1 Friday, 7 September 2007

2 [Open session]

3 [The accused entered court]

4 --- Upon commencing at 9.00 a.m.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: While the witness is coming into court, let me

6 announce a slight alteration to the sitting schedule. We'll sit until

7 10.30 for the first session this morning and then from 11.00 for the

8 second session.

9 [The witness entered court]

10 THE WITNESS: Thank you.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Good morning, Mr. Gajic.

12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Good morning.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: Your examination by Mr. Visnjic will continue in a

14 moment, but please bear in mind that the solemn declaration to speak the

15 truth which you made at the beginning of your evidence continues to apply

16 to that evidence today.

17 Mr. Visnjic.

18 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour. Before I

19 continue --

20 WITNESS: BRANKO GAJIC [Resumed]

21 [Witness answered through interpreter]

22 Examination by Mr. Visnjic: [Continued]

23 Q. [Interpretation] Good morning, General.

24 A. Good morning.

25 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Before I continue examining General

1 Gajic, Your Honours, I would like to tell you that we have looked at your

2 suggestion concerning the examination-in-chief of this witness, and during

3 the night we have reorganised our direct. So this time we're going to

4 focus on the material that we have, and in this way we are going to

5 present through exhibits to the Trial Chamber certain activities in Kosovo

6 that took place in 1998 and 1999. Thank you.

7 Q. General, yesterday you told us about the activities that the

8 Kosovo Liberation Army carried out in 1998 and 1999. We subdivided these

9 periods in three phases, up to March 1998; the second one from March 1998

10 to October 1998; and the third one from November 1998 until the beginning

11 of the war.

12 A. Correct.

13 Q. This time I would like us to go through some exhibits. I have

14 categorised them in a way. I would like us to go through some parts of

15 these documents, and I would like to ask you for your comments.

16 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, may I just note that

17 the witness in his statement 3D1084, he made certain comments regarding

18 these exhibits. However, now we've classified them according to subjects,

19 topics. Also what I wish to say to you is that for the presentation here

20 today in court, due to the brevity of time, we selected only a few, 327,

21 characteristic events that took place.

22 As for the other things that happened, they are represented in the

23 documents and we would like the Trial Chamber to examine them in their

24 entirety at a later stage.

25 Could the witness please be shown Exhibit 3D993, paragraph 2.

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Which page of the statement does that one refer to,

2 Mr. Visnjic?

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, the witness commented

4 on these exhibits in paragraphs 17 through -- 17 through 134.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: We, but 3D -- yes, you're starting with the one in

6 paragraph 17?

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] No, Your Honour. This time I've

8 divided it according to topics. I think that that will be easier for you

9 to follow. At any rate, we will try to strike a balance between what the

10 statement says and what the witness is going to testify to during his

11 examination-in-chief.

12 Q. General, yesterday as you were waiting in front of the courtroom,

13 another witness spoke about Grom 98, plan Grom 98. In one paragraph of

14 this plan it says that the army -- that the Army of Yugoslavia defines

15 certain activities in Kosovo as a purported humanitarian catastrophe. My

16 question is: Did the Army of Yugoslavia have any reason to call events in

17 Kosovo a purported humanitarian catastrophe?

18 A. Yes, it did have reason to do that.

19 Q. General, could you please look at paragraph 2 of 3D993.

20 A. Yes. This is a report from the security section of the Pristina

21 Corps dated the 31st of May, 1998. And in paragraph 2 what is stated is

22 that women and children have been moved from the territory of the

23 municipality of Djakovica deeper inside Kosovo and Metohija or through

24 identified illegal channels to Montenegro, because Montenegro was one of

25 the transit areas and also a base where even members of the KLA sought

1 shelter.

2 Q. General, actually these are paragraphs 1 and 2, but wasn't one of

3 the KLA tactics, or rather, what was the KLA tactic at the time that the

4 VJ believed they were carrying out?

5 A. That is precisely what I wanted to say. This relocation of women

6 and children further into the territory of Kosovo and Metohija or to

7 Montenegro was a planned, organised, activity of the KLA in order for them

8 to later portray this in the media as being carried out because of the

9 excessive use of force and that the army and the MUP were to be blamed for

10 that. So there were a great many such activities. And in actual fact

11 they, the KLA, were doing this in a planned fashion. They were moving

12 them deeper into Kosovo and across the border into Albania, Montenegro,

13 even into Macedonia, their women and children, that is, and then by way of

14 propaganda, through the media, they were saying that this was a

15 humanitarian catastrophe. That is the core of the matter.

16 Q. General, can you tell us a few things about this document, can you

17 tell us some more about what kind of report is this?

