1 Monday, 27 February 2006

2 [Open session]

3 [The witness entered court]

4 [The accused entered court]

5 --- Upon commencing at 9.03 a.m.

6 JUDGE ROBINSON: Let the witness make the declaration.

7 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I solemnly declare that I will speak

8 the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

9 JUDGE ROBINSON: You may be seated.

10 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you.

11 WITNESS: SLOBODAN JARCEVIC

12 [Witness answered through interpreter]

13 JUDGE ROBINSON: You may begin, Mr. Milosevic.

14 Examination by Mr. Milosevic:

15 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, please. Microphone for the

16 accused.

17 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

18 Q. [No interpretation].

19 THE INTERPRETER: The witness says he cannot hear properly.

20 JUDGE ROBINSON: That's a technical problem. Can we have that

21 attended to and corrected?

22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] My name is Slobodan Jarcevic. I was

23 born on the 2nd of February, 1942, in Gornje Ravno, Bosnia-Herzegovina. I

24 am one of the babies, few babies that survived of the Croatian Holocaust

25 against the Jews and Serbs in my native region.

1 Q. Tell us, please, something about your education and your

2 professional life.

3 A. My family was from Bosnia. It relocated to Serbia pursuant to a

4 Serbian government decision in 1946 where I went to primary school and

5 secondary school and graduated at the Faculty of Political Sciences in

6 Belgrade. I am a member of the Association of Writers of Serbia. I

7 worked for 33 years. I was a diplomat of the Federal Republic of

8 Yugoslavia.

9 Q. And where did you serve?

10 A. I served in Zambia, India, Greece, Romania, and Kuwait for a

11 certain amount of time, whether it be shorter or longer.

12 Q. And what functions did you have during the war in Krajina?

13 A. From October 1992 until April 1994, I was minister of foreign

14 affairs of the Republic of Srpska Krajina, and from April 1994 until 1996,

15 I was foreign policy advisor to the president of Srpska Krajina, Milan

16 Martic.

17 Q. I assume that that is sufficient as regards your CV. We don't

18 need any further details for the time being. To start off with, I'm going

19 to ask you something that you have direct knowledge of and which is

20 connected to the indictment for Croatia. You were therefore, as you said,

21 the foreign minister in Krajina for most of the time. Now, in the Croatia

22 indictment, referring to responsibility and accountability or, rather,

23 paragraph 6, it says that some sort of joint criminal enterprise existed,

24 the purpose of which was the forcible removal of the majority of the Croat

25 and other non-Serb population from the territory of the Republic of

1 Croatia, that I allegedly planned to become part of a new Serb-dominated

2 state.

3 A. That kind of plan is an illusion. It never existed. In Belgrade

4 there was no politician there in Serbia or Montenegro. A criminal

5 enterprise just existed in the top political parties of Croatia, their top

6 echelons, and in the authorities of Croatia. It had as its purpose to do

7 away from the Croatia that was formed in AVNOJ and AVNOJ [as interpreted]

8 all the Serbs, and to do so in one way or another. There are many facts

9 about that, including United Nations documents which testify to it.

10 Q. What does it mean to do away with all Serbs in one way or another?

11 In what way to dispose of the Serbs?

12 A. For us to be able to understand that, we have to understand the

13 doctrine of the Croatian state. From the 19th century its programme was

14 as follows: Croatia, without any Orthodox Serbs in it. They must either

15 be destroyed, expelled, or Croatised, having converted them to Catholicism

16 before that. And I think that it is very interesting for the Trial

17 Chamber to hear from me that this was done through school textbooks. In

18 each of the school textbooks, it says that the father of the Croatian

19 state is Ante Starcevic, and he wrote in the 19th century that Serbs were

20 citizens of a lower order and that they should be beaten with an axe. So

21 for 60 years, in all the school textbooks and university textbooks, that

22 formulation survived.

23 Q. Yes, but let's go back to the material period that is incorporated

24 in the indictment. Tell us this, please: When did violence and crimes in

25 that area begin and who perpetrated them?

1 A. When I said that Croatia had as its doctrine the annihilation of

2 the Serbs, if we -- if we don't take into account what the Austrians did

3 to the Croats in World War I, the second attempt to persecute the Serbs

4 and expulse them from present-day Croatia began in 1939 under the direct

5 demands of the fascist countries.

6 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Jarcevic, Mr. Milosevic, to his credit,

7 directed you to speak about the time covered by the indictment, but you

8 have gone back to the 1930s and 1940s. Just concentrate on the question

9 asked.

10 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you. I have completed what I

11 wanted to say about 1939. The next attempt at Serb expulsion was in 1971,

12 and persecution, with the so-called maspok, or mass movement in Croatia,

13 which was not a long time ago, and it was the cadres which led this

14 Croatian spring, or maspok, with the intention of persecuting the Serbs

15 were at the beginning of the political parties in 1990. And among them we

16 have Franjo Tudjman, Stipe Mesic, Djapic, and the rest of the leaders of

17 today's political parties.

18 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

19 Q. Well, let's stick to that time frame and those years. Tell us

20 what your knowledge is about what actually the Croatian authorities had

21 been planning for the territory inhabited by Serbs in Croatia.

22 A. It is probably very difficult for those of you who do not come

23 from the Balkans to understand all the religious and nationalistic

24 complications of the former Yugoslavia, but when it comes to Croatia,

25 we'll be able to show this best taking the example of the European

1 countries. Croatia was the same thing that Belgium is today. That is to

2 say a bi-national state, a state of the Croats and the Serbs.

3 The first things the Croatian leaders planned to do is this: They

4 planned to have this bi-national or two-nation Croatia turned into a

5 one-nation Croatia, and not to call it the state of the Serbs and Croats

6 any more but just the state of the Croats. That was the lever which would

7 trigger off all the terrible events that came to pass later on.

8 Q. What was the political situation in Croatia in 1990?

9 A. It was a terrible situation, precisely because the constitution

10 had been changed, and that two-nation state was turned into a

11 single-nation state, and measures immediately followed that were very

12 stringent towards the Serbs, brutal towards the Serbs. They started

13 throwing Serbs out of their jobs, first all out of the police stations,

14 then the explanation they had given for dismissing Serbs was the kind that

15 was never noted in any country anywhere in the world. For example, a

16 certain man is being dismissed from his job because he is not showing

17 sufficient respect for the Croatian authorities. That was one of the

18 formulations that you would find in letters of dismissal to thousands and

19 thousands of Serbs from Dubrovnik, Split, Zadar, Karlovac, Rijeka, all

20 these people being dismissed. And they were living far away from the

21 subject matter this Trial Chamber is involved in Srpska Krajina.

22 Q. You are talking about areas in Croatia that are not incorporated

23 in the definition of the territory of Srpska Krajina's autonomous

24 provinces and so on, districts and so on and so forth, the SAOs.

25 A. Yes, and I'm very surprised to see that there wasn't an indictment

1 raised by the Prosecution against those who expelled 400.000 Serbs from

2 Croatian towns. That is the largest ethnic cleansing on the territory of

3 the former Yugoslavia that ever took place. And there are documents to

4 bear this out from the Security Council, and I can say a few words about

5 them if the Trial Chamber would be interested in hearing it.

6 JUDGE ROBINSON: Next question, Mr. Milosevic.

7 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

8 Q. You said a few words about the general climate that prevailed and

9 the events that took place in 1990. Now, how did the Serbs react in

10 Croatia to those events and to those developments and that general mood

11 that prevailed, the violence that threatened them and that happened to

12 them?

13 A. In 1990, or the year 1990 froze the marrow in the Serb bones, as

14 we like to say. There are probably similar proverbs in other languages

15 too. Let me tell you, in 1990 the Serb leader Raskovic, in Sibenik and

16 Zadar, was shown a petition with signatures saying that he should move out

17 of town, and one of the foremost journalists of Croatia, Tanja Torbarina,

18 in 1990, in the paper Vjesnik says, "I'm not a racist. Who can say that I

19 am just for the fact that I hate Serbs more than I hate blacks?" What

20 does that mean? It means what she considers the Serbs -- the blacks to be

21 a low race and the blacks an even lower race -- and the Serbs an even

22 lower race. I have one of those articles here. It says the Serbs are

23 livestock from the east. You can never teach them anything, and they

24 behave like a bull in a china shop. Along with articles of this kind, and

25 even worse articles, you had Serb houses being set fire to and destroyed,

1 as well as shops, et cetera, and this was still far away from the Republic

2 of Srpska Krajina. There were Sisak, Zagreb, and Dubrovnik where this was

3 going on. For example, Dubrovnik is being mentioned here quite a lot and

4 he experienced 2.200 Serbs being expelled. If you take it that a family

5 has three family members, that is 700 households that were looted, seized

6 and so on. Seven hundred houses were seized, in fact.

7 Q. When you say that the Serbs froze in their bones, was that a

8 general fear or can you pinpoint that fear to individual geographic areas

9 in Croatia at that time?

10 A. Well, the threats came through the mass media, and if they weren't

11 direct threats, then there was news passed by the media saying one house

12 had just been set on fire, or another economic facility, another shop, and

13 you would always hear the name and surname of the owner, which means that

14 you could recognise through these names that they were Serb names and

15 Serbs who were under jeopardy, nobody else. Just some Serbs happened to

16 be protected if there were some reasonable men at a local level that

17 didn't look -- listen to what they were being ordered either by the police

18 or from state institutions. However, it is difficult today to recognise

19 which those areas in fact were, because there is no single region of

20 Croatia, I say further afield from the Republic of Srpska Krajina, whose

21 inhabitants do not live as fugitives all over the world; in the United

22 States of America, Australia, and so on.

23 Q. When did the different political parties in Croatia begin to

24 appear, and what was the attitude taken by the main political parties in

25 Croatia with respect to current policy and the security policy and

1 situation in Croatia?

2 A. The fact that the HDZ and the Croatian Rights Movement -- Party,

3 and perhaps some others that directly relied upon the ideology of Ante

4 Starcevic to the effect that the Serbs should be beaten with an axe, other

5 parties too had similar party programmes against the Serbs but they did

6 not publicly manifest them. I cannot see that there was a single party in

7 Croatia with a programme to protect the Serbs and to preserve Croatia as a

8 two-nation state. There was nobody in the Sabor or parliament voting

9 against any changes in the constitution which would enact a single-nation

10 state instead of a two-nation state.

11 Q. And what happened to the Serb political -- Serb political

12 organisation at that time, that is to say when those events took place and

13 when they unfolded? So what was the behaviour and conduct of the Serbian

14 Democratic Party, for example?

15 A. The political activity of the Serbs at that time was

16 supra-national, supra-ethnic, and the Serbs joined parties which also had

17 Croats among their members. They hoped that through the policy of

18 Yugoslavia that had been implemented up to that time, the policy of

19 brotherhood and unity that had been in force since World War II, they

20 would preserve Yugoslavia and suppress this dangerous Croatian nationalism

21 as had been done in 1971. However, they soon realised that the Croatian

22 cadres in these common or joint political parties were not contributing to

23 the implementation of this policy. Croatian voters mostly voted for

24 parties which openly expressed their programme and their wish to have

25 Croatia become a one-nation state. The plan was in 1990 to make Croatia a

1 state devoid of Serbs.

2 Q. And who were the main organisers of this policy in Croatia all

3 this time? Not in history. I am not asking you about history now but

4 about that time.

