
crimes committed by Serbian forces in Kosovo. The former FRY president
also authenticated minutes of high level meetings and a letter Army
Chief of Staff Momcilo Perisic wrote Milosevic, protesting his
extra-legal activities in Kosovo.
On cross examination, Lilic changed his testimony to suit his former
mentor with the ease of an actor changing roles. The fact that some of
his answers directly contradicted his earlier testimony seemed to
bother him not in the slightest. Despite having criticized Milosevic
for unnecessarily prolonging the war in Kosovo, when the Accused asked,
he agreed that Milosevic sought peace, not war. He testified that
Milosevic had no control over the Yugoslav army (VJ) and did not
interfere in its command during Lilic’s term in office – 1993 to 1997.
Moreover, he agreed that no VJ generals were promoted or dismissed at
Milosevic's request. In contrast to his earlier statement, Lilic also
assented to Milosevic's suggestion that he had no control over the
Bosnian Serbs, who often obstructed his efforts for a negotiated
settlement
In addition to these concessions, Lilic also provided the Amicus,
Branislav Tapuskovic, with helpful responses. He agreed with his
examiner that all the republican territorial defense units were under
JNA (Yugoslav People’s Army) command and their weapons and equipment
were JNA property. The Chamber has heard contrary evidence to the
effect that each Yugoslav republic had its own TO, financed by the
individual republics, and providing their own equipment, weapons and
ammunition. The relationship of the JNA and republican TO’s, including
property ownership, is important because the JNA took control of TO
weapons and ammunition before the wars, then redistributed them to
local Serbs, according to other testimony before the Chamber.
Mr. Tapuskovic also elicited the witness’s agreement that Serbian
Orthodox Patriarch Pavle was the one who intervened and secured
Mladic’s agreement for Milosevic to negotiate for the Bosnian Serbs at
Dayton – not Milosevic. This scenario counters Milosevic’s reputed
“influence” over the Bosnian Serb leadership.
Confronted with his witness’s many concessions to Milosevic, Geoffrey
Nice had only a short time for re-examination and a significant
challenge ahead of him. He did not ask the Chamber to declare Lilic a
hostile witness, though he would have been justified in doing so.
Rather, he set out to tread a cautious line, which twice drew warnings
from the Bench.
Probing Lilic’s relationship with the Accused, Mr. Nice asked him who
was giving instructions to whom as they sought to get Mladic to release
the two French pilots before the signing of the Dayton Accords in
Paris. Lilic responded, “Our fear was that the Accords would not be
signed and Milosevic insisted that I should issue an order to Perisic
that he try to establish the location of the pilots. I was not giving
instruction to him. He used his right through me to bring influence to
bear on the Yugoslav Army.” It is an explanation as curious as it is
convoluted and may provide unintended insight into the way Lilic has
ordered his reality to include a vision of his own power within the
confines of Milosevic’s far greater power.
Nice then stepped into deeper water and asked his witness, “Mladic left
the RS (Republika Srpska) at the end of 1996. Did he come to Serbia?”
Lilic responded: “I don’t know whether he left the RS altogether but
he certainly did come to Serbia.” Nice followed up by asking if there
was ever an inquiry into Mladic's involvement in Srebrenica, to which
Lilic replied, “As far as I know, no such investigation was
instituted.” Before the prosecutor could ask about the subsequent
promotion of Mladic, Judge May cautioned him, “There’s a limit to the
extent you can cross examine your own witness.”
Not for the first time, Nice tried to explain the trouble with insider
witnesses. “There are certain witnesses whose evidence has to be
viewed cautiously.” Yet, he said, “the Chamber is assisted by hearing
their evidence on particular documents and events,” in this case the
promotion of someone who has been indicted for genocide in Srebrenica.
Nice wanted to present a document showing Mladic’s promotion and to ask
the witness how it occurred. The Chamber ruled to exclude the document
and Nice approached his witness from a different angle.
In response to Mr. Nice’s questions, Lilic admitted that during his
term as president he had access to significant intelligence data,
though he said Milosevic had “more and better information.”
Nevertheless, when Nice asked him whether, despite the range of
available information, he had no intelligence on what happened at
Srebrenica, he said simply, “Right.”
Nice continued, “You denied the existence of any detention camps [when
Milosevic asked him about a report that nine existed in Serbia,
identified by location and number of prisoners] . . . . Did you visit
the areas yourself?” In another demonstration of his convoluted
universe, Lilic answered, “I did not visit them and according to my
information, they did not exist. I cannot visit what our [military
intelligence] service says does not exist.” It apparently never
occurred to him to visit the identified areas to see if they held camps
in which people were being detained. When Nice attempted to follow up
by asking if the witness would allow that he could have been kept from
information of this kind, Judge Robinson interrupted to caution him,
“Mr. Nice, you’re getting pretty close to cross examining.”
The lead prosecutor quietly asked his less than stellar witness, "If
the Court determines that the army [VJ] was involved [in the Bosnian
Serb war against the Bosnian government], who was in a position to
control or influence the VJ . . .?" The witness waffled, appearing
confused. Only General Perisic could have issued orders of that kind,
he said, and if he did, they could have come from Milosevic. That, he
continued, would have been completely unlawful. So, it could not have
happened, he appeared to conclude. "Only the President of FRY [Lilic]
[acting] with the Supreme Defense Council could issue such an order."
This exemplifies the dance he was forced to do in his efforts to please
Milosevic and protect himself.
Nice's further probing rehabilitated significant evidence Lilic had
given on direct examination, which he had repudiated on cross
examination by Milosevic. For example, Lilic re-asserted that the
Serbian MUP was militarized under Milosevic's presidency, and that it
included two special anti-terrorist units, the SJO and the SAJ. He
also reaffirmed that Jovica Stanisic, head of the Serbian State
Security Service, and indirectly Milosevic, exercised political control
over the Red Berets.
The Prosecutor then asked him about General Pavkovic's May 25, 1999
letter to Milosevic, asking him to take urgent measures to
resubordinate MUP units in Kosovo to the VJ. General Pavkovic reported
that certain MUP units were out of control, looting vast amounts of
property and "committing serious crimes against the Shiptars
[pejorative name for Kosovar Albanians]" including murder, rape,
robbery, plunder, etc. Lilic had fallen out of favor by this time and
could not testify directly about the letter. However, Mr. Nice asked
him one important question, "Do you have any reason to doubt General
Pavkovic?" In a strong voice, Lilic responded, "absolutely not."
Finally, Mr. Nice showed Lilic the transcript of a speech by Ratko
Mladic on April 16, 1995. In it, Mladic identifies the quantity of
weapons and ammunition the FRY provided to the RS Army from the
beginning of the war until December 31, 1994. Lilic explained that
Mladic was a bit of a sensationalist and the quantities were "so large
I personally don't believe them." The Prosecutor offered a
hypothetical, "If in due course it is found that [the VJ provided]
these materials . . ., who bears responsibility for authorizing it --
you as Commander in Chief?" Because the weapons were owned by the VJ
and because of the quantity, Lilic claimed that only the federal
minister of defense could have authorized their transfer to the RS.
Experience with insider witnesses demonstrates that the Court should
adopt the modern rule and allow cross examination of a party's own
witnesses. The Milosevic trial provides strong support to do so. At
least four witnesses have significantly diverted from their direct
testimony when Milosevic questioned them, under a nearly hypnotic
effect. The prosecutor should not be placed in a position to press a
reluctant Court to declare these witnesses "hostile" in order to
attempt to get at the truth. The purpose of presenting testimony
through these difficult witnesses is to assist the Chamber in its
decision-making. Applying the traditional rule thwarts that aim. The
Chamber should adopt the modern approach.
Submitted by Judith Armatta on 15 July, 2003 - Updated: 15 July 2003
08:32
=== 2 ===
SYNOPSIS OF THE JULY 22, 2003 PROCEEDINGS AT THE HAGUE TRIBUNAL
www.slobodan-milosevic.org - July 22, 2003
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
The so-called “Trial” of Slobodan Milosevic resumed again today after
a four day weekend.
A secret witness code named “B-127” testified for most of the day.
B-127 is a Muslim and a former member of the JNA who stayed on and
joined the VRS, after the JNA withdrew from Bosnia-Herzegovina in May
of 1992.
The prosecution was trying to use B-127’s testimony as part of its
pathetic attempt to “prove” their absurd claim that the VJ and the VRS
were the same army, and not 2 different armies.
The “damning testimony” came fast and furious when B-127 claimed that
the VJ and the VRS shared information with each other. Oh, parish the
thought that 2 friendly states would share information with each
other! That has got to be the most sinister conspiracy in the history
of the world, or so you would think if you listened to the
“prosecutor” at the Hague Tribunal.
The truth is that it is completely normal for states that are on
friendly terms with one another to share information. An example of
that is making headlines right now. George W. Bush made what was
apparently a false claim in his State of the Union speech, on the basis
of British intelligence.
B-127 said that the information sharing went so far that the VJ could
access VRS radar data, and the VRS could access VJ radar data. In
North America the USA and Canada have the same agreement – it’s called
NORAD.
If one uses the logic employed by the Hague Tribunal one could
theorize that the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq was really a Canadian
endeavor, and therefore the actions of the USA are really Canada’s
responsibility. After all, Canada and the USA cooperate with each
other, they share intelligence data, they share radar data – in fact,
in my home state of Washington, the Canadian Armed forces even conduct
joint training operations together with the U.S. Army at Ft. Lewis
near Tacoma.
Just like Slobodan Milosevic secretly controlled the government and
army of Republika Srpska – Canadian PM, Jean Chretien must be secretly
controlling the U.S. Government and the American armed forces. If you
understand the logic of the Hague Tribunal, or if you smoke enough
crack, then that type of thinking will make perfect sense to you.