18 A. This is a telegram that was sent by the commander of the Pristina

19 Corps because sometime from June 1998 in the security administration on

20 the orders of the then-chief, General Dimitrijevic, in order to have the

21 security administration receive information about the situation in Kosovo

22 as soon as possible because the situation was really changing fast,

23 General Dimitrijevic decided and ordered that the security section of the

24 Pristina Corps should daily provide information to the security

25 administration about what was going on by way of telegrams. One copy of

1 the telegram, in order not to hinder the chain of command, would be sent

2 to the command of the Pristina Corps, rather, the 3rd Army and this went

3 on all the way up to the 20th or the 21st of March, 1999, when the new

4 chief of the security administration, General Geza Farkas, ordered that

5 the telegrams be stopped. The security section of the Pristina Corps sent

6 all of them -- their telegrams to the security department of the 3rd Army,

7 and they in turn sent every day the so-called daily operations reports

8 that contained not only the situation and the problems in Kosovo, but also

9 in the area of responsibility of the 3rd Army.

10 Q. General, if I understood what you were saying, this is not a

11 subject that I wanted to deal with now but perhaps we can clarify it now.

12 There was one reporting system up to the beginning of the war and after

13 the beginning of the war there was a different system of reporting?

14 A. It can be put that way.

15 Q. Within the security organs?

16 A. Within the security organs --

17 THE INTERPRETER: Can the speakers please slow down.

18 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic, I think it's important right at the

19 outset that we set a tempo that the interpreters can cope with.

20 It's important, Mr. Gajic, that since you're speaking the same

21 language that you should wait until the translation is complete before you

22 answer the question and you get a guide of that in front of you because

23 once the translation is completed the cursor on the type writer will stop

24 moving.

25 Mr. Visnjic.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

2 Q. General, I'm going to make another suggestion. If you give

3 shorter answers, we will automatically have a pause between questions and

4 answers and that will be of assistance to the interpreters.

5 My question was why at the beginning of the war a new reporting

6 system was put in place within the security organs.

7 A. Well, I think that the basic reason was the fact that the security

8 organs of the Pristina Corps had a lot of work to do, and generally

9 speaking that was the situation the beginning of the aggression of NATO.

10 Q. Thank you. General, I would like to ask you to look at Exhibit

11 3D994.

12 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, this is a document

13 dated the 10th of June, 1998.

14 Q. General, I'm going to ask you to concentrate on paragraph 4 in

15 Serbian that says: "In the forthcoming period, the KLA in the territory

16 expects many asylum seekers to arrive from Europe via Albania in order to

17 have more massive action in the territory," what is that?

18 A. That is a fact that was confirmed several times through the

19 reports, namely, that Albania was a destination where volunteers were

20 gathered not only from Kosovo but from western European countries in terms

21 of the militant political wing that existed in western Europe.

22 Q. Thank you. I'd like to ask you to look at the next paragraph that

23 says: "Yesterday's information about the moving out of women, children,

24 and the elderly have been confirmed."

25 A. Yes. That is to say that the information provided in the report

1 of the previous day, the security organs checked that and confirmed that

2 it was correct.

3 Q. And all of that was happening in June, and as far as I can see in

4 this paragraph these villages actually had not been emptied?

5 A. No.

6 Q. Who remained in the villages, General?

7 A. Members of the KLA stayed in the villages, and probably part of

8 the civilians who were some kind of logistics support. Just one more

9 sentence. That is the time of intensive preparation and KLA activity that

10 made it necessary to carry out an anti-terrorist operation at the end of

11 June.

12 Q. Thank you. It is the 12th of June, so 3D996 is our next document

13 dated the 12th of June, 1998, paragraphs 6 and 7, or rather, page 2.

14 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we have page 2 of this

15 document. Thank you.

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I don't have page 2 here.

17 MR. VISNJIC: Second page. Thank you.

18 Q. [Interpretation] General, we're in a different territory here, the

19 municipality of Suva Reka, where yet again it is stated, as they say here

20 in the document: "Siptar women and children were moved out," and what was

21 continued was the building of shelters and in these two villages there

22 were about 1.000 terrorists. What did this mean for the security

23 administration at the time?

24 A. Well, it means that it was a confirmation of the previously

25 commented upon information and other similar information that we had

1 received; namely, that members of the KLA, while preparing for a clash

2 with the MUP and the Army of Yugoslavia, were moving out their civilians

3 in a planned fashion, that is to say to different areas, that they engage

4 part of them for fortifying the area and they even engaged children which

5 is in contravention of the Geneva Conventions. I'm sorry, let me finish.

6 Here you can also see that they are carrying out organised preparations

7 for a clash with the security forces and that they're relocating the

8 population.

9 Q. General, I would like to ask you to look at document 3D997, dated

10 the 13th of June, 1998, paragraph 3, the last three lines that say:

11 "Not accepting any kind of dialogue, their refusal to accept any

12 kind of dialogue, the evacuation of women and children and the fact that

13 the terrorists are trying to take the best possible conditions for an

14 all-out clash with the MUP and VJ organs throughout the territory."

