1 Friday, 25th February 1998
2 (9.05 am)
3 JUDGE RODRIGUES: Good morning ladies and
4 gentlemen. The interpreters are ready to go? Good
5 morning to you as well.
6 So now we are awaiting the witness. (Pause)
7 (Witness enters court)
8 Good morning, witness E.
9 A. Good morning.
10 JUDGE RODRIGUES: You can hear me? Fine.
11 Yesterday you made a solemn declaration which of course
12 still applies today.
13 A. Yes.
14 JUDGE RODRIGUES: Thank you again for being
15 here and this morning you are going to be answering the
16 questions which Mr. Mikulicic is going to be putting to
17 you, so counsel, please proceed.
18 Cross-examination by Mr. Mikulicic:
19 MR. MIKULICIC: Thank you your Honours and
20 good morning.
21 Good morning, witness E. My name is Goran
22 Mikulicic I am Defence counsel for the accused, Zlatko
23 Aleksovski, and I will ask you several questions now,
24 and please do answer them to the best of your
25 recollections.
1 Your Honours, respecting the wish of the
2 witness for protection, I would suggest that this part
3 of the session be closed because I will ask him several
4 questions which might relieve certain names publicly,
5 so in accordance with the witness's wishes, I would
6 kindly ask you to move into closed session now.
7 JUDGE RODRIGUES: Mr. Niemann? Can you go
8 along with that?
9 MR. NIEMANN: Absolutely, your Honours.
10 I think private session, there is a difference between
11 private session and closed session. I think private
12 session achieves the same objective, it is just the
13 sound not going outside, but certainly no objection,
14 your Honour.
15 JUDGE RODRIGUES: Now we are going to move
16 into a private session, then.
17 (In private session)
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6 (Public Session)
7 JUDGE RODRIGUES: My colleagues, do you have
8 any questions for the witness? No. Thank you.
9 Mr. Usher, could you please pull down the
10 blinds?
11 Witness E, you have now completed your
12 testimony here. We do not have any further questions
13 for you. The International Criminal Tribunal is
14 thankful for your coming to testify here at The Hague.
15 You can now leave the courtroom.
16 A. Thank you.
17 (Witness leaves court)
18 JUDGE RODRIGUES: Mr. Niemann and
19 Mr. Mikulicic, maybe we could have a recess now,
20 a fifteen-minute recess because I was told that it
21 would be convenient to have two small breaks. We could
22 perhaps come back at five minutes past ten, and then we
23 will work until twenty minutes past eleven, and in
24 order to make the best use of the time we have for the
25 next witness. I think that is a good idea. Do you have
1 any suggestions in that regard?
2 MR. NIEMANN: No, that is fine, your Honour.
3 MR. MIKULICIC: The Defence agrees as well,
4 your Honours.
5 JUDGE RODRIGUES: So, recess fifteen
6 minutes.
7 (9.50 am)
8 (Short adjournment)
9 (10.05 am)
10 JUDGE RODRIGUES: I think now we are going
11 to have an open hearing, so with regard to the further
12 proceedings, I would like to consult the interpreters.
13 I have indicated to you that we are going to
14 go on until 11.20. Then we will have a break until
15 11.45, and then we are going to go from 11.45 until the
16 end of our working today, that is to say, 1.15. I trust
17 that is all suitable to everyone. No problems?
18 Wonderful. Well, maybe you could show in the
19 next witness, Mr. Niemann.
20 MR. NIEMANN: Yes. I call Professor Stefano
21 Bianchini.
22 (Witness enters court)
23 JUDGE RODRIGUES: Good morning, Professor.
24 Please read out the Solemn Declaration that the usher
25 has just handed you.
1 A. I solemnly declare that I will speak the
2 truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
3 JUDGE RODRIGUES: Please be seated, sir. You
4 did not experience the events first-hand but, in legal
5 terms, you are a witness here. Thank you very much for
6 being here this morning, and I trust you are
7 comfortable, that you are well-seated there, and you
8 are now going to answer the questions from the counsel
9 for the Prosecution, Mr. Niemann.
10 Please proceed, counsel.
11 MR. NIEMANN: If your Honours please.
12 Would you state your full name?
13 A. My name is Stefano Bianchini,.
14 Q. Could I ask you to look at this document that
15 I now show you, and could you look through this
16 document and tell me whether it is an accurate record
17 of your curriculum vitae? (Handed).
18 THE REGISTRAR: P36.
19 A. Sorry, I can speak French/English, so I do
20 not need this. I do not think I need it because it
21 is -- yes, I know this. This is my curriculum vitae.
22 Yes.
23 Q. Yes, I tender that, your Honours.
24 Professor, do you teach East European History
25 and Institutions at the Department of Political
1 Science, University of Bologna, Programme of
2 International Relations in Forli?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. And are you the Director of the Post-graduate
5 International Summer School on 'Post-Communist
6 Transition and European Integration Processes', which
7 has been established in 1995?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. And are you the Director of the Centre of
10 East European and Balkan Studies of the University of
11 the city of Bologna and the central coordinator of the
12 Europe and the Balkan International network?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. Are you the Italian co-ordinator as a partner
15 of the University of Amsterdam and the University of
16 the Sorbonne in Paris and the University of Sofia of a
17 Tempus-Phare Project for Bulgaria on Interethnic
18 Relations, "Bugamin", and with the Sussex Institute of
19 a new Tempus Project which involves the four Balkan
20 Universities?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. Are you the Editor-in-Chief of a Series of
23 Monographs on the "Europe and Balkan International
24 Network"?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. And a Member of the Editorial Board of the
2 Quarterly "Nationalities Papers" of the Association for
3 the Studies of Nationalities as well as the Italian
4 Review of Geo-politics?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. Have you published several books and articles
7 in different languages on Balkan studies, and Balkan
8 issues?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. Including contemporary history, political and
11 economic questions related to the modernisation and
12 political culture to the national question, and to the
13 Balkan Italian relations since the beginning of the
14 century?
15 A. Exactly.
16 Q. Do you speak fluently Serbo-Croat, and
17 have you a knowledge adequate for most needs of
18 English, and French?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. And you also have some knowledge of the
21 Russian and Spanish languages?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. As a result of you being able to speak
24 Serbo-Croat and -- has Yugoslavia been a central
25 focus of your studies since 1972?
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. And do you have many sources within the
3 former Yugoslavia?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. Does your knowledge of the local language
6 present you with opportunities to read on a continuous,
7 or steady basis, newspapers, documents, and books in
8 relation to the former Yugoslavia?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. Before the war, did you have an opportunity
11 to work for a considerable time in the archives of the
12 Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. The SKY and Tito cabinet on different
15 subjects related to the period between 1952 and 1961?
16 A. Exactly.
17 Q. And did you also meet numerous Yugoslavian
18 policy-makers, journalists, and ordinary men and women
19 of that country, and during those years did you have
20 discussions with them in relation to the affairs of the
21 former Yugoslavia?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. And have you collected documentation, and had
24 an opportunity to establish associations with numerous
25 organisations in the former Yugoslavia?
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. Professor, what was the political composition
3 of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia prior
4 to 1991?
5 A. The Socialist Federation of Yugoslavia, prior
6 to 1991 was set up by six republics and two autonomous
7 regions. The republics were Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia
8 Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia. The two
9 autonomous regions of Kosovo and Vojvodina were
10 included in the framework of the Serb Republic.
11 This Federation ideal was originally
12 federation close to communism. Communism was its
13 ideology, while this ideology was a little bit
14 different from that in the Soviet Union or from the
15 so-called socialist block, since 1948. It was based
16 on self-management, on a radical, gradually-developed,
17 but radical devolution of the administration, on a lack
18 of economic planning, on certain freedom of movement
19 within and outside the country, but in any
20 case, in a framework which was resistant to political
21 democracy.
22 I would like to stress here that even in the
23 constitution self-management, in the fourth basic
24 principle, in the constitution, the fourth basic
25 principle, I mean the Constitution of 1974, the
1 last one, man agement was considered a peculiar form
2 of proletarian dictatorship.
3 Q. Thank you, Professor. I wanted to ask you
4 some questions about the ethnic composition of the
5 Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and in
6 connection with that, would you please look at the
7 document that I now show you, and by reference to this
8 document, would you be so kind as to explain the ethnic
9 composition of the SFRY in relation to the document?
10 A. Yes.
11 Q. There should be copies there for your Honours
12 and each time, would you just show the document to
13 Mr. Mikulicic? He has a copy of it, but so that he knows
14 for sure the document that we are referring to?
15 (Handed)
16 Professor, I would ask you to place this on
17 the ELMO screen beside you, and if you have occasion to
18 want to point to any particular part of any of the
19 documents that you are shown, would you please do so on
20 the document on the screen there, rather than on the
21 television screen because it will not work on
22 a television screen.
23 You have to also, unfortunately, point to
24 something and then turn your head towards the
25 microphone because your voice needs to be picked up in
1 the translation booths.
2 A. Sorry, yes. Okay.
3 Q. So managing that somewhat gymnastic exercise,
4 would you mind now explaining to us the ethnic
5 composition of the SFRY?
6 A. Yes. This is a table which was prepared here
7 under my direction and knowledge. It has as
8 as its source "Skipredleg" which is a Yugoslavian
9 journal published in Belgrade. I had the opportunity
10 to make a comparison with other sources, particularly
11 in Croat Zagreb, and I think that on these numbers
12 and percentages, there is no discussion within the
13 former Yugoslav Republics. This is just a comparison
14 between 1981, 1991. You can see that the main ethnic
15 group was the Serb with a percentage around the
16 36 per cent, a little bit reduced in 1991.
17 Then the Croats, more or less the same
18 percentage, the same exactly. The Muslims, who are the
19 third percentage with the 10 per cent in 1991. Then the
20 Albanians, particularly concentrated in Kosovo,
21 9.3 per cent, then the Slovenes, 7.5 per cent, in
22 1991 and the Macedonians, 5.8 per cent.
23 In this table I wanted to include the
24 Yugoslavs. In this order you can see that Yugoslavs were
25 5.4 per cent in 1981, and 3 per cent in 1991.
1 This is not exactly included in the, "Statistici
2 Godinjak", that is the annual review of the figures on
3 Yugoslavia published during the socialist period,
4 because Yugoslav was included only in the end of the
5 list as a group apart, not exactly considered as an
6 ethnic group.
7 They were considered more or less as those
8 who gave an unknown nationality, or not well-defined
9 nationalities. Generally, even in the former
10 Yugoslavia, Yugoslavs, within the list of the ethnic groups
11 were not considered an ethnic group.
12 Q. Professor, just, perhaps stopping there for
13 a moment, there are two features of this chart that
14 I would like to ask you about.
15 Firstly, why the dates 1981 and 1991? Why
16 have those two dates been selected?
17 A. Why I choose these? Because they are the most
18 recent.
19 Q. And were they the dates that a census was
20 carried out in the former Yugoslavia, 1981 and 1991?