Another thing that was seen as sinister (by the prosecutor) was the
fact that the government of Yugoslavia paid the former soldiers of the
JNA, through the 30th Personnel Center, the social insurance, health
benefits, salaries, old-age pensions, etc… which they had legally
accrued under Yugoslav law.
Imagine those scheming Serbs - paying people the money that they owed
them. If that doesn’t point to a “joint criminal enterprise” then I
don’t know what does. They even paid B-127, who is a Muslim, through
that same 30th Personnel Center.
The 30th Personnel Center was purely an administrative body that was
in charge of paying legally accrued social benefits to the former
soldiers of the JNA. The 30th Personnel Center issued no orders of any
kind. It had one office, consisting of one room, and it operated for a
full 6 years after the war ended,therefore it had absolutely nothing
at all to do with the war.
The prosecution’s claim that the VJ and the VRS were the same army
fell to pieces when Slobodan Milosevic asked B-127 some very direct
questions.
President Milosevic asked if B-127 knew of any orders that the VJ had
issued to the VRS, and B-127 didn’t know about any.
President Milosevic asked if B-127 had ever seen any units of the VJ
operating in Bosnia, and again B-127 hadn’t.
B-127 tried to save the prosecution’s case by saying that people from
Serbia were forced to join the VRS. President Milosevic then asked for
an example of this, but B-127 failed to come up with even a single
example.
President Milosevic further destroyed the prosecution’s case when he
asked - if the VJ and the VRS were the same army (as the prosecutor
claims), then why didn’t the VRS engage Albanian terrorists in Kosovo,
or mobilize to defend Yugoslavia during the NATO aggression?
After B-127 withdrew another secret witness code named B-83 came and
testified for about 10 minutes.
Then the so-called “judges” ruled that written statements from 2
secret witnesses, B-1576 and B-1010, could be admitted as evidence
under rule 92-bis without any cross-examination. In fact these secret
witnesses, if they even exist, don’t even have to appear in front of
the tribunal at all. For all we know these so-called “witnesses” could
simply be figments of Carla del Ponte’s imagination.
=== 3 ===
SYNOPSIS OF JULY 23 HEARINGS AT THE HAGUE TRIBUNAL
www.slobodan-milosevic.org - July 23, 2003
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
Today at the Hague tribunal a secret witness testified under the
pseudonym of “B-83.” The majority of B-83’s testimony was given in
private session.
B-83 was apparently an official in the Serbian government who had
something to do with financial matters. His employment wasn’t clear
due to the excessive use of private sessions. I’m not even sure what
the gist of his testimony was supposed to be since so much of it was
given in private session.
B-83 did, however, say some interesting things in open session. B-83
accused the prosecution of twisting his words and putting falsehoods
into his witness statement. B-83 also said that the prosecution did
not give him adequate time to review his statement, or even give him
the chance to see the statement in his own language until he got to
the Hague earlier this week.
For example the prosecution made up a story about the Serbian Police
"organizing car thefts" and inserted this outrageous fairytale into
B-83's witness statement, even though the witness said that this story
wasn’t true. The prosecution also made up a bunch of malarkey about
“black budgets” which the witness also denied.
In fact, according to the witness, there were errors of fact in almost
every single paragraph of this witness statement that the prosecutor
had prepared for him.
While President Milosevic was questioning B-83 about the numerous
false claims that the prosecution had inserted into his witness
statement the so-called “judge” May cut him off and accused him of
“wasting time on irrelevant matters.”
This is amazing even for the Hague Tribunal. Here we have a witness
who had perjurious statements put into his mouth, against his will and
without his knowledge, by the prosecutor and the judge doesn’t see any
problem with that! If this was a real court, with a real judge, a
mistrial would be declared, and the prosecutor would face criminal
prosecution himself.
After B-83 finished, the prosecution called a so-called “expert”
witness, one Audrey Budding, a historian from Harvard who wrote a
paper on “Serb nationalism.”
Mrs. Budding proved her self to be an apologist for the Albanian
Fascists of the 2nd World War.
Mrs. Budding denied that the Ballistas* were fascists, and even had
the nerve to claim that the Ballistas were the victims of the Chetniks
and the Partisans.
All in all it was just another day at the Hague Tribunal.
* If you don’t know what a Ballista is see:
http://emperors-clothes/articles/thompson/rootsof.htm
=== 4 ===
ANOTHER SYNOPSIS OF THE JULY 23, 2003 PROCEEDINGS AT THE HAGUE
Written by: Vera Martinovic - July 23, 2003
Today's first witness, B-083, demonstrated again the flimsiness of the
Prosecution's case and the desperation of the OTP (Office of the
Prosecutor). Why flimsiness? Because, in the absence of anything
stronger, the Prosecutors sought to prove that Serbia provided
financial aid to the Serbs on the other side of the Drina. But that is
a common knowledge, an undisputed fact and certainly not a war crime.
And why desperation? They manipulated heavily the testimony of B-083,
fabricating his several previously given written statements, tricking
him into signing the English version without him fully understanding
it and trying to hide that by keeping his entire testimony in the
private session.
Only the last 10 minutes of the cross-examination were held in the
open session, but it was enough to reveal the whole scam. B-083 thus
joined those Prosecution witnesses whom they regretted they had ever
summoned: having received only few days ago at The Hague the Serbian
version of "his" statements, B-083 corrected in his handwriting
practically each and every paragraph, striking them out and adding in
the margins his explanations which invalidated the statements in toto.
B-083, introduced only vaguely as an "officer in the Ministry of
Defence of Serbia in 1991," started his testimony yesterday, but it
lasted only 10 minutes before the proceedings were adjourned for the
day and it was in the open session. The only thing Nice covered then
was the claim that the Government of Serbia deliberated in one of its
sessions in November 1991 the aid for the Serbs in Croatia, and the
amount mentioned was in the neighborhood of 92 million DM.
Today, B-083 finished his examination-in-chief, but most of it was in
private session. Therefore, the public was unable to follow the
explanation about those alleged millions.
Back in the open session, we saw that the examination-in-chief was
over and that amicus curiae Stephen Kay was arguing with Mr. May over
the allotment of time for the cross-examination, and the constant
changing in the order of witnesses.
Each time May spoke, he managed to muddle the issues, "explaining"
that indeed the Accused has to be granted a certain amount of time,
but he is not to waste it on arguments and quarrels with the witness.
Kay tried to point out this is a technical matter and the main thing
is that Nice 'moves like an express train', covering a large number of
important issues extremely briefly and superficially, which in turn
radically shortens the allotment of time for the Accused and makes it
impossible for him to cover those issues at all. He also noticed that
it is Nice who leads the most important witnesses, like Kucan was, who
was processed in only 1 day. Therefore, the time spent for the
examination-in-chief could not be the standard by which the allotted
time for the cross-examination is to be measured.
Apparently, the OTP produces a weekly list of witnesses complete with
the time planned for each examination-in-chief, and since the general
rule has been to allot approximately the same time for the
cross-examination, the Accused can plan his questioning accordingly.
But then Nice comes up, drastically cutting the actual time of his
questioning of a witness to, say, half an hour instead of the planned
two hours, simply by being superficial and thereby setting the low time
standard. And, he constantly reshuffles the witnesses, hampering the
preparation of the Defense.
Nice tried to prevent the judges from allotting too much time to this
cross-examination, by appealing to the Chamber to 'exert pressure on
the amicus and the Accused' (I failed to understand what kind of
pressure and in relation to what - perhaps to make them shut up).
Nice also half-complained and half-flattered: "I have to note that in
a short time the Accused has developed enviable skills of
cross-examination." What he meant by that was probably that the Accused
was now so much better at it that he could wrap it up in much less
time.
The troika in the scarlet robes put their heads together, murmuring
for two minutes among themselves and then May pronounced: "An hour and
fifteen minutes." Like a magician pulling a rabbit out of the hat, or
a generous nobleman tossing coins to a beggar: 15 minutes longer than
Nice had for the examination-in-chief.
So, not only haven't we seen what the witness had to say, and how rich
were the issues he covered, we also couldn't judge whether an hour and
fifteen would be reasonably long enough to cross-examine.
But, that was not all. Milosevic first tried to verify with May that
the issue of the place of employment of this witness was not for the
private session. May answered he also believed this had been mentioned
in the open session. But the moment Milosevic started to mouth his
first question, something to the effect of "You have been working…",
Nice jumped up, saying: "I believe this could infringe the security
measures." May seconded: "Yes, I think it might. We go to the private
session." And nearly all of the cross-examination, more than one hour
of it, was closed to the public!
When the session again became open again, there were Milosevic and the
witness at the end of the careful demolition of the written statements
by the latter and of the Prosecution's credibility.
Milosevic said that there was virtually not a single paragraph in
these statements that had not been corrected in writing by the
witness. B-083 confirmed: "That's right." He explained there were so
many mistakes and even some totally unrelated, irrelevant and invented
stuff, that he believed it was unfair that Milosevic is to be charged
with these things or the Tribunal's time wasted like this.
B-083 used the words "silly" and "preposterous" when describing these
passages from "his" statements. He spoke directly to Milosevic: "I
apologise to you", and he requested these issues to be disregarded. He
said he had made a mistake by being insufficiently cautious, and
signing this without having read it or having received it in Serbian.
Milosevic quoted several quite outrageous passages from one of these
statements, allegedly in direct speech by the witness: "I'll give you
another example of illegal fundraising - the Police had been involved
in car theft." He said to the witness: "Here you have added in your
handwriting: 'Not correct'." B-083 confirmed this, saying he also wrote
that it should be explained to the Accused, along with an apology, the
circumstances of this statement.
B-083 only got the Serbian version 5 days ago. Apparently, the OTP
Investigator Gerald Sexton had tricked the witness into signing the
English version years ago, saying he'll be able to 'explain everything
at The Hague', but then B-083 found out that practically everything
had been invented or too liberally interpreted, but as if the witness
had been quoted verbatim complete with the inverted commas ("I'll give
you another example…"). The witness now stated that, if he only had a
chance to write his statement with his own hand, "we would not be
having 1 minute of this discussion'.