15 A. I don't have that.

16 Q. General, it should be in front of you. The paragraph begins with

17 the words "operativnim radom"?

18 A. Yes, here it is.

19 Q. Can you please tell us what does it mean operational work?

20 A. Well, it means we obtained this intelligence from various sources

21 and the military security service had very good sources and tried to

22 verify all the intelligence before they were circulated.

23 Q. Thank you. So very briefly, the last three lines here.

24 A. Yes. Here again we see the same problem of the evacuation,

25 planned evacuation organised by the KLA, and the second thing here is that

1 this militant wing that the KLA represented refused any dialogue, any

2 political settlement for the Kosovo problem. They only wanted to use

3 arms.

4 Q. General, I would like you to look at the text three passages down.

5 It begins with the words "komunikacija Kosovska Mitrovica" and it says

6 here: "On the 12th of June all of the Serbian population moved out after

7 Srbica, most of the Siptars from that town moved out going in the

8 direction of Kosovska Mitrovica."

9 A. Yes, that is the Lap Operative Zone and this is a striking

10 example, striking evidence of the Serbian population. It shows that they

11 were moving out on a daily basis under this pressure, again from the area

12 of the Srbica municipality, practically all of the Serbs moved out, moving

13 to the area of Kosovska Mitrovica where --

14 Q. Just a moment, General, we're still waiting for the

15 interpretation. It says here in the text that most of the Albanians moved

16 out from that town, too?

17 A. Yes, precisely, that's what I wanted to say. Not only were Serbs

18 under pressure, but also honest Albanians, and I said yesterday that many

19 Albanians were actually opposed to terrorism and to armed violence that

20 was to be used to achieve the political goals. And more or less they

21 shared the fate of the Serbian population.

22 Q. General, the population did not flee in the face of the conflict.

23 They fled, they moved out, because they were under pressure, there was

24 pressure exerted. Am I right?

25 A. Yes, you're completely right.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Can we please look at Defence

2 Exhibit 3D998, the last two passages, please.

3 Q. General don't we see an example here of terrorists exerting

4 pressure on the villagers in order to force them to move out of their

5 villages?

6 A. Yes, this is one of the many such examples, and we can see here

7 where the pressure is exerted on the Albanian population to move out of

8 the villages and there were many examples where ultimatums were issued and

9 deadlines were set: You have to move out by such and such date. If they

10 failed to obey an armed group of the KLA would arrive and would warn again

11 and tell the population that the ultimatum has to be honoured.

12 Q. Thank you. In the last passage- and you just gave evidence about

13 that, that moving out of the population was an activity that the KLA

14 performed in a planned manner?

15 A. Yes.

16 Q. What did the KLA achieve by moving out those people, apart from

17 getting an empty space where it could fight the army?

18 A. Well, what it did get was in the sphere of the humanitarian

19 catastrophe, so-called humanitarian catastrophe. It was one of their

20 strategic goals because they wanted to paint this picture for the world,

21 for the international community, that the Albanians in Kosovo and Metohija

22 are victims of a genocidal policy where the Army of Yugoslavia and MUP

23 participated actively.

24 Q. General, if you move the Albanian population from one area and

25 have them go across the border into the Republic of Albania, as we see in

1 this here example, what happens on the other side of the border? It is

2 stated here that they are received in an organised manner. Could you

3 please tell us what happened with the population, with the women,

4 children, men?

5 A. Yes, I can give you an answer to that. There was -- there was a

6 really good organisation in place. When the Albanian population would

7 come, various genders, various ages, then they would be classified. Men

8 of military age would be sent to training camps. They would be given

9 weapons and they would receive military training so that they could later

10 join the KLA. The women and children would be separated and put into

11 other reception centres, where their life and work would be organised.

12 Q. General, we looked at this document and it was dated --

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we please move it up a little

14 bit, scroll up, I think it is the 16th of June, 1998.

15 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes.

16 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we please look at another

17 document, it's dated one month later, that's 3D1000.

18 Q. General, this is the command of the 2nd Army.

19 A. I haven't yet gotten this document on my screen.

20 Q. Are you familiar with this document?

21 A. Yes, of course.

22 Q. I don't want us to comment on this document paragraph by

23 paragraph, but I would like to ask you, if you can, to just tell us

24 briefly what is this document about.

25 A. First of all, it confirms in the second and third paragraph

1 starting with the words "illegal crossings," this confirms what I have

2 just said about the reception of the civilians from Kosovo and Metohija

3 and their classification with the men of military age going to training

4 centres and women, children, and the elderly going to other places. Here

5 we see what they say about the organisation of the training, and this is

6 the result of an interrogation of two Albanians, Edmir Musaj is the son of

7 a retired Sigurimi officer service, the Albanian Sigurimi service and we

8 can see that the main training centre for the Albanians was Tropoje.