21 Are these the dates when the census was carried out?
22 A. Yes, it could be a census, just to understand
23 the recent evolution of the situation.
24 Q. And the --
25 A. Let me say, sorry, that more or less in 1981
1 and 1991 the same questions were addressed, more or
2 less in this topic to the ethnic composition of the
3 Yugoslavia to the population, while previously in 1948
4 and 1961. For instance, they questioned particularly
5 for Muslims, so this is the reason why I choose the
6 last two census.
7 Q. Now, is there any particular explanation that
8 you may have as to why the percentage of Yugoslavs
9 drops, in fact, from 1981 to 1991?
10 A. There are many reasons. The most common
11 reason in all former Yugoslavia was the impact,
12 the disappointment in the longer term economic crisis,
13 the crisis of communism. The League of Communists
14 collapsed in January 1990, that is one year and some
15 months before the census was done and the pressures of
16 nationalistic waves in the country created a kind of
17 disappointment towards the Yugoslav idea and this was
18 one of the reasons for the diminishing
19 percentage, or, the result of the pressures from the
20 nationalist group which made a psychological pressure
21 on the population to choose their ethnic groups.
22 Let me add also that, for instance, in 1981
23 the main intellectuals attacked strongly when the
24 result of the census was published. Those who declared
25 themselves as Yugoslavs, because they accused these
1 people to have abandoned, renounced, their origin
2 nationalities.
3 Another question is that during the 1980s,
4 often Yugoslavs were considered, particularly in the
5 last years of this decade, as Serbs. If it is true --
6 Q. Was that in 1981 or 1991?
7 A. 1991. The articles were published
8 particularly in Zagreb but not only in Zagreb, by
9 a colleague of mine between 1981, 1982 as a reaction
10 to these figures.
11 Q. I just need to stop you. There is some
12 confusion. Just confirm for us. Are you saying that
13 this reaction was in 1981 or 1991?
14 A. The reactions against the Yugoslavs, this
15 intellectual reactions was after the census of 1981.
16 Q. Sorry.
17 A. 1981, so the first census, and one of the
18 reasons, in addition, that was considered, during the
19 1980s, was that Yugoslavs were more or less Serbs, but
20 if you see, if you make a comparison with 1991, you see
21 that this diminishing percentage and absolute vote of
22 the Yugoslavs did not increase the number
23 significantly, the numbers of the Serbs.
24 This means that probably they were shared
25 more or less by all the groups, and it seems to me,
1 particularly by the Muslims.
2 Q. Now, I tender that, your Honours, that
3 exhibit as the next exhibit in order. I think it is
4 number 37.
5 I would like to now take you to Bosnia
6 Herzegovina itself in relation to the same question and
7 show you a document which I would ask you to look at
8 when giving an explanation of the ethnic break-up of
9 that republic. Perhaps that could be given the next
10 Prosecution number in order.
11 THE REGISTRAR: P38.
12 MR. NIEMANN: Now, Professor, looking at this
13 particular exhibit, can you give us an explanation of
14 the distribution in terms of numbers of the ethnic
15 population in Bosnia Herzegovina?
16 A. Yes. The sources are the same as the previous
17 one, and this is the detail of the ethnic composition
18 of Bosnia Herzegovina on the basis of the census in
19 1981 and 1991. I just mentioned the three main ethnic
20 groups, the Muslims, the Serbs and the Croats, plus the
21 Yugoslavs, because Yugoslavs had a particular role in
22 Bosnia Herzegovina before the multi-party elections in
23 1990. They had even one representative in the
24 Presidency of the Republic. So the Yugoslavs had
25 a particular role, and this is the reason why. Then the
1 others, which means a lot of small ethnic groups.
2 Q. Thank you. Now, I tender that, your Honours,
3 as the next exhibit.
4 I would like you to look, in terms of the
5 geographical distribution of the ethnic groups, at the
6 map that I now show you, and could you explain the
7 geographical distribution of the ethnic groups, having
8 regard to this map that is now shown to you?
9 THE REGISTRAR: P39.
10 MR. NIEMANN: Yes, Professor?
11 A. This is the map of Bosnia Herzegovina with --
12 you can see -- divided in municipalities. These are the
13 main municipalities of Bosnia Herzegovina, on the basis
14 of the census 1991.
15 You can see for the Muslims has been chosen
16 the green colour, for the Croats the red one, and for
17 the Serbs the blue one. The map was available here in
18 The Hague. I made the comparison with other sources
19 I had, particularly with, "Natlas", published in Zagreb
20 in 1983, and there are no significant disputes
21 on this.
22 You can see this is a map, a good map,
23 because it allows you to see where an ethnic group had
24 a specific majority over 50 per cent, and when this
25 group had a relative majority in the areas.
1 But what is important also to take into
2 account, that for instance, because of the demographic
3 balance, the concentration, for instance, of the Croats
4 in the red area, you can see along the borders of
5 Dalmatia, Croatia, south of Croatia, leave no -- but
6 the name has been changed in Tomislavgrad or Alejgrude,
7 Chaplijna, Prozo, and so on, this area had a minority
8 group of Croats in comparison with all the Croats in
9 Bosnia Herzegovina because they were concentrated
10 mainly in Sarajevo in the centre and also in other
11 areas. So you can see this area because it is not so
12 populated with a so strong percentage of Croats, but
13 the majority of the Croats living in Bosnia
14 Herzegovina, by demographic point of view, were not in
15 this area but in other areas of Bosnia, so this is just
16 to give you an idea of the distribution of the
17 population, but it is quite difficult to give you an
18 exact picture of the distribution of the ethnic groups
19 in Bosnia.
20 Q. I tender that, your Honours, as the next
21 exhibit in order.
22 Professor, when was the Bosnian Muslim
23 community first recognised, or established, perhaps?
24 A. This is a complicated question, because the
25 Muslim ethnic group has been contested both by the Croat
1 and Serb side, both claimed that they were Croats
2 or Serbs of Islamic religion.
3 However, during the Second World War in
4 a document -- this is very interesting -- in a document
5 of the parties and organisations, "Slavnoc", which
6 means the territorial organisation of the liberation
7 movement in Bosnia Herzegovina, this document has been
8 held two days before the Jijica conference and the
9 Jijica conference was the conference when the
10 Federation of Yugoslavia was established by the parties
11 and movements led by Tito.
12 So two days before this meeting, in
13 a document of the Slavnoc, the Muslims are quoted as an
14 ethnic group with the Serbs and the Croats of Bosnia.
15 This quotation was not included two days
16 after in the official documentation of "Afnoj", the
17 second session. So they were recognised in a way in the
18 Bosnian context, not in the Yugoslav context.
19 So, Bosnia was in the least of the six future
20 republics of Yugoslavia but not Muslim was titular
21 nation of Bosnia in the Yugoslav context.
22 So this created the situation that for
23 instance in of 1948 the population had the opportunity
24 to declare themselves as Croat Muslim, Serb Muslim or
25 even Macedonian Muslim.
1 You have to take into account that the
2 Muslims are not concentrated only in Bosnia but even in
3 the area between the Montenegro and Serbia, this is
4 Sanjac and in other areas, minority Macedonia. For this
5 reason, Macedonian Muslim.
6 Then in 1961 the question was changed. There
7 existed, the possibility, for the Muslims to declare
8 themselves as Muslim or as an ethnic group, not as
9 a nation but as an ethnic group, with this
10 qualification.
11 Then in 1971 as a nation, a titular nation,
12 of Bosnia Herzegovina. So even during communism we had
13 a gradual process in accepting the term of, "Muslim".
14 Even the term, "Muslim", has been disputed, and now,
15 those who are considered Muslims generally call
16 themselves Bosniaks, not Bosnians because
17 Bosnians are all the people living in Bosnia, Yugoslav,
18 Serbs, Croats, Jews and so on and Muslims so Bosniaks
19 means those who are not Serbs and Croats and Jews and
20 the others, so the Muslims. It is a quite complicated
21 system, how to call this ethnic group.
22 Q. When was the entity of Yugoslavia first
23 proclaimed?
24 A. Yugoslavia, as a state, was proclaimed by the
25 Serb Prince Regent, Alexander, on 1st December 1918.
1 As a Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes with this
2 name. Not with the name of Yugoslavia.
3 Q. What were they seeking to achieve by the
4 formation of Yugoslavia?
5 A. By the formation of Yugoslavia was achieved
6 a political programme based on Yugoslavism. This
7 political programme found its origin in the 16th,
8 17th Century, particularly in Dalmatia and Croatia, and
9 was developed in Slovenia, in the democratic and
10 socialist movements in Serbia in the 19th Century.
11 The idea was to create a common state of
12 South Slavs from -- including, in some ideal approach,
13 including Bulgarians, and this was already as a project
14 prepared by the political experience of the Illyrian
15 Movement and the Illyrian provinces established by
16 Napolean at the beginning of the 19th century and then
17 supported by several leaders, policy-makers in
18 connection with the ideals, national ideals of
19 19th century Europe, so the personalities, the Yugoslav
20 personalities who supported this project, for instance,
21 Strossmayer, Raci, Kalas, or Markovic, Polit-Desancic
22 and others were, in several ways, in connection with
23 other opponent policy makers for instance like
24 Mussolini in Italy or Sartoritski from Poland and
25 others that were increasing that idea of nation which
1 was not related with ethnicity. This was typical of the
2 19th century.
3 Q. Was there a desire to achieve a simulation or
4 was that not the concept, by this process of the
5 creation of Yugoslavia?
6 A. We have to distinguish the ideal, and then
7 how the situation was implemented. During the First
8 World War and immediately after the First World War,
9 the ideal was shared by a large part of the
10 intellectuals in Croatia and in Slovenia, not only in
11 Serbia.
12 For instance, when Strossmayer created the
13 academy, the academy was called the Yugoslav Academy of
14 Science and Arts in Zagreb and not the Croatian
15 Academy.
16 When the Social Democrat Party in Slovenia
17 was created in the 70s of the 19th Century, this
18 party was not called, "the Social Democrat Slovenian
19 Party", but the, "Yugoslav Social Democrat Party", so
20 this idea was shared by some policy-makers and
21 particularly by Markovic and socialist and democrats in
22 Serbia who had this idea of creating a state,
23 a common state, leaving the form of the language in the
24 first half of the 19th Century, by Ludwig Guj in
25 Croatia and Vuk Stefanovic Karajic in Serbia was an
1 attempt of creating, of establishing the common dialect
2 as the literary language for whole the area of the --
3 not only for the all Serbo-Croatian-speaking area, they
4 had even the idea that Slovene was only a dialect
5 in this context.
6 This is not a simulation, also, because we
7 have to consider in the context of the mentalities of
8 that time, which is not exactly the mentality of the
9 20th century, and, you know, many policy-makers, shared
10 the idea that nation was something different from
11 ethnicity. It had a more wide concept, related even
12 with the idea of the Citizen in France.
