Milosevic "trial" synopses, October 1-15, 2003:
TRIBUNAL ATTEMPTS TO HIDE ITS SHAMEFUL FARCE FROM THE PUBLIC
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An important LINK:
Dutch TV documentary on the Hague process, in two parts:
http://info.vpro.nl/info/tegenlicht/index.shtml?7738514+7738518+8048024
===
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg100703.htm
MILOSEVIC "TRIAL" SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 7, 2003
After nearly a 3 week break taken due to the continued illness of
President Milosevic the Hague Tribunal again resumed the so-called
"trial." President Milosevic is still ill, his blood pressure today
was measured to be 160 over 110 mm Hg.
The "trial" started off with Mr. Nice announcing that they would not
be hearing from Maj. Russo of the Canadian Armed Forces, because he
had decided not to come to the tribunal. According to Mr. Nice the
Office of the Prosecutor arranged his flight but when it came time to
leave, he simply decided not to get on the plane.
Then the so-called "presiding judge" Mr. May made a ruling regarding
the prosecution's September 23rd submission. The prosecution was
seeking to videotape examinations in chief on days when President
Milosevic is unable to attend due to illness. The so-called "trial
chamber" denied this request. The Prosecution had also sought to have
defense counsel imposed on President Milosevic, the "court" didn't
rule one way or the other on that. They simply said that they would
keep it under consideration.
The witness today was a Ms. Eva Tabo. Ms. Tabo is a demographer, and
an employee of the Office of the Prosecutor. She has worked for the
Prosecution since December of 2000.
Ms. Tabo wrote two reports. One report was on the displacement of
persons in the so-called "Milosevic case area." This report focused on
47 municipalities in Bosnia-Herzegovina, and highlighted 7
municipalities as case-studies. The other report dealt with the
so-called "Siege of Sarajevo" and the war-related mortalities in the
Sarajevo area.
President Milosevic denounced Ms. Tabo's reports as "a malicious
manipulation of statistics," and when one looks at the methods and
sources that she employed in order to write her reports it is obvious
that she is in fact making malicious manipulations of fact. Her
objective is clearly to demonize the Serbs, and to paint them as
aggressors against their own country.
First of all, in her report on displacement, she arrives at her
conclusions by taking the 1991 census and comparing it with OSCE voter
registration lists from 1997 and 1998. She concludes that anybody who
was in a different location in 1997-98 than they were in 1991 is a
refugee or an IDP.
It is useful at this point to remind ourselves of what a refugee is.
According to the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees
(the Refugee Convention), Article 1A(2), the term refugee is applied
to a person who owing to well founded fear of being persecuted for
reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular
social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his(/her)
nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to
avail himself (/herself) of the protection of his(/her) country; or
who, not having a nationality and being outside the country of
his(/her) former habitual residence as a result of such events, is
unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it.
In her report, Ms. Tabo counted migrant migrant workers as "refugees."
She counted citizens who were working abroad before the war in 1991,
and who were still working abroad in 1997-98 as refugees.
Her objective here can only be to falsely inflate the number of
refugees emanating from the so-called "Milosevic case area."
Even Mr. Robinson had trouble accepting that persons such as migrant
workers who were working abroad before the war even started could be
considered to be refugees. Mr. Robinson asked her if she was even
aware of what constitutes a refugee.
Ms. Tabo sheepishly responded by saying that she wasn't using any
"legal definition" to define refugees, but that for the purposes of
her report she was using a statistical definition of her own making.
Ms. Tabo eventually admitted that her report did not take into account
any of the reasons why her so-called "refugees" had left the country,
which means that according to the definition of a refugee used by
everybody else she has no basis for calling these people refugees.
As President Milosevic observed, if one employed Ms. Tabo's
definition, a tourist could be called a refugee.
Another problem is the question of IDPs. Ms. Tabo defined an IDP as
anybody who was living in one place at the time of the 1991 census and
was living in another place when they registered to vote in 1997-98.
A problem arises here because the information she is using is not
limited to the period of the war. People who moved before the war in
1991-92 and after the war between 1995 and 1997-98 are counted as IDP's
(or as refugees if they moved out of the country).
President Milosevic pointed out that there were massive migrations of
persons that took place after Dayton. He pointed to the example of the
Sarajevo Serbs, where 150,000 Serbs left Sarajevo after the end of the
war.
Ms. Tabo's data is not limited to the period of the war, nor does it
take into account any of the reasons why her so-called "refugees" or
"IDPs" moved from one place to the other. Many people moved solely
because of economic reasons yet in her reports they are considered to
be some sort of refugee or IDP.
Ms. Tabo, in her crusade to Satanize the Serbs, referred in court,
almost exclusively to municipalities in the Republika Srpska where the
Muslim declined and the Serb populations increased. The truth about
Bosnia is that 88.2% of the pre-war Serb population has left the B-H
Federation, and 95.5% of the pre-war Muslim population has left the
R.S. The differences in their respective migrations is less than 8%,
and not even Ms. Tabo's report, as misleading as it is, makes an
attempt to hide that, in fact that statistic is contained in her
report.
Ms. Tabo also grudgingly admitted to President Milosevic, during
cross-examination, that Serbia gave safe heaven to 70,000 Muslim
refugees from Bosnia.
Ms. Tabo's other report dealt with the so-called "Siege of Sarajevo"
and it's war related mortalities. For her data sources she extensively
relied on Muslim sources. She took the International Red Cross's
reports into account in her report and used them as one of 7 data
sources, but the other 6 sources were Muslim sources.
She admitted that because of her extensive reliance on Muslim sources
that her statistics could be prejudiced by any biases that the Muslims
had when collecting the data. Such as in the case of one of her
sources known as the "Household Survey," conducted by Muslim
researchers, in which Serbs were referred to simply as "the
aggressors."
Even though she extensively used Muslim sources she still had to admit
that the "vast majority of casualties in Sarajevo were combatants" and
not civilians. But because she relied so heavily on Muslim sources,
information about casualties among Serb civilians was not sufficiently
dealt with in her report.
At the end of the proceedings President Milosevic learned of a new
practice that will be employed by the prosecution. The appeals chamber
changed the rules and now the prosecution has the option of not
conducting the examination-in-chief.
This new practice goes even further than 92-bis. The prosecution
compiles a witness statement, then the prosecution writes the
witness's testimony for the witness, at that point the witness signs
his pre-written testimony and that counts as the evidence in chief. So
essentially the witness only has to come to court to be cross-examined.
This new practice is scandalous. First of all, it allows the
prosecution to present more "evidence" in less time. Essentially
meaning that the prosecution is producing "evidence" faster than the
defense can refute it. This practice is like to pouring water into
somebody's mouth, not allowing them to breathe, and waiting for them
to choke.
Secondly, it makes it extremely difficult for the public to follow the
"trial" because we won't have any idea what exactly it is that the
defense is trying to refute or accomplish while it is cross-examining
the witness. If we don't know what the evidence in chief is we won't be
able to understand what point defense is trying to make.
===
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg100803.htm
MILOSEVIC "TRIAL" SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 8, 2003:
TRIBUNAL ATTEMPTS TO HIDE IT'S SHAMEFUL FARCE FROM THE PUBLIC
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
A new procedure was initiated at the Hague Tribunal today. Prosecution
witnesses can now give their examination-in-chief in whole or in part
via statements written for them by the prosecutor.
The witness doesn't write the statement that is used for his
evidence-in-chief, the prosecutor writes it, and it is treated as
"evidence" by the so-called "trial chamber."
This so-called "trial" is secretive enough already. The extensive use
of so-called "closed sessions" already hides vast portions of the
"trial" from public scrutiny. The use of so-called "protected
witnesses" keeps the public into the dark as to who the witness even
is, thus making it impossible for the public to judge the credibility
of a witness.