5 A. Franjo Tudjman was at the top of it all, because -- I do have to

6 go a little way back into the past. There were Croatian emigres in many

7 Western countries - Australia, America, England, France - and they gave

8 him selfless assistance in money and everything else, and propaganda. The

9 president of Croatia today, Mesic, Racan, and everybody had the same kind

10 of policy. No one can deny that all the leaders of all the Croatian

11 political parties were preparing for what was to happen in 1991 and 1992.

12 That is the expulsion of Serbs from Croatian towns.

13 It might be interesting to explain why the towns were the first:

14 Because the Krajina was sparsely populated, and in the former Yugoslavia

15 it had been neglected. There was no industrial development. Industrial

16 development took place in towns. This naturally moved the Serbs from the

17 Krajina to go to the cities on the coast where there was tourism, or to

18 Zagreb, which was a large industrial centre, to Karlovac, Rijeka, Osijek,

19 and so on.

20 The majority of the Serb population was no longer in the Krajina.

21 According to the information received from the Croatian embassy in New

22 York, there were 471.000 Serbs in the towns, whereas there were only

23 251.000 in the Krajina. If we add those figures up, we see to what extent

24 the Croatian state was indoctrinated against the Serbs. Official

25 statistical data said that there was only 581.000 Serbs in Croatia;

1 however, if you add up these two figures, you see it's over 700.000.

2 In Knin in 1992 and 1993, we re-checked these figures, and it

3 appears that there were over a million Serbs in Croatia. One could

4 reconstruct this taking into account the Croatian information from the

5 Security Council mentioning 471.000 Serbs. Why? Because these were the

6 Serbs in all the municipalities added up, and this is more convincing than

7 the census that was published at republican level. Evidently the number

8 of Serbs was always reduced.

9 Q. You said that there was fear among the Serbs because of all these

10 events that you have mentioned. Was there anything coming from Belgrade

11 that might fan the flames of that fear?

12 A. Mr. President, for heaven's sake, was there any impulse needed

13 from outside the borders of Croatia to lead the Serbs to conclude they

14 were in mortal danger? The same kind of measures taken by Franjo

15 Tudjman's government had been literally implemented in 1941 in fascist

16 Croatia. One doesn't have to be highly intelligent to realise that the

17 Croatian authorities were to take up arms and take the same road they had

18 taken in 1941. Had there been a Great Wall of China between Serbia and

19 Montenegro and the Croatia of today, the Serbs would probably have been

20 even more determined to defend themselves. This way, they placed their

21 hopes in the Yugoslav People's Army, and they perhaps prepared to a lesser

22 extent than they should have.

23 Q. When did this violence in Croatia begin specifically?

24 A. It began in 1990 when Croatian newspapers were full of the kind of

25 writing I've just described. And all the Serbs who were employed in the

1 police, that is the Ministry of the Interior, were dismissed from their

2 jobs.

3 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Jarcevic, are you reading from notes?

4 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I don't have to read, but I can if

5 you like, because I have brought some --

6 JUDGE ROBINSON: No. I just need to know whether you're reading

7 from notes and, if you are, then whether you have prepared the notes.

8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] When I was about to come here, a man

9 downloaded from the internet something that the Serbian forum in Zagreb

10 had posted on the internet, and it is some information which is hard to

11 memorise, although in 1992 and 1993, when I was minister, I knew it all by

12 heart, but you can't expect a man to remember every detail. However, I

13 will speak in general. And you can get all this information from the

14 Croatian government, which I think is duty-bound, as is the Yugoslav

15 government, to provide information to this Tribunal.

16 In 1990, dismissals of policemen began. According to the

17 information gathered by the Serb Democratic Forum, headed by Pupovac, you

18 can see that dozens of policemen were dismissed in every town. People who

19 were dismissed from their jobs in various companies or government jobs,

20 that is not recorded anywhere, but you can compare this to the statistical

21 data in Serbia and Montenegro where these people arrived as refugees. Of

22 course, in 1992, the government of the Republic of Srpska Krajina asked

23 all the countries to which these people had gone in Western Europe,

24 Canada, America, Australia, to give us this information and to tell us how

25 many Serbs had arrived in these countries in 1993 who had left Croatian

1 towns, but no government gave us this information.

2 We sent several notes to the Security Council, asking them to ask

3 their members and the members of the UN to get this information from their

4 immigration authorities, but they refused to give us this data.

5 However, let me add something that's very interesting.

6 Boutros-Ghali, when we exerted pressure on him, on the 15th of May, 1993,

7 read out that the number of Serbs who had fled to the Krajina and to

8 Serbia and Montenegro amounted to 251.000. If one trusts the

9 Secretary-General, then the information provided by the Croatian embassy

10 about 471.000 Serbs is quite correct.

11 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

12 Q. Mr. Jarcevic, in connection with the figures are you mentioning,

13 you have brought here a copy of a letter from the then Croatian ambassador

14 containing some of this information. It's in tab 16. Can you please look

15 at it and tell us about this information.

16 A. Mr. President, I don't have to look at it. I think I know it off

17 by heart. The Croatian embassy is informing the Security Council that in

18 the Krajina, that is in the UN protected area, there are only 189.000

19 Croats. However, if we look at the extent of the suffering -- that's not

20 it. If we look at the extent of the suffering of the Serbs and Croats,

21 when you look at the number of Serbs who were there and the number of

22 Croats who were on the other side, you will see that there were two and a

23 half times more Serbs who suffered than the number of Croats who were

24 withdrawn in an organised manner from the Republic of Srpska Krajina.

25 Q. Can you pause for a moment, please. You've just said "withdrawn

1 in an organised manner" referring to Serbs from the territory of the

2 Republic of Srpska Krajina. What do you know about this?

3 A. Mr. President, if we use basic logic, the fact that in the world

4 -- the fact that 471.000 Serbs were expelled has been concealed. One

5 wonders how the media and the UN could have overlooked this. Then of

6 course it was much easier on the Croatian side to organise the departure

7 of the Serbs from the Serbian Krajina, and there were only 189.000 of

8 these.

9 Q. And who organised the departure from the Republic of Srpska

10 Krajina?

11 A. As I said, it was organised by the Croatian government in order to

12 demonstrate to the world how cruel the Serbs were and how they could not

13 tolerate people of other ethnicities or religions. This kind of language

14 was omnipresent and can be found even in the most prestigious European and

15 American media.

16 Of the 471.000 Serbs that I've mentioned, there is no information

17 to this very day that this was ever discussed in any UN body, for example,

18 or any body of the European Union, or anywhere else except - and we may

19 come to this - that the Republic of Serbian Krajina received some signals

20 from European international organisations to the effect that this is an

21 issue that will soon be raised. And it's already been raised at the

22 session of the Council of Europe of the 26th of January.

23 Q. What year?

24 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, you have directed our attention to

25 tab 16, the letter from the Croatian ambassador to the Secretary-General

1 of the UN. There's an explanatory memorandum. What part of the

2 memorandum do you wish us to attend to?

3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I haven't finished with this.

4 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Just let me have a look.

5 JUDGE ROBINSON: No. I'm asking Mr. Milosevic.

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, I understand that.

7 JUDGE ROBINSON: [Previous translation continues] ...

8 JUDGE KWON: Next page, Mr. Nort.

9 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] In this explanatory memorandum that

10 he has provided, figures are mentioned. I was only interested in the

11 figures that Mr. Jarcevic could comment upon. As to the political

12 explanations, these are irrelevant for our purposes. These are political

13 phrases used at that time.

14 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

15 Q. Mr. Jarcevic --

16 JUDGE ROBINSON: The second paragraph. What is the point of

17 directing us to a memorandum and you don't tell us what aspect of it you

18 wish to rely on? In the second paragraph there is a reference to some

19 figures.

20 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Yes. In the second paragraph there

21 are some figures mentioned. You see, it says here as a result --

22 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

23 Q. Please look, Mr. Jarcevic, at paragraph 2, and I will ask you --

24 A. What tab?

25 Q. Sixteen. This is the letter dated the 27th of May, 1994, sent by

1 the permanent mission of the Republic of Croatia to the United Nations.

2 It's a letter signed by Mario Nobilo, and there are figures that are

3 mentioned here.

4 A. I'm just waiting for them to assist me. Yes.

5 Q. I -- have you found it?

6 A. Yes, I have. The gentleman helped me, and I'm grateful to him.

7 Q. I just wanted to ask you whether these figures that the Croatian

8 government is submitting to the Secretary-General are correct. It says

9 here: "According to the census of 1991, [In English] 500.000 -- 533.202

10 people lived in territories that are presently under Serbian occupation."

11 [Interpretation] Were these territories under Serbian occupation at the

12 time?

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] May I reply?

14 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.

15 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you very much. Look here:

16 The Croats say here that there are 533.000 people who lived there. Of

17 them, 271.000 were Serbs, and there were 72.000 others. These were

18 Yugoslavs, but 80 per cent of those were Serbs again. So if we were to

19 add this up, there were 320.000 Serbs. And as the Croatian ambassador

20 says, there were 189.000 Croats. It's really impossible that the Serbs

21 occupied their own country. This has entered the political vocabulary of

22 the world, and it is a wonder that this has survived to this day.

23 Secondly, the Croats say that the Serbs expelled 251.000 Croats

24 from the Krajina.

25 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

1 Q. Where does he say that?

2 A. I think it's in the very next letter, if you -- here it is:

3 250.000 Croats were expelled from the occupied parts of Croatia.

4 JUDGE ROBINSON: Where do we find that?

5 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I have this page.

6 JUDGE ROBINSON: Tab 17?

7 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] It's a letter --

8 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, you must manage your case better

9 than you're doing. We are now being asked to look at tab 17.

10 MR. KAY: Paragraph 3, about six lines up.

11 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, we have found it.

12 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

13 Q. Is that what you were talking about?

14 A. Yes.

15 Q. Where it says, under point 3, in the middle of that paragraph:

16 "[In English] About 250.000 Croats have been expelled from the occupied

17 areas of Croatia."

18 [Interpretation] So more Croats were expelled than had lived

19 there, according to the census?

20 A. Yes, 60.000 more, approximately.

21 Q. Mr. Jarcevic, as you were the minister of foreign affairs of the

22 Krajina, were there any Croats in those areas during the war; in Knin, in

23 other towns? Were there any Croats there?

24 A. Yes. Unfortunately, I can't give you the numbers because I didn't

25 delve into that at the time, but there were Croats in Knin, Vukovar,

1 Baranja, and several villages in Lika. However, one should know that many

2 Croats were employed in the administration of the Republic of Srpska

3 Krajina, and some even joined the army.

4 A few days ago, I ran into a man, a Croat, who until 2005 had been

5 the commander of the garrison in Mladenovci, which is 60 kilometres south

6 of Belgrade. He retired only last year.

7 Q. To sum up, what, according to you, are the realistic figures

8 demonstrating how many Serbs lived in Croatia, how many were expelled, and

9 where they went?

10 A. Mr. President, there are no realistic figures to be found anywhere

11 today. Unfortunately, in the former Yugoslavia in many republics and

12 provinces, when the census was taken, the results were forged. For

13 example, in Kosovo, a far larger number of Siptars was shown to be there

14 and a far smaller number of Serbs.