13 Just to give you an example, when King
14 Alexander thought that Croats, Serbs and Slovenes
15 were three names of the same people, he had the same
16 political approach, the same political culture than
17 a democratic. King Alexander was not democrat. It
18 was an autocratic kingdom, but democratic as Maserik
19 the President of Czechoslovakia was, when he considered
20 also the Czechoslovakian nation existing as a Slovakian
21 nation and not a Czech nation or a Slovak nation with
22 related regions to ethnicity.
23 This was also the approach of Wilson. They
24 had this wide approach and in this sense they
25 considered the possibility of creating Yugoslavia as
1 a state of those, of this common state for all the
2 South Slavs. Bulgarians were excluded only after the
3 second Balkan war, when the Bulgarians attacked the
4 Serbs after having signed an agreement before the first
5 Balkan war. So this was the reason why the Bulgarian
6 was considered missed for the Yugoslav perspectives.
7 This was the aim of those who wanted the creation of
8 Yugoslavia, before the First World War.
9 Q. Professor, if I may ask you, could you slow
10 down just a little because it has to be translated and
11 that is a very difficult job for them, for the
12 translators to do that so if you could speak a little
13 slower I would be grateful.
14 What effect did the World Wars have on
15 Yugoslavia? World War I and II?
16 A. The two wars had different impacts, so we
17 have to consider first World War I, and then
18 World War II.
19 About World War I: This created the
20 conditions for establishing Yugoslavia. It created the
21 conditions for several reasons; the first was that the
22 great modern Empires, the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman
23 empires collapsed during this war, albeit many scholars
24 emphasised that both the empires failed in their
25 modernisation before the war started. This is true for
1 both the empires, albeit the Austro-Hungarian empire
2 had only one attempt of take-off and this happened in
3 between 1901 and 1903 while the Ottoman empire had at
4 least two attempts during the 19th century, through the
5 so-called Tanzimat which were supported by the western
6 great powers, particularly.
7 So, anyway, the two empires were unable to
8 modernise themselves to create the conditions for the
9 take-off of the country. The war created the conditions
10 for their collapse.
11 In the meantime, because of this
12 disappointment in their lack of a modernisation
13 process, the wings, who supported Yugoslavism, were
14 threatened because the Yugoslav perspective was
15 envisaged as a better perspective for creating
16 conditions for the modernisation of the countries
17 because of the failure of the modernisation of the
18 great empires.
19 The other reason was a great influence was
20 also, and this must be taken into account, made by the
21 evolution of the idea of nationalism in Europe in the
22 second half of the 19th century. This evolution had
23 a great impact on the policy of the great powers, and
24 this influenced the states in the Balkans.
25 Nationalism which was an ideal of the
1 opponents up to 1860s, 1870s, became after a state
2 ideology. This is very important change. This state
3 ideology was influenced by different elements.
4 First, imperialism. I mean imperialism
5 particularly of the second half of the 20th century.
6 Then the second question was, for instance, the
7 attempts of applying the Darwinian approach to the
8 evolution of the species into international relations,
9 only strong countries can survive in the international
10 context.
11 The third was anti-semitism which was
12 particularly strengthened in France. I can mention the
13 Dreyfuss case and the reaction, the anti-German
14 reaction after the defeat at Sedan in 1870. So all
15 these elements influenced the perception of
16 nationalism, and this was one of the reasons why the
17 Balkan alliance, which prepared the first Balkan war,
18 collapsed, and then a second Balkan war occurred within
19 the former alliance. Bulgaria attacked Serbia and was
20 attacked by Serbia, by Greece, by Romania and
21 Montenegro.
22 So, this is just to show you how these
23 elements were transferred into the policy attitude of
24 the states at the beginning of the 19th century.
25 Then I would like to mention also Italian
1 irredentism. This effect had a great impact
2 particularly on the decision of the Slovene and
3 Croatian policy-makers when they had to establish their
4 negotiation with the Serb representatives on the
5 island of Corfu. Italian irredentism claimed --
6 heritability is just a term to say that there are
7 unredeemed areas for establishing the national state,
8 and the Italian heritability claimed, not only Trento
9 and Trieste but Dalmatia which was overwhelmingly
10 populated by a Slavic population, Croat and Serb, so
11 they claimed for historical reasons, for demographic
12 reasons, artistic reasons and so on, and this had
13 a great impact in the sense that this created a sense
14 of insecurity with the policy-makers in Croatia and
15 Slovenia, and when they had to establish their
16 negotiation with the Serb representative, they were
17 forced to do the negotiation, to find an agreement as
18 soon as possible, because Italy threatened the
19 possibility of establishing their western borders, that
20 is the Italian eastern borders.
21 So this element, just to remind you, Italy
22 signed an agreement in 1915 with France and Great
23 Britain, before entering the First World War, the
24 so-called Treaty of London, which became public after
25 the Russian revolution when Lenin took over the power
1 in Russia, because Russia had made public, these
2 documents, and in this document, Dalmatia was offered to
3 Italy, but not the city of Rijeka.
4 Q. Now, once the collapse of the Hapsburg Empire
5 became a certainty, was there then a conference called
6 in relation to the situation in Yugoslavia?
7 A. Yes. When the empire was collapsing, it was
8 clear to collapse, Italy summoned, held congress of
9 oppressed peoples in Rome. The congress was organised by
10 the liberals but the government did not want to find
11 any agreement with the Yugoslav delegation, and the
12 Yugoslav delegation, the name was set up particularly
13 by Croats, Serbs of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and
14 Slovenes and the Italian Government did not want to
15 find an agreement with them which increased the sense
16 of uncertainty of these policy-makers.
17 So when the empire collapsed they were, in
18 a way, urged to find any agreement with the Serb
19 Kingdom in order to protect themselves from the
20 aggressive approach of Italy.
21 Q. Now, moving on to World War II, what impact
22 did it have on Yugoslavia?
23 A. World War II was different because World
24 War II arrived when Yugoslavia was already established
25 and when an attempt of modernisation of Yugoslavia,
1 during the kingdom failed, particularly the 1929
2 economic crisis affected deeply the evolution, the
3 economic values of Yugoslavia, plus it was difficult to
4 find an agreement between the Serb Government in
5 Belgrade and generally the Croats, this is true, but
6 not only the Croats. The Croats in Zagreb and
7 particularly the peasant party, enjoyed the alliance --
8 this is very interesting -- of the Serb party of the
9 Serbs in Croatia which was against the centralisation
10 attempts of the Belgrade courts of the so-called
11 Carsija and the kingdom.
12 So this was two of the elements of contrast.
13 In addition, we had the influence of when
14 Hitler took over power, we had the influence of the
15 Hitlerian perception of nationalism which added an element
16 of racism to nationalism, and in this sense were
17 created the Ustasha movement after the coup d'etat in
18 1929 by the King, and this movement was at the
19 beginning supported by Mussolini in Italy. It was armed
20 and financed by Mussolini.
21 Then this movement perceived ideas coming
22 from Italian heritability and from the Hitler
23 nationalism and applied it to the context of Yugoslavia
24 from the Croatian nationalist point of view.
25 So this element clashed when Hitler attacked
1 Yugoslavia in 1941 and Yugoslavia collapsed in a week,
2 in a week this element clashed with the other
3 nationalist approach, this was the Chetnik one, which
4 was supported by the General Draza Mihailovic and was
5 connected to the King, the King who escaped to
6 London, and the idea was in this case to create
7 a greater Serbia or a greater Yugoslavia with a greater
8 Serbia, and Croatia had to be punished, because Croatia
9 was charged to be an ally of Hitler.
10 So, these elements created in a sense two
11 movements, the Chetniks and Ustasha, who clashed with
12 each other, and a civil war erupted immediately. We had
13 the Italian army, occupation army had the first
14 information between April and May 1941, Yugoslavia was
15 attacked at the beginning of April 1941, and I can tell
16 you this for sure because I had the opportunity to see
17 the archives of the Italian army so I had the
18 opportunity to see the notes of the Italian officers
19 sending to the Italian army what was going on
20 particularly in Lika and in the area between
21 Croatia and Bosnia.
22 Thus, for this reason, this condition created
23 the best ground for increasing the role of the
24 Communist Party, led by Tito. This Communist Party was
25 a Yugoslav Communist Party, had a Yugoslav direction
1 with representatives of all the main ethnic groups of
2 Yugoslavia, then Tito had a strategy of war while Dagar
3 Mikaisleovic did not have one, he wanted to wait
4 the arrival of the alliance.
5 At the beginning attempts of finding
6 a compromise between the Chetniks and Tito failed in
7 the fall in 1941 and the two groups started a war, one
8 against the other.
9 Even they -- Tito had more -- wanted to react
10 immediately against the occupation, and of course
11 a support to the invasion of the Soviet Union was also
12 included in this, and this created the best condition.
13 Then Great Britain particularly supported
14 Tito after 1943, when it appeared clear that Tito was
15 fighting against Germany, and the Chetniks, no.
16 However, I have found in the Italian archives
17 the documentation, interesting documentation, by the
18 way, that proved that the Chetnik movements seen in
19 Montenegro already in the summer 1941, but particularly
20 after the end of the year, was financed by the Italian
21 army, by the Italian occupation army, so the Chetniks
22 became more or less allies of Italy until -- up to,
23 until 1943 while the Ustasha became much more close to
24 Hitler and this was provoked by the fact that Italy
25 wanted to obtain control over Dalmatia which was
1 claimed by the Ustasha movement too, and Hitler,
2 anyway, gave to its Italian ally, Dalmatia, so this is
3 one of the reasons why we had this split between the
4 Italian government, Mussolini and the Ustasha
5 immediately after the beginning of the war.
6 Q. What happened after World War II?
7 A. Well, immediately after the war in 1945
8 communism took over the power rapidly. War accounts
9 were settled mercilessly. First General Draza
10 Mihailovic was arrested and executed in 1946. The
11 Albanian revolt in 1944, 1945 was repressed strongly
12 after several months with difficulties for the Yugoslav
13 army.
14 People, 30,000 Croats, general Croats,
15 related to some extent to Ustasha movement, the occupation
16 German army, were all surrounded by the parties or
17 handed back by the British army in Austria and they
18 were executed in the area of Kocevski Rog and Blejburg
19 between Slovenia and Croatia, in this area. The
20 Catholic top, and particularly the Bishop and
21 Cardinal of Zagreb, Stepinac was charged with being
22 involved in supporting the Ustasha regime, to have
23 participated in -- or to have been included in -- to
24 have supported the policy of eliminating opponents,
25 Communist opponents, and the Serb's population in the
1 Jasenovac area. For these reasons he was sentenced,
2 he was not executed. He remained in prison, and
3 died without obtaining his freedom. He was 96,
4 something like this.
5 So this was the reactions against the
6 anti-Communist movements by the Communist movement.