Here's another gem: Milosevic said that one of the statements
contained the claim by the witness about our state budget, which had
'one secret segment, called a black fund'. B-083 simply said there's no
way he could have said that.
Judging by some other examples from the OTP's work of fiction that
Milosevic quoted, B-083 spoke to the Investigator quite broadly and
openly about the situation in the Ministry of Defense, where internal
squabbles and embezzlements were rife (and for which, as Milosevic
pointed out that 2 Ministers had been arrested at that time), and
cunning Mr. Sexton took it all and gave it a nice spin, necessary for
the Indictment.
B-083 had clearly misunderstood what it meant to give a statement for
the court, presuming it meant one should open up one's heart and spill
out every large and tiny office happening, giving the Investigator a
free hand to weave a story out of it, not even bothering to read what
the nice, understanding gentleman wrote in his name. Now he was
understandably angry at being bamboozled.
B-083 continued to complain about some of his former misbehaving
office colleagues even to Milosevic, saying that some of those who did
it were still holding their high positions today "and you and me are
sitting here". Milosevic drove the point home: "What possible
connection all these things could have with what's going on here?" The
witness answered: "None whatsoever."
Gradually, B-083 and Milosevic began to discuss those events in almost
friendly manner, chatting and not bothering to keep the pause between
questions and answers, like in a normal conversation. Milosevic would
quote another invented passage and they would together marvel at how
brazen the OTP had been, the witness repeating 'I have never said
something like that'.
B-083 even volunteered in his explanation of one particular instance
that he had 'never went there to inspect', forcing Nice to interject:
"I do not know whether the witness is aware he's in the open session?"
May also interrupted the cozy chat once, warning both not to overlap,
reminding witness he is "here to testify" and Milosevic is "here to
cross-examine," and not to have a conversation. Milosevic was quite
pleased with himself for exposing once more the sleazy modus operandi
of the OTP and disrupting so successfully this show trial, that he
calmly answered to May he was quite pleased to have the opportunity to
chat with this man, whom he has never met before.
Milosevic and the witness even tried to establish the method of
creating certain passages of the statements by the OTP. The problem
was, as many times before with those written statements, that there
were no questions to which these statements were answering, only the
unbroken, spun story.
B-083 was guessing what the original questions by the Investigator
must've been: probably the Investigator asked, for instance, what
would be the regular chain of command in the government for any given
issue. He got a detailed answer about the whole structure with the
President of the Republic at the top of the pyramid. Then the OTP
retold this explanation as if it had been an answer to a specific
accusation against Milosevic.
B-083 used the ship metaphor, describing the subordination, but he was
not answering the question of whether the captain organized the
piracy. It was as if the Investigator had asked: Who runs the ship?
and got the answer: The captain, who has officers under him. Then, the
Investigator spun the question this way: Who organized the piracy using
this ship? , and coupled it with the original question: The captain,
who has officers under him.
It was obvious that both Milosevic and B-083 were displeased when Mr.
May announced that there were only 5 minutes left, so they quickly
tried to cover several more inventions (Milosevic quoting them and
asking whether they were correct, the witness answering: "Not a chance.
Please, disregard this.") They parted almost friends, I'm sure.
Mr. Tapuskovic got his 2 minutes, and he used them to clarify the only
issue from the testimony mentioned by the witness in the open session
- those millions of Deutsche Marks requested/planned/given by Serbia
to the Serbs in Croatia. He wanted to make a distinction between the
sums requested and planned and those actually paid. B-083 confirmed
that he personally handled some of these payments, but these were all
amounts in dinars, it was aid and hardly the amount stated. Tapuskovic
was pleased: "I have no further questions."
Nice had a chance for a redirect, but guess what? The public couldn't
see it, again. He said: "We have a couple of additional questions, but
they're for a private session." And the screen went blank.
Please try to read "Dealing with the 'Hostile' Insider Witness"
(
http://www.cij.org/
index.cfm?fuseaction=viewReport&reportID=361&tribunalID=1 ) by Judith
Armatta of the CIJ. Here she explained the fact that several insiders
so far (notably Radomir Markovic, Captain Dragan, Zoran Lilic and
B-1775) allegedly changed their testimony due to the mesmerizing
effect of Milosevic on them. She compared him with an 'alpha dog', in
front of which a poor witness simply 'rolled over like a cur'. She
applied her cottage psychology/astrology/ESP skills, claiming that a
witness stood no chance, because 'Milosevic's aura was too strong for
him'.
I would suggest much simpler explanations: these people did not
volunteer to testify for the Prosecution, they had been summoned
or/and threatened into it with possible indictments against themselves.
And then the following happened: for instance, Captain Dragan had NOT
changed his testimony nor succumbed to a powerful aura, but had been
bamboozled by the OTP in the same manner as today's witness B-083.
Their original written statements had been liberally invented,
suggestively worded and devoid of questions by the Investigator and
they were tricked into signing. Not having seen the
examination-in-chief of B-083, I can only suppose that it had been
pretty much like that one of Captain Dragan: Prosecutor Nice rushing,
skipping and sliding through the invented statement 'like an express
train', sometimes not making sense at all, leaving the witness to
stare in disbelief and to simply say 'yes' to whatever construction
proffered. Too bad there was this damned cross-examination and the
possibility to demonstrate that the testimony was not at all what the
witness has signed, meant or wanted to say.
The second witness today, who is to continue tomorrow, is an expert on
history from Harvard (the font of knowledge for the ICTY), who
testifies about the Serbian nationalism in 20th century as she had
penned it in her report commissioned by the OTP. The very definition of
an expert must've been wildly stretched after the ICTY set up shop.
Vera Martinovic is an independent writer based in Belgrade, Yugoslavia.
=== 5 ===
SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC: HISTORY TEACHER
July 24, 2003
Written by: Vera Martinovic
Audrey Budding testified who testified on July 23rd and 24th, is a
skinny, bespectacled youthful PhD with expressive gesticulation. She
knows lots of historical facts. Her clothes and hairdo are unusually
interesting for an American. She apparently speaks/reads Serbian.
But that's where the plus side stops. Mrs. Budding's historical
knowledge is fragmentary and incomplete and, so she often misses the
big picture, and is unaware of important events and sources.
Mrs. Budding used to be a diplomatic official at the American Embassy
in Belgrade in the '80s, so she is obviously more of a politician then
a historian.
She penned a report commissioned by the OTP on Serbian nationalism in
the 20th century, which seems to be a rewrite of her own, more
balanced PhD thesis on the Serbian intellectuals and the national
question, only with the added twist to make the Serbs look bad, so she
supplied a political trial with a politicized rewrite of her own work.
None the less, I have to give her the credit of being much more subtle
than the previous Prosecution "expert", Riedlmayer, who was simply
ridiculous.
Mrs. Budding was seldom obvious and crude in her conclusions, except
sometimes, when Milosevic cornered her with facts and questions, and
then she turned stubborn. For example, when she disagreed with the
data by the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum about the figure of 600,000
victims of the Ustasa concentration camp Jasenovac, claiming the
number is 100,000 and explaining that anyway 'nobody knows exactly how
many Serbs died in NDH [Nezavisna Drzava Hrvatska = Independent State
of Croatia, Ustase-led Nazi puppet invention during WW2, comprising
today's Croatia and Bosnia & Herzegovina], in each village and each
house' . Although she admitted this was clearly a genocide, she was
suspicious about the number, she couldn't be bothered to believe those
pedantic Jews at the Holocaust museum, and certainly not Yugoslav
sources, because she was unable to personally peek into each village
and house.
Another example where she was crude and stubborn was when she refused
to accept the fact that the Albanian Fascist movement of the notorious
Balli Combetar or balisti, were Fascists. The fact that they were
installed by Mussolini to rule Kosovo when it was given over to
Albania during the WW2, butchered thousands of Serbs, and then
continued armed fighting years after the war officially ended, all
that was to Audrey, "a rebellion that started after this region of
Drenica was incorporated in the Yugoslav state, which caused the
revolt of the Albanians, who didn't want to join the Partisans in the
final push against the Germans in 1944 because they were afraid to
leave their houses, and so this rebellion was quashed and probably few
thousands were killed, some in battles, some executed".
Mrs. Budding stubbornly persisted saying, "to describe balisti as
Albanian Fascists is not correct, because they did not support the
Fascistic form of the state."
Milosevic got impatient and curtly asked: "And what did they support?
Did they support Italian Fascists?"
Mrs. Budding mumbled that well, of course, they supported the creation
of the Greater Albania.
Milosevic snapped: "Not only supported the idea, but militarily
supported the Fascists."
Mrs. Budding mumbled some more, trailing off and ultimately saying
that she's not familiar with it, with each military action, that there
were different groups… Some historian and expert!
There were some more gaffes in her paper, like when she wrote that the
Ustasa émigrés were a marginal group (Milosevic wanted to know how
come they got to run a country for 4 years if they were so marginal).
Also, she found it problematic to define the nascent Yugoslavia as a
solution for the Serbs, with the maxim 'all Serbs in one state'. When
Milosevic said that Yugoslavia was not a solution only for the Serbs,
but also for others, that it could be equally said 'all Croats/Slovenes
in one state', Mrs. Budding proudly begged to disagree, 'because there
were significant Croatian and Slovenian minorities left in Italy and
Austria', but when Milosevic reminded her that also a significant
portion of the Serbs were left in Hungary and Romania, so the maxim
still applied for the bulk of all nations, Mrs. Budding didn't have
anything to say. A historian who argues an issue not knowing what the
next related historical fact might be used against her is not a very
competent historian.