As for the secret witnesses, there have been occasions when these
witnesses have divulged enough information about themselves, such as
the position they held at a given time that one can figure out who
they are, or at least who they are pretending to be. For example, the
secret witness known as "B-24" claimed to have been a member of the
crisis staff in of Zvornik from the inception of the crisis staff
until 12 April 1992, while serving in the crisis staff “B-24” said
that he was the commander of the police station. “B-24” also claimed
that he was a member of the SDS, and president of the local government
in Zvornik from February 1993 until September 1993.
Based on the information that "B-24" divulged about himself during his
open-session testimony one can conclude that "B-24" is Dragan
Spasojevic, or that he is somebody who is pretending to be Dragan
Spasojevic. You can conclude this by just looking through media
reports to see who held the positions that he claimed to hold at the
times he claimed to have held them. His identity was revealed to me
simply by using public information that I obtained from the information
media. Anybody who wanted to could figure out who he was.
Armed with the identity of "B-24" one is able to find out that Dragan
Spasojevic was threatened with an EU travel ban, due to his links with
organized crime, but was able to avoid the ban because of cooperation
with the Hague Tribunal. Spasojevic is accused of war crimes himself,
he is alleged to have participated in the massacre of some 750
Muslims. On top of this, Mr. Spasojevic has a hatred for Milosevic,
Spasojevic told the May 16, 1993 edition of The Sunday Times that "We
[the Bosnian Serbs] have been betrayed by Milosevic."
With this additional information (that the tribunal wants to keep
hidden from you) you can see all sorts of things. Since Spasojevic is
accused by the Muslims of taking part in the alleged massacre of 750
of them it is possible that the "tribunal" told him that if he
testified against Milosevic, who he hated anyway that they would let
him off the hook and not prosecute him for his alleged war crimes.
Another possibility is that the "tribunal" offered Spasojevic a new
identity in exchange for his testimony. A new identity could come in
handy for a criminal couldn't it? It would allow him to avoid the E.U.
travel ban and continue his criminal activities unhindered.
No doubt many of you have figured out the identity of certain secret
witnesses yourselves. When the identity of the tribunal's secret
witnesses is ascertained you can almost always figure out why their
identity is kept a secret. If the witness is a criminal they become a
"protected witness" and their identity is hidden from the public so
that the public won't know that they are a criminal.
This new invention of admitting written statements that have been
prepared by the prosecutor as "evidence", only hides the so-called
"judicial" process even further. The examination-in-chief is
practically abolished, and the point of the alleged "evidence" is lost
as far as the public is concerned.
Mr. Nice even admitted that this new practice hides the "trial" from
the public. Nice wants all witnesses to be dealt with in this fashion.
Nice says that even witnesses whose testimony would be particularly
damning to Milosevic should be dealt with in this fashion, and that he
was willing to lose the advantage that publicly hearing these witnesses
would give to the OTP in the eyes of the public. I hate to break it to
you Mr. Nice, but in the over 250 witnesses that you have called not
one of them has had any testimony that was damning in the least to
President Milosevic.
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights guarantees
the right to a public trial, but this is apparently something that the
Hague Tribunal feels doesn't apply to it. The "tribunal" regularly
hides its "trials" from the public. One has to wonder what they are so
ashamed of? After all, if they had a case wouldn't they want the
public to see that?
This new practice of using written testimony is based on Rule 89(f)
which reads: A Chamber may receive the evidence of a witness orally
or, where the interests of justice allow, in written form.
President Milosevic categorically objected to this new practice.
President Milosevic's argument is that it is clearly not in the
interests of justice to hide the proceedings from the public in this
way, he also argued that Rule 89(f) says "A Chamber may receive," not
must receive, evidence in written form when the interests of justice
allow.
President Milosevic rightly argued that it can not possibly be in the
interests of justice for evidence to be given against him where he is
not present. He argued that witnesses must give their evidence live,
in front of him, in front of the "trial chamber," and ultimately in
front of the public.
President Milosevic correctly argued that it is definitely not in the
interests of justice if evidence is only given in the prosecutors
office. Who knows what sort of important information that the
prosecutor might decide to omit from the "evidence" if it doesn't fit
its case.
President Milosevic also argued that this is a way for the prosecutor
to present more evidence than the defense can prepare for and deal
with in the time allotted for cross-examination. The situation is bad
enough already, President Milosevic is frequently denied the
opportunity to complete his cross-examination. Because "judge" May's
primary concern is the clock, and not conducting any sort of fair
trial cross-examination is frequently cut short when the time limit
imposed by Mr. May has expired.
President Milosevic pointed out that witness statements that are
already prepared by the prosecution in much the same fashion as will
be employed with this new practice are frequently inaccurate, with
witnesses frequently claiming in court that they never said the things
that the prosecution put into their statements.
The other side argued that there are safe-guards that ensure that this
new process doesn't jeopardize the "fair trial" (which is a joke
coming from them anyway). They say that the witness will be
cross-examined, and they say that the witness will have to sign the
written "testimony" and attest to its truthfulness after taking the
solemn declaration.
Another point raised by Mr. Nice is that if the witness says something
different in court than what is contained in his pre-written
testimony, Mr. Nice says that the witness will be exposed to sanction.
So essentially what we have here is witnesses who are testifying from
a script that has been written for them by the prosecutor, and if they
deviate from the prosecution's script they will be punished.
In yet another slap to the face of justice, the trial chamber ruled
that this new practice is acceptable, and it was applied to the
witness Milan Milanovic.
The interesting thing here is that Milan Milanovic doesn't speak
English. His testimony was written for him in English by the
prosecution. No Serbian version was available. Milanovic none the less
signed his pre-written English "testimony", and attested to its
truthfulness while under the solemn declaration.
The question here is how can Mr. Milanovic possibly sign a document
and attest to its truthfulness if he doesn't even understand it?
President Milosevic, and the Amicus Mr. Kay both raised this point,
but the prosecutor and the "judges" didn't seem to give a damn.
This exposes this new procedure as a scam right out of the box. The
Hague Tribunal has sunk to a new low. Secret witnesses, closed
sessions, and now scripted testimony.
As for Mr. Milanovic the prosecution spent the last 2 sessions of the
day asking him about things that weren't in his script. Apparently his
claim is that the VJ was active in the Krajina, and that President
Milosevic knew something about this. The most time was spent showing
the witness documents and asking him if he recognized them as authentic.
Mr. Milanovic will be cross-examined sometime in the future,
apparently a General Smith will be testifying tomorrow, but maybe not.
At the end of the day Mr. Nice asked for a closed session to discuss
when Milanovic would return and who was going to testify tomorrow.
===
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg100903.htm
MILOSEVIC "TRIAL" SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 9, 2003
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
The Hague "tribunal" heard testimony from the retired British Army
General Sir Rupert Smith today. Smith was the UNPROFOR (United Nations
Protection Force) commander in Bosnia in 1995, and he was the Deputy
Supreme Allied Commander of NATO from 1998 until 2001.
Immediately the objectivity of Smith is called into question. It was
General Smith who "turned the key" on behalf of the UN to unleash NATO
air strikes on the Bosnian Serbs after the so-called "Markale Market
Massacre." It is also this same General Smith who was the Deputy Allied
Commander of NATO at the time of NATO's criminal aggression against
Yugoslavia in 1999.
So we can see right off the bat that General Smith has an interest in
painting the Serbs as mad killers in order to justify his own criminal
aggression against the Serbs.
To begin with General Smith clings to the notion that the Bosnian
Serbs perpetrated the so-called "Markale Market Massacre" in Sarajevo
in August 1995, in spite of the evidence to the contrary. This is not
surprising since it was this alleged act by the Bosnian Serbs that lit
the fuse for the NATO air strikes against them that General Smith
personally authorized on behalf of the UN.
The UNMOs (UN Military Observers) issued a report stating that the
deadly mortars were fired from inside the Muslim lines, a group of
French engineers also conducted an investigation and they too concluded
that the mortars had come from inside of the Muslim lines. The
Sarajevo sector UNPROFOR commander also believed that the shells had
emanated from inside of the Muslim lines. He even went on television
and said that there was only a one in a million chance that the Serbs
could have hit that spot.