9 There are actually two centres, one is the centre for training and the

10 other is the logistics centre. This is where the command is located, the

11 command that had links with Sali Berisha because the people working at the

12 centre command were in regular contact with Sali Berisha, which all speaks

13 to the fact that Sali Berisha at that time, he was the president of

14 Albania at the time, that he supported, or rather, he was not the

15 president of Albania, but he was a high-ranking political official, that

16 he was behind the KLA and the separatist movement in Kosovo and Metohija.

17 .

18 Q. General, just a moment, excuse me.

19 A. We're waiting for the interpretation?

20 Q. No, we're waiting for the Judges to see page 2 of the English

21 version.

22 A. I apologise.

23 Q. So what happened with the people who completed their training?

24 A. The people who completed their training had two options. One was

25 to wait the call-up and then to move through illegal channels to Kosovo,

1 to try and get into Kosovo, and join the KLA units depending on the areas

2 from which they had come from to undergo training; or they would return to

3 Kosovo immediately, where they would immediately join the units or go home

4 and wait for the call-up.

5 Q. Thank you, General. Now I would like --

6 A. Just a moment, if I may say one more sentence. It is important to

7 stress here because this -- the fact that this document shows that the

8 officers of the Albanian army were actually conducting this training in

9 those centres.

10 Q. Thank you.

11 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we have Defence Exhibit 3D1001

12 on the screen, please.

13 Q. General, this document is dated the 1st of August, 1998, so some

14 ten days after the previous document that we looked at. Could you please

15 look at paragraph 3 that begins with the words: "The women and children

16 have fled from Junik ..." And could you please comment on this paragraph,

17 in particular the last sentence in this paragraph.

18 A. Yes. This, as you said, is a document dated the 1st of August.

19 This is the time when the anti-terrorist operation was underway already,

20 and this paragraph shows us two things. First, that -- you have to know

21 that Junik was a major stronghold of the KLA and they suffered some

22 casualties because of the onslaught of the security forces and they were

23 fleeing -- throwing down their arms and fleeing, trying to save their

24 lives. And under the -- because of this action and because of the

25 situation in the KLA, they were hiding their women and children, finding

1 shelter for them, and in this column of women and children there were

2 infiltrated terrorists. And some documents indicate that they even put on

3 women's clothes in order to hide and to be able to move to other

4 destinations.

5 Q. General, could we please look at the last paragraph on page 1,

6 that's page 1 in the Serbian and in English that would be page 2, the

7 penultimate paragraph.

8 Here we have a description of the situation in the territory of

9 another municipality, that of Glogovac, and it is stated here that the

10 civilian population had been evacuated from that area, too; am I right?

11 A. Yes, you're right.

12 Q. General, may I then conclude that both in the territory of Junik

13 and Glogovac the civilian population was evacuated and combat, as

14 indicated in this document, were either under way or were being prepared,

15 rather, there were no civilians in that area during combat operations; am

16 I right?

17 A. Yes, that is correct, you are absolutely right. I have to add one

18 more thing. They created this psychological situation, and the desire,

19 the fact, was to create this image of purported humanitarian catastrophe

20 for the benefit of the international community. There -- even when there

21 was no combat, when there were no combat operations, they would raise

22 tensions, spread rumours that there would be attacks, and then they moved

23 out the civilian population.

24 Q. I would like --

25 JUDGE BONOMY: Just one moment.

1 Mr. Gajic, just two questions. The paragraph you've just looked

2 at actually says that the civilian population was evacuated because they

3 expected a MUP attack, rather than to create some impression of

4 humanitarian catastrophe because of refugees.

5 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. I spoke in general about what

6 they were doing, but in this specific case you are right. They expected

7 the MUP to attack, and as far as I know this attack never materialised.

8 But this psychological effect was being created.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, you've actually said that it was created in

10 Glogovac, but it's difficult to draw that conclusion from this paragraph.

11 The second question I want to ask you is this: What steps were

12 taken to alter the impression that was abroad in the United Nations that

13 the refugee problem was caused by Serb activity?

14 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I know what the army did. I know

15 that 3rd Army command, the Pristina Corps had some documents ordering that

16 the Albanian people in the villages be contacted and inform that they were

17 under no threat from the army and that they could feel safe and secure in

18 this respect and that they were under threat of terrorism, that getting

19 involved in terrorism was the real danger and despite the fact that these

20 were different ethnicities --

21 JUDGE BONOMY: That's not really my question. The evidence we

22 have here is of an increasing impression over 1998 and early 1999 that the

23 refugee crisis was caused by the activity of Yugoslav and Serb forces

24 rather than the KLA. Now, what steps are you aware of taken by your

25 government to create -- or to alter what you would say was a false

1 impression that the international community had about the real source of

2 the refugee problem?