7 Meanwhile, a coalition government was set up
8 at the beginning of 1945 between the Communist
9 Government and those policy-makers who were involved in
10 the London Government and who did not have
11 connections with the Italian/German alliance.
12 This government, this coalition was imposed
13 by Jalta, by Jalta because of the agreement of 1944
14 between Tito and Churchill. Tito did not implement
15 it, so Churchill requested of Jalta the
16 implementation of this agreement. Tito had to do
17 this, but this alliance was very weak, and it
18 evaporated in a few months, between September and
19 October 1945.
20 So, when the elections were held in November
21 1945, the campaign was really traversed way of
22 democratic campaign, it was not really a democratic
23 campaign. The opposition made the decision to
24 participate in the ballot only with a box, an empty
25 box, a box without a list, so they did not participate,
1 in fact, with their candidates. But the elections
2 itself were fairly conducted in the sense that a secret
3 vote was guaranteed to the population. Probably we have
4 a map that we can...
5 Q. Yes. Explain the empty box campaign in
6 relation to the document that I now show you. Perhaps
7 the document on the screen can be taken and given to
8 the Registrar.
9 THE REGISTRAR: P40.
10 MR. NIEMANN: Now, looking at that document,
11 Professor, what can you tell us about it in relation to
12 this campaign that you referred to as the "empty box
13 campaign"?
14 A. Yes. This is the empty box. Box vote is
15 interesting for this reason; you can read down there
16 that the result was, for the Federal Chamber,
17 88.7 per cent in favour of the Communist Party, which
18 was not in reality, actually, the Communist Party. It
19 was the National Front. The Communist Party was never
20 quoted at that time. This is very important, and for
21 the Chamber of the People, the popular front, the
22 88.4 per cent.
23 But what is interesting to make a comparison
24 in some of the most crucial areas of the country, of
25 the votes, the empty box votes. You see that for
1 instance in Slovenia more than 15 per cent of people
2 did not want to vote or voted for the least -- the
3 empty list, and then even in Vojvodina, which is part
4 of Serbia, you have more or less near the 50 per cent,
5 the 11.4 per cent of the Serbia, and the 8.5 per cent
6 of Croatia. The figures of Serbia are particularly
7 interesting because if you read, in addition, down, in
8 the notes, Serbia had an abstention of 20.8 per cent,
9 that reduced the fraction of eligible votes for the
10 National Front to 68 per cent, 68.3 per cent, so this
11 is just to give you an idea why I said that the
12 election by itself, they are fair, albeit the campaign
13 was not fair and was not made under the typical
14 democratic rules.
15 Q. I tender that, your Honours as the next
16 Prosecution exhibit.
17 Professor, what was the constitutional model
18 of Tito's Yugoslavia? What was its origins, its source?
19 A. You mean the constitution in 1946, the first
20 constitution?
21 Q. The first constitution.
22 A. Yes. The model was the soviet model,
23 particularly the Stalin constitution of 1936.
24 Q. And what was the main features of socialist
25 self-management that you...
1 A. Socialist self-management became the ideology
2 of the state from 1950. At the beginning it was a union
3 proposal, and it was applied in some factories around
4 Split and then a law was passed in 1950 and this was the
5 beginning of the self-management system.
6 This system tried to create -- first, the
7 system changed radically between 1950 and 1989
8 radically. So, at the beginning, this was just an
9 attempt of creating more freedom of decisions in the
10 factories, so only in the factories with a possibility
11 of -- for the working people to participate in the
12 discussion about the production, something like this.
13 This was linked to a lack of planning. This
14 system occurred after the split with Stalin in 1948, so
15 no possibility of planning, because they had no
16 financial sources. They were isolated. It was
17 impossible to create a planning system. For this
18 reason, this system worked up to the end of the 1950s.
19 Then a great crisis occurred, and in 1965, after many,
20 many confrontations within the party, a radical
21 economic reform was passed. This was a very serious and
22 interesting attempt of introducing market rules in
23 a socialist economy. This was the attempt of giving to
24 the factories the right of establishing prices, and
25 prices were established on the basis of typical
1 economic or market economic laws.
2 So this was -- this law was supported by
3 other laws that made possible immigration flows within
4 the country, and outside the country. A passport was
5 given to all the citizens for a period of five years.
6 You have to take into account that a free passport was
7 only given to the population in the other socialist
8 countries after 1988. 1989 in Hungary and for the
9 others even later, so Yugoslavia was the only one
10 country, socialist country that allowed this free-flow
11 of people, under the condition of the dictatorship of
12 the proletariat. This must be all the time clear, but
13 free-flow existed in this sense.
14 Then after the crisis, national and
15 ideological crisis which occurred in the country
16 between 1971 and 1972 the Slovenian ideologist of
17 self-management, Kardelj, made a new reform of the
18 self-management. He created a very complicated system
19 through the constitution of 1974, and the law for the
20 associated labour of 1976, very complicated system
21 based on the structure of co-operatives. If you have an
22 idea, just to give you an idea what was on.
23 This was a system, a general system which
24 permeated the whole of the society. That means not only
25 the factories, but all the activities, agriculture,
1 social services, the law system, the judiciary, the
2 school system, so self-management became the system of
3 organising the society on this basis of the associated
4 labour.
5 But, this created a very articulated society,
6 very articulated society. But, this articulated society
7 had a limitation, a great limitation from the political
8 point of view. This limitation appeared clear with the
9 Djilas case in 1954. Djilas was a very important
10 policy-maker of the Yugoslav communism. He was the Head
11 of the Department of Propaganda, and Education. He was,
12 during the war, he had a very hard line and Stalinist
13 approach towards non-communists, but in the period
14 between 1948 and 1952, 1953, he gradually changed
15 because he had a lot of relations with social democrats
16 party, the British Labour Party so, it changed his idea
17 and he started to write under the approval of Tito,
18 a series of articles where he envisaged the possibility
19 of establishing a kind of dialect within the
20 organisation of the parties.
21 The party changed in 1952 the name from the
22 Communist Party into the League of the Communists.
23 In fact the change was just a formal change
24 but when they started, when they wanted to make this
25 change, they thought that, "league", meant something
1 that, a kind of dialectic should be encouraged within
2 the structures of the party, and for this reason,
3 Djilas started to speak about this, but the orthodox
4 wings of the party opposed strongly. Tito feared the
5 evolution of this thesis, stopped Djilas. Djilas
6 insisted. Djilas was condemned, then he spoke in an
7 interview in the New York Times about the possibility
8 to create -- a bi-party system, social democrats and
9 Communist Party in the social countries. For this
10 reason he was condemned and he became the most known
11 dissident of Yugoslavia.
12 This event made clear to everybody that
13 a great limitation affected the development of
14 self-management and this limitation was the possibility
15 to move from an economic and social ethno-national
16 articulated structure into a political articulated
17 structure because this was an idea originally opposed
18 by the constitution, by the idea that self management
19 was a part of the proletarian dictatorship and because
20 the Djilas event made clear this limitation in the
21 strategy of the league of Communists of Yugoslavia.
22 Q. What was the implications of the split
23 between Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union?
24 A. The implications --
25 Q. I am sorry, I will repeat the question. What
1 was the implication of the split between Yugoslavia and
2 the Soviet Union?
3 A. There were many implications. The first
4 implication was that the balance, the east/west balance
5 changed. The confrontation, the Cold War confrontation
6 moved from west to east, from Trieste areas to the
7 Danube River, and both the great superpowers tried to
8 take advantage, in a way, or the United States, in
9 a way, to include Yugoslavia in the western camp, and
10 the Soviet Union tried to withdraw, to get Yugoslavia
11 into the socialist camp. So this changed the relations
12 and both tried to bring their own influence on
13 Yugoslavia. This was the first consequence.
14 The second consequence was that the Yugoslav
15 communism was forced to find an alternative to the
16 soviet system.
17 They had or to accept the western order, and
18 so to change radically their ideological orientation or
19 to find something else, and they did it with the idea
20 of self-management with all the limitations I spoke of
21 earlier.
22 The third consequence was that Yugoslavia, at
23 the beginning, but this can be considered for all the
24 history of the Communist Yugoslavia, tried to lead an
25 international movement. It is less known that
1 Yugoslavia tried to lead an international
2 anti-stalinist movement immediately after 1949, 1950,
3 because the Yugoslav leaders did not understand
4 immediately that the break-up with Stalin was so
5 radical. They tried to find some compromise. Compromise
6 failed, and then...
7 So, they tried to establish their leadership
8 in the sense, with establishing contacts with the
9 socialist party of France, with the Labour Party,
10 supporting some Italian policy-makers who split the
11 Italian Communist Party, particularly Valdo Magnani or
12 Silone and others, given an economic support after the
13 split occurred in 1951. I had the opportunity to see
14 the documentation, so in the archives in Belgrade in
15 Italy, so I am sure about this event, and then, after
16 this, when this attempt failed, they tried to establish
17 a leadership in the regional area through the Balkan
18 pact with Greece and Turkey. They tried to create --
19 they did not want to join NATO.
20 This was the aim of the United States of
21 America but a clear document of 1952, November 1952, of
22 the party made clear it was a secret discussion with
23 Tito and the policy-makers, where this is conserved, in
24 the archives in Belgrade exclude absolutely this
25 possibility, but they signed the agreement with Greece
1 and Turkey with the aim, particularly shared by Greece
2 to create a new kind of Balkan integration, and in
3 order to attract, if possible, particularly after
4 1954/1955, Bulgaria and Albania.
5 Then when this attempt failed, because of
6 Greek/Turkish nationalism, confrontation, the Cyprus
7 question, and because of the Stalinisation processes
8 in the Soviet Union, Tito tried to lead the
9 anti-deStalinisation process in the Soviet Union. When
10 these processes failed, after the Hungarian Revolution
11 and the execution of Imre Nagy in Hungary, Tito, who
12 had already connections with the so-called Third World,
13 particularly with Nehru and Nasser started to create
14 a non-aligned movement. So if you compare all these
15 elements you can see the strategy of Yugoslavia to be
16 the leader of an international movement and this was also
17 one of the reasons why the split with Stalin occurred.
18 Then, the last of the consequences of the
19 1948 split was that Yugoslavia, by inventing, in a way,
20 to a certain extent, self-management, by finding
21 itself in a peculiar position, became a kind, a sort of
22 example for the other countries included in the soviet
23 block from Poland to Bulgaria. It is very interesting.
24 It is not by chance, for instance, that self-management
25 was a claim shared by the Hungarians during the
1 Hungarian revolution, Czechoslavakia in 1968 and by
2 Solidarnost in 1981.
3 It is true that all these movements did not
4 want to apply the Yugoslav model of self-management to
5 their own situation. No. They wanted to just use the
6 fact that Yugoslavia had an independent position to
7 obtain a similar position in the eastern camp. This was
8 the reason why this example had a peculiar impact in
9 the -- even in the soviet camp, and this was the reason
10 why the Soviet Union tried all the time to reinclude
11 Yugoslavia in its camp.
12 MR. NIEMANN: Your Honours, is that
13 a convenient time?