In spite of the fact that all of the evidence indicated that the
Muslims had massacred their own civilians. General Smith none the less
dismissed all of the evidence in the first UN report, issued a second
report stating that the Serbs did it, and authorized the air strikes.
General Mladic even contacted Smith and asked that a joint
investigation be carried out with the participation of Serb, Muslim,
and UN investigators, but Smith who was apparently intent on waging
war against the Serbs declined.
If the Muslims massacred their own civilians in order to get NATO to
attack the Serbs, then the trick worked, because that is precisely
what did happen.
The strategy of the prosecution is shameful. Mr. Nice and General
Smith were observing examples when Milosevic negotiated the freeing UN
personnel taken as hostages by the VRS, and when Milosevic negotiated
the peace agreement at Dayton as being proof of his alleged "control"
over the Bosnian Serbs. So here is President Milosevic working for
peace, and this is used against him as some sort of "proof" that he is
a war criminal. However, when Milosevic pressed Smith on this point;
Smith was forced to admit that he didn't see any indication that
Milosevic had any direct control over the VRS.
A meeting was also mentioned at which Mladic, Milosevic, Bildt,
Stoltenberg, Akashi, and Smith were all present. This was seen as some
sort of sinister conspiracy because here are Mladic and Milosevic at
the same meeting together. Smith was however forced, under
cross-examination, to admit that Mladic's attendance at the meeting
was Carl Bildt's idea, and not any sort of a plan between General
Mladic and President Milosevic.
Another interesting piece of information came when Smith was speaking
about the Muslim enclaves in Eastern Bosnia (Srebrenica, Zepa,
Gorazde, etc...) According to Smith the Muslims would use these
enclaves, these so-called "safe areas" established by the UN, to
launch attacks against the surrounding Serb areas.
President Milosevic asked if UNPROFOR had done anything to
demilitarize the so-called "safe areas." Smith attempted to evade the
question, and so President Milosevic asked Smith if he considered that
it was the UNPROFOR's responsibility to demilitarize the "safe areas,"
and Smith said that it wasn't UNPROFOR's job to demilitarize it's own
"safe areas."
So here we have UNPROFOR knowing that the Muslims are using it's "safe
areas" as military bases from which to attack the Serbs from, and
UNPROFOR doing nothing about it. But when the VRS is forced to protect
it's people by retaliating against these attacks the VRS is accused of
genocide.
Srebrenica was a matter of particular discussion. President Milosevic
cited the April 2001 report issued by the Dutch Government which
categorically stated that there was no political or military connection
between Belgrade and the events in Srebrenica. General Smith then
confirmed that he had no knowledge that would indicate that anybody
from either Serbia or Yugoslavia had any involvement in any of the
events at Srebrenica.
The Dutch Government report is of particular importance because
Dutchbat soldiers were at Srebrenica when the enclave fell, and they
saw nothing that could indicate Belgrade's involvement, and now we have
the UNPROFOR commander saying the same thing.
===
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg101403.htm
MILOSEVIC “TRIAL” SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 14, 2003
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
The prosecution finished its abbreviated examination-in-chief of Milan
Milanovic today. Milanovic served as the Deputy Defense Minister for
the Republika Srpska Krajina, and he was the leader of the Serb
negotiating team when the Erdut agreement was signed.
The Erdut Agreement
[http://www.usip.org/library/pa/croatia/croatia_erdut_11121995.html%5d
was signed on November 12, 1995. It guarantees Serbs living in Eastern
Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srem the right to form a joint council
of municipalities, it provides for the return of refugees, and for the
restoration of refugee’s property. Unfortunately, the Croatian side has
to this day failed to implement its end of the agreement. The refugees
have not returned and some even left after the signing of the
agreement, and no joint council of municipalities exists.
Mr. Milanovic claimed that President Milosevic’s associates would
harass him because he signed the Erdut Agreement. However, Mr.
Milanovic said that when he met with Milosevic that he was supportive
of him for signing the agreement. Milanovic says that Milosevic even
asked him if any of his associates were giving him a hard time, and
Milanovic told him that they weren’t.
Another allegation raised by the prosecution was that the VJ was
active in Krajina. Under cross-examination this turned out not to be
true. According to Milanovic the VJ was only active on the territory
of the FRY. There were times when the VJ was on the border of the FRY,
but it never crossed into Krajina.
The witness admitted that Belgrade had no direct command over the VRS
or the Serbian Army of Krajina.
This witness was frequently confused by names. He would refer to the
JNA as the “Yugoslav Army”, in stead of by its proper name which is of
course the Yugoslav People’s Army. The Yugoslav Army on the other hand
is the VJ, but that isn’t what the witness meant. The witness was also
confused and repeatedly referred to the Vance Plan as the “Vance-Owen
Plan.” The Vance Plan was of course for Croatia, and the Vance-Owen
Plan was for Bosnia. But like I said, the witness was confused.
The prosecution exploited the new practice of Rule 89(F). The
prosecution submitted various exhibits which had no relevance at all.
It is obvious that the prosecution is only trying to waste time.
President Milosevic and his associates have to go through all of this
so-called “evidence” and for the prosecutor to be dumping all of these
piles of pointless exhibits into the evidence pool only wastes time,
because the documents have to be read and the witness has to be
questioned about them.
The strategy of the prosecution is clear. They want to drown the
defense in a sea of irrelevant documents that it will have to deal
with, and then the prosecutor hopes that time will expire on the
defense before it can ask the witness about everything. They want to
bog down the defense in pointless documents in the hopes that they
won’t have time to refute some important point.
For example documents were produced about a Krajina Government office
that was in Belgrade. This office would arrange accommodation for
Serbian citizens who wished to volunteer to assist the Krajina Serbs.
This was totally the endeavor of the Krajina Government, nobody in
Serbia was forced to volunteer, but these documents were none the less
presented as “evidence” against Milosevic. Evidence of what you ask;
well as far as Milosevic is concerned nothing. I only regard this sort
of “evidence” as evidence of the prosecution’s plan that I outlined
above.
A point raised by the prosecution was the presence of Radovan
Stojicic “Badza” in Krajina. Badza was a commander in the Serbian MUP,
and he came to Krajina with 15 other members of the MUP of Serbia.
They were integrated into the T.O. and were suborned to the JNA. Badza
was promoted to the T.O. command by Goran Hadzic, and not by anybody
from Serbia.
These men, by virtue of the fact that they were suborned to the JNA,
were obviously volunteers, but the witness tried to deny that and say
that they were something else. None the less, the witness said that
neither Badza, nor any of the men who came with him committed any
crimes.
Badza came to Krajina to help the JNA liberate Vukovar. In Vukovar the
ZNG (Croatian National Guard) attacked JNA columns. The ZNG blockaded
and laid siege on the JNA barracks in Vukovar, killing and wounding
several JNA soldiers.
It was only after the ZNG’s barbaric attacks that the JNA engaged in
operations to rid Vukovar of the ZNG. The JNA was defending itself on
its own territory. Vukovar, whether the Croats liked it or not, was at
that time, part of the SFRY and the JNA was the national army of the
SFRY.
Badza and the men who accompanied him may have been from the republic
of Serbia, but Serbia and Vukovar were both part of the SFR
Yugoslavia. Badza was only volunteering to help his country’s army at
a time when it was being attacked inside of its own territory. Quite
honestly, I can’t imagine what could be wrong with that. I don’t see
what the prosecution is trying to prove here. What kind of patriot
could just stand by and watch his country’s army being attacked on its
own territory?
The witness did give some useful evidence about the origins of the war
in Croatia. According to the witness tensions started in 1990 and
1991, when elections were held and the HDZ and Tudjman were coming to
power.
The Serbian people in Croatia voted for the League of Communists,
because that party was against war and favored the preservation of
Yugoslavia. The Croats, on the other hand, voted for the HDZ and for
the destruction of Yugoslavia.