Almost all other conclusions in her report were less obviously biased,
only ever so slightly leaned towards prejudice and one would have to
carefully read both her thesis and her OTP report to pinpoint the
distortions, although the general impression of a different slant is
palpable even from those paragraphs that were read in the courtroom.
Milosevic quoted her PhD thesis where she explained how it was
impossible for the Serbs to accept the confederate Yugoslavia and its
breaking along the borders of its republics because they were so
dispersed; the same issue in her report for the OTP got the subtle
addition that the Serbs failed to pay much attention to their ties
with other nations within the republics in which they lived outside of
Serbia.
Milosevic quipped: "Well, do you seriously believe that the ties of
the Serbs in Croatia with the Croats, these ties that include the
genocide that you've already explained, are so much stronger and more
important than the ties with other Serbs?!" Budding got pretty confused
after that and started to babble about life being not only one's
nation, but a house in which one lives… To that one can argue that one
can indeed live in a house if it still stands and if one is still
alive.
Another major problem with Budding's paper is the extremely shallow
and selective pool of sources that she used, some of the works
completely debunked as political pamphlets (e.g. "Kosovo - A Brief
History' by Noel Malcolm), yet she quoted from such articles and
books, disregarding or not being aware of the existence of other well
known authors and works that Milosevic listed.
Budding was often reduced to answering 'I'm not familiar with this
particular work' or 'I do not know about these particular sources' or
'I haven't read all the transcripts, only from the first meeting' or
'No, I haven't seen these diplomatic documents'. Milosevic and his
aides have done their homework and at times Mrs. Budding was indeed
receiving a thorough lesson in history.
The young doctor was selective not only in her sources, but also in
the historical events which she did or did not include in her paper.
Thus, she did quote a public speech by the soon-to-be Yugoslav King
Alexander, who said that Serbia must be strong so that Yugoslavia could
be strong too. She explained that as an example of 'Serbian
nationalism', but she failed to quote and explain, or even to mention
at all the crucial document of that time, the Corfu Declaration on the
creation of Yugoslavia. She explained her omissions with the necessity
to keep her report concise. Strangely enough, only the relevant and
balanced things got chopped off.
The "learned panel of judges" found themselves in an absurd situation:
here they were, admitting into evidence the Prosecution's exhibit
going way back into the 15th century, and discussing these despised
historical issues which they always pronounced as irrelevant, and of
which they knew nothing, and frankly didn't care to know. But, this is
what you get when the Prosecution's case so heavily depends on the
silly notion that all this is one and the same 'joint criminal
enterprise' to create the Greater Serbia, the plan which goes
centuries back, so even King Alexander, Vuk Karadzic, Garasanin and
other Serbian historical figures must be evoked in order to take their
punishment for their participation in this Nice-Del Ponte co-production
in Cinemascope.
History is a tough discipline, and it demands a broad knowledge. It
was at times hard for me to follow all of the expert nuances, because
I certainly haven't read all of the books that were mentioned. But, at
least I was able to follow the basic logic of the discussion and
arguments.
Mr. May was probably dozing or doing crosswords, because he proved
time and again unable to follow or understand the point of a certain
line of questioning.
At one point, Milosevic asked Mrs. Budding why she wrote that Vuk
Karadzic could be attributed with the authorship of the idea of
defining a nation by its language, when there is a whole line of other
linguists, historians and philosophers (of which he quoted some) who
had stated the same ideas much earlier, and Karadzic had merely
embraced that idea?
May interrupted by saying: "I do not know what is the purpose of this
list of names?" Milosevic professorially reprimanded him: "Mr May, you
have not been listening to the previous question", and he patiently
repeated the whole question and said that 'the list you're preventing
me from reading are the people who originally created the idea, among
them someone whom you might be familiar with, a German philosopher
Fichte'. So, not only was Mrs. Budding given a free history lesson,
but Mr. May as well.
The time was again the main problem, May not wanting to allow any
extension of the cross-examination. Milosevic said twice: "These time
restrictions I really regard as violence." And, at one point he
mockingly pointed at the courtroom wall clock and told May: "Anyway,
the press has been already writing that the central issue here is
time, and nothing much else."
As I said, Mrs. Budding was subtle in her intentional bias, perhaps
overly subtle, so the point the Prosecution wanted to make with this
witness hasn't come across all that clearly. It only left a faint
anti-Serb aftertaste, a few hints and insinuations, an admission that
yes, no nation of these parts is blameless, but the Serbs were somehow
the main culprits.
The time allotted for this witness, both for the examination-in-chief
and for the cross-examination, was all to short. And even that short
time was interrupted by inane interventions from Nice and stupid
questions from May. Milosevic told May at one point (when the latter
tried to dismiss one issue as irrelevant): "I don't believe that you
should learn the whole Serbian history in half an hour, but since you
mainly deal here with altering history, I consider this particular
issue to be relevant."
What I find appalling is that the "trial" aimed at rewriting history
was dealing in history in such a superficial and brief manner. But,
the reason lies precisely in that: when you want to do a quick and
crude rewrite, you don't dwell too much on the serious science.
Vera Martinovic is in independent writer based in Belgrade, Yugoslavia.
=== 6 ===
"TRIAL" HALTED DUE TO PRESIDENT MILOSEVIC'S ILL HEALTH
www.slobodan-milosevic.org - July 28, 2003
On Monday July 28th the troika announced that there would be no
proceedings in the Milosevic "trial." The proceedings have also been
canceled for the 29th.
There is no word on what type of illness President Milosevic is
suffering from, although it is known that he suffers from high blood
pressure and that he has a heart condition.
The Tribunal's doctors will examine President Milosevic on Tuesday in
order to determine when he will be fit to resume taking part in the
proceedings.
---
http://www.ptd.net/webnews/wed/aa/Qwarcrimes-yugo-
milosevic.R_qz_DlT.html
Milosevic war crimes trial to resume August 25
Tuesday, 29-Jul-2003 1:00PM
THE HAGUE, July 29 (AFP) - The war crimes trial of Slobodan Milosevic,
suspended again because the former Yugoslav leader was again suffering
from ill-health, will resume on August 25, the UN tribunal said Tuesday.
"The trial of Slobodan Milosevic is scheduled to resume on Monday 25
August at 9:00 am after the ICTY summer court recess," the
International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia said in a
press release.
Tribunal spokesman Jim Landale told AFP Monday that Milosevic, who had
seen a doctor on Monday, would have another medical visit on Tuesday
and that the doctor's conclusions would affect the start date for the
trial.
He did not provide details on the illness of the former Yugoslav
leader, who suffers from high blood pressure and is at risk of a heart
attack.
The interruption was the ninth to date in the long-running trial before
the The Hague-based court. The ICTY began hearing Milosevic's case in
February last year, and the prosecution has not finished arguing its
case.
Milosevic, 61, has been undertaking his own defense in the case.
The one-time Yugoslav president, who was ousted from power in October
2000, is standing trial on more than 60 charges of war crimes and
crimes against humanity for his role in the 1990s wars in Bosnia,
Croatia and Kosovo.
0. Sloboda: Reagujte dok ne bude prekasno!
Milosevic "Trial", 15--25 July 2003:
1. Dealing With the "Hostile" Insider Witness
by Judith Armatta, 15 July, 2003 - http://www.cij.org/
2. SYNOPSIS OF THE JULY 22, 2003 PROCEEDINGS AT THE HAGUE TRIBUNAL
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg072203.htm
3. SYNOPSIS OF JULY 23 HEARINGS AT THE HAGUE TRIBUNAL
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg072303.htm
4. ANOTHER SYNOPSIS OF THE JULY 23, 2003 PROCEEDINGS AT THE HAGUE
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/martinovic072303.htm
5. SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC: HISTORY TEACHER, July 24
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/martinovic072403.htm
6. "TRIAL" HALTED DUE TO PRESIDENT MILOSEVIC'S ILL HEALTH
Milosevic war crimes trial to resume August 25
=== 0 ===
Da: "Vladimir Krsljanin"
Data: Mer 30 Lug 2003 16:42:10 Europe/Rome
Oggetto: Sloboda: Reagujte dok ne bude prekasno!
SAOPSTENJE ZA JAVNOST
Udruzenje "Sloboda" - Jugoslovenski komitet za oslobodjenje
Slobodana Milosevica ukazuje domacoj i medjunarodnoj javnosti da se
zbog opasnog i zlonamernog nepostovanja medjunarodnih standarda o
zastiti ljudskih prava od strane ilegalnog tribunala u Hagu, stanje
zdravlja Predsednika Slobodana Milosevica stalno pogorsava. Predsednik
Milosevic svojom borbom za istinu trijumfuje u procesu bez presedana u
istoriji, izlozen svakodnevnim nadljudskim naporima i nehumanim
zatvorskim uslovima.
To traje vec vise od dve godine. Iako su dosadasnji malobrojni
specijalisticki pregledi i medicinske analize nesumnjivo utvrdili da
uslovi kojima je izlozen predstavljaju opasan faktor kardiovaskularnog
rizika, tribunal odbija cak i da obezbedi redovne specijalisticke
kontrole njegovog zdravstvenog stanja.
Udruzenje "Sloboda" zahteva da se Predsedniku Slobodanu Milosevicu
omoguce neophodni pregledi i oporavak u nasoj zemlji i da u ovom
procesu ucestvuje sa slobode. To je jedini primeren nacin da se zastite
njegov zivot i zdravlje.
UDRUZENJE "SLOBODA" - JUGOSLOVENSKI KOMITET ZA OSLOBODJENJE SLOBODANA
MILOSEVICA
Beograd, 30. jula 2003. godine
SLOBODA urgently needs your donation.