15 In 1993 in Knin, the government tried to get more precise

16 information about the Serbs in the former Croatia, and they arrived at a

17 number which was over a million. In Croatia there were between 22 and 25

18 per cent Serbs and not 12 per cent, as Croatian statistics falsely

19 represented.

20 I wish to draw attention once again to the number the Croats

21 obtained by adding up the numbers of Serbs in the various municipalities,

22 which they handed over to the Secretary-General. There were 471.000 Serbs

23 in the big towns alone. Unfortunately, this document was seized by the

24 Croatian police as was the entire archives in Knin.

25 Q. All right. Let's not dwell on this any longer and let's move on.

1 To the best of your knowledge, how many Serbs fled from Croatia in 1990

2 and 1991? I'm not talking about what happened later, the attacks that

3 took place during Flash and Storm and Western Slavonia, et cetera.

4 A. I am not competent to utter that figure in my own name on the

5 basis of the information that the government of the Krajina had. As I

6 said, these documents were seized. But let us rely on Boutros-Ghali's

7 report that says that until the beginning of 1993, that is to say in 1991,

8 1992 and 1993, the following number was expelled only to Yugoslavia and to

9 Krajina, that is 251.000 Serbs. Only Germany reacted to our letter when

10 in 1993 we asked European countries to give us information about the

11 number of Serbs who sought shelter there. However, the reaction of the

12 German state was very strange. They only said that all of those who came

13 to Croatia -- to Germany from Croatia would be returned. Of course, that

14 led the government of the Serb Krajina to write a note to the German

15 embassy in Belgrade and ask them to tell the government not to return

16 people to areas where they were in danger. That is a very basic tenet of

17 the UN: You cannot return refugees to areas where they would live under

18 the threat of robbery, killing, et cetera.

19 JUDGE ROBINSON: I'm going to ask you to endeavour to answer more

20 briefly. Concentrate on the question. There is a tendency to digress.

21 Yes, Mr. Milosevic.

22 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

23 Q. You said now, in view of these documents of the United Nations,

24 that the representatives of the international community knew about the

25 magnitude of the problem that existed then and they knew about this great

1 wave of refugees, Serb refugees from those areas outside the Republic of

2 Serb Krajina, the Serb refugees that fled from other parts of Croatia. Did

3 you personally talk to any representatives of the international community

4 about that, in view of the fact that you were foreign minister?

5 A. Yes, with many, but I'm afraid that the Chamber is going to say

6 that I go on and on at great length. However, if noteworthy, I'm going to

7 describe these conversations. Gert Ahrends --

8 Q. Gert Ahrends.

9 A. Yes.

10 Q. Oh, I remember him, yes, Ambassador Gert Ahrends. He spoke

11 Serbian.

12 A. He spoke Serbian better than I do. Then Kofi Annan as well, then

13 General Wahlgren, then I talked to Cyrus Vance about this in February

14 1993. If you find this of interest, I can tell you about what was said

15 during these meetings.

16 Q. Tell us just as briefly as possible. What did you talk about to

17 Gert Ahrends?

18 A. As for Gert Ahrends, I talked to him about refugees from Croat

19 towns in Germany, and he said the German government is not going to give

20 you any information in writing, and the embassy in Belgrade is not going

21 to give any information; however, what I am conveying to you is that the

22 German government gave up on returning Serb ex-police from Croatian towns.

23 They will remain in Germany, although Germany has the largest expenses

24 among all the European countries in terms of supporting such refugees.

25 And then he went on to other matter that are not that interesting.

1 Then I talked to Cyrus Vance about all of this. Our delegation

2 was in New York then.

3 Q. When was that?

4 A. February 1993. That was before the Secretary-General read that

5 251.000 Serbs were expelled from Croat towns to Yugoslavia and to the

6 Republic of Serb Krajina. And then when I talked to Vance, I was on the

7 delegation that was led by Goran Hadzic, the president of the Republic of

8 Serb Krajina. I took the floor, and we and the Croats and Vance had the

9 draft Resolution 815 in our hands then. I asked Mr. Vance the following:

10 If this draft Resolution is ultimately adopted, then your own plan, the

11 Vance Plan, will go down the drain, because the Resolution will say that

12 the Republic of Serb Krajina is part of Croatia, the Republic of Croatia.

13 Mr. Vance, are you not going to protect your own plan? You have time to

14 intervene with the Security Council.

15 He kept silent for a long time, and then he said the Security

16 Council has too great an authority for me to be able to intervene. Then I

17 asked both him and Thornberry, who sat next to him, why there is no

18 mention in these resolutions of the persecution of Serbs and their

19 expulsion from Croat towns. Why is there no mention of that? Why is

20 there no punishment for that? He kept quiet and he said that nothing

21 could be done against Croatia because no Resolution envisages any such

22 thing. That is to say that no Resolution calls for Croatia to do that.

23 That was quite a surprise. I could not believe it, why no one had to be

24 punished if they persecuted Serbs or expelled Serbs.

25 I asked him about another matter, too. If you think,

1 Mr. President, I can talk about that as well, but can I tell you about

2 Kofi Annan's reaction?

3 Q. All right. Kofi Annan at that time was under-secretary for

4 operations, and these operations were taking place in the UNPAs; isn't

5 that right?

6 A. He was commander of the peace forces.

7 Q. He was no commander of the peace forces. He was the

8 under-secretary in charge of peace operations of the UN throughout the

9 world.

10 A. Well, yes, that's what he was. He visited Knin. He had a meeting

11 with the government, and the deputy Prime Minister spoke, Branko Lubovac,

12 and he asked Mr. Kofi Annan, "What about the officers and soldiers who are

13 in the Serb Krajina? Are they not going to protect the Serbs?" He

14 expressed his doubts. He thought that they would not do that because he

15 mentioned this expulsion of Serbs from Croat towns. However, Kofi Annan

16 got visibly angry - he even raised his voice - and he said, "Officers and

17 soldiers who serve here on -- within the peacekeeping missions will keep

18 their military honour, and they will protect your people."

19 After that meeting, I asked him, "Mr. Kofi Annan, this republic of

20 ours of the Serb Krajina, which is officially called a UNPA, why is it now

21 under UN sanctions? Is there any logic involved there that you who are

22 protecting us are now punishing us so severely, which is going to lead to

23 the population that sought refuge from the Croat towns leave?" I was

24 surprised. Mr. Kofi Annan hugged me. He put his arms around me, and he

25 said, "Let's go and have lunch. We really made a mistake. We don't know

1 how to get out of all this."

2 And then also I talked to General Wahlgren on the plane when we

3 went to Geneva.

4 Q. All right. General Wahlgren was for awhile commander of the UN

5 peace forces.

6 A. Yes. He was a Norwegian, and in March we were on the same plane,

7 travelling to Geneva where, after the New York negotiations, the same

8 talks continued in Geneva. Then I asked Mr. Wahlgren why no document of

9 the UN mentions the Serbs who were expelled from towns. And he said no,

10 no, no, that is referred to. And he called one of his officers on the

11 plane and he said give me all the documents, give me all the Resolutions

12 of the Security Council. And they were reading all of this as we were

13 flying over Croatia, Austria, all the way to Geneva. And then he said,

14 "Mr. Jarcevic, indeed there is no mention, but I'm going to do my best

15 that this is referred to." And he promised that he would raise the

16 question in New York of the expulsion of Serbs from Croatian towns.

17 However, I think this was sometime in August 1993, and he was transferred

18 from the peace forces there. And I said, "Mr. Wahlgren, what happened?"

19 And he said, "Mr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali did that to me in his democratic

20 circle," the democratic circle around him, under quotation marks. So

21 that's what he said.

22 Q. Did you talk to the first commander of the UN Protection Force,

23 the Indian general, Nambiar, General Nambiar?

24 A. Yes. That was a very interesting conversation at the beginning of

25 1993. I was minister for only three months then and he was about to

1 leave, and I paid him a farewell call and I asked him, "General, tell me,

2 why is there no mention of the expelled Serbs from Croatian towns?" He

3 was visibly moved. He went silent. He put his head down, and I hope that

4 you will believe me because I do not have any documents corroborating

5 this. That was also seized in Knin. He said: "Well, there is mention of

6 that. The Security Council has detailed information about crimes

7 committed against Serbs in Croatia and detailed information about the

8 expulsion of Serbs that you are asking me about now, but believe me,

9 Minister -" he even called me a minister - "this information is in the

10 Security Council, but they are sealed off." This is a terrible thing to

11 say, I know, but I swore to tell the truth.

12 Q. Parallel to what happened at the beginning of the conflict and the

13 initial tensions in Croatia, do you know until when Serb representatives

14 were involved in regular political life and were -- how long were they in

15 the Croatian parliament too?

16 A. Mr. President, at that time I was not a member of the Krajina

17 government. I already said I came in mid-October 1992 when this had

18 already happened. But it so happens that I know three persons from the

19 then Croatian parliament in 1992. That's Marko Atlagic, who has already

20 testified here; Mr. Ratko Licina; and -- how can I not remember the third

21 name? Maybe I'll remember. Yes, Rade Tanga. He was a member of

22 parliament who was seen by the entire world because he went up to the

23 rostrum and he spoke about the bi-national Croatia, and he wanted to say

24 something about the statehood of the Serb peoples sending back to the days

25 of Austria. And he uttered a sentence, and he said that that statehood

1 supersedes the statehood of the Croatian people. And then one of the MPs

2 threw his briefcase at him and walked up to him, threatening him

3 physically. So that is how Serb MPs fared in the Croatian parliament.

4 What I have here is the Serb constitution from 1630. If you wish,

5 I can show it on this overhead projector and you will see that Serbs in

6 Austria had their municipal courts, had their Supreme Court, and no

7 organisation or no court from Austria had the right to intervene except

8 for the emperor himself. When Mr. Tanga wanted to say that, and when he

9 wanted to call the Croatian MPs to reason, not turning Croatia into a

10 one-nation state, I told you how he fared.

11 Q. Tell us, did you follow what happened and what led to the

12 referendum on the sovereignty and autonomy of the Serb people in Croatia?

13 When did this referendum take place? What was the reason for it to be

14 held, and how did this happen?

15 A. Mr. President, when you asked me whether anybody organised the

16 persecution of Croats, of course there was no mention of that, not in a

17 single Serb party or a Serb body or a Serb organisation. The Serbs, as

18 always, wanted Yugoslavia to be preserved. And then, when they saw that

19 the Croatian MPs started voting the way they did, as I've already

20 explained, then they tried, in that State of Croatia, to win at least

21 cultural autonomy, because they realised that the Croats would not say

22 that there were two equal peoples, peoples who had statehood within

23 Croatia, that there would be no going back to that.

24 When this persecution of Serbs started and when more and more were

25 being expelled from the cities, and when they realised that this was no

1 joking matter at all, I cannot remember the exact dates of all of this,

2 but then they moved on and held a referendum. 99 per cent of the

3 population, I think, of the Republic of Serb Krajina voted in favour of

4 creating a state of their own, as the Serbs presented in 1945.

5 I don't want to be criticised for going back to the past all the

6 time, but I would like to draw your attention to a paper that was part of

7 obtaining a master's degree at the University of Belgrade, and this has to

8 do with Serb-Croatian relations. And then at their Congress in 1945, on

9 the 29th and 30th of September - and this Congress was held in Zagreb, no

10 less - they voted in favour of a resolution asking that the future

11 Yugoslavia cannot cut off ties with all the Serbs within it, including

12 Serbs living in Croatia. So this will and content of the resolution of

13 the Serb people dating back to 1945 was denied. And may I repeat that

14 they were the only protagonists of the anti-fascist struggle in Croatia

15 during the Second World War.