Once the HDZ attained power in 1991 they removed the Serbian people as
a constituent people from the Croatian constitution. The Croats began
illegally importing arms, formed paramilitary formations, and fired
Serbs from their jobs en masse. The Croats resurrected the symbols
used by the Ustasha (Croatia’s Nazi puppet regime) during the 2nd
World War, such as the checkerboard emblem that appears to this day on
the Croatian flag.
All of these actions by the Croats caused discomfort and fear among
the Serbs who were living in Croatia. The fears of the Serbs were
proven to be justified when on May 2, 1991 Croatian policemen entered
Borovo Selo, the largest Serbian settlement in the Vukovar
municipality. When the Croatian police rolled into Borovo Selo they
opened fire on Serbian houses in the center of Borovo Selo, killing
several civilians.
The witness spoke about the Vance Plan and how the Serbs abided by the
agreement, but that the Croats violated the agreement when they
stormed UN Protected Areas such as the Miljevac Plateau and the Medak
Pocket. These attacks were completely unprovoked. The Serbs did not
launch a single attack after the UNPAs were set-up, but the Croats
attacked them anyway.
The witness went all through the war. He confirmed that the Croats had
formed camps for Serbs, and that the war ultimately culminated in the
Croat operations Storm and Flash, in which many Serbs were killed, and
hundreds of thousands were expelled from Croatia.
The witness also spoke of a time when a ZDF news crew from Germany
came to his village of Polaca. When the ZDF crew was there they filmed
as Croats from Laslovo came and attacked the Serbs living in Polaca,
but when ZDF aired the tape they said that it was Serbs from Polaca
who were attacking the Croats in Laslovo.
This is only one of many examples where the international media lied.
ZDF reported the exact opposite of the truth. ZDF turned the victim
into the aggressor, and the aggressor into the victim.
This witness will conclude his testimony tomorrow. The troika has
granted Slobodan Milosevic 50 more minutes to conclude his
cross-examination.
===
http://slobodan-milosevic.ihostsites.net/news/smorg101503.htm
MILOSEVIC "TRIAL" SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 15, 2003
The witness Milan Milanovic finished his testimony today. President
Milosevic used this occasion to expose the strategy of the prosecutor.
President Milosevic showed the witness documents that were submitted
by the prosecutor as evidence in conjunction with his testimony.
Among the documents were invoices from the Zastava Promot Company in
Sombor. The Krajina T.O. had purchased items for their uniforms from
that company, belts, t-shirts, berets, etc… They paid for the items,
and they were shipped.
President Milosevic asked the witness what that was supposed to prove?
He wondered was there anything illegal about a company selling
merchandise to somebody? The witness had no explanation as to why
these documents were exhibited as evidence in conjunction with his
testimony. He couldn’t see anything illegal.
In addition to vast lists of bank accounts were submitted. Bank
account information for bowling clubs, cinemas, butcher shops, and
even the Red Cross was submitted as “evidence” with this witness by
the prosecution. Again the witness didn’t know how to explain this.
Again today we can see that the prosecution is abusing Rule 89(F). The
prosecution has no case and so they are abusing Rule 89(F) in order to
overwhelm the defense with piles of irrelevant documents.
The prosecutor has even submitted obviously forged documents as
evidence. One example came today with a document from a Dusko Babic
that was stamped as received the day before it was ever sent.
This witness has proven nothing against Milosevic. On the contrary,
his testimony only proves what President Milosevic has been saying.
The witness said that Milosevic contacted him and advised him to sign
the Erdut peace agreement. The witness signed the agreement, and
claimed that Milan Martic, Milan Babic and Goran Hadzic were all angry
with him for signing it.
If the whole Krajina leadership was angry with the witness for signing
an agreement that Milosevic supported, then this clearly proves that
they were not under the control of Milosevic. All this proves is that
President Milosevic used his influence to achieve peace, and it proves
that all he had was influence and not any sort of control outside of
Serbia.
After Milan Milanovic withdrew a secret witness codenamed “B-1115”
took the witness stand. B-1115 was a 92-bis witness, and the gist of
his “testimony” was that the Serbs attacked his unarmed Muslim village
for no reason took him prisoner and then abused the prisoners.
B-1115 was allegedly from Doboj. B-1115 was a member of what he called
a “reserve police unit” which consisted of 36 armed Muslims.
Milosevic however viewed this 36 man unit as a paramilitary formation,
and the real police had seen it the same way. Milosevic produced the
documents proving that B-1115 and his so-called “reserve police” were
all arrested by the real police and charged with armed insurrection
under article 124 of the penal code; so much for B-1115’s claim about
being the innocent unarmed civilian.
B-1115 also claimed to have seen Montenegrin Red Berets training the
VRS at a base near Doboj while he was allegedly being held prisoner.
The problem with this is that there has never been any such thing as
Montenegrin Red Berets. They are a figment of B-1115’s imagination.
So B-1115 was a member of a Muslim paramilitary group that was
engaging in armed insurrection, yet he claimed to be an unarmed
civilian living in a village where no armed conflicts were taking
place. B-1115 claimed to be the Serb’s prisoner, but at the times he
was allegedly being held he saw things that never existed. He is very
typical for the sorts of witness’s that the prosecution likes to bring.
After B-1115 finished another secret witness testifying under the
pseudonym of “B-1445” took the stand.
B-1445 was a member of the B-H parliament from Doboj and one of the
founders of the SDA.
According to B-1445 the attack on Doboj took place on May 3, 1992.
B-1445 said that he witnessed the attack and that members of Arkan’s
Tigers and Seselj’s White Eagles took part in the attack. Of course
B-1445 didn’t actually see Tigers and White Eagles taking part in the
attack he only heard about that later on from some other people.
B-1445, who claimed to have witnessed the attack, said that he fled
Doboj on the afternoon of May 3, 1992. This is interesting since the
previous secret witness (B-1115) said that the attack didn’t begin
until 5 PM, so how could B-1445 have witnessed the attack if he wasn’t
even there when it happened?
Because B-1445 was an SDA MP and one of the founders of the party,
President Milosevic asked him whether or not it was true that the SDA
was the first party formed on an ethnic basis. B-1445 confirmed that
the SDA had been founded before the SDS and the HDZ.
B-1445 also confirmed that in 1992 the Bosnian constitution explicitly
stated that decisions had to be made on the basis of consensus of
Bosnia’s 3 constituent peoples: the Serbs, the Croats, and the Muslims.
Because B-1445 had admitted that decisions had to be made on the basis
of consensus of all 3 peoples, he put himself in a very uncomfortable
position. President Milosevic asked him if he was aware that the
Serbian people had been against succession, but that the decision was
none the less made to separate from Yugoslavia against the will of the
Serbian people?
Because he had admitted what the law was, B-1445 was stuck, and so he
decided to lie and say that the Serbs were not against succession. I
don’t know what sort of Serbs that B-1445 has been talking to, but I
have certainly never met the Serb who favored the succession of
Bosnia-Herzegovina from Yugoslavia.
President Milosevic asked B-1445 if Alija Izetbegovic favored the
establishment of an Islamic state. B-1445 said that Izetbegovic didn’t
want any such thing. However Alija Izetbegovic’s “Islamic Declaration”
indicates something quite different.
President Milosevic began to ask B-1445 about the presence of Arab
mujahedeens in Bosnia. It was at this point that the so-called “judge”
May had to intervene and save the witness. May prohibited Milosevic
from pursuing this line of questioning.
President Milosevic observed that the first killing that took place
after the illegal referendum on succession was the killing of a Serb
by four Muslims at a Serbian wedding celebration in Sarajevo.
President Milosevic then asked if this killing caused tensions to
increase.
The witness’s explanation was that murders happened all of the time in
Sarajevo, this was nothing remarkable, and besides the Serb who got
killed provoked his Muslim killers.
President Milosevic was clearly shocked that this witness had the gall
to claim that killings are something that is routine and that the
victim deserved to be murdered because he had allegedly provoked his
killer, and it was on that note that the proceedings ended. President
Milosevic will cross-examine the witness for 70 more minutes tomorrow.