Please find the detailed instructions at:
http://www.sloboda.org.yu/pomoc.htm
To join or help this struggle, visit:
http://www.sloboda.org.yu/ (Sloboda/Freedom association)
http://www.icdsm.org/ (the international committee to defend Slobodan
Milosevic)
http://www.free-slobo.de/ (German section of ICDSM)
http://www.wpc-in.org/ (world peace council)
http://www.geocities.com/b_antinato/ (Balkan antiNATO center)
=== 1 ===
(NOTE: This Lady Armatta, after expressing concern about how
"accusation" witnesses turn in favor of Milosevic in
cross-examinations, claims that in "modern" proceedings such
cross-examinations must be forbidden. Milosevic would have "a nearly
hypnotic effect" thus "it makes it difficult to get at the truth", she
says - she is right, since only HER truth is meant.)
http://www.cij.org/
index.cfm?fuseaction=viewReport&reportID=361&tribunalID=1
Dealing With the "Hostile" Insider Witness
International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia (ICTY)
Milosevic Trial - The Hague - Court Room Three
15 July 2003
THE HAGUE - An attorney cannot impeach a witness he or she has called,
according to traditional trial practice rules. The rule is based on
the assumption that a party calling a witness vouches for the witness's
credibility. Only when the party can show that a witness has surprised
him or her with their testimony is there an exception. In this
situation, an attorney may ask the court to declare the witness
“hostile” and allow the attorney to impeach his or her own witness,
i.e., attempt to show the witness is lying. Traditionally, judges did
not favor this procedure and tended to tell attorneys they take their
witnesses as they find them. If they “go south” (change their stories)
on the stand, it is just one of life’s risks.
The more modern approach is to recognize that attorneys do not have
unlimited choice of witnesses. Not infrequently, a witness with
important information may also be untrustworthy. That is often the
case with certain witnesses in war crimes trials, especially where the
charge is involvement in a joint criminal enterprise. The best
witnesses in such cases are insiders. They can also be the worst.
Geoffrey Nice has been struggling with this problem since the beginning
of the Milosevic trial, as the Trial Chamber appears to favor the
traditional rule. The recent appearance of Zoran Lilic, one-time
President of the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY), was only
the latest challenge.
On the stand, Lilic showed himself a devotee of Slobodan Milosevic, the
Accused who he had come to testify against. Like other insider
witnesses, such as Rade Markovic, Dragan Vasiljkovic and protected
witness B-1775, once confronted by his old-time boss, Lilic rolled over
like a cur before the alpha dog. Milosevic’s aura was too strong for
him. Lilic (and Markovic, Vasiljkovic and B-1775) willingly and
unashamedly agreed to whatever Milosevic asked, with some exceptions.
It is not unusual for authoritarian leaders to surround themselves with
“yes-men,” but it makes it difficult to get at the truth, particularly
if the hostile witness rule is applied.
Lilic provided important testimony on direct examination about:
Milosevic's central role in getting the Bosnian Serbs to lay down their
guns; the primacy of Milosevic's Serbian police (MUP) over the VJ
(Yugoslav Army) and the direct subordination of MUP chiefs to him; the
FRY's financial support of the Croatian and Bosnian Serb armies, and
crimes committed by Serbian forces in Kosovo. The former FRY president
also authenticated minutes of high level meetings and a letter Army
Chief of Staff Momcilo Perisic wrote Milosevic, protesting his
extra-legal activities in Kosovo.
On cross examination, Lilic changed his testimony to suit his former
mentor with the ease of an actor changing roles. The fact that some of
his answers directly contradicted his earlier testimony seemed to
bother him not in the slightest. Despite having criticized Milosevic
for unnecessarily prolonging the war in Kosovo, when the Accused asked,
he agreed that Milosevic sought peace, not war. He testified that
Milosevic had no control over the Yugoslav army (VJ) and did not
interfere in its command during Lilic’s term in office – 1993 to 1997.
Moreover, he agreed that no VJ generals were promoted or dismissed at
Milosevic's request. In contrast to his earlier statement, Lilic also
assented to Milosevic's suggestion that he had no control over the
Bosnian Serbs, who often obstructed his efforts for a negotiated
settlement
In addition to these concessions, Lilic also provided the Amicus,
Branislav Tapuskovic, with helpful responses. He agreed with his
examiner that all the republican territorial defense units were under
JNA (Yugoslav People’s Army) command and their weapons and equipment
were JNA property. The Chamber has heard contrary evidence to the
effect that each Yugoslav republic had its own TO, financed by the
individual republics, and providing their own equipment, weapons and
ammunition. The relationship of the JNA and republican TO’s, including
property ownership, is important because the JNA took control of TO
weapons and ammunition before the wars, then redistributed them to
local Serbs, according to other testimony before the Chamber.
Mr. Tapuskovic also elicited the witness’s agreement that Serbian
Orthodox Patriarch Pavle was the one who intervened and secured
Mladic’s agreement for Milosevic to negotiate for the Bosnian Serbs at
Dayton – not Milosevic. This scenario counters Milosevic’s reputed
“influence” over the Bosnian Serb leadership.
Confronted with his witness’s many concessions to Milosevic, Geoffrey
Nice had only a short time for re-examination and a significant
challenge ahead of him. He did not ask the Chamber to declare Lilic a
hostile witness, though he would have been justified in doing so.
Rather, he set out to tread a cautious line, which twice drew warnings
from the Bench.
Probing Lilic’s relationship with the Accused, Mr. Nice asked him who
was giving instructions to whom as they sought to get Mladic to release
the two French pilots before the signing of the Dayton Accords in
Paris. Lilic responded, “Our fear was that the Accords would not be
signed and Milosevic insisted that I should issue an order to Perisic
that he try to establish the location of the pilots. I was not giving
instruction to him. He used his right through me to bring influence to
bear on the Yugoslav Army.” It is an explanation as curious as it is
convoluted and may provide unintended insight into the way Lilic has
ordered his reality to include a vision of his own power within the
confines of Milosevic’s far greater power.
Nice then stepped into deeper water and asked his witness, “Mladic left
the RS (Republika Srpska) at the end of 1996. Did he come to Serbia?”
Lilic responded: “I don’t know whether he left the RS altogether but
he certainly did come to Serbia.” Nice followed up by asking if there
was ever an inquiry into Mladic's involvement in Srebrenica, to which
Lilic replied, “As far as I know, no such investigation was
instituted.” Before the prosecutor could ask about the subsequent
promotion of Mladic, Judge May cautioned him, “There’s a limit to the
extent you can cross examine your own witness.”
Not for the first time, Nice tried to explain the trouble with insider
witnesses. “There are certain witnesses whose evidence has to be
viewed cautiously.” Yet, he said, “the Chamber is assisted by hearing
their evidence on particular documents and events,” in this case the
promotion of someone who has been indicted for genocide in Srebrenica.
Nice wanted to present a document showing Mladic’s promotion and to ask
the witness how it occurred. The Chamber ruled to exclude the document
and Nice approached his witness from a different angle.
In response to Mr. Nice’s questions, Lilic admitted that during his
term as president he had access to significant intelligence data,
though he said Milosevic had “more and better information.”
Nevertheless, when Nice asked him whether, despite the range of
available information, he had no intelligence on what happened at
Srebrenica, he said simply, “Right.”
Nice continued, “You denied the existence of any detention camps [when
Milosevic asked him about a report that nine existed in Serbia,
identified by location and number of prisoners] . . . . Did you visit
the areas yourself?” In another demonstration of his convoluted
universe, Lilic answered, “I did not visit them and according to my
information, they did not exist. I cannot visit what our [military
intelligence] service says does not exist.” It apparently never
occurred to him to visit the identified areas to see if they held camps
in which people were being detained. When Nice attempted to follow up
by asking if the witness would allow that he could have been kept from
information of this kind, Judge Robinson interrupted to caution him,
“Mr. Nice, you’re getting pretty close to cross examining.”
The lead prosecutor quietly asked his less than stellar witness, "If
the Court determines that the army [VJ] was involved [in the Bosnian
Serb war against the Bosnian government], who was in a position to
control or influence the VJ . . .?" The witness waffled, appearing
confused. Only General Perisic could have issued orders of that kind,
he said, and if he did, they could have come from Milosevic. That, he
continued, would have been completely unlawful. So, it could not have
happened, he appeared to conclude. "Only the President of FRY [Lilic]
[acting] with the Supreme Defense Council could issue such an order."
This exemplifies the dance he was forced to do in his efforts to please
Milosevic and protect himself.
Nice's further probing rehabilitated significant evidence Lilic had
given on direct examination, which he had repudiated on cross
examination by Milosevic. For example, Lilic re-asserted that the
Serbian MUP was militarized under Milosevic's presidency, and that it
included two special anti-terrorist units, the SJO and the SAJ. He
also reaffirmed that Jovica Stanisic, head of the Serbian State
Security Service, and indirectly Milosevic, exercised political control
over the Red Berets.
The Prosecutor then asked him about General Pavkovic's May 25, 1999
letter to Milosevic, asking him to take urgent measures to
resubordinate MUP units in Kosovo to the VJ. General Pavkovic reported
that certain MUP units were out of control, looting vast amounts of
property and "committing serious crimes against the Shiptars
[pejorative name for Kosovar Albanians]" including murder, rape,
robbery, plunder, etc. Lilic had fallen out of favor by this time and
could not testify directly about the letter. However, Mr. Nice asked
him one important question, "Do you have any reason to doubt General
Pavkovic?" In a strong voice, Lilic responded, "absolutely not."
Finally, Mr. Nice showed Lilic the transcript of a speech by Ratko
Mladic on April 16, 1995. In it, Mladic identifies the quantity of
weapons and ammunition the FRY provided to the RS Army from the
beginning of the war until December 31, 1994. Lilic explained that
Mladic was a bit of a sensationalist and the quantities were "so large
I personally don't believe them." The Prosecutor offered a
hypothetical, "If in due course it is found that [the VJ provided]
these materials . . ., who bears responsibility for authorizing it --
you as Commander in Chief?" Because the weapons were owned by the VJ
and because of the quantity, Lilic claimed that only the federal
minister of defense could have authorized their transfer to the RS.