3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, as far as I know, although I

4 don't really have any specific knowledge, but on the basis of what I do

5 know representatives of the state organs and the Ministry of Foreign

6 Affairs in contacts with the international community tried to paint the

7 real picture to tell the truth, and some publications were issued in order

8 to inform the international community about the real state of affairs. I

9 couldn't be more specific than that, but I do know that at this diplomatic

10 level in all the contacts, efforts were made to explain what the essence

11 of the problem in Kosovo and Metohija was when it comes to the civilian

12 population, and indeed the overall situation.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: You see, we have evidence that as early as the 31st

14 of March the Security Council of United Nations in a resolution expressed

15 the following: "Gravely concerned that the recent intense fighting in

16 Kosovo and in particular the excessive and indiscriminate use of force by

17 Serbian security forces and the Yugoslav Army, which have resulted in

18 numerous civilian casualties and according to the estimate of the

19 Secretary-General the displacement of over 230.000 persons from their

20 homes."

21 And I was really anxious to find out what the Serb authorities

22 were going to correct what, according to you, is clearly a false

23 impression. Now, are you aware of -- if you're not aware of any steps

24 taken, then please simply say so.

25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, what I just said, this is the

1 thing that I know of. I couldn't be more specific than that.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

3 Mr. Visnjic.

4 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I would like to go back

5 to a document we just looked at, document 3D996, to confirm what

6 General Gajic just said about the efforts the army put in in order to keep

7 the population in the territory, not to have them move out. And could we

8 please --

9 JUDGE BONOMY: We can certainly read it -- you've drawn our

10 attention to it and we can read that for ourselves. If you're going to

11 deal with the evidence in this way we're going to be here for many hours

12 dealing with the statement and one wonders what's the point of the

13 statement if you're going to elaborate on it and greatly expand the

14 references to every incident that's simply summarized in three lines in

15 the present statement.

16 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] No, Your Honour. I directly wanted

17 to rely on General Gajic's answer. I wanted to indicate another paragraph

18 that I didn't indicate before, and that is paragraph 3, that says that the

19 villagers from Korenica -- could we please have that document on the

20 screen, 3D996, which says briefly that the villagers of Korenica asked the

21 Army of Yugoslavia for protection in order to be protected from terrorist

22 attacks, and that therefore there were consultations going on with the

23 Army of Yugoslavia.

24 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, sorry, I really have to say

25 something.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

2 Q. General, please, now I would like to show 3D1002.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, it has to do with

4 population movements our one-but-last exhibit on that subject, 3D1002

5 dated the 9th of August, 1998, paragraph 4, please.

6 Q. General, do you see it?

7 A. Evacuation of members, is that what you're saying?

8 Q. Can you just give us a brief comment.

9 A. Well, it confirms everything I've said so far. We see here that

10 even a staff -- a KLA staff was established, headed by Tahir Zemaj, a

11 former JNA officer, by the way, who was organising the transport of

12 civilians, organised transport and evacuation, that is, towards Streocki

13 Planine, the mountains of Streoc, and the border towards toward

14 Montenegro that was a transit area, as I've already said; so they indeed

15 have an organisation.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: Let me correct one mistake I made. The resolution

17 I was actually referring to was the 23rd of September, 1998.

18 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] I am sorry. This is our last

19 exhibit on this topic, the 21st of August, 1998, 3D1004, points, or

20 rather, point 2.1. In English it is probably -- yes, on this page, or

21 rather, it would be good to move on to the next page in English. It's all

22 right in Serbian, but perhaps I can read it.

23 Q. "In the woods between the villages of -- the villages of Duvnjak

24 and Skivjane there are about 300 refugee from Junik and Glodjane. Some

25 members of the KLA from these villages are among them and they are not

1 allowing the civilians to return to their places of residence."

2 A. You want my comment?

3 Q. General, a brief comment from you, please.

4 A. There was several pieces of information of this nature where

5 representatives of the KLA did not allow civilians to return to their

6 places of residence.

7 Q. Thank you, General.

8 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, the next topic that I

9 would like us to deal with in this period from March to October, that is,

10 pertaining to KLA activity are -- typical terrorist activities that they

11 were carrying out, two exhibits 994 and 996 respectively. We are doing to

12 start with 3D994.

13 Q. General, I'd like to draw your attention to these paragraphs that

14 are somewhere around the middle of the page in Serbian starting with the

15 words: "On the 8th of June ..." In English it's page 1, we see it, and

16 then it continues on page 2.