16 Q. You mentioned the MA thesis, but you just take that as a source.

17 The document exists, doesn't it, what you mentioned? And you were talking

18 about the resolution of the Serb Congress at the end of the World War II.

19 A. Yes, that's right.

20 Q. And it was held in Zagreb.

21 A. Yes. I have a book about it. I can read out the sentence, if you

22 wish.

23 Q. Just read that one sentence out.

24 A. I have to get it out of my bag.

25 JUDGE ROBINSON: Do we really need that? He has already spoken

1 about it.

2 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, Mr. Robinson, not that. It

3 would be interesting for us to hear it regardless of whether you're going

4 to consider it or not. He's mentioning a master's degree paper as the

5 source of a document because he didn't find it anywhere else, but the

6 document is a well-known one. It exists. So perhaps he could be allowed

7 to read just one sentence out, if that is possible. If not, we can, of

8 course, move on.

9 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, I'll allow him to read one sentence.

10 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, it will take me some time to

11 find the book.

12 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

13 Q. All right. Never mind. We'll read it after the break. You can

14 find it during the break and, not to lose time, we can read it afterwards.

15 Let's move on now.

16 In connection with the referendum that you spoke about just now,

17 tell us, but just briefly, please, whether the authorities from Belgrade,

18 the Republic of Serbia, took part in the organisation of that referendum

19 or in any way influenced the outcome of the referendum.

20 A. The authorities could not influence the outcome of the referendum.

21 I don't say that there were not people from Serbia who went to assist and

22 offer advice over there and to give guidelines, organisationally speaking,

23 to their relations, because - perhaps the Chamber knows this or not - in

24 Serbia there are 2 million Serbs who originated from Krajina and

25 Bosnia-Herzegovina, and they still have their houses and land, both in

1 Krajina and in Bosnia. So of course they went to stay with their

2 relations and help them out.

3 Now, as far as the authorities are concerned, they had no

4 influence whatsoever on the events, because the Serbs in Krajina had

5 organised themselves to defend their very life and their property as well.

6 And for that you don't need any incentive from outside.

7 Q. Now, in Krajina at the time, were there a number of parties? When

8 I say numerous parties, I mean parties the membership of which was largely

9 made up of Serbs.

10 A. Well, let me tell you, there were a number of parties, and mostly

11 they were made up of Serb members. However, they did not have the same

12 programmes. For example, Mikelic's party had a pro-Yugoslav programme.

13 Then there was another party, I don't know its exact title, but it was a

14 social democratic party and it too had a Yugoslav programme. And that was

15 the best sign that the Serbs were not as extreme nationalists as the

16 Croats were in their political parties. But when we saw that the Croats

17 were not ready to lend a helping hand to Yugoslavia or to a two-nation

18 Croatia, then all these people turned towards the Serbian Radical Party --

19 or, rather, the Serbian Democratic Party. That was a slip of the tongue.

20 Q. Towards the SDS, which was the ruling party.

21 A. Yes. You also had the Serb Radical Party over there.

22 Q. And which party were you a member of? You were a minister in the

23 government of Krajina yourself. Which party did you belong to?

24 A. Mr. President, I was a member of the League of Communists of

25 Yugoslavia until 1990, and from 1990 onwards, throughout the time of my

1 political activity in the Republic of Serbian Krajina I was not a member

2 of any single party, and I informed the government that I would not join

3 up either with the Serbian Democratic Party -- that I would not join the

4 Serbian Democratic Party either.

5 Q. Bearing in mind the political, league -- well, I'm not going to

6 ask you about that. We've heard that from other witnesses, all the

7 changes that took place in laws and so on. I'll skip over all that,

8 because you were talking about political and legal changes in Croatia in

9 1990 and 1991. Now, what happened on the ground? Do you remember any

10 specific event or events which followed those political and legal changes?

11 A. Mr. President, we've already talked about this in one of your

12 first questions. There was dismissal from work. There was dismissal from

13 the police stations and the Ministry of the Interior, of Serbs; the

14 pilfering and looting of houses, setting fire to houses, destroying

15 houses.

16 Q. Yes. Well, you've already spoken about all this, these phenomena.

17 Can you be more specific?

18 A. I have a court ruling from Zadar dating back to one month where a

19 Serb lady - I have it in my bag - a Serb lady is being accorded damages

20 because her house was looted three times in 1990, and then damaged and

21 destroyed and razed to the ground. So I have the document in my

22 briefcase. And I assume your associates have that document too. I gave

23 it to them, I think a month ago.

24 Q. Well, we'll take a look at what it says in the document, but --

25 A. I apologise for interrupting, Mr. President, but in one of the

1 tabs, a report of the Secretariat of the Interior of Zadar, that is to say

2 Croatia, you have the number of explosions. Perhaps we could see it on

3 the overhead projector, the gentleman could perhaps place it on the

4 overhead projector, because it is a Croatian source, a Croatian police

5 source. So you can see that there were hundreds of explosions and fires

6 planted just in the town of Zadar itself. And Zadar is small coastal town

7 on the Adriatic coast, and it 28.000 Serbs living in it. Of course, all

8 of them, every single one of them were expelled.

9 Q. All right, from Zadar and the surrounding parts Serbs were

10 expelled. We've heard about that. Did they, the Serbs in Zadar, ever

11 give rise to this behaviour towards them, cause it?

12 A. No. They didn't give any cause for such brutal behaviour there or

13 anywhere else.

14 Q. What about Osijek and other towns in which no Serb forms of

15 organisation and defence were set up?

16 A. In all Croatian towns where there was no Serb organisation or

17 membership in the Serb Democratic Party, pogroms came to pass. And let me

18 tell you that a few days ago I saw documents from Sisak whereby lawyers

19 from Zagreb - and I'd like to thank them - the lawyers from Zagreb sent in

20 to this Tribunal a piece of evidence about 600 Serbs killed in Sisak and

21 the surrounding parts. The same thing happened in Osijek, the Drava River

22 area, where there were bodies in 1990. And in Osijek a very good local

23 leader, he was a German by origin, wanted to prevent this onslaught by the

24 Croatian police and soldiers against Serb civilians, but he was,

25 unfortunately, killed. I'm very sorry about that, I can't remember his

1 name, but the first refugees into Serbia were from Vukovar. Perhaps you

2 have an erroneous opinion of that town. Vukovar and the surrounding parts

3 had a Serb majority population. Let's go back to before World War II, a

4 much greater majority. And the rest of the Vukovar inhabitants were

5 Germans and Roma. In the Independent State of Croatia during World War

6 II, not a single Roma --

7 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Jarcevic, who carried out these expulsions?

8 How were they carried out?

9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That's so easy. So simple. It was

10 done by the Croatian state. All the organs of the Croatian state

11 persecuted the Serbs.

12 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, but give me the state officials. What state

13 officials carried out these expulsions?

14 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, I was lucky enough not to have

15 been living in Croatia at the time so I can't tell you the name of the man

16 who expelled people from a certain town.

17 JUDGE ROBINSON: [Previous translation continues] ...

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Oh, the organs, I see. The head of

19 state, Franjo Tudjman.

20 JUDGE ROBINSON: [Previous translation continues] ...

21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] He was at the head and led

22 everything.

23 JUDGE ROBINSON: I'm trying to find out who carried out the

24 expulsions. Was it the police or the army or what body?

25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The expulsions? Well, simple again,

1 Mr. President. It's very simple: The Croatian state armed almost all

2 adult Croatian males. They set up the Zengas, the ZNGs. They were a

3 paramilitary formation. So they were the ones that did it. The police

4 didn't stop them, they helped them. They helped them hide or keep the

5 identity of the perpetrators hidden. For example, there were 28.000

6 Serbs expelled from Zadar, and just imagine if from -- 28.000 Croats had

7 been expelled from a Serb town, for instance.

8 JUDGE ROBINSON: Who carried out the looting of Serb houses?

9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The looting was carried out by -- I

10 apologise for interrupting you. The question is a simple one: The

11 looting was carried out by the paramilitaries and the next-door

12 neighbours, unfortunately.

13 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.

14 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

15 Q. You said a moment ago, Mr. Jarcevic -- you asked what would have

16 happened had 28.000 Croats been expelled from Serbia, for instance. What

17 would have happened if only 28 Croats were expelled from Serbia? Have you

18 ever heard of even 28 Croats being expelled from Serbia, or two Croats,

19 for that matter, or any Croat being expelled from Serbia?

20 A. No, never.

21 Q. And have you ever heard of any Croat being killed in Serbia?

22 A. No. Today, Mr. President, there are more Croats in Serbia - I

23 happened to read some statistical data a few days ago - than there were in

24 1990.

25 Q. When you speak about the protagonists of those expulsions and

1 persecutions, do you remember the public statements made by Tudjman and

2 Mesic as a function of those expulsions and persecutions?

3 A. Yes, certainly, Mr. President. I think it was in 1991 when Stipe

4 threatened that the Croatian state, once it is established, will enable

5 all the Serbs in Croatia to fit under a single umbrella.

6 Q. I think you've mixed the dates up rather. Mesic spoke about that

7 in 1990 in Gospic, in the pre-election campaign, pre-election speech.

8 It's a famous speech of his when he said that all the Serbs would fit

9 under a single umbrella once the state is formed.

10 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: Now Mr. Milosevic is actually giving the

11 evidence. The witness does obviously not know about the event enough that

12 he can even place it in location and time.

13 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic. Refrain from giving

14 evidence. Let the witness give the evidence, if he can.

15 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, I was just adding an

16 explanation to what he knows and to what everybody knows in Yugoslavia.

17 JUDGE ROBINSON: This is not the time for explanations.

18 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Very well.

19 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

20 Q. Mr. Jarcevic, did you personally talk to people at that time who

21 were leaving Croatia?

22 A. Yes, I did. I talked to many of them.

23 Q. Those who were fleeing from Croatia?

24 A. Well, it was terrible to listen to all the stories of these

25 families. For example, Boro Kutic was a policeman in Pakrac, and he says

1 that just one local paper published the fact that he sent weapons to Knin

2 for the log revolution. At that point in time, nobody wanted to talk to

3 his children in school. I mean the Croatian children didn't want to talk

4 to his children, and his senior called him and said that he should resign

5 and leave his job. What could be worse? Or, for example, in Zagreb -

6 this is quite unbelievable - people were incited to convert to

7 Catholicism, saying that nothing would happen to them if they did so. In

8 the government we had three documents about this, and we asked the

9 Security Council and the Vatican, His Holiness Pope John Paul II, to treat

10 these cases in the way that the Human Rights Charter demands under point

11 E, I think, the crime of genocide. However, nobody turned a -- everybody

12 turned a blind eye to this.

13 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you, Mr. Jarcevic.

14 Mr. Milosevic -- Mr. Milosevic, would you just explain to me what

15 your case is as to how these acts against the Serbs relate to the charges

16 in the indictment.

17 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] They are related in such a way,

18 Mr. Robinson, that we can look at the events and see that the Serbs in

19 Croatia exclusively defended themselves, and that the war was the product

20 of the armed secession and a highly brutal form of violence towards them

21 and that, faced with a situation of that kind, they had to organise

22 themselves, and that certainly once there was a clash, there were clashes

23 and conflicts, there were crimes too.