14 JUDGE RODRIGUES: We are going to have
15 a recess, so see you back here at ten minutes to
16 twelve.
17 (11.25 am)
18 (Short adjournment)
19 (11.50 am)
20 JUDGE RODRIGUES: Mr. Niemann? At present,
21 there is an academic tradition, that -- well, maybe
22 I should say that in a language other than language --
23 the first is given and the last is accepted.
24 Now, we accepted the first, and we are going
25 to accept the last in this case. In other words, you
1 might pursue it, sir.
2 I think a little Latin does no harm to the
3 solemnity of our proceedings.
4 MR. NIEMANN: Professor Bianchini, moving on
5 now, can you explain to the court what the significant
6 features of the 1974 Constitution of the Socialist
7 Federal Republic were?
8 A. Yes. The main features were the following;
9 First, the 1974 Constitution outlined a very
10 decentralised state based on six republics and two
11 autonomous regions. Then the state was based on
12 a collective direction, collective on several levels,
13 and on a collective representation. Political
14 representation, which means that citizens as such did
15 not have any opportunities to be represented in any
16 political and administrative body of the country, but
17 only as expression of a collective.
18 The system, the constitution also outlined in
19 a very complicated and wide sense the social and
20 economic system of the country. These were the main
21 features of the constitution.
22 Q. And what about the presidency? Was there any
23 special feature in relation to the presidency?
24 A. The presidency was a collective presidency of
25 eight members which rotated, who rotated in the sense
1 that they had a specific order. This was the system
2 after the death of Tito. Tito was elected in 1974 as
3 a President-for-Life, so after his death, a collective
4 presidency took over power, and with a specific
5 order they had a presidency and a vice-president. The
6 vice-president became the following President after
7 receiving at least five votes of the eight members of
8 the election, and they rotated every year, so every
9 year they changed the direction, the President.
10 Q. What was the main criticism of the system of
11 representation?
12 A. Two were the criticisms. The first one which
13 seems to me particularly interesting is the criticism
14 included in a book written by Jovan Miric, Sistem I
15 Kriza, published in Zagreb. This book made evident
16 the fact that the representation was collective and the
17 decision was taken only on the basis of the consensus.
18 The six republics and the two autonomous regions had,
19 in fact, a right of veto.
20 So this means that, albeit they had
21 a different number of representatives in the two
22 chambers of the parliament, the republics had a certain
23 number and the autonomous region contained a number of
24 representatives, had only one vote. Each representative
25 had only one vote, so they vote, majority, minority, within
1 their own representatives. But then they expressed only
2 one vote, positive or negative, and only the eight
3 positive vote allowed to make a decision. Otherwise,
4 only one negative vote expressed both by one of the six
5 republics or by one of the two autonomous regions could
6 stop the decision.
7 So, the provocative proposal of Jovan Miric
8 was to send to the Federal parliament only eight
9 persons because it was too expensive to send so many
10 people when the possibility to express their votes was
11 only extremely contained.
12 This was one aspect.
13 The other aspect was the criticism which came
14 from Serbia. This was particularly related to the
15 statehood, nationhood of Serbia. This means that even
16 within the Serb League of Communists there were
17 disappointments and criticism on the fact that the two
18 autonomous regions had too much autonomy in comparison
19 with the republics.
20 So in effect, there was no difference between
21 the republics -- the six republics and two autonomous
22 regions on the decision-making process.
23 So, in this sense, Serbs, a Serb wing
24 within the party insisted that Serbia was, in a way,
25 marginalised or punished by the constitution, and this
1 status was already supported before the Memorandum of
2 the Academy of Science was published, was supported by
3 some political leaders, as for instance Draza Markovic
4 in Serbia. Tito, since he was active politically,
5 strongly opposed against this position, as was his
6 reaction -- the last reaction was in Bugojno three
7 months before he was -- he became sick in 1979, when he
8 reacted very strongly on rumours and protests coming
9 from Serbia on these topics because he defended
10 strongly the balance of the ethnic national relations
11 included in the 1974 constitution.
12
13 Q. What was the circumstances surrounding the
14 SANU Memorandum that you mentioned?
15 A. The SANU Memorandum was prepared by a group
16 of scientists of the academy in the years between 1982,
17 1983, up to 1986. It was published only partially by
18 some magazine in 1986, 1987. It provoked a very great
19 crisis, not only in the country but within the Serb
20 League of Communists, and it was published completely,
21 as far as I know, only in Zagreb by Nase Teme in 1989.
22 The scientists who met together in that period between
23 1982 and 1986 were particularly scientists on Ancient
24 and Middle Age Arts, on Middle Ages History, Modern
25 History, Literature, Philosophy, mainly, and they
1 shared one specific approach of nationalism which
2 traced back its origins on the German anti-alignment
3 Romanticism of Herder and von Schlozer, two scholars of
4 the period -- leaving the period between the 18th and
5 19th century.
6 They had great impact on the whole Eastern
7 European history, and the main feature of these two
8 scholars was that national is something that you
9 receive from your parents biologically, so you are
10 a member of this nation as you have the colours of your
11 eyes, or the colours of your hair inherited from your
12 parents.
13 So this is something that you cannot change,
14 which is completely the opposite of the Matcini point
15 of view, for instance. Matcini spoke about nationalism
16 as something that is shared on the basis of
17 a consciousness, so on the basis of the -- and we
18 shared particularly not only -- yes, a language,
19 a culture, but particularly we share a common right,
20 a common law.
21 So in this sense, just to give you an example
22 to understand, if an Italian goes to Argentina he can
23 share the Argentinian nationality and become an
24 Argentinian on the basis of the Matcini approach but he
25 cannot, never, in his life, on the Herder approach, so
1 these persons of the Serb academy shared this
2 cultural mentality and they started to write a document
3 as a collective work where they claimed that Serbs
4 were, in a way, oppressed in Yugoslavia, that their
5 idea of Tito was to create a weak Serbia to have
6 a strong Yugoslavia. Particularly they charged Croatia
7 to marginalise the Serbs which was, in effect, untrue,
8 and even in Bosnia, in Bosnia, they charged more or
9 less the same things, taking into account particularly
10 the situation of Kosovo.
11 They started from this, the tensions in
12 Kosovo and because in Kosovo the Serbs were a minority,
13 but the region has claimed, as the south of the Serb
14 nationality, nationhood, and so for this reason they
15 started from this and they charged Croatia and to
16 a lesser extent Bosnia of the same attempts.
17 So, this was the document and the framework
18 when it was written. What is interesting is the end of
19 the document, the last three pages, where the documents
20 made clear that in the event that Serbia cannot have
21 its own role in Yugoslavia in its own right, this is
22 their argument, on the basis of history, of the
23 previous nationhood they had in the 19th century, on
24 the basis of their demographic weight and so on and so
25 on, they had the right to have an alternative as Croats
1 and Slovenes had, which means the right of cessation
2 from Yugoslavia. So this was the document, the
3 particular characteristic of the SANU document.
4 Q. Was this the first expression or first
5 perhaps significant expression of an assertion of
6 sovereignty or, alternatively, cessation from the SFRY
7 that occurred?
8 A. Yes. On the basis of the elements I explained
9 previously, I think that, in the recent period, the
10 first cessation came from Serbia. It was included in
11 the SANU Memorandum. The SANU Memorandum created
12 a strong reaction within the Serb League of
13 Communists. The President of Serbia at the time,
14 Stambolic, defined that the SANU Memorandum, in
15 memorandum Yugoslavia, in Latin words, which means
16 a document against the future of Yugoslavia and he
17 opposed strongly this document. He had the support of
18 the local Communist organisation of Belgrade, so in
19 that moment, a split was evident in the Serb League
20 of Communists.
21 When Milosevic, who was the President of
22 the party, started informally to support the SANU
23 document, and first he removed the President of the
24 Belgrade League of Communists, and then some months
25 later he managed to remove even Stambolic. This was the
1 first step in the ideological homogenisation of the
2 Serb League of Communists in Serbia. This was the
3 reaction and for this sense -- and I think that this
4 document represented really the first claim of
5 a cessation. This is not something -- it can appear
6 a paradox, that Serbia, in a sense, claimed to, albeit
7 in a not clear way, but claimed a possible cessation
8 from Yugoslavia.
9 If you consider even the position expressed
10 in another country in Soviet Union in 1989, Boris
11 Yeltsin claimed the same for Russia. He claimed that
12 Russia had the right to secede from Soviet Union.
13 So, it was a discontent that started in the
14 main republic, in the main ethnic group of these two
15 Federations: Serbia for Yugoslavia and Russia for the
16 Soviet Union.
17 This was one of the elements of the troubles
18 that were coming into the top level, and becoming
19 evident in that moment.
20 Q. Now, dealing with the 1974 Constitution just
21 for a moment, what was the distinction between nations
22 and nationalities in that Constitution and what was the
23 effect of the distinction?
24 A. This is a very interesting question because
25 on this question many misunderstandings had been
1 occurring, particularly in the face of the Yugoslav
2 collapse. In the basic principle, at the beginning of
3 the Constitution, 1974 Constitution, it was stated
4 clearly that -- it was written, coming from the
5 right -- the rights of the -- may I refer to my notes
6 just to quote exactly the sentence?
7 Q. Your Honour, might he have permission to
8 refer to his notes?
9 A. Yes. The first basic principle of the 1974
10 Constitution clarifies that the Socialist Federative
11 Republic of Yugoslavia has been created by:
12 "Peoples of Yugoslavia..."
13 "... starting from their right of
14 self-determination, included the right of cessation..."
15 And then on.
16 "People's", the term was not "nation", but
17 "people's".
18 So, the question is: Who has the right of
19 cessation in the Yugoslav context, because in the
20 commonest terminology, used in the books on the
21 newspapers, Narod, "people's", was the titular people
22 of one of the six republics. While nationalities,
23 "narodnost" was the term used for the minorities,
24 including Albanians from Kosovo and the Hungarians from
25 Vojvodina.
1 This was, in fact, the only relevant
2 difference between the six republics and the two
3 autonomous regions in the decision-making process.
4 So, it was in this context considered in the
5 Communist terminology.
6 The problem is that the Communist
7 terminology, does the term "people" identify it with
8 the titular nation anyway, or with all the people
9 living, these people living in the context of
10 Yugoslavia. This was the question, because if you
11 consider the Serb people, just to give you an example,
12 Serb people was the titular nation of Serbia and
13 that, in this context, Serbia, proper Serbia with the
14 two autonomous regions, already, questionable.
15 But if you consider Serb people as a whole
16 you have people in Bosnia and Serb people in
17 Croatia.
18 The same you can tell for the Croatian
19 people. Croats in Croatia and the Croats in Bosnia
20 and even the Croats in some villages, if you want, in
21 Kosovo or even the City of Subotica which has
22 a Croat tradition in Vojvodina.