17 A. Yes. It's these two paragraphs that speak of arming the KLA in

18 the area. This is the territory of Metohija, or rather, the Dukajgin

19 Operation Zone. Most probably they are arming the population by force

20 because in the second paragraph there is a reference to the arming of the

21 Catholic population. I know that there is a document among the evidence

22 where it says that the Catholic population refused to take arms and that a

23 Catholic priest opposed that and was therefore threatened by death. And

24 that is why the Catholic population voluntarily surrendered their weapons

25 to the MUP.

1 Q. Could you just give us your brief comment on the last two

2 paragraphs.

3 A. Yes. I think that this is psychological manipulation yet again

4 pertaining to the 15th of June, 1998. They're saying that they're

5 expecting an imminent threat of war to be declared and that their duty is

6 to destroy everything Serbian, which is correct.

7 Q. General, two paragraphs down it is stated that there is

8 information concerning terrorist intentions of attacking Morina from

9 Albania and from our territory. I'm not going to ask you much about

10 border incidents. Colonel Cucak spoke about that when we started our

11 Defence case, but this information, to have a border post attacked both

12 from the territory of Albania and from the territory of Yugoslavia, what

13 does that say to you?

14 A. It tells us about synchronisations, and that was something that

15 Colonel Cucak spoke about, that is what led to the extension of the border

16 area twice. Synchronisation from the territory of Albania and supporters

17 of the KLA from our area, our border area, that is to say from the

18 territory of Metohija who were involved in these illegal channels,

19 regarding the smuggling of weapons, military equipment, and terrorists.

20 That is why, as I said the border belt was extended.

21 Q. Thank you. And our last exhibit related to these activities and

22 the border 3D1001, paragraphs 4 through 7. That is the second half of

23 this document. There is a rather interesting reference concerning a

24 rather interesting way of how armed groups were being brought into the

25 territory of Yugoslavia, or rather, Kosovo when the border belt was

1 expanded. So it's the bottom of the page, the lower half of the text.

2 A. Where does it start?

3 Q. "It is expected that the bringing in of two numerous and well-armed

4 groups of KLA members ..."

5 A. Yes, that is what referred to, these illegal channels not only

6 from Albania but also from Macedonia. I think I've said that there were

7 channels from Macedonia, too. We identified seven channels through which

8 weapons and military equipment and terrorists were brought in from the

9 Republic of Macedonia.

10 Q. Thank you. General, in this way we would conclude our review of

11 KLA activity through these documents, or rather, parts of it because the

12 rest is in documents. Is there any area that you consider to be

13 significant that we perhaps did not cover with these examples?

14 A. Well, yes, it has to do with the question put by Judge Bonomy. I

15 would like to say a few things. As far as I know, from the beginning of

16 March 1998 the command of the Pristina Corps and the commander of the

17 Pristina Corps personally, at that time General Pavkovic, visited Albanian

18 villages, several villages at that. It was shown on television, so it was

19 broadcast in public. They talked to Albanians with a view to giving

20 political solutions a chance. These problems were solvable. An armed

21 conflict would be the worst option at that. And secondly, that there

22 would be no harm coming to them from the army and that they should not be

23 allowed to be dragged into a fratricidal war. They said to General

24 Pavkovic then and the team that was with him that they were facing

25 terrible problems and pressures of being armed by force, that they were

1 fighting against receiving these weapons because they did not want to take

2 up arms against the Serbs who were the local population just like they

3 were from way back.

4 Another example, and it was the security organs that were

5 particularly engaged in this respect and I'm sure that you'll have

6 witnesses to testify about that. People went to a lot of villages and

7 talked to Albanians who were armed by force and who returned these

8 weapons, or rather, surrendered these weapons of their own free will and

9 military and state organs were informed about this. Probably in these

10 contacts that I talked about, they presented this to the international

11 community, what it was that was going on there, and what the problems

12 were. Thank you.

13 Q. Thank you, General. Now I would like us to move on to the period

14 from October until the beginning of the war. Primarily I would like to

15 deal with a few excerpts from documents that have to do with the KLA

16 taking over parts of the territory, or rather, the return of the KLA to

17 territories that were left by the security forces, the Yugoslav security

18 forces, or rather, the Army of Yugoslavia.

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] With respect to that, I would like

20 Exhibit 1020 to be shown, 3D. 3D1020, point 1.2 on this exhibit.

21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes.

22 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

23 Q. General, let us just make an introduction in order to take the

24 Trial Chamber to the relevant period. It's the 11th of November, 1998,

25 the time in the immediate aftermath of the signing of the October

1 agreement between Milosevic and Holbrooke.

2 A. Yes.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Sorry if I said "signing," Your

4 Honours, achieving an agreement, achieving an agreement, that might be a

5 better word.

6 JUDGE BONOMY: I take it you're still looking for it.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

8 Q. General, tell me what can we see from this document? It's a

9 biggish paragraph, isn't it, it refers to quite a few things, but let us

10 deal with it briefly.