24 JUDGE ROBINSON: Are you able to direct me to any paragraph in the

25 indictment, to any particular allegation in relation to which any of the

1 evidence given by Mr. Jarcevic points to a response by the Serbs, or are

2 we just at large and speaking in general terms?

3 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] We're not at large and in general

4 terms. I quoted at the beginning a part of the indictment according to

5 which there was a plan to expel the Croats --

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The Serbs.

7 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Yes, the fact that this was the

8 territory where the Serbs lived and where many who were expelled from the

9 rest of Croatia had taken refuge, and that all that was a form of their

10 defence and their protection and the realisation of their right to

11 self-defence. And ultimately you saw that the Vance Plan defined UNPA

12 zones, and we quoted what it says in the plan, to protect the population

13 in those areas, that is to say to protect the Serb population. Why would

14 somebody have to protect themselves if they were not under threat? So the

15 United Nations protected them then. And since they didn't protect them as

16 they had promised to do, so they endeavoured to protect themselves.

17 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you, Mr. Milosevic.

18 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] But after the arrival of the United

19 Nations, there was not a single aggressive act against Croatia.

20 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you. Thank you. In my view, it would be

21 to the better if you could relate his evidence more specifically to the

22 charges in the indictment. Proceed.

23 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

24 Q. You mentioned that the Serbs were converted to Catholicism. What

25 happened to the Serb Orthodox church in Croatia at that time? How was it

1 possible that there was this process to convert them, because there was

2 the Serb Orthodox Church there. It existed and had existed previously.

3 So what happened to the church, the Orthodox church?

4 A. It was terrible. That's the least that can be said. When the

5 believers came to the church in Zagreb, when the congregation rallied,

6 they were under threat. The Croats gathered together and members of

7 paramilitaries issued threats to them. They wrote on the churches, "Srbe

8 na vrbe," "Hang Serbs on trees," and other threats of that kind. And at

9 the time in the government we had the testimonies of people that were

10 recorded whereby the church premises or church yards were used as toilets.

11 So can you imagine a situation like that? When people saw that, they

12 didn't like coming to church because their lives were at stake.

13 Q. And who were the exponents of the most extreme behaviour against

14 the Serbs at the time? What social group?

15 A. Well, let me tell you, I don't want to speak about groups. Groups

16 were incited, and the state organs allowed them to behave the way they

17 did. Everybody knows that from 1990 to 1991, a lot of people arrived in

18 Croatia who were listed as fascists and terrorists everywhere in the

19 world. For example, the murderer of the Yugoslav ambassador in Sweden,

20 Rolovic, returned to Croatia. His name was Miro Barisic. Then in

21 Dalmatia, Pavelic suddenly turned up, pretending to be a fighter for human

22 rights. He was one of the survivors of the group in 1970 who had been

23 sent from Australia to raise a rebellion in Yugoslavia, and unfortunately,

24 they began their activities on Mount Radusa, where I was born. Such

25 people became esteemed in Croatia, and the media reported that Franjo

1 Tudjman liked to meet those people on his visits to the USA, Germany, and

2 other countries.

3 Q. You're talking about Ustasha emigres who then returned to Croatia.

4 A. Yes. These were emigres who had inherited the fascist ideology,

5 or the Nazi ideology.

6 Q. And what was the relationship between the return of those emigres

7 and the formation of the army, and how much of it was open and how much of

8 it was concealed?

9 A. The Croats did nothing covertly. They were proud of what they

10 were doing. They were proud that people were returning to Croatia who

11 could assist in the establishing of a Croatian army.

12 Q. And when did they begin forming those famous volunteer units on a

13 large scale?

14 A. In 1990, in Croatia, a secret import of weapons began. I think

15 that in these tabs there is a lot of information about that.

16 Unfortunately, these weapons were imported into Croatia secretly from

17 several European countries. I don't want to disparage European countries,

18 and I don't want to say that their police and military organs didn't know

19 about this import of weapons to arm units in friendly Yugoslavia. That's

20 what all European countries used to say about our country. There was a

21 plan, that is, which extended beyond the borders of Croatia.

22 Q. What was the National Guard Corps? Can you answer that briefly?

23 A. Yes. It was modelled after the Ustasha formations of 1941 and the

24 so-called National Guard of 1939 when the autonomous unit called the

25 Croatian Banovina was formed in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, and when many

1 Serb territories were included in it.

2 Q. In tab 4, we have a document that you brought here which

3 illustrates what you've just been saying. It's from the command of the

4 1st Military District. It's dated August 1990, and the date is the 27th

5 of August, 1990.

6 A. Yes.

7 Q. Look at what it says in the first paragraph. It says: "On the

8 18th of August, 1990, the presence of over a hundred persons from these

9 countries has been registered. This refers to Canada, Australia, and the

10 USA. Among them, several members of leaderships of certain extremist

11 organisations have been identified. These people are on the list of

12 Yugoslav citizens who are to be arrested if they attempt to enter the

13 country."

14 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, this is not translated. Put it

15 on --

16 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] We can put it on the ELMO, just page

17 1, just to see what this is.

18 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

19 Q. You're talking about the arrival of emigres. You mentioned

20 criminals. Would you read the second half of the first paragraph and tell

21 us what the date is here. Can we see the date?

22 A. Yes, we can see the date here. This is a document dated the 27th

23 of August, 1990. So that's very early on. And it's actually preparation

24 for what was to follow.

25 The Yugoslav organs knew, and that's the saddest thing about this,

1 because anywhere else all the people on this list would have been

2 arrested. And I hope that Interpol would have helped if any of them had

3 escaped. But because the members of the Yugoslav Presidency from Croatia

4 and Slovenia had a strong influence there and they advocated separatism,

5 this information was provided only to a narrow circle of politicians and

6 offices.

7 Q. There is mention here of the presence on the 18th of August, 1990,

8 at a rally of the HDZ in Sarajevo. Can you see this in the first

9 paragraph? So they were actually staying in Sarajevo, in Bosnia and

10 Herzegovina, and these persons whose names are listed in the footnote are

11 mentioned, and they should have been arrested but nobody arrested them.

12 A. Yes.

13 Q. Well, now, tell us, was there any connection between those

14 paramilitary units set up in Croatia and the Muslim side, which was also

15 creating some sort of paramilitary units at that time?

16 A. Yes. I hope the Presiding Judge will forgive me, but I have to go

17 back to World War II when the Muslims of Bosnia and Herzegovina were

18 declared to be the flowers of the Croatian nation. Franjo Tudjman, which

19 with the HDZ wanted to cut off Bosnia and Herzegovina together with the

20 Muslims from Yugoslavia and create a greater Croatia, such as Hitler had

21 created in 1941. And it was sickening to see those rallies in Bosnia and

22 Herzegovina where the Croatian and Muslims' flags were tied together and

23 the Serbian flag was nowhere to be seen, even though up to 20 or 30 years

24 before the Serbs had been the majority population in Bosnia and

25 Herzegovina, amounting to 64 per cent. They owned 64 per cent of the

1 land, that is. They were the owners of the new state, but yet the Croats

2 and the Muslims together wanted to separate it from Yugoslavia, and

3 probably they were planning the same fate for the Serbs in Bosnia and

4 Herzegovina that the Serbs had suffered in the Croatian towns.

5 Q. You mentioned the import of weapons. This has already been

6 documented before this Tribunal, so I will not document it again.

7 However, there is a very interesting document here in tab 5, and it refers

8 to the 13th of February, 1991. It's a note about talks between the

9 federal secretary, Budimir Loncar, with the state secretary of the MIP of

10 the Republic of Hungary on the 11th of February, 1991, in Belgrade.

11 A. Yes.

12 JUDGE ROBINSON: This is not translated. If you wish to cite a

13 particular portion, then we can put it on the ELMO.

14 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Very well. Put it on the ELMO.

15 First page 1 and then page 2.

16 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

17 Q. First I want to clarify with the witness: Do you know who Budimir

18 Loncar was?

19 A. Mr. President, yes; he was my boss.

20 Q. Yes, he was your boss, but was he the minister of foreign affairs

21 of the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia?

22 A. Yes, a cadre from Croatia.

23 Q. Yes, and a representative of Croatia in the federal government.

24 Who was the president of the federal -- who was the federal Prime

25 Minister?

1 A. It was Ante Markovic.

2 Q. Very well. So the Croat Ante Markovic was the Prime Minister;

3 Budimir Loncar, a Croat, was the minister of foreign affairs, and he was

4 having talks with the minister of foreign affairs of Hungary.

5 A. Yes. And what we see here.

6 Q. Just let's have a look at it because I want to go through the

7 document. On page 1, in the last paragraph, what does it say? Would you

8 read it, please.

9 A. The first paragraph?

10 Q. No, no. Page 1, last paragraph.

11 A. "First the incident erupted because of deliveries of weapons to

12 the organs in Croatia from Hungarian military reserves which is against

13 the mutual agreement."

14 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, sorry to interrupt you, but we

15 must take the break now. Twenty minutes.

16 --- Recess taken at 10.32 a.m.

17 --- On resuming at 10.56 a.m.

18 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic. Please continue.

19 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, please, for Mr. Milosevic.

20 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

21 Q. Mr. Jarcevic, please look at page 2.

22 A. Yes.

23 Q. In the middle of this first paragraph, which is very long, the

24 minister of foreign affairs says to his Hungarian colleague: "The

25 delivery of weapons from Hungary under such conditions represents

1 sabotage." That's what he tells his colleague. And several lines lower

2 down, he says -- read it: "We have always said that --"

3 A. "We have always said that our relations with Hungary are ideal.

4 This consignment of weapons, however, has caused unease in Yugoslavia as

5 well as reactions in Hungary, especially in the parliament."

6 Q. Very well. Now, please go on to the next paragraph, where it

7 says: "But --"

8 A. "But solving this based on discovery of the full truth can be

9 useful to both sides. Whether the ministers will remain in the government

10 or not is an internal matter for Hungary, but we want to know what their

11 responsibility is."

12 Q. So a lot of questions were asked here as to whether the

13 information about the legal import of weapons from Hungary was true. This

14 is a conversation between the SFRY minister of foreign affairs with the

15 minister -- his counterpart in Hungary about this, this occurrence.

16 A. Yes, Mr. President. If you remember, and the Chamber will also

17 probably remember, when referring to these events I said that one should

18 not underestimate or disparage European countries and that these weapons

19 illegally imported into Croatia could not have gone past their police and

20 immigration organs unnoticed. So this is a conversation between two

21 ministers.

22 The weapons were, therefore, brought into Croatia and this was

23 organised by a friendly neighbouring country.

24 Q. Let's look at page 3.

25 A. Yes. Delivery of weapons from Hungary.

1 Q. Page 3, third paragraph from the bottom, Loncar says, "We don't

2 want the problem we are discussing to be discussed in the OSCE forums."

3 A. Excuse me, Mr. Milosevic. The third page is missing from my copy.

4 Q. Very well. Then I will read from my copy. Only one passage that

5 I'll quote. At the bottom of page 3 - I hope the others have it - in the

6 last paragraph, end of last paragraph, the state secretary of Hungary

7 says: "The Hungarian government has stated in public that this is

8 regrettable and that the government -- that it has nothing to do with the

9 Hungarian minority in Yugoslavia or its organisations."

10 So they say that this event is regrettable. That's the position

11 of the Hungarian government.