23 So, this is the question, the Communist
24 terminology established this interpretation, and no
25 one knew how to obtain the implementation of this
1 right. This is evident. This was in the communist
2 mentality.
3 Lenin: When Lenin wrote his articles on
4 nationalities, particularly in 1916 and then after the
5 Bolshevik revolution, he suggested that this right of
6 cessation is a right, and must be declared, but it is
7 not in the interests of the working class to accomplish
8 it. Why? Because, and this was typical 19th century
9 mentality, they want people to modernise and develop
10 a country large enough to develop an economy. So this
11 was not in the interests. This is why, in all the
12 Communist constitutions you can find the quotation,
13 "the right of cessation", but no one -- a legal
14 procedure to join this right because the right was
15 proclaimed but not recognised, because it was not in
16 the interests of the working class and because the
17 Yugoslav Communist shared, anyway, the Bolshevik
18 legacy, i.e. mentioned the connection between
19 self-determination and the proletarian revolution,
20 these considerations must be taken into account in this
21 context.
22 Q. I will ask you some more questions about this
23 later on in your evidence, but did this whole issue of
24 nationals of one side or another, have an impact upon
25 the interpretation of "peoples" in places like Bosnia,
1 when it came to their treatment and by republics such
2 as Serbia and Croatia?
3 A. Even earlier. Even earlier. When the European
4 Community, the famous Troika started to go to
5 Yugoslavia after the war already erupted in Slovenia,
6 we had two interpretations on the basis of the
7 constitution, and the European Union was unable to
8 manage this situation because they referred to the
9 constitution. The constitution had the sentence and
10 this sentence was interpreted by Slovene leadership
11 and the Croat leaderships on the basis of the
12 Communist terminology. Titular nation has the right to
13 secede, while the Serb, this is interesting,
14 amazing, the Serb policy-makers, gave another
15 interpretation. That is that all the people is not the
16 commonest interpretation. All people, all Serb
17 people has the right to secede from Yugoslavia, so
18 this means that the Serb people living in Krajina,
19 for instance in the area of Croatia, had the right to
20 secede from Croatia to remain in a Yugoslavia or in
21 a state, in a new state of the Serb people.
22 So, they both used the document, the
23 constitution of 1974 to strengthen their own position.
24 Q. But for different ends.
25 A. Of course. For different ends? Yes, for
1 different ends, yes.
2 Q. What were some of the factors that led to the
3 disintegration of the Socialist Federal Republic of
4 Yugoslavia?
5 A. I would like to turn your attention,
6 particularly on three factors. The first one is the
7 economic factor, the second one is a social factor
8 related to the immigration flows, and the third one is
9 the political system and the political representation
10 system.
11 Economy. Immediately after the death of Tito
12 in 1988, but the signs were perceived by Tito and even
13 by Cardell, Cardell died in 1979 in February, so they
14 perceived that something was wrong in the economy
15 during the late 1978 and during 1979 but anyway, the
16 economic crisis erupted immediately after the death of
17 Tito.
18 The crisis was based on a very high level of
19 international debt, which was created by the fact that
20 the republics were not, in a sense, under some central
21 control, in this sense. They had the opportunity to
22 establish economic relations with international
23 apartness without receiving the permission of the
24 Federal bodies. So, for instance, the government was
25 informed about the debt by the international economic
1 institutions rather than from the internal
2 republic information system.
3 So when the head of the government, Milka
4 Planinc had finally the picture on the table, she
5 established, she informed the population about the
6 amount of the debt but she put the state secret on the
7 partition of the republics because she feared possible
8 impact on the inter-republic, inter-region relations.
9 The situation led the government to adopt
10 very strict policies, while it was unable to control
11 the autonomous of the republics and regions. This means
12 that a lot of resources were wasted under the control,
13 or they were even used in a very ineffectual sense. For
14 instance, they built factories where they were not
15 needed, or they spent money for having all the
16 republics in the same factories.
17 In this context, the system, the economic
18 system of the country reacted, in order to protect
19 itself where it was possible. So, the economic units,
20 the organisation of the labour, the municipalities, the
21 regions, the republics, tried to protect their own
22 market, their own activities, economic activities, and
23 since 1984 it was possible to speak about an economic
24 nationalism, which was emerging in Yugoslavia, and this
25 threatened the common market, because the more the
1 crisis became deeper, the more each unit were closing
2 in itself. This was one of the reasons why the
3 self-management system showed itself to be ineffective in
4 the economic situation.
5 The petrol crisis in 1973 was also a negative
6 influence because this was one of the reasons why
7 Yugoslavia started to obtain economic support from
8 abroad and they had an international debt, and then
9 when Reagan took over power in the United States,
10 you know that the value of dollars went up rapidly and
11 this also affected the international debt of
12 Yugoslavia, so all these elements created the
13 conditions for the crisis and the reaction in the
14 country was such as I explained. This is one thing.
15 The second thing was the social development
16 in the country, because the country had, in the 1960s
17 and 1970s, really a great transformation, and this
18 transformation was followed by migration flows, or
19 within the country or outside the country, sometimes as
20 a definitive and without coming back migration, or
21 sometimes just temporary migration. For instance, in
22 Europe, when the migration was temporary, generally.
23 This migration, particularly the immigration
24 within the country, were not only from the south to the
25 north, so as for instance the Muslims often from Bosnia
1 or the Albanians went to work in Slovenia or along the
2 Dalmatian coast and so on, not only this, but from the
3 villages to the cities, and they arrived in the
4 suburbs. When they arrived in the suburbs, the social
5 strata were, in a sense, being promoted by the economic
6 development of the 1960s and the 1970s but these
7 structures were, at the same time, the most affected by
8 the economic crisis of the 1980s, so disappointment
9 increased particularly in these structures, in the
10 suburbs of the main cities, or in the village where
11 even the possibility of agriculture offered
12 a possibility to soften the impact of the crisis.
13 The third reason was a political reason. That
14 is the system of representation. As I told you before,
15 the political representation was based on a collective
16 system. This was in principle not only ethnical
17 principle. The representation was deferred, and this is
18 true, that it was a very complicated system, with three
19 chambers in the municipalities, and three chambers in
20 the republics and regions and two chambers on the
21 Federal level, and each Chamber of these had a peculiar
22 representative. The representative of the quarters, the
23 zones in the municipalities, as the local
24 organisations, territorial organisation, or the
25 representative of the municipalities at the republic
1 level, or you had a representative of the labour,
2 associated labour from the factories, or even from the
3 allowed political institutions which were the league of
4 Communists, the unions, the popular front which
5 included the Communist and the independence, the youth
6 organisation, female organisation, Red Cross and so on
7 and so on and so on.
8 So, this was the representation in the
9 republics and regions and, as you can see, the citizen,
10 by himself was never represented, but only as
11 a collectivity or because he/she was politically involved
12 in an organisation, or because he/she was a member of
13 a municipality, of a territory, or because he/she was
14 a worker, but not because he/she was a citizen. This is
15 very important.
16 On the Federal level, the representation was,
17 and even in the republics, based not only on this
18 element but on the ethnic issue so that issue was
19 crucial also in choosing, in selecting the state elite,
20 and the party elite.
21 I have a table on Kosovo, for instance, just
22 to give you an example, what I want to say.
23 Q. Perhaps we could look at the table now. Might
24 that be given the next number in order, please?
25 THE REGISTRAR: P41.
1 A. If you see in this table, you can see this
2 table, the sources of these tables are different.
3 I make comparisons with different studies of my
4 colleagues.
5 As you can see, in the notes, it is related
6 to the situation in 1981 which means on the census of
7 1981 and you can see, for instance, in Kosovo that the
8 Albanians represented in 1981 77.5 per cent of the
9 population, and the Albanian members of the League of
10 Communists were 62.8 per cent of the members of the
11 Communist League, and in the elite they represented
12 a 65 per cent of the party elite and a 70.5 per cent of
13 the regional elite. So, you can see also the Serbs,
14 were this 13 per cent of the population and the
15 25 per cent of the members of the party, they shared
16 the 20 per cent of the party elite, and the 18 per cent
17 of the state elite, and the others, it is the same for
18 there.
19 So, as you can see, to a large extent, the
20 ethnic ratio was used in order to select the elite of
21 the party and of the state, and this was reflected by
22 the representatives of the six republics and the two
23 autonomous regions in the Federal Parliament, in the
24 two chambers of the Federal Parliament.
25
1 Q. And what effect did that have on...
2 A. This had a great impact when the economic
3 crisis arose, because every republic, every region,
4 tried to defend, to protect its own area. So, they
5 tried to protect one collective right, which was not,
6 in a way, contained moderated, by the rights of the
7 citizens, but only by the collective right, so each
8 collective right reacted, protecting itself. The
9 consequences of that was that this system, which was
10 basically in a kind of feudalisation of the whole
11 institutions, if one Serb became the President of one
12 institution, so the Croat had to be in another
13 position, the Muslim in another one. This was, for
14 instance, when they had to select the members of the
15 Federal government, whether the head of the government,
16 the premier was a Croat, the minister of the interior
17 had to be of this republic, and the other of the other
18 republic and so on.
19 So every task was controlled directly by this
20 compromise within the republics and autonomous regions.
21 This was even more strengthened by the crisis
22 and by the ideological approach of communism.
23 Why? Because communism said that no political
24 free-flow of ideas was possible because of the
25 dictatorship of the proletariat, so the obviously
1 possible dialect particulars was the national dialect
2 particulars within regions and republics and this
3 created this context.
4 So, in a context of crisis when you had, in
5 the end, the collapse of communism, you had the
6 collapse of ideology. When you had the collapse of the
7 economic system, you had the collapse of
8 self-management. What remained? Ethnicity nation. This
9 system of sharing the power. This was one of the
10 reasons why the protection on the national ethnic basis
11 was strengthened by the economic crisis generally in
12 the whole of the former Yugoslavia and then with
13 different approaches to the matter.
14 Q. I tender that exhibit, if your Honour
15 pleases.
16 What was the first major challenge to the
17 constitution of Tito's Yugoslavia after his death? You
18 have mentioned the SANU Memorandum. What happened after
19 that?
20 A. The first challenge, significant, we can get
21 even the tensions in Kosovo in 1981, but the first
22 significant relevant challenge against the constitution
23 was the SANU document for the reasons I explained
24 previously. It is interesting that a few months after
25 his death, the SANU challenge in Slovenia, journal Nova
1 Revija published a series of articles under the title,
2 "Contribution for a Slovene National Programme".
3 The document was a little bit different from
4 the memorandum of SANU because it was just a series of
5 articles by different authors, while the memorandum
6 tried to be a document, signed by different persons.
7 However, it was a second challenge. The challenge
8 was by a group of intellectuals towards the Slovene
9 leadership on the basis of the national programme.