11 A. May I say one sentence. After the agreement was reached between

12 Mr. Holbrooke and Milosevic, I think this was on the 13th of October and

13 this agreement envisaged that the Army of Yugoslavia would withdraw to

14 barracks except for three company-rank combat groups that remained in the

15 area. This time vacuum between the moment when the agreement was reached

16 and before the moment of arrival of the verification mission came was

17 taken advantage of by the KLA. They took up their old positions, the

18 positions they held before the anti-terrorist action had been launched.

19 So they were back again. So now I'm commenting on what you're asking me

20 about, roads and activities of the KLA vis-a-vis citizens, the army, MUP,

21 and everyone moving along these roads, that is to say there are armed

22 incursions, attacks, sabotage. Only between the 9th and 10th of November

23 seven such KLA actions were registered along the Pristina-Nis road, the

24 road to Podujevo as well and so on.

25 Q. Thank you, General, would you please look at the same document,

1 1.4 and 1.5. In the English page that is page 2.

2 A. Yes. In those two paragraphs, 1.4 and 1.5, the document speaks

3 about the establishment of armed check-points. The KLA established armed

4 check-points in the areas of roads leading to villages where it checked

5 IDs of the population, the civilians moving in that area, and seized, not

6 to say robbed, their private property. The objective of this action was

7 to show that they were in power, in fact.

8 Q. Thank you. And in paragraph 1.5 I chose this incident because of

9 its location.

10 A. Yes. This is the village of Racak in the municipality of Stimlje.

11 The KLA members blocked it entirely. They controlled every exit and entry

12 point into this village and out of this village, mistreating the citizens,

13 the villagers of ethnic -- Albanian ethnic background who dared to move

14 out of this village, threatening them with more radical measures.

15 Q. Once again this is a document dated 11th of November, 1998. I

16 would now like to -- I would now like you to look at the document 3D1025.

17 Now we are one month ahead. The date is the 6th of December, 1998, and I

18 think that it would be of interest for the Trial Chamber. Here we see

19 that the KLA activities are talked about in the territory of the Podujevo

20 municipality. This is the so-called Lap area, Lap zone of the KLA.

21 A. Yes. The contents of this document are, indeed, very interesting

22 because this document talks about the fortifications, the fortification

23 works in the area of the Pristina-Podujevo road leading further north to

24 Kursumlija. Two lines of trenches were made 60 centimetres wide and 1.7

25 metres deep. These trenches are manned by the best soldiers the KLA has

1 wearing black uniforms, which means that they were members of the special

2 units.

3 Q. General, could you please make a pause here. I would like to draw

4 the Chamber's attention to the following. These data were obtained from a

5 person who had spent three months with the Kosovo Liberation Army. It is

6 a soldier from the 2nd Army who had been captured during the previous bout

7 of fighting in 1998?

8 A. Yes, and he is the original source.

9 Q. So to speak, this is a man who spent three months with them who

10 had inside information?

11 A. Yes, precisely.

12 Q. And a part of this document, lest we should confuse the Chamber,

13 refers to the time-period before the October agreement, but what I am

14 interested in is this period December of 1998 and that would be on page 2

15 of the Serbian version, and it is also page 2 in the English version. So

16 we will not go into any details, the trenches, the roads, the fortified

17 firing positions that the KLA had set up in order to establish control of

18 this road. This witness provided information about the unit deployed in

19 this area and its intentions.

20 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, that would be the last

21 three paragraphs of this document.

22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Precisely.

23 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

24 Q. Or rather, that would be the last five paragraphs in the English

25 version?

1 A. Yes, precisely, but this document indicates that the -- that

2 they're using women and children to build fortifications.

3 Q. And you said that this had been a special unit, and in this

4 paragraph here we see that this person noted in particular that as for --

5 that he also stressed what the intentions of the KLA were vis-a-vis this

6 territory?

7 A. Yes.

8 Q. In a portion of this text he names persons who were, in his

9 opinion, the commanders of these forces, among them is a person by the

10 name of Remi. General, do you know who that is because several verifiers

11 spoke about this person?

12 A. That was Rrustemi Mustafa, a.k.a. Remi, commander of the Lap

13 zone. As far as I know he had been sentenced to 12 or 15 years in prison

14 by the UNMIK courts, and he's serving a sentence in Dubrava prison and

15 recently some prisoners escaped this prison. It was probably organised by

16 the KLA, and Remi was among those --

17 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, we're not interested in recent activities in

18 that area. This opens doors that lead to passages we do not wish to

19 explore.

20 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] It was not my intention. I wanted

21 to ask the witness something else.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: [Previous translation continues]... You can

23 control the witness.

24 Can you also clarify for me whether the information that you're

25 now leading from the witness relates to the period earlier than the report

1 or does it relate to the period of the report? You referred to an

2 infiltrator who was there for a period of three months.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour ...