12 In the same tab, further on, there is some information. Would you

13 please just take a look at it. It has to do with involvement of foreign

14 factors in the illegal import of weapons into Yugoslavia in October 1990

15 to January 1991. That's the time period.

16 A. Yes, Mr. President.

17 Q. At the bottom of page 1, under A, from Hungary.

18 A. Yes, here it is again.

19 Q. You have it?

20 A. Yes.

21 Q. Does it mention 20.000 automatic rifles, 7.62, and so on and so

22 forth?

23 A. It says that the transport was carried out --

24 Q. It doesn't matter which company transported the goods.

25 A. Well, it's important because the company's a Croatian one.

1 Q. Well, that's understood. There's no need to prove it. And then

2 it goes on to talk about this from Hungary, and then further on it says

3 everything from Hungary, the 18th, the 16th, the 7th of December, when

4 seven persons were arrested at the civilian airport in Budapest on the 7th

5 of December 1991, and then it goes on to talk about the 19th of December

6 1991 when a large quantity of projectiles were transported from Hungary to

7 Croatia. Then there is mention of weapons from Germany, from Austria, and

8 other countries.

9 So is this large-scale illegal import of weapons into Croatia?

10 A. The government of the Republic of Srpska Krajina had this

11 information in 1992 and 1993 for as long as the Krajina lasted, and here

12 one can see that what I said when answering one of your previous

13 questions, the intention towards Yugoslavia and the Serbs extended beyond

14 the borders of Croatia. It was no accident that criminals from so many

15 different countries could bring weapons into Croatia without the knowledge

16 of their state organs.

17 As we can see in this conversation between two ministers, one from

18 Yugoslavia and the other one from Hungary, this has been confirmed. This

19 document also mentions Austria and Germany. They wanted to break up

20 Yugoslavia, and that was at the root of all the misfortunes that occurred

21 later.

22 Q. Yes. We can see that this happened in 1990 and 1991.

23 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson, this has to do with

24 that question of yours, because you keep the asking about the indictment.

25 In the indictment, where individual criminal responsibility is mentioned,

1 it follows that what happened was a consequence of a policy or a plan of

2 mine, my behaviour, the behaviour of Serbia and so on, but it's evident

3 from everything there is that it was a consequence of the policy of armed

4 secession and the self-organisation of the Serbian people in Croatia for

5 purposes of self-defence.

6 The fact that individual crimes happened in all this, nobody

7 denies that, although I can't confirm it either because I don't know

8 everything that happened, but the cause and effect links are evident.

9 There was no joint criminal enterprise on the Serbian side. On the

10 contrary. This wave which began even before 1990 with expulsions and

11 murders of Serbs and all the other cruelty they suffered throughout this

12 period, and it culminated in armed secession and the consequences of armed

13 secession.

14 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you, Mr. Milosevic.

15 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

16 Q. All right. I'm sorry, Mr. Jarcevic, I omitted to go through a few

17 tabs before this tab number 5. So just for the sake of the documents

18 themselves, I would like to put a very technical question to you in order

19 to be able to tender the documents that we've gone through already.

20 Please, in tab 1 -- it's pretty late. Let's go through this as

21 fast as we can. What is in tab 1? Take a look at this. What is this?

22 On page 25 of this document there is a circle that is Wednesday, the 3rd

23 of March. It says: "[In English] The radioactive waste management in the

24 area of Croatia affected by war - Damir Subasic, Antun Stare, Marjan

25 Gunaric," et cetera. [Interpretation] And so on. In parenthesis,

1 "Croatia." What does this document say? And later on, you have

2 documents and all the rest.

3 A. Mr. President, this is an international conference on mixed waste

4 and environment restoration held in Tucson, Arizona. However, something

5 that precedes this document is far more important, and I hope that the

6 Trial Chamber will not mind if I say a few words about this.

7 Much earlier in Pecs in Hungary, yet another international

8 conference was held about radioactive waste as well. In 1991, the

9 Croatian delegation there presented a report stating that certain areas in

10 Croatia will be used for storing radioactive waste and chemical poison.

11 The maps that show where this storage will be overlap with the Serb

12 settlements there that were fully cleansed ethnically in 1991 and the

13 villages were razed to the ground, including the infrastructure.

14 Q. All right, Mr. Jarcevic. In order to use time as efficiently as

15 possible, are these documents that show that radioactive material, as

16 envisaged by the Croatian authorities, should be stored in areas where

17 Serbs lived?

18 A. Yes. And also, may I remind you of the fact that in 1991 the

19 Serbs were totally expelled from that area, Western Slavonia.

20 Q. All right. Thank you.

21 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson, could this tab number

22 1 be admitted into evidence?

23 JUDGE BONOMY: Sorry, what's not clear to me at the moment is what

24 this tab actually is. Does it relate to the Tucson conference or does it

25 relate to the Hungary conference?

1 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] May I answer?

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes.

3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. These are two conferences

4 independent from one another. One was in Hungary, one was in the United

5 States, geographically speaking.

6 JUDGE BONOMY: Does the document relate to both of them?

7 THE INTERPRETER: Could the witness please repeat what he said.

8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The document has to do with the

9 first conference in Hungary, with maps as to where radioactive waste is to

10 be deposited. We only have the programme of the conference from the

11 United States of America, and it says --

12 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

13 Q. So the first page is the programme of the conference in the US?

14 A. Yes.

15 Q. And then, under number 7, we see the radioactive waste management

16 in the area of Croatia affected by --

17 A. Yes. That was the only topic, Mr. President.

18 Q. All right. We see that. And the second document has to do with

19 the conference in Hungary.

20 A. Yes.

21 Q. And this map that shows the sites coincides with the map of the

22 area from where Serbs were expelled.

23 A. Exactly. Precisely. Can I say what document is missing here, and

24 if you're prepared to hear me out, I'll tell you what this has to do with

25 that. The route of this radioactive material was from Germany to

1 Slavonski Brod by train, and then it was put onto trucks and taken to its

2 final destination.

3 Q. All right.

4 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Could tab 1 please be admitted into

5 evidence, Mr. Robinson?

6 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: Your Honour, I don't see any relevance with

7 this trial, this document.

8 [Trial Chamber confers]

9 JUDGE ROBINSON: We are not with you, Ms. Uertz-Retzlaff. We

10 consider it to be relevant. We'll admit it.

11 Yes. A number for the binder.

12 THE REGISTRAR: Your Honours, the exhibits with the binder

13 accompanying -- I'm sorry, the binder will be Exhibit D338. And the tabs

14 dealt with thus far, which are 16, 17, 4, 5, and 1, are admitted as such.

15 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

16 Q. Thank you. And what is this in tab 2? In all fairness, in part

17 of one of your answers to one of my questions, you spoke about two

18 peoples, two nations in Croatia. So what is this in tab 2? I see it's

19 January 2006, the parliamentary Assembly of --

20 A. The Council of Europe.

21 Q. -- the Council of Europe.

22 A. Mr. President, this is very interesting, and I hope that it will

23 interest the Trial Chamber too. The parliament and government of the Serb

24 Krajina in exile have been working, and they've registered three offices

25 of theirs in France, Canada, and Holland before they opened their offices

1 in some other European countries too. They consulted politicians and

2 parliamentarians from European parliaments, and they were surprised that

3 in 1990 the civil war and the persecution of the Serbs started with the

4 change in the status of Croatia. Twenty-eight MPs from the parliamentary

5 Assembly of the Council of Europe signed a declaration stating that

6 Croatia should give Serbs the same status that they had in 1990, that is

7 to say that constitutionally Croatia be regulated as a bi-national state,

8 like Belgium, or a tri-national state, like Britain, or a quadri-national

9 state, like Switzerland. This will be on the agenda of the Council of

10 Europe in April, and even more parliamentarians are going to support the

11 mentioned 28, and they will vote in favour of a resolution which will be

12 more binding than a declaration. At the same time, a few MPs from

13 European countries this summer, before the European parliament - that is

14 to say the parliament of the European Union - they are going to sponsor a

15 similar resolution and they're going to ask Croatia to do what I've just

16 said, and in this way there will be conditions placed on its admission

17 into the European Union. They will not be able to accede before they give

18 the Serbs back the status they had in 1990 and before that.

19 I should like to say that we have parliamentarians from the major

20 countries of Europe, they are going to sponsor this; Britain, France,

21 Italy and Belgium.

22 JUDGE ROBINSON: What is the relevance of this, Mr. Milosevic?

23 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] The relevance, Mr. Robinson, is in

24 the fact that obviously judging by these reactions, too, the decision

25 taken in 1990 for the Serbs to be abolished as a people or nation in

1 Croatia cannot be considered a fait accompli. It is a pending issue, and

2 it will probably remain a pending issue before this decision, which was

3 highly discriminatory and which went against the grain of all relevant

4 principles and norms, is finally annulled. As you can see, even 15 years

5 after that, it is brought up yet again even in the Council of Europe and

6 in the European parliament, as Mr. Jarcevic has been saying.

7 So it has to do with the presence of - how should I put this not

8 to use a stronger term? - an unjust phenomenon that marked the beginning

9 of the 1990s and the persecution of Serbs in part of Europe.

10 [Trial Chamber confers]

11 JUDGE ROBINSON: This is not relevant. We'll not admit it.

12 Please move on to another matter, Mr. Milosevic.

13 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

14 Q. Let us just go through tab 3 as well. What is there in tab 3,

15 Mr. Jarcevic? This is a document from September 1990.

16 JUDGE ROBINSON: This one is not translated, so let it be placed

17 on the ELMO.

18 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

19 Q. Is this information about -- what does it say here? It says:

20 "Recent knowledge about activities of the members of the Ministry of the

21 Interior of Croatia, the stay of extremist emigres, the training of

22 members of the 'Croatian army.'" What does this document speak of? This

23 is a document of the secretariat, the Federal Secretariat for National

24 Defence. As briefly as possible, please.

25 A. Mr. President, this document is similar to the ones that pertain

1 to the import of weapons in terms of what it caused it and what it was

2 supposed to cause. It didn't cause anything. As we've said, in any other

3 country people like this would have been arrested or at least prevented

4 from taking any kind of action.

5 In view of the fact that the Presidency consisted of

6 representatives --

7 Q. We are not going into all of that now, Mr. Jarcevic. This

8 document talks about the stay of extremist emigres and what kind of

9 knowledge existed about that, and then you testified about extremist

10 emigres and the beginning of violence, physical violence against Serbs in

11 Croatia.

12 A. Yes, Mr. President, that is correct, we've already spoken about

13 that, but what I'm saying is that in any other country they would have

14 been arrested or prevented from taking any kind of activity. Now, why was

15 that not done in Yugoslavia in 1990? That is a question that is very

16 interesting.

17 Q. All right. Now tab 4 --

18 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Could this document please be

19 admitted into evidence, because it talks about extremist emigres, and all

20 of that serves the purposes of the escalation of violence against the

21 Serbs. So the year is 1990.

22 [Trial Chamber confers]

23 JUDGE ROBINSON: We'll admit it, yes.

24 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

25 Q. The information the 1st Military District. What does that

1 contain? As briefly as possible. It's the 4th of November, 1991 the

2 transference of military weapons and --

3 JUDGE BONOMY: [Previous translation continues] ... and been

4 through it in some detail.

5 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Very well.