10 So, in this sense, we had, for the first time
11 after the death of Tito, two challenges in two
12 republics in -- towards the political -- the Communist
13 policy, and the two leaderships in Serbia and
14 Croatia -- and Slovenia had to react, and they did it,
15 and they reacted in such a way that they tried to
16 follow and to strengthen at least partially these
17 national claims from these intellectuals.
18 So, in this sense, the Kucan and the
19 Milosevic positions became based on the reaction of
20 these challenges coming from a group of intellectuals
21 considering that part of these claims were made part of
22 the programme of the two local Communist organisations.
23 Q. Well, what happened in Serbia in March of
24 1989?
25 A. Oh, in March of 1989 the constitution was
1 amended, and the autonomy of the two regions, Kosovo
2 and Vojvodina, was significantly contained.
3 Q. And who was the prime mover in achieving
4 these amendments, primarily responsible?
5 A. The issue was claimed by Milosevic strongly.
6 It is true that this decision was impossible to be
7 taken without the agreement of the other six republics
8 and for this reason, a very strong clash occurred in
9 late 1988 between Milosevic and Stipe Suvar which was
10 at that time the President of the League of the
11 Communists.
12 In the end the republics accepted, probably
13 because they thought that in such a way Milosevic will
14 soften other pressures in future, which was not the
15 case, because Milosevic had a very important speech in
16 June 1989 in Kosovo when he celebrated the 600 years of
17 the battle of Kosovo against the Turks, which is part
18 of the national mythology, not only of the Serbs but
19 generally in the Balkans, but it was particularly used
20 and manipulated by Serb nationalism.
21 He was very aggressive, and he did not
22 exclude the possibility of armed conflict in Yugoslavia
23 in the future, which created a great concern all over
24 the country.
25 It is also true that he tried with,
1 informally, the support of other political persons to
2 overthrow the direction in Vojvodina and in Montenegro
3 between 1988 and 1989, but particularly in 1989 through
4 Solovic who was a person particularly active within the
5 Serb movement in Kosovo, Solovic tried to organise
6 a demonstration in Ljubljana in order to explain to the
7 Slovones why they were unable to understand the
8 reasons of Serbs -- of Serbia in order to contain
9 autonomy of Kosovo and Vojvodina. Because similar
10 demonstrations overthrown the governments in Montenegro
11 and Vojvodina between 1988 and 1989. The Slovone
12 government made a decision not to allow this
13 demonstration. By reaction, Milosevic ordered the
14 Serb enterprises to cut off economic relations with
15 the Slovone enterprises which is the first real
16 attempt and threat to the Yugoslav integration. The
17 first step towards the disintegration of the country,
18 and this was made by Serbia.
19 Q. Now, did the events of Kosovo have influences
20 in other parts of Yugoslavia? You have mentioned in
21 particular one instance. Did it have any impact in
22 other areas?
23 A. Oh yes, yes. They had great impact since
24 1981, if we stay in the recent period, of course,
25 particularly because on the Albanian request to become
1 a republic, this was today, the claim in 1981, to
2 become a republic and not a region, in order to have
3 the possibility to base possible -- this was the
4 concern of the Serbs, possible request of cessation on
5 the basis of the Communist interpretation of the term,
6 "titular people", that is now on the constitution.
7 This was the reason why they wanted to become
8 a republic instead, rather than a region. But this was
9 one of the elements that allowed the Serb
10 nationalism to strengthen its position, but this
11 affected also relations within the republics,
12 particularly because Slovene leadership, in several
13 occasions, supported the Albanian claims against the
14 reactions.
15 First, they tried to support Albanians
16 economically. The problem was -- and this was
17 a decision made by all the whole Communist League, but
18 the economic possibilities of Yugoslavia during the
19 1980s were very limited, so this was not possible, and
20 then with Kucan they supported -- so this was one of
21 the reasons why the Serbs charged the Albanians to
22 support the Albanians, to charge the Slovenes to
23 support the Albanians and this was one of the reasons
24 why the Serbs insisted they were disappointed of the
25 common South Slav state.
1 Let me say, also in addition, that all of
2 these questions have to be considered in the framework
3 of the traditional, for the Yugoslavia, attention
4 between centralisation and decentralisation forces
5 which were represented on the one side, I mean, the
6 decentralisation forces, by Slovone, Croat
7 leaderships and Vojvodina.
8 While traditionally the centralising forces
9 were supported by the undeveloped areas; Bosnia,
10 Montenegro, Kosovo, and Macedonia. The reason was
11 because they wanted a centralisation of the resources
12 in order to receive, then arrange support for their
13 economy.
14 Serbia was in between. Independent on the
15 leaderships, so sometimes supported the centralisation
16 in order to receive the economic support, not only for
17 Kosovo but also for the south of the Serbia, but
18 sometimes not. This was, and this is very important, to
19 be stressed, this was not the case in the period
20 between 1966 and 1972 when Marko Nikezic and Latinka
21 Perovic were the most significant leaders in Serbia.
22 I think they were so open and so clever that
23 probably they must be considered the more democratic
24 and open Serb leadership in the last 200 years, and
25 because they were forced to resign in 1972, this was
1 a real tragedy, not only for Serbia, but for the whole
2 of Yugoslavia.
3 Q. Now, in the midst of all this turmoil, was
4 there then held elections in the republics in 1990?
5 A. You mean in the Bosnian election? Yes.
6 Q. Was there elections held in 1990 and where
7 were they held?
8 A. In 1990, in January 1990 the League of
9 Communists collapsed, collapsed on the basis of its own
10 national, ethno-national representative or... so that
11 Slovene representative abandoned the party
12 immediately followed by the Croat, Macedonian and by
13 all the others.
14 So, the party disappeared, they separated,
15 and in this context, a series of multi-party elections
16 were organised in the republics. It was the regular,
17 normal order to have election in the republics first,
18 and then on the Federal level. So, in Slovenia,
19 elections were held first in April, then in Croatia,
20 and then during the year in November in Bosnia, and
21 Macedonia and then in the end in Serbia and Montenegro.
22 So during the 1990s, multi-party elections were held
23 all over the six republics of Yugoslavia.
24 Q. Now, in relation to Bosnia Herzegovina, would
25 you look at the document I now show you, and by
1 reference to this document can you explain to us the
2 results of the elections in 1990 and perhaps that might
3 be given the next exhibit number.
4 I tender the last Exhibit 23.
5 If I have not already tendered that, your
6 Honours. I think that is Exhibit 41.
7 THE REGISTRAR: P42.
8 MR. NIEMANN: Now, referring to that
9 document -- there appears a series of initials there in
10 reference to each of the parties. We are familiar with
11 most of them but just to assist, and for the purposes
12 of the record, can you tell us what the initials
13 represent on the chart?
14 A. Yes. This is the figure of the results, the
15 final results of the elections, considering each party.
16 The SDR was the Muslim party, the SDS was led by --
17 sorry, led by Izetbegovic. The SDS was the party led by
18 Radovan Karadzic and HDZ, the party led by Stjepan
19 Kljuic. Then SK SDP was the party -- and these three
20 parties, as you can see, shared the best results. They
21 shared particularly a result in their own ethno-national
22 basis, so as there was particularly voted by the Muslim
23 population, SDS by Serb population and HDZ by
24 Croat population while the other parties shared the
25 remains. SK SDP was the wing, the democratic wing of
1 the Communist Party.
2 Generally the orthodox representative of the
3 parties became a member of the administration and of
4 the body, of the previous three parties, so they enter,
5 the support the SDR, SDS, HDZ when the party split, and
6 only the most open wings remained in the SK SDP, or in
7 this -- the other party, SJ, as you can see here, this
8 was the party created by the premier, Adno Markovic,
9 the Federal premier, Ante Markovic who had a disaster
10 in Bosnia, according to the polls before the elections,
11 he was considered the possible winner of the elections,
12 but the result has showed completely
13 another perspective.
14 MBO was a party, a Muslim party led by
15 a group of persons, Adil Zufilkarpasic, in the
16 beginning Izetbegovic and then they split, and the
17 others were alliances with the main parties.
18 So the most significant element is that the
19 three parties, the three first parties which tried to
20 represent the interest of their ethnic group of
21 reference, as I can say, obtained a great majority, but
22 they were forced, because of these results, as you can
23 see, or to govern together, or to lead immediately the
24 country to a war, because only one excluded would be --
25 would -- arose discontent and dissatisfaction in the
1 country, and created condition for a clash. So they
2 were forced to stay together, and this was what
3 happened. For instance, it was very interesting. They
4 divided in a former Communist system, all their tasks.
5 The presidency, for instance, of Bosnia,
6 which was set up by seven persons, was -- and three
7 representatives from SDR, two each from SDS and HDZ.
8 The President of the parliament was a Serb Krasnik and
9 a premier was a Croat, Pelivan. The same also for the
10 ministers. The Minister of the Interior was a Muslim,
11 the Minister of Defence a Croat, the Minister of the
12 Information was a Serb.
13 So, they had to manage the situation in order
14 to save peace. We are in November and December 1990.
15 Yugoslavia still exists, the other events added to a
16 core, before the collapse was achieved, so they were
17 forced to stay together and they had to share the power
18 in this way, and this was the result of the elections
19 in 1990.
20 Q. And what happened in, for example, Serbia and
21 Montenegro as a result of the elections?
22 A. Paradoxically, nothing, in the sense that in
23 Serbia and Montenegro, the previous Communist
24 leadership were confirmed by the ballot. Milosevic
25 obtained an overwhelmingly majority in seats because of
1 the majoritarian system of elections. In Serbia, and
2 the same was for Bulatovic in Montenegro. So they, in
3 a sense, they were both legitimated by the vote in
4 their nationalist options, as were legitimated by the
5 multiparty vote, the leaderships in Slovenia, Croatia,
6 Bosnia and Macedonia.
7 Q. I tender that document as the next exhibit
8 for your Honours, please. What was the Jovic proposal,
9 and how did it come about and how was it received,
10 especially in Slovenia and Croatia?
11 A. The Jovic proposal was submitted to the other
12 members of the presidency of the Federal presidency in
13 October 1990, after the submission of the
14 Croat/Slovone proposal of a confederation.
15 Anyway, shortly the proposal of Jovic
16 envisaged the recognition of recognised international
17 rights and freedom in the constitution. It envisaged
18 a Federal state of six units with a common market,
19 a common national bank, and a government with two
20 chambers, a Federal Chamber and a Chamber of Republics
21 in the Chamber of Republics. The representatives had
22 to be equal for all the republics of Yugoslavia, while
23 for the Federal Chamber he offered two or three
24 options, that it was possible to accept
25 the proportional approach which was supported
1 particularly by Serbia, or to have just a joint -- each
2 republic the same number of seats, or a mixture of the
3 two.
4 So, the proposal of Jovic was a proposal with
5 several possibilities -- several options to be
6 discussed. However the proposal was rejected by the
7 Slovene and Croatian leaderships and the proposal
8 was not discussed at all.
9 Q. What brought it about? What caused it? What
10 caused the proposal to be made?