TRIBUNAL ATTEMPTS TO HIDE ITS SHAMEFUL FARCE FROM THE PUBLIC
---
An important LINK:
Dutch TV documentary on the Hague process, in two parts:
http://info.vpro.nl/info/tegenlicht/index.shtml?7738514+7738518+8048024
===
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg100703.htm
MILOSEVIC "TRIAL" SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 7, 2003
After nearly a 3 week break taken due to the continued illness of
President Milosevic the Hague Tribunal again resumed the so-called
"trial." President Milosevic is still ill, his blood pressure today
was measured to be 160 over 110 mm Hg.
The "trial" started off with Mr. Nice announcing that they would not
be hearing from Maj. Russo of the Canadian Armed Forces, because he
had decided not to come to the tribunal. According to Mr. Nice the
Office of the Prosecutor arranged his flight but when it came time to
leave, he simply decided not to get on the plane.
Then the so-called "presiding judge" Mr. May made a ruling regarding
the prosecution's September 23rd submission. The prosecution was
seeking to videotape examinations in chief on days when President
Milosevic is unable to attend due to illness. The so-called "trial
chamber" denied this request. The Prosecution had also sought to have
defense counsel imposed on President Milosevic, the "court" didn't
rule one way or the other on that. They simply said that they would
keep it under consideration.
The witness today was a Ms. Eva Tabo. Ms. Tabo is a demographer, and
an employee of the Office of the Prosecutor. She has worked for the
Prosecution since December of 2000.
Ms. Tabo wrote two reports. One report was on the displacement of
persons in the so-called "Milosevic case area." This report focused on
47 municipalities in Bosnia-Herzegovina, and highlighted 7
municipalities as case-studies. The other report dealt with the
so-called "Siege of Sarajevo" and the war-related mortalities in the
Sarajevo area.
President Milosevic denounced Ms. Tabo's reports as "a malicious
manipulation of statistics," and when one looks at the methods and
sources that she employed in order to write her reports it is obvious
that she is in fact making malicious manipulations of fact. Her
objective is clearly to demonize the Serbs, and to paint them as
aggressors against their own country.
First of all, in her report on displacement, she arrives at her
conclusions by taking the 1991 census and comparing it with OSCE voter
registration lists from 1997 and 1998. She concludes that anybody who
was in a different location in 1997-98 than they were in 1991 is a
refugee or an IDP.
It is useful at this point to remind ourselves of what a refugee is.
According to the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees
(the Refugee Convention), Article 1A(2), the term refugee is applied
to a person who owing to well founded fear of being persecuted for
reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular
social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his(/her)
nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to
avail himself (/herself) of the protection of his(/her) country; or
who, not having a nationality and being outside the country of
his(/her) former habitual residence as a result of such events, is
unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it.
In her report, Ms. Tabo counted migrant migrant workers as "refugees."
She counted citizens who were working abroad before the war in 1991,
and who were still working abroad in 1997-98 as refugees.
Her objective here can only be to falsely inflate the number of
refugees emanating from the so-called "Milosevic case area."
Even Mr. Robinson had trouble accepting that persons such as migrant
workers who were working abroad before the war even started could be
considered to be refugees. Mr. Robinson asked her if she was even
aware of what constitutes a refugee.
Ms. Tabo sheepishly responded by saying that she wasn't using any
"legal definition" to define refugees, but that for the purposes of
her report she was using a statistical definition of her own making.
Ms. Tabo eventually admitted that her report did not take into account
any of the reasons why her so-called "refugees" had left the country,
which means that according to the definition of a refugee used by
everybody else she has no basis for calling these people refugees.
As President Milosevic observed, if one employed Ms. Tabo's
definition, a tourist could be called a refugee.
Another problem is the question of IDPs. Ms. Tabo defined an IDP as
anybody who was living in one place at the time of the 1991 census and
was living in another place when they registered to vote in 1997-98.
A problem arises here because the information she is using is not
limited to the period of the war. People who moved before the war in
1991-92 and after the war between 1995 and 1997-98 are counted as IDP's
(or as refugees if they moved out of the country).
President Milosevic pointed out that there were massive migrations of
persons that took place after Dayton. He pointed to the example of the
Sarajevo Serbs, where 150,000 Serbs left Sarajevo after the end of the
war.
Ms. Tabo's data is not limited to the period of the war, nor does it
take into account any of the reasons why her so-called "refugees" or
"IDPs" moved from one place to the other. Many people moved solely
because of economic reasons yet in her reports they are considered to
be some sort of refugee or IDP.
Ms. Tabo, in her crusade to Satanize the Serbs, referred in court,
almost exclusively to municipalities in the Republika Srpska where the
Muslim declined and the Serb populations increased. The truth about
Bosnia is that 88.2% of the pre-war Serb population has left the B-H
Federation, and 95.5% of the pre-war Muslim population has left the
R.S. The differences in their respective migrations is less than 8%,
and not even Ms. Tabo's report, as misleading as it is, makes an
attempt to hide that, in fact that statistic is contained in her
report.
Ms. Tabo also grudgingly admitted to President Milosevic, during
cross-examination, that Serbia gave safe heaven to 70,000 Muslim
refugees from Bosnia.
Ms. Tabo's other report dealt with the so-called "Siege of Sarajevo"
and it's war related mortalities. For her data sources she extensively
relied on Muslim sources. She took the International Red Cross's
reports into account in her report and used them as one of 7 data
sources, but the other 6 sources were Muslim sources.
She admitted that because of her extensive reliance on Muslim sources
that her statistics could be prejudiced by any biases that the Muslims
had when collecting the data. Such as in the case of one of her
sources known as the "Household Survey," conducted by Muslim
researchers, in which Serbs were referred to simply as "the
aggressors."
Even though she extensively used Muslim sources she still had to admit
that the "vast majority of casualties in Sarajevo were combatants" and
not civilians. But because she relied so heavily on Muslim sources,
information about casualties among Serb civilians was not sufficiently
dealt with in her report.
At the end of the proceedings President Milosevic learned of a new
practice that will be employed by the prosecution. The appeals chamber
changed the rules and now the prosecution has the option of not
conducting the examination-in-chief.
This new practice goes even further than 92-bis. The prosecution
compiles a witness statement, then the prosecution writes the
witness's testimony for the witness, at that point the witness signs
his pre-written testimony and that counts as the evidence in chief. So
essentially the witness only has to come to court to be cross-examined.
This new practice is scandalous. First of all, it allows the
prosecution to present more "evidence" in less time. Essentially
meaning that the prosecution is producing "evidence" faster than the
defense can refute it. This practice is like to pouring water into
somebody's mouth, not allowing them to breathe, and waiting for them
to choke.
Secondly, it makes it extremely difficult for the public to follow the
"trial" because we won't have any idea what exactly it is that the
defense is trying to refute or accomplish while it is cross-examining
the witness. If we don't know what the evidence in chief is we won't be
able to understand what point defense is trying to make.
===
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg100803.htm
MILOSEVIC "TRIAL" SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 8, 2003:
TRIBUNAL ATTEMPTS TO HIDE IT'S SHAMEFUL FARCE FROM THE PUBLIC
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
A new procedure was initiated at the Hague Tribunal today. Prosecution
witnesses can now give their examination-in-chief in whole or in part
via statements written for them by the prosecutor.
The witness doesn't write the statement that is used for his
evidence-in-chief, the prosecutor writes it, and it is treated as
"evidence" by the so-called "trial chamber."
This so-called "trial" is secretive enough already. The extensive use
of so-called "closed sessions" already hides vast portions of the
"trial" from public scrutiny. The use of so-called "protected
witnesses" keeps the public into the dark as to who the witness even
is, thus making it impossible for the public to judge the credibility
of a witness.