6 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

7 Q. Now, just briefly, let's go through tab 8, Mr. Jarcevic, and tell

8 us what that contains, and a short explanation will suffice, thank you.

9 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: Your Honour, just an inquiry. Tab 4, we have

10 discussed tab 4, but that's a document from the 27th of August, 1990, and

11 it's not a document of the 4th of November, 1991. So I wonder whether

12 there is something in disorder, because I can't see that we have discussed

13 any document from November.

14 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, can you clarify?

15 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, yes, I can. Probably

16 Ms. Uertz-Retzlaff might have misheard when I referred to tab 7, which

17 relates to the 14th of November, 1991, and the transference of military

18 materiel and parts of the weapons, whereas tab 4 is August 1990, but tab 7

19 is November 1991. As far as I understood it, you said that it was

20 adopted, admitted.

21 JUDGE KWON: You haven't reached tab 7. Did you deal with tab 7,

22 Mr. Milosevic?

23 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I repeated it now, but since you've

24 said that I dealt with tab 7, then -- no, I didn't deal with it, but you

25 said that I didn't need to.

1 JUDGE ROBINSON: We are getting confused. Ms. Uertz-Retzlaff,

2 your point related to tab 4.

3 Ms. Uertz-Retzlaff was speaking about tab 4, Mr. Milosevic.

4 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: He was speaking of tab 7, but we were

5 thinking tab 4. So I think he did not deal with tab 7 yet.

6 JUDGE BONOMY: That's the problem, yes.

7 JUDGE ROBINSON: Okay. All right. So you're now going to deal

8 with tab 7.

9 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I assume that there is no need for

10 me to go back to tab 4. Tab 4 was the 27th of August, 1990, and we've

11 done that.

12 JUDGE ROBINSON: There is no need.

13 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

14 Q. Now, tab 7 is November 1991, and it speaks of the transfer of

15 military equipment and other weapons of foreign origin to the territory of

16 Posusje in order to equip the paramilitary units. And that is a document

17 of the 1st Military District of the JNA at that time. Now, what does it

18 speak of? What's this tab about, this particular document, Mr. Jarcevic?

19 A. Do you mean tab 8?

20 Q. Tab 7.

21 A. It says tab 8 here.

22 Q. We're dealing with tab 7 now. Tab 8 is another tab. Tab 7 is a

23 document of the 1st Military District relating to the transfer of military

24 equipment and other weapons of foreign origin to equip the paramilitary

25 units.

1 A. Well, this contains everything that we were speaking about so far.

2 There are facts about how paramilitaries were armed. However, these

3 paramilitaries are not disarmed, being disarmed, that nothing was done

4 against the organisers of their arming, that is to say nothing was done to

5 prevent arms reaching from them -- reaching them. And I say that because

6 in the organs of the federation, there were many, and they were people in

7 positions of decision-making, who assisted activities of this kind in

8 Croatia.

9 Q. Very well.

10 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] May I tender this document, please,

11 Mr. Robinson, tab 7?

12 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.

13 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you.

14 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

15 Q. Mr. Jarcevic, in tab 8 we have a document of the Croatian Ministry

16 of the Interior. Can we see that on the document?

17 A. Yes, we can.

18 Q. What is the date of that document, the Croatian ministry?

19 A. The 17th of January, 1991. And since it is a report or record

20 intended for the federal organs -- the document deals with the

21 distribution of weapons to paramilitary units, and the types of weapons

22 are mentioned - Kalashnikovs, and so on and so forth - but this document

23 didn't help prevent what Croatia was doing to the Serbs that year and the

24 following year, although the signatory is the minister of the interior of

25 Croatia, Josip Boljkovac. He saw no reason not to sign this together with

1 the federal secretary, and nothing happened. Nobody questioned it.

2 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, I'd like to tender this

3 document too, Mr. Robinson.

4 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: Your Honour --

5 JUDGE ROBINSON: I should say that all these documents are not

6 translated. They're marked for identification pending translation. Yes,

7 Ms. Uertz-Retzlaff.

8 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: Your Honour, in addition to that, it is, of

9 course, for me not possible to cross-examine on these documents because I

10 have no idea really what is said in there. And in addition to that, the

11 witness has told us that he was actually at that time not in Croatia. He

12 was living, as I understood him, in Serbia. I can't really see how he

13 relates to this document and how he confirms the contents of these

14 documents. I can't -- at the moment I cannot see any relation of him to

15 those matters.

16 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic?

17 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson, the witness was very

18 much informed about everything that went on there, because he was

19 politically involved in it all. He was the minister of the -- he was

20 foreign minister of Krajina very shortly afterwards, and he couldn't have

21 become minister of Krajina by just having his name looked up in the

22 telephone directory. He was a man who had already worked in the field and

23 helped solve current political problems, the ones that existed. So he is

24 fully informed about what was happening there.

25 [Trial Chamber confers]

1 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, we'll admit it. We'll mark it for

2 identification pending translation.

3 JUDGE BONOMY: I would find it helpful, when you have got so few

4 documents as there are in this instance compared with so many others, if

5 you had somebody here who was able to tell you if there was anything in

6 them that required cross-examination, but perhaps today you don't have

7 that facility which you often do have.

8 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: Your Honour, part of the documents I had

9 available when I prepared for the cross-examination, and of course our

10 staff member who speaks the language told me what it is, but we actually

11 received these documents -- at least, some of these documents I see today

12 for the first time, and therefore I didn't get any information what it

13 could be.

14 [Trial Chamber confers]

15 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, what is the position with these

16 documents and their translation or their non-translation? Why are they

17 not translated?

18 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, I don't know that exactly. As

19 far as I'm concerned, I considered that they had been translated when I

20 received them in the binder. Now I hear that they haven't been

21 translated. I assume there's a technical reason. It might be a mistake

22 on the part of my associates. I don't exclude that at all. But I really

23 did believe that the documents that I have here and that arrived here had

24 been translated. But as you can see, they are very few in number and

25 short documents. So they're not long documents, and you can identify them

1 very easily.

2 JUDGE ROBINSON: Well, nonetheless, the Prosecutor is at a

3 disadvantage. How is she to cross-examine?

4 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] From what we have already seen shown

5 on the overhead projector and from what the interpreters have already

6 interpreted and said, you can see quite easily what these documents relate

7 to, and anything that is questionable there or that can be challenged is

8 quite easy to see. But it's not the practice that I suggest be

9 introduced, it's the practice that was introduced on many occasions by the

10 other side over there as well.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Ms. Uertz-Retzlaff, which ones do you not have any

12 information about?

13 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: It was actually the military documents that

14 were now the last ones. I had information on these talks about the arming

15 of the Croats. That I had already, and I know what it was.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: Can you tell us which tab numbers, then, you don't

17 have any information?

18 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: I would have to compare them now with the

19 B/C/S version that I have in the other binder that I got originally. I

20 only see that the military documents I didn't have. Those -- I mean, tab

21 7 and --

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, 4 is a military document as well.

23 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: Yes. But I would have to check now. I only

24 notice that some of them I've never seen.

25 [Trial Chamber confers]

1 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: Your Honours.

2 JUDGE ROBINSON: Ms. Uertz-Retzlaff, yes.

3 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: We need a little bit more time because it's

4 even more confusing than I thought because the original tab numbers that I

5 had in the binder have -- are now completely different tabs. So that

6 comes in addition to this, but Ms. Dicklich is just checking.

7 JUDGE ROBINSON: All right. We'll come back to this point,

8 Mr. Milosevic. Continue. That one is also marked for identification

9 pending its translation.

10 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

11 Q. Mr. Jarcevic, take a look at tab 9 now, please, which is

12 information. What does it say? What kind of information is this? Can

13 you find your way around those documents?

14 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone for the witness, please. Microphone

15 for the witness.

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Once again, a subject we were

17 discussing, the illegal introduction of weapons into Croatia. Here we

18 have it again. The 31st of August, 1991 is the date.

19 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

20 Q. All right. Fine.

21 A. I apologise for interrupting, Mr. President, but the interesting

22 thing to note here is this, and every citizen of Yugoslavia could have

23 seen that, and people from the world, too, what was -- this was about a

24 flight by an aeroplane which was full of weapons for the Croatian

25 military, and the plane was piloted by a Croatian emigre from Canada, but

1 the company -- the plane belonged to a Uganda company.

2 Q. It was rented out.

3 A. Yes. Well, I have a document here with a Nigerian -- from the

4 Nigerian embassy so I thought it was Nigeria, but it was Uganda, you're

5 right.

6 Q. It was a large plane, a Boeing 707, in fact.

7 A. Yes, that's right, and it was grounded by the Yugoslav People's

8 Army planes at Pleso airport in Zagreb. It was forcibly ground, forced to

9 land.

10 Q. What does it say? What was its destination according to

11 documents? The third paragraph: "The Boeing set out from Uganda with its

12 destination Burnik near Ljubljana."

13 A. Yes. The fact that Croatia and Slovenia or their air forces at

14 the time worked together to break up Yugoslavia.

15 THE INTERPRETER: Their forces, interpreter's correction, not air

16 forces.

17 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

18 Q. And what did the -- this Croatian emigre say? He says it in the

19 last paragraph. In talking to the official organs of the Yugoslav

20 People's Army, what did he say? The last paragraph on page 1 of this

21 report.

22 A. Do you want me to read it out? "In initial talk with the official

23 organs of the Yugoslav People's Army, Kikes said that the president of the

24 Socialist Croatian Businessmen's and Intellectuals Alliance in Toronto had

25 225 members and that all the leading members of that society were members

1 of the Croatian Democratic Union, and so on. According to Kikes, the

2 society had amassed together 880.000 dollars for the arming of the armed

3 forces of the Republic of Croatia. The money was deposited in a bank in

4 Klagenfurt, Austria, already on the 22nd of August this year."

5 Q. What does it say at the end of that first paragraph on page 2,

6 towards the end of that first paragraph? It says it should have been

7 taken over by who?

8 A. By the government -- a representative of the government of the

9 Republic of Croatia.

10 Q. Then what does it say in the next paragraph?

11 A. It says: "Kikes, in this first statement of his, was adamant that

12 the purchase of weapons were intended for the Republic of Croatia and that

13 behind this whole action was the Croatian Democratic Union."

14 Q. And what does it say after that?

15 A. "During the day the forces of the Ministry of the Interior of the

16 Republic of Croatia surrounded Pleso airport in Zagreb and used mortar

17 fire to try and destroy the plane belonging to the Uganda company with the

18 illegally purchased and illegally transported weapons and military

19 equipment and materiel of foreign production, foreign make. The JNA units

20 -- or, rather, the JNA unit providing security for the airport retaliated

21 by firing at a -- destroyed a vehicle of the attacker. Through the

22 actions of the forces of the Ministry of the Interior of Croatia this was

23 stopped for the time being."

24 Q. I'd like to tender this document into evidence as well now,

25 please.

1 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.

2 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] It's a document dated August 1991.

3 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. It's admitted on the same terms, marked for

4 identification pending translation.

5 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

6 Q. In tab 10, you have a document of the Federal Secretariat of

7 National Defence. It's signed by the deputy federal secretary for

8 national defence, Stane Brovet. It concerns information about the import

9 of weapons and military equipment from Hungary, and it's dated the 10th of

10 September, 1991.

11 A. Yes. We see here that as of the 20th of August until the 9th of

12 September 1991, weapons were being transported into Croatia by planes

13 belonging to agricultural estates, so that the import of weapons was not

14 ceasing. As the ministry established long before, neighbouring countries

15 were deeply involved, unfortunately, in arming these paramilitary units

16 which were to cause the suffering of millions of people in Yugoslavia.