Experience with insider witnesses demonstrates that the Court should
adopt the modern rule and allow cross examination of a party's own
witnesses. The Milosevic trial provides strong support to do so. At
least four witnesses have significantly diverted from their direct
testimony when Milosevic questioned them, under a nearly hypnotic
effect. The prosecutor should not be placed in a position to press a
reluctant Court to declare these witnesses "hostile" in order to
attempt to get at the truth. The purpose of presenting testimony
through these difficult witnesses is to assist the Chamber in its
decision-making. Applying the traditional rule thwarts that aim. The
Chamber should adopt the modern approach.
Submitted by Judith Armatta on 15 July, 2003 - Updated: 15 July 2003
08:32
=== 2 ===
SYNOPSIS OF THE JULY 22, 2003 PROCEEDINGS AT THE HAGUE TRIBUNAL
www.slobodan-milosevic.org - July 22, 2003
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
The so-called “Trial” of Slobodan Milosevic resumed again today after
a four day weekend.
A secret witness code named “B-127” testified for most of the day.
B-127 is a Muslim and a former member of the JNA who stayed on and
joined the VRS, after the JNA withdrew from Bosnia-Herzegovina in May
of 1992.
The prosecution was trying to use B-127’s testimony as part of its
pathetic attempt to “prove” their absurd claim that the VJ and the VRS
were the same army, and not 2 different armies.
The “damning testimony” came fast and furious when B-127 claimed that
the VJ and the VRS shared information with each other. Oh, parish the
thought that 2 friendly states would share information with each
other! That has got to be the most sinister conspiracy in the history
of the world, or so you would think if you listened to the
“prosecutor” at the Hague Tribunal.
The truth is that it is completely normal for states that are on
friendly terms with one another to share information. An example of
that is making headlines right now. George W. Bush made what was
apparently a false claim in his State of the Union speech, on the basis
of British intelligence.
B-127 said that the information sharing went so far that the VJ could
access VRS radar data, and the VRS could access VJ radar data. In
North America the USA and Canada have the same agreement – it’s called
NORAD.
If one uses the logic employed by the Hague Tribunal one could
theorize that the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq was really a Canadian
endeavor, and therefore the actions of the USA are really Canada’s
responsibility. After all, Canada and the USA cooperate with each
other, they share intelligence data, they share radar data – in fact,
in my home state of Washington, the Canadian Armed forces even conduct
joint training operations together with the U.S. Army at Ft. Lewis
near Tacoma.
Just like Slobodan Milosevic secretly controlled the government and
army of Republika Srpska – Canadian PM, Jean Chretien must be secretly
controlling the U.S. Government and the American armed forces. If you
understand the logic of the Hague Tribunal, or if you smoke enough
crack, then that type of thinking will make perfect sense to you.
Another thing that was seen as sinister (by the prosecutor) was the
fact that the government of Yugoslavia paid the former soldiers of the
JNA, through the 30th Personnel Center, the social insurance, health
benefits, salaries, old-age pensions, etc… which they had legally
accrued under Yugoslav law.
Imagine those scheming Serbs - paying people the money that they owed
them. If that doesn’t point to a “joint criminal enterprise” then I
don’t know what does. They even paid B-127, who is a Muslim, through
that same 30th Personnel Center.
The 30th Personnel Center was purely an administrative body that was
in charge of paying legally accrued social benefits to the former
soldiers of the JNA. The 30th Personnel Center issued no orders of any
kind. It had one office, consisting of one room, and it operated for a
full 6 years after the war ended,therefore it had absolutely nothing
at all to do with the war.
The prosecution’s claim that the VJ and the VRS were the same army
fell to pieces when Slobodan Milosevic asked B-127 some very direct
questions.
President Milosevic asked if B-127 knew of any orders that the VJ had
issued to the VRS, and B-127 didn’t know about any.
President Milosevic asked if B-127 had ever seen any units of the VJ
operating in Bosnia, and again B-127 hadn’t.
B-127 tried to save the prosecution’s case by saying that people from
Serbia were forced to join the VRS. President Milosevic then asked for
an example of this, but B-127 failed to come up with even a single
example.
President Milosevic further destroyed the prosecution’s case when he
asked - if the VJ and the VRS were the same army (as the prosecutor
claims), then why didn’t the VRS engage Albanian terrorists in Kosovo,
or mobilize to defend Yugoslavia during the NATO aggression?
After B-127 withdrew another secret witness code named B-83 came and
testified for about 10 minutes.
Then the so-called “judges” ruled that written statements from 2
secret witnesses, B-1576 and B-1010, could be admitted as evidence
under rule 92-bis without any cross-examination. In fact these secret
witnesses, if they even exist, don’t even have to appear in front of
the tribunal at all. For all we know these so-called “witnesses” could
simply be figments of Carla del Ponte’s imagination.
=== 3 ===
SYNOPSIS OF JULY 23 HEARINGS AT THE HAGUE TRIBUNAL
www.slobodan-milosevic.org - July 23, 2003
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
Today at the Hague tribunal a secret witness testified under the
pseudonym of “B-83.” The majority of B-83’s testimony was given in
private session.
B-83 was apparently an official in the Serbian government who had
something to do with financial matters. His employment wasn’t clear
due to the excessive use of private sessions. I’m not even sure what
the gist of his testimony was supposed to be since so much of it was
given in private session.
B-83 did, however, say some interesting things in open session. B-83
accused the prosecution of twisting his words and putting falsehoods
into his witness statement. B-83 also said that the prosecution did
not give him adequate time to review his statement, or even give him
the chance to see the statement in his own language until he got to
the Hague earlier this week.
For example the prosecution made up a story about the Serbian Police
"organizing car thefts" and inserted this outrageous fairytale into
B-83's witness statement, even though the witness said that this story
wasn’t true. The prosecution also made up a bunch of malarkey about
“black budgets” which the witness also denied.
In fact, according to the witness, there were errors of fact in almost
every single paragraph of this witness statement that the prosecutor
had prepared for him.
While President Milosevic was questioning B-83 about the numerous
false claims that the prosecution had inserted into his witness
statement the so-called “judge” May cut him off and accused him of
“wasting time on irrelevant matters.”
This is amazing even for the Hague Tribunal. Here we have a witness
who had perjurious statements put into his mouth, against his will and
without his knowledge, by the prosecutor and the judge doesn’t see any
problem with that! If this was a real court, with a real judge, a
mistrial would be declared, and the prosecutor would face criminal
prosecution himself.
After B-83 finished, the prosecution called a so-called “expert”
witness, one Audrey Budding, a historian from Harvard who wrote a
paper on “Serb nationalism.”
Mrs. Budding proved her self to be an apologist for the Albanian
Fascists of the 2nd World War.
Mrs. Budding denied that the Ballistas* were fascists, and even had
the nerve to claim that the Ballistas were the victims of the Chetniks
and the Partisans.
All in all it was just another day at the Hague Tribunal.
* If you don’t know what a Ballista is see:
http://emperors-clothes/articles/thompson/rootsof.htm
=== 4 ===
ANOTHER SYNOPSIS OF THE JULY 23, 2003 PROCEEDINGS AT THE HAGUE
Written by: Vera Martinovic - July 23, 2003
Today's first witness, B-083, demonstrated again the flimsiness of the
Prosecution's case and the desperation of the OTP (Office of the
Prosecutor). Why flimsiness? Because, in the absence of anything
stronger, the Prosecutors sought to prove that Serbia provided
financial aid to the Serbs on the other side of the Drina. But that is
a common knowledge, an undisputed fact and certainly not a war crime.
And why desperation? They manipulated heavily the testimony of B-083,
fabricating his several previously given written statements, tricking
him into signing the English version without him fully understanding
it and trying to hide that by keeping his entire testimony in the
private session.
Only the last 10 minutes of the cross-examination were held in the
open session, but it was enough to reveal the whole scam. B-083 thus
joined those Prosecution witnesses whom they regretted they had ever
summoned: having received only few days ago at The Hague the Serbian
version of "his" statements, B-083 corrected in his handwriting
practically each and every paragraph, striking them out and adding in
the margins his explanations which invalidated the statements in toto.
B-083, introduced only vaguely as an "officer in the Ministry of
Defence of Serbia in 1991," started his testimony yesterday, but it
lasted only 10 minutes before the proceedings were adjourned for the
day and it was in the open session. The only thing Nice covered then
was the claim that the Government of Serbia deliberated in one of its
sessions in November 1991 the aid for the Serbs in Croatia, and the
amount mentioned was in the neighborhood of 92 million DM.
Today, B-083 finished his examination-in-chief, but most of it was in
private session. Therefore, the public was unable to follow the
explanation about those alleged millions.
Back in the open session, we saw that the examination-in-chief was
over and that amicus curiae Stephen Kay was arguing with Mr. May over
the allotment of time for the cross-examination, and the constant
changing in the order of witnesses.
Each time May spoke, he managed to muddle the issues, "explaining"
that indeed the Accused has to be granted a certain amount of time,
but he is not to waste it on arguments and quarrels with the witness.
Kay tried to point out this is a technical matter and the main thing
is that Nice 'moves like an express train', covering a large number of
important issues extremely briefly and superficially, which in turn
radically shortens the allotment of time for the Accused and makes it
impossible for him to cover those issues at all. He also noticed that
it is Nice who leads the most important witnesses, like Kucan was, who
was processed in only 1 day. Therefore, the time spent for the
examination-in-chief could not be the standard by which the allotted
time for the cross-examination is to be measured.
Apparently, the OTP produces a weekly list of witnesses complete with
the time planned for each examination-in-chief, and since the general
rule has been to allot approximately the same time for the
cross-examination, the Accused can plan his questioning accordingly.