As for the secret witnesses, there have been occasions when these
witnesses have divulged enough information about themselves, such as
the position they held at a given time that one can figure out who
they are, or at least who they are pretending to be. For example, the
secret witness known as "B-24" claimed to have been a member of the
crisis staff in of Zvornik from the inception of the crisis staff
until 12 April 1992, while serving in the crisis staff “B-24” said
that he was the commander of the police station. “B-24” also claimed
that he was a member of the SDS, and president of the local government
in Zvornik from February 1993 until September 1993.
Based on the information that "B-24" divulged about himself during his
open-session testimony one can conclude that "B-24" is Dragan
Spasojevic, or that he is somebody who is pretending to be Dragan
Spasojevic. You can conclude this by just looking through media
reports to see who held the positions that he claimed to hold at the
times he claimed to have held them. His identity was revealed to me
simply by using public information that I obtained from the information
media. Anybody who wanted to could figure out who he was.
Armed with the identity of "B-24" one is able to find out that Dragan
Spasojevic was threatened with an EU travel ban, due to his links with
organized crime, but was able to avoid the ban because of cooperation
with the Hague Tribunal. Spasojevic is accused of war crimes himself,
he is alleged to have participated in the massacre of some 750
Muslims. On top of this, Mr. Spasojevic has a hatred for Milosevic,
Spasojevic told the May 16, 1993 edition of The Sunday Times that "We
[the Bosnian Serbs] have been betrayed by Milosevic."
With this additional information (that the tribunal wants to keep
hidden from you) you can see all sorts of things. Since Spasojevic is
accused by the Muslims of taking part in the alleged massacre of 750
of them it is possible that the "tribunal" told him that if he
testified against Milosevic, who he hated anyway that they would let
him off the hook and not prosecute him for his alleged war crimes.
Another possibility is that the "tribunal" offered Spasojevic a new
identity in exchange for his testimony. A new identity could come in
handy for a criminal couldn't it? It would allow him to avoid the E.U.
travel ban and continue his criminal activities unhindered.
No doubt many of you have figured out the identity of certain secret
witnesses yourselves. When the identity of the tribunal's secret
witnesses is ascertained you can almost always figure out why their
identity is kept a secret. If the witness is a criminal they become a
"protected witness" and their identity is hidden from the public so
that the public won't know that they are a criminal.
This new invention of admitting written statements that have been
prepared by the prosecutor as "evidence", only hides the so-called
"judicial" process even further. The examination-in-chief is
practically abolished, and the point of the alleged "evidence" is lost
as far as the public is concerned.
Mr. Nice even admitted that this new practice hides the "trial" from
the public. Nice wants all witnesses to be dealt with in this fashion.
Nice says that even witnesses whose testimony would be particularly
damning to Milosevic should be dealt with in this fashion, and that he
was willing to lose the advantage that publicly hearing these witnesses
would give to the OTP in the eyes of the public. I hate to break it to
you Mr. Nice, but in the over 250 witnesses that you have called not
one of them has had any testimony that was damning in the least to
President Milosevic.
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights guarantees
the right to a public trial, but this is apparently something that the
Hague Tribunal feels doesn't apply to it. The "tribunal" regularly
hides its "trials" from the public. One has to wonder what they are so
ashamed of? After all, if they had a case wouldn't they want the
public to see that?
This new practice of using written testimony is based on Rule 89(f)
which reads: A Chamber may receive the evidence of a witness orally
or, where the interests of justice allow, in written form.
President Milosevic categorically objected to this new practice.
President Milosevic's argument is that it is clearly not in the
interests of justice to hide the proceedings from the public in this
way, he also argued that Rule 89(f) says "A Chamber may receive," not
must receive, evidence in written form when the interests of justice
allow.
President Milosevic rightly argued that it can not possibly be in the
interests of justice for evidence to be given against him where he is
not present. He argued that witnesses must give their evidence live,
in front of him, in front of the "trial chamber," and ultimately in
front of the public.
President Milosevic correctly argued that it is definitely not in the
interests of justice if evidence is only given in the prosecutors
office. Who knows what sort of important information that the
prosecutor might decide to omit from the "evidence" if it doesn't fit
its case.
President Milosevic also argued that this is a way for the prosecutor
to present more evidence than the defense can prepare for and deal
with in the time allotted for cross-examination. The situation is bad
enough already, President Milosevic is frequently denied the
opportunity to complete his cross-examination. Because "judge" May's
primary concern is the clock, and not conducting any sort of fair
trial cross-examination is frequently cut short when the time limit
imposed by Mr. May has expired.
President Milosevic pointed out that witness statements that are
already prepared by the prosecution in much the same fashion as will
be employed with this new practice are frequently inaccurate, with
witnesses frequently claiming in court that they never said the things
that the prosecution put into their statements.
The other side argued that there are safe-guards that ensure that this
new process doesn't jeopardize the "fair trial" (which is a joke
coming from them anyway). They say that the witness will be
cross-examined, and they say that the witness will have to sign the
written "testimony" and attest to its truthfulness after taking the
solemn declaration.
Another point raised by Mr. Nice is that if the witness says something
different in court than what is contained in his pre-written
testimony, Mr. Nice says that the witness will be exposed to sanction.
So essentially what we have here is witnesses who are testifying from
a script that has been written for them by the prosecutor, and if they
deviate from the prosecution's script they will be punished.
In yet another slap to the face of justice, the trial chamber ruled
that this new practice is acceptable, and it was applied to the
witness Milan Milanovic.
The interesting thing here is that Milan Milanovic doesn't speak
English. His testimony was written for him in English by the
prosecution. No Serbian version was available. Milanovic none the less
signed his pre-written English "testimony", and attested to its
truthfulness while under the solemn declaration.
The question here is how can Mr. Milanovic possibly sign a document
and attest to its truthfulness if he doesn't even understand it?
President Milosevic, and the Amicus Mr. Kay both raised this point,
but the prosecutor and the "judges" didn't seem to give a damn.
This exposes this new procedure as a scam right out of the box. The
Hague Tribunal has sunk to a new low. Secret witnesses, closed
sessions, and now scripted testimony.
As for Mr. Milanovic the prosecution spent the last 2 sessions of the
day asking him about things that weren't in his script. Apparently his
claim is that the VJ was active in the Krajina, and that President
Milosevic knew something about this. The most time was spent showing
the witness documents and asking him if he recognized them as authentic.
Mr. Milanovic will be cross-examined sometime in the future,
apparently a General Smith will be testifying tomorrow, but maybe not.
At the end of the day Mr. Nice asked for a closed session to discuss
when Milanovic would return and who was going to testify tomorrow.
===
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg100903.htm
MILOSEVIC "TRIAL" SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 9, 2003
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
The Hague "tribunal" heard testimony from the retired British Army
General Sir Rupert Smith today. Smith was the UNPROFOR (United Nations
Protection Force) commander in Bosnia in 1995, and he was the Deputy
Supreme Allied Commander of NATO from 1998 until 2001.
Immediately the objectivity of Smith is called into question. It was
General Smith who "turned the key" on behalf of the UN to unleash NATO
air strikes on the Bosnian Serbs after the so-called "Markale Market
Massacre." It is also this same General Smith who was the Deputy Allied
Commander of NATO at the time of NATO's criminal aggression against
Yugoslavia in 1999.
So we can see right off the bat that General Smith has an interest in
painting the Serbs as mad killers in order to justify his own criminal
aggression against the Serbs.
To begin with General Smith clings to the notion that the Bosnian
Serbs perpetrated the so-called "Markale Market Massacre" in Sarajevo
in August 1995, in spite of the evidence to the contrary. This is not
surprising since it was this alleged act by the Bosnian Serbs that lit
the fuse for the NATO air strikes against them that General Smith
personally authorized on behalf of the UN.
The UNMOs (UN Military Observers) issued a report stating that the
deadly mortars were fired from inside the Muslim lines, a group of
French engineers also conducted an investigation and they too concluded
that the mortars had come from inside of the Muslim lines. The
Sarajevo sector UNPROFOR commander also believed that the shells had
emanated from inside of the Muslim lines. He even went on television
and said that there was only a one in a million chance that the Serbs
could have hit that spot.