17 When I say millions, I mean all Yugoslavs, because there were sanctions,

18 and industrial and other facilities were destroyed, so that the suffering

19 is still going on in all the republics which are now independent states.

20 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson, I have received

21 information that these military documents were handed over for translation

22 on the 13th of February. That is two weeks ago. They're short military

23 documents.

24 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, I can't allow that to go without

25 comment, because two weeks is not enough notice, not enough time for the

1 Translation Unit, as you well know. They should have been sent in at

2 least a month before.

3 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson, I'm informing you of

4 the fact.

5 JUDGE ROBINSON: But it's not sufficient to inform me of the fact.

6 What I'm pointing out to you is that you have been delinquent in

7 submitting the documents to the Translation Unit late, and that is why we

8 are in the position which we now face today. And you must attend to these

9 matters. It is within the discretion of the Chamber not to allow you to

10 lead evidence on a document which is not translated. Proceed.

11 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

12 Q. Look at tab 11. It's a letter from the Federal Secretariat of

13 National Defence to the Prime Minister of Croatia, dated the 30th of

14 August, 1991. So this is communication between the Ministry of Defence

15 and the Prime Minister of Croatia.

16 A. Yes, Mr. President. This shows the third source of arming the

17 paramilitary formations of Croatia. A train was attacked which was

18 transporting weapons belonging to the JNA on the Zagreb-Belgrade line. Of

19 course I assume that those who are responsible for this were arrested and

20 tried, but I never heard that they actually were. The Croatian

21 leadership, I assume, should have been punished, but I don't know that

22 anything was done.

23 Q. So what was this about? In point 1 it says: "On the

24 Zagreb-Belgrade line --"

25 A. Yes.

1 Q. "-- military equipment was taken from the wagon which was being

2 transported from the Republic of Slovenia pursuant to a decision of the

3 Presidency of the SFRY." So the JNA was leaving Slovenia. Its trains had

4 to pass through Croatia where they were stopped and looted.

5 A. Precisely so.

6 Q. Is that what this document says?

7 A. Yes.

8 Q. The Ministry of Defence is writing this to the Croatian Prime

9 Minister.

10 A. Yes. As there's no translation into English, you have faithfully

11 translated what it says here.

12 The JNA, which was declared an aggressor in Slovenia, was pulling

13 out, pursuant to a decision of the Presidency, passing through Croatia,

14 which was a part of the then-Yugoslavia. However, Croatian paramilitary

15 formations ambushed the trains, looted them, and the participants of this

16 robbery would have been punished and tried in any country, but in

17 Yugoslavia nothing happened because in the top leadership of the

18 then-Yugoslavia the dominant role was played for the most part by cadres

19 from Slovenia and Croatia.

20 Q. Very well. And what does it say in paragraph 2?

21 A. It says that ten rail wagons of various quartermaster material was

22 looted.

23 Q. Was that established?

24 A. Yes it was. There's no need for me to comment on it.

25 Q. There is no need to comment. What does it say in paragraph 3?

1 A. It says at 0640 hours on the 30th of August, 1991, a train

2 carrying military equipment was stopped in the village of Mrkovci.

3 That's close to Vukovar.

4 Q. Very well, and what about the next paragraph?

5 A. It says it's occurring more and more frequently that military

6 columns are being stopped by force or trains with military equipment

7 stopped and members of the JNA maltreated. Military equipment and

8 property is regularly being confiscated and the extent of all this is

9 overstepping all reasonable limits. It cannot be tolerated. And this is

10 happening even after --

11 THE INTERPRETER: Could there be a pause between question and

12 answer, please.

13 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, just a minute, please. The

14 interpreter is asking the witness and yourself to observe a pause between

15 question and answer.

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you.

17 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

18 Q. As for the campaign started in mid-June 1990 in Croatia in

19 connection with the replacement of cadres in the Territorial Defence, do

20 you know anything about this?

21 A. Yes. In the Territorial Defence of Croatia and in Croatian police

22 stations, as early as 1990 there was replacement of people who were Serbs,

23 and of course people were brought in their place who were supposed to

24 carry out orders from Zagreb which were aimed at the ethnic cleansing of

25 Serbs. This was soon to be demonstrated after these dismissals, and it

1 was to culminate in 1990 and 1991, as seen in the Secretary-General's

2 report in the United Nations.

3 Q. Let's have a look, please. At that time, you said that at that

4 time there was a lot of arson and so on. Do you remember this?

5 A. Yes.

6 Q. Well, look at tab 13. It's a letter from the Ministry of Interior

7 of the Zadar police administration. It's dated 2001.

8 A. Mr. President, this document is very important. I hope that the

9 Chamber will understand this, because it was compiled after the civil war

10 in 2001. I wish to remind everybody that this kind of report has to be

11 submitted in every trial in which ethnic Serbs have instituted a suit.

12 Q. What does say?

13 A. It says here: "In connection with your request of the number and

14 date above, we hereby submit the following information: During 1990 --"

15 Q. Don't comment, just read.

16 A. "During 1991 --" Well, I'm trying to say that this is an organ of

17 the Croatian Ministry of the Interior.

18 Q. That's not in dispute.

19 A. Yes. And in Zadar, in the area, 21 fires and explosions were

20 recorded.

21 Q. PU is the police administration?

22 A. Yes.

23 Q. So in 1990, the Zadar police administration recorded in its area a

24 total of 21 arsons and explosions.

25 A. Well, it doesn't say here who planted the bombs, but had the Serbs

1 done that they would certainly have said that. It goes on to say: "With

2 the spreading of war activities in these areas, the number of fires and

3 explosions increased so that in 1991 381 instances were recorded, whereas

4 in 1992 a total of 673 instances of fires or explosions were recorded."

5 I want to say that it was only Serb property and only Serb houses

6 that were blown up or set fire to.

7 Q. While in Zadar and the area there were no Serb units and so on.

8 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] So this is something that can be

9 tendered into evidence, Mr. Robinson?

10 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Jarcevic, do you by any chance know that -- who

11 sent this information to whom and for what?

12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] In trials before the court in Zadar,

13 this kind of document is delivered to Serb prosecutors who gave this to

14 me, to the government of the Republic of Serbian Krajina in exile, and I

15 felt duty-bound to give the Court this information which comes from police

16 sources in Croatia.

17 JUDGE KWON: So do you know to what court was this document

18 submitted?

19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That's the court in Zadar, the

20 municipal court in Zadar. You can ask the Croatian side, if I may make so

21 bold as to suggest it, for all this documentation accompanying this

22 document.

23 JUDGE KWON: Do you know who was tried at that court?

24 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Some individuals sued the Croatian

25 state. Others sued Zadar municipality, and some sued the insurance

1 company where the building they owned which was destroyed was insured. As

2 you know, there is more than one way to initiate civil court proceedings.

3 Q. You can see here that the memorandum of the Ministry of the

4 Interior, the Zadar police administration is the heading on this letter,

5 and it's addressed to the Zadar municipal court.

6 A. Yes, that's what I said.

7 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] To the municipal court in Zadar,

8 informing the court that in 1990 there were 21 instances of fires or

9 explosions; in 1991, 381; and in 1992, 673. So this is being sent from

10 the Zadar police administration to the court in Zadar in connection with

11 certain lawsuits initiated by Serbs before that court. And I assume that

12 the court in Zadar asked the Zadar police for this information and this is

13 the response they received.

14 JUDGE KWON: Thank you.

15 JUDGE ROBINSON: That is marked for identification pending

16 translation.

17 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: Your Honour, just to your information, this

18 is precisely one of the documents that we did not receive in advance but

19 only today, and it's about another six documents that we only got today.

20 Just to --

21 JUDGE ROBINSON: This one is very short.

22 MS. UERTZ-RETZLAFF: Yes, and I will actually use it, that's for

23 sure.

24 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.

25 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

1 Q. In parallel with the declaration of secession of Croatia and all

2 the events you've been testifying about up to now, were any peace

3 negotiations being carried on that you know about?

4 A. Mr. President, with my arrival in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,

5 this coincided with the negotiations which went on until the summer of

6 1994. Throughout 1993, due to circumstances because of my office, I

7 attended all these negotiations.

8 Q. So you attended all the negotiations that Krajina had with the

9 Croatian side and international mediators?

10 A. Yes. Better to say they were organised by members of the

11 international community, members of the International Conference on the

12 Former Yugoslavia, and on two occasions representatives of the government

13 of the USA and the Russian Federation.

14 Q. Did the international mediators or the representatives of the USA

15 and Russia put forward proposals to both sides or was it just the two

16 sides talking to each other? Could you describe the negotiations a little

17 bit.

18 A. As the standpoints of the government of the Krajina and the

19 government of Croatia were diametrically opposed and at the first meeting

20 each side would present its standpoint, the people I have just mentioned

21 mediated, the people from the International Conference on the Former

22 Yugoslavia and on two occasions representatives from Russia and America.

23 Most often, when we could not agree, they would propose the text

24 of an agreement we were supposed to sign. I cannot generalise here, but

25 every point had to be discussed separately. Let me clarify. For example,

1 the negotiations in New York in February, those in Geneva in March, April,

2 and all the way up to June, the ones in Erdut, the secret negotiations in

3 Norway, the secret negotiations in Great Britain, each had different

4 characteristics.

5 Q. As you were one the chief protagonists in these negotiations on

6 the Serb side, I would like to go through them all in chronological order.

7 So please be kind enough to tell us what characterised the negotiations in

8 February. After that, you will go on to those in March and later. I will

9 ask you what was happening on the ground at the same time as these

10 negotiations were going on. Please go in chronological order. So let's

11 look at February first.

12 A. February 1993, New York. It was Mr. Cyrus Vance who was chairing

13 these negotiations. David Owen was there as well. And the third person

14 was Gert Ahrends, who I mentioned a while ago and I told you that he spoke

15 excellent Serbia, and also a lawyer by the name of Okun. I cannot

16 remember his first name.

17 Q. Ambassador Okun was secretary to Mr. Cyrus Vance?

18 A. That was the group that we were meeting with, and at that time,

19 because of the Croatian offensive on the 22nd of January 1993 against

20 Ravni Kotari and the Maslenica bridge, I don't remember exactly how many

21 people were killed there, but the number is about 300, it was very hard

22 for the representatives of the Krajina to sit opposite the Croatian

23 delegation, so Cyrus Vance and David Owen decided that they should sit in

24 one room and we in another one. Then they would bring the positions of

25 one delegation to the other and the other way around. I don't know

1 whether I've put this very clearly.

2 Q. Just a moment. Let's get this clear. At that time these were

3 areas under UN protection.

4 A. Yes.

5 Q. When did the Croatian offensive take place again these parts of UN

6 protected areas?

7 A. The 22nd of January, 1993.

8 Q. So for a year, or a bit less than that, those were UN protected

9 areas?

10 A. Yes, on the basis of the Vance Plan.

11 Q. All right. At least half a year later, after the UN forces were

12 deployed on the ground, this Croatian offensive took place.

13 A. Mr. President, before that there was yet another offensive, an

14 attack on the Republic of the Serb