But then Nice comes up, drastically cutting the actual time of his
questioning of a witness to, say, half an hour instead of the planned
two hours, simply by being superficial and thereby setting the low time
standard. And, he constantly reshuffles the witnesses, hampering the
preparation of the Defense.
Nice tried to prevent the judges from allotting too much time to this
cross-examination, by appealing to the Chamber to 'exert pressure on
the amicus and the Accused' (I failed to understand what kind of
pressure and in relation to what - perhaps to make them shut up).
Nice also half-complained and half-flattered: "I have to note that in
a short time the Accused has developed enviable skills of
cross-examination." What he meant by that was probably that the Accused
was now so much better at it that he could wrap it up in much less
time.
The troika in the scarlet robes put their heads together, murmuring
for two minutes among themselves and then May pronounced: "An hour and
fifteen minutes." Like a magician pulling a rabbit out of the hat, or
a generous nobleman tossing coins to a beggar: 15 minutes longer than
Nice had for the examination-in-chief.
So, not only haven't we seen what the witness had to say, and how rich
were the issues he covered, we also couldn't judge whether an hour and
fifteen would be reasonably long enough to cross-examine.
But, that was not all. Milosevic first tried to verify with May that
the issue of the place of employment of this witness was not for the
private session. May answered he also believed this had been mentioned
in the open session. But the moment Milosevic started to mouth his
first question, something to the effect of "You have been working…",
Nice jumped up, saying: "I believe this could infringe the security
measures." May seconded: "Yes, I think it might. We go to the private
session." And nearly all of the cross-examination, more than one hour
of it, was closed to the public!
When the session again became open again, there were Milosevic and the
witness at the end of the careful demolition of the written statements
by the latter and of the Prosecution's credibility.
Milosevic said that there was virtually not a single paragraph in
these statements that had not been corrected in writing by the
witness. B-083 confirmed: "That's right." He explained there were so
many mistakes and even some totally unrelated, irrelevant and invented
stuff, that he believed it was unfair that Milosevic is to be charged
with these things or the Tribunal's time wasted like this.
B-083 used the words "silly" and "preposterous" when describing these
passages from "his" statements. He spoke directly to Milosevic: "I
apologise to you", and he requested these issues to be disregarded. He
said he had made a mistake by being insufficiently cautious, and
signing this without having read it or having received it in Serbian.
Milosevic quoted several quite outrageous passages from one of these
statements, allegedly in direct speech by the witness: "I'll give you
another example of illegal fundraising - the Police had been involved
in car theft." He said to the witness: "Here you have added in your
handwriting: 'Not correct'." B-083 confirmed this, saying he also wrote
that it should be explained to the Accused, along with an apology, the
circumstances of this statement.
B-083 only got the Serbian version 5 days ago. Apparently, the OTP
Investigator Gerald Sexton had tricked the witness into signing the
English version years ago, saying he'll be able to 'explain everything
at The Hague', but then B-083 found out that practically everything
had been invented or too liberally interpreted, but as if the witness
had been quoted verbatim complete with the inverted commas ("I'll give
you another example…"). The witness now stated that, if he only had a
chance to write his statement with his own hand, "we would not be
having 1 minute of this discussion'.
Here's another gem: Milosevic said that one of the statements
contained the claim by the witness about our state budget, which had
'one secret segment, called a black fund'. B-083 simply said there's no
way he could have said that.
Judging by some other examples from the OTP's work of fiction that
Milosevic quoted, B-083 spoke to the Investigator quite broadly and
openly about the situation in the Ministry of Defense, where internal
squabbles and embezzlements were rife (and for which, as Milosevic
pointed out that 2 Ministers had been arrested at that time), and
cunning Mr. Sexton took it all and gave it a nice spin, necessary for
the Indictment.
B-083 had clearly misunderstood what it meant to give a statement for
the court, presuming it meant one should open up one's heart and spill
out every large and tiny office happening, giving the Investigator a
free hand to weave a story out of it, not even bothering to read what
the nice, understanding gentleman wrote in his name. Now he was
understandably angry at being bamboozled.
B-083 continued to complain about some of his former misbehaving
office colleagues even to Milosevic, saying that some of those who did
it were still holding their high positions today "and you and me are
sitting here". Milosevic drove the point home: "What possible
connection all these things could have with what's going on here?" The
witness answered: "None whatsoever."
Gradually, B-083 and Milosevic began to discuss those events in almost
friendly manner, chatting and not bothering to keep the pause between
questions and answers, like in a normal conversation. Milosevic would
quote another invented passage and they would together marvel at how
brazen the OTP had been, the witness repeating 'I have never said
something like that'.
B-083 even volunteered in his explanation of one particular instance
that he had 'never went there to inspect', forcing Nice to interject:
"I do not know whether the witness is aware he's in the open session?"
May also interrupted the cozy chat once, warning both not to overlap,
reminding witness he is "here to testify" and Milosevic is "here to
cross-examine," and not to have a conversation. Milosevic was quite
pleased with himself for exposing once more the sleazy modus operandi
of the OTP and disrupting so successfully this show trial, that he
calmly answered to May he was quite pleased to have the opportunity to
chat with this man, whom he has never met before.
Milosevic and the witness even tried to establish the method of
creating certain passages of the statements by the OTP. The problem
was, as many times before with those written statements, that there
were no questions to which these statements were answering, only the
unbroken, spun story.
B-083 was guessing what the original questions by the Investigator
must've been: probably the Investigator asked, for instance, what
would be the regular chain of command in the government for any given
issue. He got a detailed answer about the whole structure with the
President of the Republic at the top of the pyramid. Then the OTP
retold this explanation as if it had been an answer to a specific
accusation against Milosevic.
B-083 used the ship metaphor, describing the subordination, but he was
not answering the question of whether the captain organized the
piracy. It was as if the Investigator had asked: Who runs the ship?
and got the answer: The captain, who has officers under him. Then, the
Investigator spun the question this way: Who organized the piracy using
this ship? , and coupled it with the original question: The captain,
who has officers under him.
It was obvious that both Milosevic and B-083 were displeased when Mr.
May announced that there were only 5 minutes left, so they quickly
tried to cover several more inventions (Milosevic quoting them and
asking whether they were correct, the witness answering: "Not a chance.
Please, disregard this.") They parted almost friends, I'm sure.
Mr. Tapuskovic got his 2 minutes, and he used them to clarify the only
issue from the testimony mentioned by the witness in the open session
- those millions of Deutsche Marks requested/planned/given by Serbia
to the Serbs in Croatia. He wanted to make a distinction between the
sums requested and planned and those actually paid. B-083 confirmed
that he personally handled some of these payments, but these were all
amounts in dinars, it was aid and hardly the amount stated. Tapuskovic
was pleased: "I have no further questions."
Nice had a chance for a redirect, but guess what? The public couldn't
see it, again. He said: "We have a couple of additional questions, but
they're for a private session." And the screen went blank.
Please try to read "Dealing with the 'Hostile' Insider Witness"
(
http://www.cij.org/
index.cfm?fuseaction=viewReport&reportID=361&tribunalID=1 ) by Judith
Armatta of the CIJ. Here she explained the fact that several insiders
so far (notably Radomir Markovic, Captain Dragan, Zoran Lilic and
B-1775) allegedly changed their testimony due to the mesmerizing
effect of Milosevic on them. She compared him with an 'alpha dog', in
front of which a poor witness simply 'rolled over like a cur'. She
applied her cottage psychology/astrology/ESP skills, claiming that a
witness stood no chance, because 'Milosevic's aura was too strong for
him'.
I would suggest much simpler explanations: these people did not
volunteer to testify for the Prosecution, they had been summoned
or/and threatened into it with possible indictments against themselves.
And then the following happened: for instance, Captain Dragan had NOT
changed his testimony nor succumbed to a powerful aura, but had been
bamboozled by the OTP in the same manner as today's witness B-083.
Their original written statements had been liberally invented,
suggestively worded and devoid of questions by the Investigator and
they were tricked into signing. Not having seen the
examination-in-chief of B-083, I can only suppose that it had been
pretty much like that one of Captain Dragan: Prosecutor Nice rushing,
skipping and sliding through the invented statement 'like an express
train', sometimes not making sense at all, leaving the witness to
stare in disbelief and to simply say 'yes' to whatever construction
proffered. Too bad there was this damned cross-examination and the
possibility to demonstrate that the testimony was not at all what the
witness has signed, meant or wanted to say.
The second witness today, who is to continue tomorrow, is an expert on
history from Harvard (the font of knowledge for the ICTY), who
testifies about the Serbian nationalism in 20th century as she had
penned it in her report commissioned by the OTP. The very definition of
an expert must've been wildly stretched after the ICTY set up shop.
Vera Martinovic is an independent writer based in Belgrade, Yugoslavia.
=== 5 ===
SLOBODAN MILOSEVIC: HISTORY TEACHER
July 24, 2003
Written by: Vera Martinovic
Audrey Budding testified who testified on July 23rd and 24th, is a
skinny, bespectacled youthful PhD with expressive gesticulation. She
knows lots of historical facts. Her clothes and hairdo are unusually
interesting for an American. She apparently speaks/reads Serbian.
But that's where the plus side stops. Mrs. Budding's historical
knowledge is fragmentary and incomplete and, so she often misses the
big picture, and is unaware of important events and sources.
Mrs. Budding used to be a diplomatic official at the American Embassy
in Belgrade in the '80s, so she is obviously more of a politician then
a historian.
She penned a report commissioned by the OTP on Serbian nationalism in
the 20th century, which seems to be a rewrite of her own, more
balanced PhD thesis on the Serbian intellectuals and the national
question, only with the added twist to make the Serbs look bad, so she
supplied a political trial with a politicized rewrite of her own work.
None the less, I have to give her the credit of being much more subtle
than the previous Prosecution "expert", Riedlmayer, who was simply
ridiculous.