11 A. What caused the Confederative proposal of
12 Slovenia and Croatia? This was a different proposal.
13 They envisaged a Yugoslavia as a confederation of
14 sovereign and independent states which could have
15 a consultative parliament, a consultative parliament,
16 and a government with one representative of each
17 republics only, and the obligation for the Federation
18 not to interfere in the internal affairs of the
19 republics, so this was a kind of state which does not
20 exist in -- at the moment in the international order,
21 and it was just a -- and they envisaged only a common
22 system, a security system. This was also possible. They
23 envisaged the possibility to establish a common
24 security system. That is all. The proposal was rejected
25 by the Serb leaderships and the proposal was not
1 discussed at all as the others were not.
2 Q. And just for the record, who was Jovic?
3 A. Sorry, Jovic was a Serb member of the
4 Federal presidency. He was a person strongly close to
5 Milosevic. He was strongly supported by Milosevic and
6 at that moment he shared completely the Milosevic
7 political conduct.
8 Q. Now, during this period, what was the
9 position of the Federal authorities in Yugoslavia?
10
11 A. Interesting question. We have to consider two
12 institutions, the Federal Presidency, and the Federal
13 Government.
14 The Federal Presidency was in fact in a great
15 confusion and blocked. This was because in May 1990,
16 15th May 1990, the Slovone presidency came to an end,
17 it was Drnovesek, the current Slovone premier, and
18 the turn was the Serb turn so this was Jovic who
19 became the President of the presidency.
20 Jovic, during his presidency, supported all
21 the claims, the Milosevic positions, and had a great
22 responsibility, rejecting all the position coming from
23 Croatia and Slovenia, great responsibility in
24 increasing radically the inter-republic tensions,
25 confrontations in Yugoslavia.
1 Q. Can I just stop you for one moment? I am
2 sorry to interrupt you, but you say that the presidency
3 came to an end in May 1990, according to --
4 A. Jovic presidency began, and this ended in
5 15th May 1991.
6 Q. 1991.
7 A. 1991. When the Croat term came, and this
8 is -- and Stjepan Mesic, in this case appointed by the
9 Croat Sabor and the government, had to take over the
10 duty, but Jovic strongly opposed his election, and he
11 voted against. This was the first time that it
12 happened, something in the Federal presidency. Jovic
13 was supported by the representatives of Kosovo and
14 Vojvodina because after the containment of the autonomy
15 of the two regions in 1989, Milosevic was able to
16 control their representative in the Federal bodies, so
17 he had three votes. He managed three votes instead of
18 eight. The fourth vote was of the Montenegro but
19 Montenegro, because albeit it was close to Molosevic,
20 did not take part in the vote. He had other claims, and
21 so Montenegro representative was not in the meeting
22 when they had to vote. So Mesic had the support of
23 Slovenia, a Slovene representative of Bosnian
24 representative of Macedonian representative and his
25 vote, which is four, and to be elected he needed five.
1 For this reason, after May 15th, 1991,
2 Yugoslavia remained without a President of the
3 presidency which created chaos in the country,
4 particularly because the army, the JNA, lacked a
5 supreme command because for the constitution, he was
6 the President of the presidency who has the command of
7 the army.
8 Q. Now, you have mentioned the presidency --
9 A. Yes, the presidency. The government. The
10 Federal government. The story of the Federal government
11 is quite different. The government was led by Ante
12 Markovic, a Croat a man who had a good knowledge of
13 economic and entrepreneurial aspects and immediately he
14 started with economic reforms. The reform was started
15 on January 1st 1990, and had an astonishingly good
16 result in the first six months. The inflation was
17 completely destroyed, inflation was -- before 1990,
18 around 2,000, 3,000 per cent and it became under 0 in
19 a few months, and he started -- he made the currency,
20 the Dinar solid because he linked the value of the
21 Dinar to the Deutschmark, so he made a series of --
22 and he started to prepare a new set of laws, because
23 after the first measures, just to block the disaster,
24 he had to accomplish a serious set of laws, physical
25 laws, economic laws, the laws for privatisation, as
1 requested by the International Community.
2 At the same time he tried to go to have the
3 Federal multi-party elections and he tried to dissolve
4 the Federal assembly and to go to the elections.
5 However, this claim was opposed for different
6 reasons, but jointly, by the Serb, Slovone and
7 Croat leaderships. For these leaderships it was much
8 more important to have a not legitimised Federal
9 assembly, in order to have a confrontation with the
10 government, which is interesting, let me say, that the
11 international community never imposed or claimed
12 multi-party elections for the Federal assembly for
13 Yugoslavia while Yugoslavia was the recognised state in
14 the international framework.
15 So I can say that Yugoslavia was the only
16 Communist country which was not -- well, which was not
17 imposed by the international community, multiparty
18 elections.
19 As you can very well understand, through
20 international -- multiparty, and international
21 controlled elections you had the possibility to have
22 the discussion for the future of Yugoslavia in the
23 Federal bodies, and in that Federal bodies it was
24 possible to discuss the future of the country, to
25 dissolve it, to transform it in another Federation,
1 confederation or something else. This was made
2 impossible by this lack of request, and because the
3 three main leaderships, Serbia, Slovenia and Croatia,
4 opposed.
5 In this context, when Ante Markovic tried
6 to implement the new set of laws as I mentioned before,
7 he was opposed by the three leaderships. Sometimes they
8 agreed together, sometimes they formed strange
9 alliances, so, for instance, Croatia and Serbia did not
10 apply the laws or the laws approved by the government,
11 albeit the constitution, the Yugoslav Constitution, and
12 I want to stress that at that time, Yugoslavia still
13 existed, and was a recognised international state, the
14 Constitution made clear that the constitutions and the
15 laws of the republics had not to be in contrast with
16 the Federal Constitution. They were not implemented,
17 or, for instance, Serbia and Slovenia rejected the
18 Ante Markovic proposal to change immediately the
19 70 per cent of the Federal constitutions, in particular
20 in the parts related to the economic issues, because
21 this would allow the two to start with the economic
22 reforms, and to create the condition for westernised
23 Yugoslavia, and secondly in the parts related to the
24 role of the party, because the party was operating and
25 it was possible to change because everybody could agree
1 on these two topics, and he was stopped by Slovenian
2 and Serb leaderships.
3 Then in the end of 1990 Milosevic, who
4 had a great social situation in the country, and was
5 affected by the risk of social turmoil, made the
6 decision to order to the Serb bank, popular bank, to
7 print money without the control of the Federal Bank
8 which affected enormously all the whole economic
9 proposal of Markovic.
10 Meanwhile Markovic was already isolated in
11 the country because his party created in August 1990,
12 was defeated in Bosnia, and he had a significant
13 support, only Macedonia.
14 So, he was weak, and he became weaker and
15 weaker in the first half of 1994, 1991, when he tried
16 to submit a proposal for a Union of Independent States
17 which was more a proposal of principles, than a real
18 proposal of transforming Yugoslavia, it was gist
19 a series of principles on the basis of, "we just
20 started to find a compromise", but this proposal was
21 rejected. It was arrived in the beginning of June, and
22 on 27th June the war erupted, so it was the end for --
23 so it was particularly boycotted in this activity and
24 it was not supported by the international community,
25 particularly in one aspect, which is very important for
1 the international community point of view. The
2 multi-party elections of Yugoslavia.
3 Q. So it was a few days after the proposals of
4 Markovic being rejected that the war erupted. Is that
5 right?
6 A. Not only the Markovic, it was another
7 proposal, even another proposal. There was another
8 proposal submitted by Izetbegovic and Kiro Gligorov a
9 few days later and this was another attempt
10 at mediation, but according to Gligorov himself, who
11 I know personally, and I met in his cabinet as
12 a President of Macedonia, he told me that the proposal
13 was not discussed at all, not considered at all, and
14 because it was clearly too late -- it was interesting
15 that from January 1991 to June 1991, we had a series of
16 meetings of the six presidents. They met in different
17 Tito villas. They move from one villa to another to
18 find a compromise which was not included in the legal
19 system of the existing country. They tried to find
20 a solution and it was impossible because the position
21 particularly of Serbia on one side and Slovenia, backed
22 by Croatia on the other side, were clashing, and it was
23 impossible to find, in this context, within these six
24 people, a compromise.
25 So, this is also interesting to stress that
1 no one of the President of Yugoslavia claimed the
2 participation of Albanian representatives in this
3 context. No one, included Slovenia, when you asked me
4 before about the Slovenia, actually, this changes
5 according to the situation. They support and not
6 support Albanians suspended, or, for instance, never
7 Ante Markovic was involved in this discussion, so the
8 premier was not involved.
9 This was a discussion within these six
10 presidents only.
11 Q. In this process of disintegration, what
12 happened in Slovenia on 23rd December 1990?
13 A. In Slovenia a referendum was held in December
14 1990. the referendum was addressed, a question, to the
15 population, whether they accepted the idea of a free
16 and independent Slovenia in the event that the
17 confederation proposal submitted by Slovenia would not
18 be accepted by the other Yugoslav countries within six
19 months. Within six months. This movement of the voters
20 of the referendums were 93.5 per cent, if I remember
21 well, and the support, the option for the possible
22 independence was 88.5 per cent.
23 Q. So 93.5 per cent of eligible voters
24 participated of which 88.5 per cent --
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. -- decided for independent.
2 A. Yes. Let me just add this; this was very
3 interesting. When the six months were expiring in May
4 1991, Ante Markovic visited Ljubljana and the Ljubljana
5 government asked him to provide immediately in three
6 weeks the budget division, the economic and patrimonial
7 situation of Yugoslavia in three weeks in order to
8 start the proceeding of dividing the debts and the
9 properties of Yugoslavia. This happened in May 1991 and
10 they gave to the government only three weeks to do
11 this.
12 Q. Your Honours, I notice the time, and, as
13 I had anticipated, I have not completed my
14 examination-in-chief. I have had discussions with
15 Professor Bianchini, and he would be available on the
16 26th and 27th of March which is the last two days of
17 our March session, the end of March session.
18 It is my submission, your Honours, that that
19 would be a good time to complete Professor Bianchini's
20 evidence, and I might just say that it is our
21 expectation, at least we are striving to achieve this,
22 that the 27th would be the last day, will be the last
23 day of the Prosecution case. That is our expectation.
24 Whether we are able to achieve that or not, I can
25 inform your Honours better of that at the end of next
1 week, but if Professor Bianchini can be excused now and
2 come back on the 26th, we will complete his evidence in
3 those two days and hopefully at the same time, complete
4 the Prosecution case.
5 JUDGE RODRIGUES: Thank you, Mr. Niemann. We
6 can go along with that. I think we can also agree that
7 we have reached 1.15 pm. So, we are going to leave it
8 at that for today. We will be back next week, so the
9 Professor will be back on the basis outlined by
10 Mr. Niemann. So thank you very much.
11 (1.15 pm)
12 (Hearing adjourned)
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