In spite of the fact that all of the evidence indicated that the
Muslims had massacred their own civilians. General Smith none the less
dismissed all of the evidence in the first UN report, issued a second
report stating that the Serbs did it, and authorized the air strikes.
General Mladic even contacted Smith and asked that a joint
investigation be carried out with the participation of Serb, Muslim,
and UN investigators, but Smith who was apparently intent on waging
war against the Serbs declined.
If the Muslims massacred their own civilians in order to get NATO to
attack the Serbs, then the trick worked, because that is precisely
what did happen.
The strategy of the prosecution is shameful. Mr. Nice and General
Smith were observing examples when Milosevic negotiated the freeing UN
personnel taken as hostages by the VRS, and when Milosevic negotiated
the peace agreement at Dayton as being proof of his alleged "control"
over the Bosnian Serbs. So here is President Milosevic working for
peace, and this is used against him as some sort of "proof" that he is
a war criminal. However, when Milosevic pressed Smith on this point;
Smith was forced to admit that he didn't see any indication that
Milosevic had any direct control over the VRS.
A meeting was also mentioned at which Mladic, Milosevic, Bildt,
Stoltenberg, Akashi, and Smith were all present. This was seen as some
sort of sinister conspiracy because here are Mladic and Milosevic at
the same meeting together. Smith was however forced, under
cross-examination, to admit that Mladic's attendance at the meeting
was Carl Bildt's idea, and not any sort of a plan between General
Mladic and President Milosevic.
Another interesting piece of information came when Smith was speaking
about the Muslim enclaves in Eastern Bosnia (Srebrenica, Zepa,
Gorazde, etc...) According to Smith the Muslims would use these
enclaves, these so-called "safe areas" established by the UN, to
launch attacks against the surrounding Serb areas.
President Milosevic asked if UNPROFOR had done anything to
demilitarize the so-called "safe areas." Smith attempted to evade the
question, and so President Milosevic asked Smith if he considered that
it was the UNPROFOR's responsibility to demilitarize the "safe areas,"
and Smith said that it wasn't UNPROFOR's job to demilitarize it's own
"safe areas."
So here we have UNPROFOR knowing that the Muslims are using it's "safe
areas" as military bases from which to attack the Serbs from, and
UNPROFOR doing nothing about it. But when the VRS is forced to protect
it's people by retaliating against these attacks the VRS is accused of
genocide.
Srebrenica was a matter of particular discussion. President Milosevic
cited the April 2001 report issued by the Dutch Government which
categorically stated that there was no political or military connection
between Belgrade and the events in Srebrenica. General Smith then
confirmed that he had no knowledge that would indicate that anybody
from either Serbia or Yugoslavia had any involvement in any of the
events at Srebrenica.
The Dutch Government report is of particular importance because
Dutchbat soldiers were at Srebrenica when the enclave fell, and they
saw nothing that could indicate Belgrade's involvement, and now we have
the UNPROFOR commander saying the same thing.
===
http://www.slobodan-milosevic.org/news/smorg101403.htm
MILOSEVIC “TRIAL” SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 14, 2003
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
The prosecution finished its abbreviated examination-in-chief of Milan
Milanovic today. Milanovic served as the Deputy Defense Minister for
the Republika Srpska Krajina, and he was the leader of the Serb
negotiating team when the Erdut agreement was signed.
The Erdut Agreement
[http://www.usip.org/library/pa/croatia/croatia_erdut_11121995.html%5d
was signed on November 12, 1995. It guarantees Serbs living in Eastern
Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srem the right to form a joint council
of municipalities, it provides for the return of refugees, and for the
restoration of refugee’s property. Unfortunately, the Croatian side has
to this day failed to implement its end of the agreement. The refugees
have not returned and some even left after the signing of the
agreement, and no joint council of municipalities exists.
Mr. Milanovic claimed that President Milosevic’s associates would
harass him because he signed the Erdut Agreement. However, Mr.
Milanovic said that when he met with Milosevic that he was supportive
of him for signing the agreement. Milanovic says that Milosevic even
asked him if any of his associates were giving him a hard time, and
Milanovic told him that they weren’t.
Another allegation raised by the prosecution was that the VJ was
active in Krajina. Under cross-examination this turned out not to be
true. According to Milanovic the VJ was only active on the territory
of the FRY. There were times when the VJ was on the border of the FRY,
but it never crossed into Krajina.
The witness admitted that Belgrade had no direct command over the VRS
or the Serbian Army of Krajina.
This witness was frequently confused by names. He would refer to the
JNA as the “Yugoslav Army”, in stead of by its proper name which is of
course the Yugoslav People’s Army. The Yugoslav Army on the other hand
is the VJ, but that isn’t what the witness meant. The witness was also
confused and repeatedly referred to the Vance Plan as the “Vance-Owen
Plan.” The Vance Plan was of course for Croatia, and the Vance-Owen
Plan was for Bosnia. But like I said, the witness was confused.
The prosecution exploited the new practice of Rule 89(F). The
prosecution submitted various exhibits which had no relevance at all.
It is obvious that the prosecution is only trying to waste time.
President Milosevic and his associates have to go through all of this
so-called “evidence” and for the prosecutor to be dumping all of these
piles of pointless exhibits into the evidence pool only wastes time,
because the documents have to be read and the witness has to be
questioned about them.
The strategy of the prosecution is clear. They want to drown the
defense in a sea of irrelevant documents that it will have to deal
with, and then the prosecutor hopes that time will expire on the
defense before it can ask the witness about everything. They want to
bog down the defense in pointless documents in the hopes that they
won’t have time to refute some important point.
For example documents were produced about a Krajina Government office
that was in Belgrade. This office would arrange accommodation for
Serbian citizens who wished to volunteer to assist the Krajina Serbs.
This was totally the endeavor of the Krajina Government, nobody in
Serbia was forced to volunteer, but these documents were none the less
presented as “evidence” against Milosevic. Evidence of what you ask;
well as far as Milosevic is concerned nothing. I only regard this sort
of “evidence” as evidence of the prosecution’s plan that I outlined
above.
A point raised by the prosecution was the presence of Radovan
Stojicic “Badza” in Krajina. Badza was a commander in the Serbian MUP,
and he came to Krajina with 15 other members of the MUP of Serbia.
They were integrated into the T.O. and were suborned to the JNA. Badza
was promoted to the T.O. command by Goran Hadzic, and not by anybody
from Serbia.
These men, by virtue of the fact that they were suborned to the JNA,
were obviously volunteers, but the witness tried to deny that and say
that they were something else. None the less, the witness said that
neither Badza, nor any of the men who came with him committed any
crimes.
Badza came to Krajina to help the JNA liberate Vukovar. In Vukovar the
ZNG (Croatian National Guard) attacked JNA columns. The ZNG blockaded
and laid siege on the JNA barracks in Vukovar, killing and wounding
several JNA soldiers.
It was only after the ZNG’s barbaric attacks that the JNA engaged in
operations to rid Vukovar of the ZNG. The JNA was defending itself on
its own territory. Vukovar, whether the Croats liked it or not, was at
that time, part of the SFRY and the JNA was the national army of the
SFRY.
Badza and the men who accompanied him may have been from the republic
of Serbia, but Serbia and Vukovar were both part of the SFR
Yugoslavia. Badza was only volunteering to help his country’s army at
a time when it was being attacked inside of its own territory. Quite
honestly, I can’t imagine what could be wrong with that. I don’t see
what the prosecution is trying to prove here. What kind of patriot
could just stand by and watch his country’s army being attacked on its
own territory?
The witness did give some useful evidence about the origins of the war
in Croatia. According to the witness tensions started in 1990 and
1991, when elections were held and the HDZ and Tudjman were coming to
power.
The Serbian people in Croatia voted for the League of Communists,
because that party was against war and favored the preservation of
Yugoslavia. The Croats, on the other hand, voted for the HDZ and for
the destruction of Yugoslavia.