Mrs. Budding was seldom obvious and crude in her conclusions, except
sometimes, when Milosevic cornered her with facts and questions, and
then she turned stubborn. For example, when she disagreed with the
data by the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum about the figure of 600,000
victims of the Ustasa concentration camp Jasenovac, claiming the
number is 100,000 and explaining that anyway 'nobody knows exactly how
many Serbs died in NDH [Nezavisna Drzava Hrvatska = Independent State
of Croatia, Ustase-led Nazi puppet invention during WW2, comprising
today's Croatia and Bosnia & Herzegovina], in each village and each
house' . Although she admitted this was clearly a genocide, she was
suspicious about the number, she couldn't be bothered to believe those
pedantic Jews at the Holocaust museum, and certainly not Yugoslav
sources, because she was unable to personally peek into each village
and house.
Another example where she was crude and stubborn was when she refused
to accept the fact that the Albanian Fascist movement of the notorious
Balli Combetar or balisti, were Fascists. The fact that they were
installed by Mussolini to rule Kosovo when it was given over to
Albania during the WW2, butchered thousands of Serbs, and then
continued armed fighting years after the war officially ended, all
that was to Audrey, "a rebellion that started after this region of
Drenica was incorporated in the Yugoslav state, which caused the
revolt of the Albanians, who didn't want to join the Partisans in the
final push against the Germans in 1944 because they were afraid to
leave their houses, and so this rebellion was quashed and probably few
thousands were killed, some in battles, some executed".
Mrs. Budding stubbornly persisted saying, "to describe balisti as
Albanian Fascists is not correct, because they did not support the
Fascistic form of the state."
Milosevic got impatient and curtly asked: "And what did they support?
Did they support Italian Fascists?"
Mrs. Budding mumbled that well, of course, they supported the creation
of the Greater Albania.
Milosevic snapped: "Not only supported the idea, but militarily
supported the Fascists."
Mrs. Budding mumbled some more, trailing off and ultimately saying
that she's not familiar with it, with each military action, that there
were different groups… Some historian and expert!
There were some more gaffes in her paper, like when she wrote that the
Ustasa émigrés were a marginal group (Milosevic wanted to know how
come they got to run a country for 4 years if they were so marginal).
Also, she found it problematic to define the nascent Yugoslavia as a
solution for the Serbs, with the maxim 'all Serbs in one state'. When
Milosevic said that Yugoslavia was not a solution only for the Serbs,
but also for others, that it could be equally said 'all Croats/Slovenes
in one state', Mrs. Budding proudly begged to disagree, 'because there
were significant Croatian and Slovenian minorities left in Italy and
Austria', but when Milosevic reminded her that also a significant
portion of the Serbs were left in Hungary and Romania, so the maxim
still applied for the bulk of all nations, Mrs. Budding didn't have
anything to say. A historian who argues an issue not knowing what the
next related historical fact might be used against her is not a very
competent historian.
Almost all other conclusions in her report were less obviously biased,
only ever so slightly leaned towards prejudice and one would have to
carefully read both her thesis and her OTP report to pinpoint the
distortions, although the general impression of a different slant is
palpable even from those paragraphs that were read in the courtroom.
Milosevic quoted her PhD thesis where she explained how it was
impossible for the Serbs to accept the confederate Yugoslavia and its
breaking along the borders of its republics because they were so
dispersed; the same issue in her report for the OTP got the subtle
addition that the Serbs failed to pay much attention to their ties
with other nations within the republics in which they lived outside of
Serbia.
Milosevic quipped: "Well, do you seriously believe that the ties of
the Serbs in Croatia with the Croats, these ties that include the
genocide that you've already explained, are so much stronger and more
important than the ties with other Serbs?!" Budding got pretty confused
after that and started to babble about life being not only one's
nation, but a house in which one lives… To that one can argue that one
can indeed live in a house if it still stands and if one is still
alive.
Another major problem with Budding's paper is the extremely shallow
and selective pool of sources that she used, some of the works
completely debunked as political pamphlets (e.g. "Kosovo - A Brief
History' by Noel Malcolm), yet she quoted from such articles and
books, disregarding or not being aware of the existence of other well
known authors and works that Milosevic listed.
Budding was often reduced to answering 'I'm not familiar with this
particular work' or 'I do not know about these particular sources' or
'I haven't read all the transcripts, only from the first meeting' or
'No, I haven't seen these diplomatic documents'. Milosevic and his
aides have done their homework and at times Mrs. Budding was indeed
receiving a thorough lesson in history.
The young doctor was selective not only in her sources, but also in
the historical events which she did or did not include in her paper.
Thus, she did quote a public speech by the soon-to-be Yugoslav King
Alexander, who said that Serbia must be strong so that Yugoslavia could
be strong too. She explained that as an example of 'Serbian
nationalism', but she failed to quote and explain, or even to mention
at all the crucial document of that time, the Corfu Declaration on the
creation of Yugoslavia. She explained her omissions with the necessity
to keep her report concise. Strangely enough, only the relevant and
balanced things got chopped off.
The "learned panel of judges" found themselves in an absurd situation:
here they were, admitting into evidence the Prosecution's exhibit
going way back into the 15th century, and discussing these despised
historical issues which they always pronounced as irrelevant, and of
which they knew nothing, and frankly didn't care to know. But, this is
what you get when the Prosecution's case so heavily depends on the
silly notion that all this is one and the same 'joint criminal
enterprise' to create the Greater Serbia, the plan which goes
centuries back, so even King Alexander, Vuk Karadzic, Garasanin and
other Serbian historical figures must be evoked in order to take their
punishment for their participation in this Nice-Del Ponte co-production
in Cinemascope.
History is a tough discipline, and it demands a broad knowledge. It
was at times hard for me to follow all of the expert nuances, because
I certainly haven't read all of the books that were mentioned. But, at
least I was able to follow the basic logic of the discussion and
arguments.
Mr. May was probably dozing or doing crosswords, because he proved
time and again unable to follow or understand the point of a certain
line of questioning.
At one point, Milosevic asked Mrs. Budding why she wrote that Vuk
Karadzic could be attributed with the authorship of the idea of
defining a nation by its language, when there is a whole line of other
linguists, historians and philosophers (of which he quoted some) who
had stated the same ideas much earlier, and Karadzic had merely
embraced that idea?
May interrupted by saying: "I do not know what is the purpose of this
list of names?" Milosevic professorially reprimanded him: "Mr May, you
have not been listening to the previous question", and he patiently
repeated the whole question and said that 'the list you're preventing
me from reading are the people who originally created the idea, among
them someone whom you might be familiar with, a German philosopher
Fichte'. So, not only was Mrs. Budding given a free history lesson,
but Mr. May as well.
The time was again the main problem, May not wanting to allow any
extension of the cross-examination. Milosevic said twice: "These time
restrictions I really regard as violence." And, at one point he
mockingly pointed at the courtroom wall clock and told May: "Anyway,
the press has been already writing that the central issue here is
time, and nothing much else."
As I said, Mrs. Budding was subtle in her intentional bias, perhaps
overly subtle, so the point the Prosecution wanted to make with this
witness hasn't come across all that clearly. It only left a faint
anti-Serb aftertaste, a few hints and insinuations, an admission that
yes, no nation of these parts is blameless, but the Serbs were somehow
the main culprits.
The time allotted for this witness, both for the examination-in-chief
and for the cross-examination, was all to short. And even that short
time was interrupted by inane interventions from Nice and stupid
questions from May. Milosevic told May at one point (when the latter
tried to dismiss one issue as irrelevant): "I don't believe that you
should learn the whole Serbian history in half an hour, but since you
mainly deal here with altering history, I consider this particular
issue to be relevant."
What I find appalling is that the "trial" aimed at rewriting history
was dealing in history in such a superficial and brief manner. But,
the reason lies precisely in that: when you want to do a quick and
crude rewrite, you don't dwell too much on the serious science.
Vera Martinovic is in independent writer based in Belgrade, Yugoslavia.
=== 6 ===
"TRIAL" HALTED DUE TO PRESIDENT MILOSEVIC'S ILL HEALTH
www.slobodan-milosevic.org - July 28, 2003
On Monday July 28th the troika announced that there would be no
proceedings in the Milosevic "trial." The proceedings have also been
canceled for the 29th.
There is no word on what type of illness President Milosevic is
suffering from, although it is known that he suffers from high blood
pressure and that he has a heart condition.
The Tribunal's doctors will examine President Milosevic on Tuesday in
order to determine when he will be fit to resume taking part in the
proceedings.
---
http://www.ptd.net/webnews/wed/aa/Qwarcrimes-yugo-
milosevic.R_qz_DlT.html
Milosevic war crimes trial to resume August 25
Tuesday, 29-Jul-2003 1:00PM
THE HAGUE, July 29 (AFP) - The war crimes trial of Slobodan Milosevic,
suspended again because the former Yugoslav leader was again suffering
from ill-health, will resume on August 25, the UN tribunal said Tuesday.
"The trial of Slobodan Milosevic is scheduled to resume on Monday 25
August at 9:00 am after the ICTY summer court recess," the
International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia said in a
press release.
Tribunal spokesman Jim Landale told AFP Monday that Milosevic, who had
seen a doctor on Monday, would have another medical visit on Tuesday
and that the doctor's conclusions would affect the start date for the
trial.
He did not provide details on the illness of the former Yugoslav
leader, who suffers from high blood pressure and is at risk of a heart
attack.
The interruption was the ninth to date in the long-running trial before
the The Hague-based court. The ICTY began hearing Milosevic's case in
February last year, and the prosecution has not finished arguing its
case.
Milosevic, 61, has been undertaking his own defense in the case.
The one-time Yugoslav president, who was ousted from power in October
2000, is standing trial on more than 60 charges of war crimes and
crimes against humanity for his role in the 1990s wars in Bosnia,
Croatia and Kosovo.