Once the HDZ attained power in 1991 they removed the Serbian people as
a constituent people from the Croatian constitution. The Croats began
illegally importing arms, formed paramilitary formations, and fired
Serbs from their jobs en masse. The Croats resurrected the symbols
used by the Ustasha (Croatia’s Nazi puppet regime) during the 2nd
World War, such as the checkerboard emblem that appears to this day on
the Croatian flag.
All of these actions by the Croats caused discomfort and fear among
the Serbs who were living in Croatia. The fears of the Serbs were
proven to be justified when on May 2, 1991 Croatian policemen entered
Borovo Selo, the largest Serbian settlement in the Vukovar
municipality. When the Croatian police rolled into Borovo Selo they
opened fire on Serbian houses in the center of Borovo Selo, killing
several civilians.
The witness spoke about the Vance Plan and how the Serbs abided by the
agreement, but that the Croats violated the agreement when they
stormed UN Protected Areas such as the Miljevac Plateau and the Medak
Pocket. These attacks were completely unprovoked. The Serbs did not
launch a single attack after the UNPAs were set-up, but the Croats
attacked them anyway.
The witness went all through the war. He confirmed that the Croats had
formed camps for Serbs, and that the war ultimately culminated in the
Croat operations Storm and Flash, in which many Serbs were killed, and
hundreds of thousands were expelled from Croatia.
The witness also spoke of a time when a ZDF news crew from Germany
came to his village of Polaca. When the ZDF crew was there they filmed
as Croats from Laslovo came and attacked the Serbs living in Polaca,
but when ZDF aired the tape they said that it was Serbs from Polaca
who were attacking the Croats in Laslovo.
This is only one of many examples where the international media lied.
ZDF reported the exact opposite of the truth. ZDF turned the victim
into the aggressor, and the aggressor into the victim.
This witness will conclude his testimony tomorrow. The troika has
granted Slobodan Milosevic 50 more minutes to conclude his
cross-examination.
===
http://slobodan-milosevic.ihostsites.net/news/smorg101503.htm
MILOSEVIC "TRIAL" SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 15, 2003
The witness Milan Milanovic finished his testimony today. President
Milosevic used this occasion to expose the strategy of the prosecutor.
President Milosevic showed the witness documents that were submitted
by the prosecutor as evidence in conjunction with his testimony.
Among the documents were invoices from the Zastava Promot Company in
Sombor. The Krajina T.O. had purchased items for their uniforms from
that company, belts, t-shirts, berets, etc… They paid for the items,
and they were shipped.
President Milosevic asked the witness what that was supposed to prove?
He wondered was there anything illegal about a company selling
merchandise to somebody? The witness had no explanation as to why
these documents were exhibited as evidence in conjunction with his
testimony. He couldn’t see anything illegal.
In addition to vast lists of bank accounts were submitted. Bank
account information for bowling clubs, cinemas, butcher shops, and
even the Red Cross was submitted as “evidence” with this witness by
the prosecution. Again the witness didn’t know how to explain this.
Again today we can see that the prosecution is abusing Rule 89(F). The
prosecution has no case and so they are abusing Rule 89(F) in order to
overwhelm the defense with piles of irrelevant documents.
The prosecutor has even submitted obviously forged documents as
evidence. One example came today with a document from a Dusko Babic
that was stamped as received the day before it was ever sent.
This witness has proven nothing against Milosevic. On the contrary,
his testimony only proves what President Milosevic has been saying.
The witness said that Milosevic contacted him and advised him to sign
the Erdut peace agreement. The witness signed the agreement, and
claimed that Milan Martic, Milan Babic and Goran Hadzic were all angry
with him for signing it.
If the whole Krajina leadership was angry with the witness for signing
an agreement that Milosevic supported, then this clearly proves that
they were not under the control of Milosevic. All this proves is that
President Milosevic used his influence to achieve peace, and it proves
that all he had was influence and not any sort of control outside of
Serbia.
After Milan Milanovic withdrew a secret witness codenamed “B-1115”
took the witness stand. B-1115 was a 92-bis witness, and the gist of
his “testimony” was that the Serbs attacked his unarmed Muslim village
for no reason took him prisoner and then abused the prisoners.
B-1115 was allegedly from Doboj. B-1115 was a member of what he called
a “reserve police unit” which consisted of 36 armed Muslims.
Milosevic however viewed this 36 man unit as a paramilitary formation,
and the real police had seen it the same way. Milosevic produced the
documents proving that B-1115 and his so-called “reserve police” were
all arrested by the real police and charged with armed insurrection
under article 124 of the penal code; so much for B-1115’s claim about
being the innocent unarmed civilian.
B-1115 also claimed to have seen Montenegrin Red Berets training the
VRS at a base near Doboj while he was allegedly being held prisoner.
The problem with this is that there has never been any such thing as
Montenegrin Red Berets. They are a figment of B-1115’s imagination.
So B-1115 was a member of a Muslim paramilitary group that was
engaging in armed insurrection, yet he claimed to be an unarmed
civilian living in a village where no armed conflicts were taking
place. B-1115 claimed to be the Serb’s prisoner, but at the times he
was allegedly being held he saw things that never existed. He is very
typical for the sorts of witness’s that the prosecution likes to bring.
After B-1115 finished another secret witness testifying under the
pseudonym of “B-1445” took the stand.
B-1445 was a member of the B-H parliament from Doboj and one of the
founders of the SDA.
According to B-1445 the attack on Doboj took place on May 3, 1992.
B-1445 said that he witnessed the attack and that members of Arkan’s
Tigers and Seselj’s White Eagles took part in the attack. Of course
B-1445 didn’t actually see Tigers and White Eagles taking part in the
attack he only heard about that later on from some other people.
B-1445, who claimed to have witnessed the attack, said that he fled
Doboj on the afternoon of May 3, 1992. This is interesting since the
previous secret witness (B-1115) said that the attack didn’t begin
until 5 PM, so how could B-1445 have witnessed the attack if he wasn’t
even there when it happened?
Because B-1445 was an SDA MP and one of the founders of the party,
President Milosevic asked him whether or not it was true that the SDA
was the first party formed on an ethnic basis. B-1445 confirmed that
the SDA had been founded before the SDS and the HDZ.
B-1445 also confirmed that in 1992 the Bosnian constitution explicitly
stated that decisions had to be made on the basis of consensus of
Bosnia’s 3 constituent peoples: the Serbs, the Croats, and the Muslims.
Because B-1445 had admitted that decisions had to be made on the basis
of consensus of all 3 peoples, he put himself in a very uncomfortable
position. President Milosevic asked him if he was aware that the
Serbian people had been against succession, but that the decision was
none the less made to separate from Yugoslavia against the will of the
Serbian people?
Because he had admitted what the law was, B-1445 was stuck, and so he
decided to lie and say that the Serbs were not against succession. I
don’t know what sort of Serbs that B-1445 has been talking to, but I
have certainly never met the Serb who favored the succession of
Bosnia-Herzegovina from Yugoslavia.
President Milosevic asked B-1445 if Alija Izetbegovic favored the
establishment of an Islamic state. B-1445 said that Izetbegovic didn’t
want any such thing. However Alija Izetbegovic’s “Islamic Declaration”
indicates something quite different.
President Milosevic began to ask B-1445 about the presence of Arab
mujahedeens in Bosnia. It was at this point that the so-called “judge”
May had to intervene and save the witness. May prohibited Milosevic
from pursuing this line of questioning.
President Milosevic observed that the first killing that took place
after the illegal referendum on succession was the killing of a Serb
by four Muslims at a Serbian wedding celebration in Sarajevo.
President Milosevic then asked if this killing caused tensions to
increase.
The witness’s explanation was that murders happened all of the time in
Sarajevo, this was nothing remarkable, and besides the Serb who got
killed provoked his Muslim killers.
President Milosevic was clearly shocked that this witness had the gall
to claim that killings are something that is routine and that the
victim deserved to be murdered because he had allegedly provoked his
killer, and it was on that note that the proceedings ended. President
Milosevic will cross-examine the witness for 70 more minutes tomorrow.