4 [Trial Chamber confers]

5 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes, Mr. Visnjic.

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, the way I read this

7 document, it is quite clear that the second half of the document pertains

8 to the time-period immediately before this statement was taken.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: And then towards the end there's a reference to the

10 name of the provider of the information; is that right?

11 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] The very end and the beginning of

12 the document.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: And is this the infiltrator?

14 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] No, no, he was a prisoner of the

15 KLA. He was held captive by them for three months, so he spent three

16 months with them.

17 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, I may have used the wrong expression, but

18 this is the person you say was from the 2nd Army and was there for three

19 months?

20 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] This is a person, as indicated in

21 this document, had been a soldier of the 2nd Army and he was taken

22 prisoner in this zone and spent some time after that with the KLA in this

23 zone.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: I --

25 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] The circumstances in which he was

1 captured, perhaps I can explain this, have nothing to do with the 2nd

2 Army.

3 JUDGE BONOMY: That's not necessary, but for some reason I have

4 the impression that you said or the witness said that the period of three

5 months was earlier, prior to October; is that wrong?

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] The period of three months preceded

7 the 6th of December, which means that it would also include parts of

8 October.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

10 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] And if I may add, there is other

11 evidence about this group and its activities in this period, and our

12 Defence may call this evidence or perhaps the Defence of other accused may

13 do that as the Defence case proceeds. So this information will be

14 corroborated by information from other sources.

15 Q. General, could we move on to the next document, 3D1034, paragraph

16 2.1. General, now we're moving to the territory of the municipality of

17 Glogovac, and this is the 22nd of December, 1998, and here we see that

18 this is about the pressure. I will not be reading this document. I will

19 just be making the most salient points. Paragraph 2.1 speaks about the

20 pressure on the part of the KLA against the population, that includes

21 threats, intimidation of Albanians who in any way show their loyalty to

22 the state. There are some rather penal examples here, paying the

23 electricity bills, registering their vehicles, and so on. And open

24 promises that the KLA would soon establish its own authorities, and we

25 have very clear deadlines for the attacks or actions that the KLA will

1 launch in order to try to force the remaining Serbian authorities from

2 Glogovac and put it under its full control.

3 General, could you please tell me first of all what KLA unit was

4 operating in the Glogovac municipality area?

5 A. Well, I don't know -- in fact, I don't really understand your

6 question.

7 Q. Do you know what operations zone of the KLA covered the

8 municipality of Glogovac?

9 A. I think it was the Nerodimlje or Pastrik Operational Zone, but I

10 don't remember.

11 Q. Do you know perhaps who was the commander of that zone or can you

12 remember?

13 A. No, no, I can't recall now.

14 Q. Thank you --

15 A. But if I can make one comment, if you allow me, just one sentence.

16 This is about the organised rallies in Albanian villages organised by

17 the KLA representatives with the aim of winning over the Albanian

18 population of -- turning them into a homogenous entity in order to promote

19 their terrorist and separatist goals on the one hand, and on the other

20 hand the efforts to distance themselves from the official authorities of

21 Serbian and Yugoslavia and to obstruct them in some way, trying to present

22 themselves as the actual and future power structure in Kosovo.

23 Q. And this is all happening in late December at the time when the

24 verification commission is already in the field and when all parties are

25 trying to calm the situation down and to achieve a political solution?

1 A. Yes, precisely.

2 Q. Thank you. The next document is 1035, 3D1035, paragraph 2.3, that

3 would be on page 2 of the English version.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: This is one not referred to in the statement, is

5 it?

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Paragraph 76.

7 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

8 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

9 Q. General, could you please comment on this request or this demand

10 sent by the KLA to KDOM and the verification mission?

11 A. Yes, in two sentences. So this is a communique from the KLA Main

12 Staff, in which they, in fact, issue an ultimatum to the verification

13 mission and KDOM, demanding that the MUP forces de facto pull out from the

14 territory of Kosovo. This is not first such demand. I can give you --

15 Q. There's no need for you to give us such example. The document

16 speaks for itself. Is this in line with what was achieved by the

17 so-called October agreement?

18 A. No.

19 Q. Thank you, General. Once again, the date of this document is the

20 24th of December, 1998. We will be getting back to this document relating

21 to another case, and now I would like you to look at 3D1038. This is a

22 document dated the 29th of December, 1998, paragraphs 2.2, 2.3, and 2.4.

23 General, this document talks about the KLA's intention to set up a

24 larger operational unit to control the Pristina-Podujevo road; am I right?

25 A. Yes.

1 Q. In 2.4 there is a description of the first combat line of these

2 KLA forces that are right by the Pristina-Podujevo road. Also, there is a

3 reference to the forces, or rather, there is a description of the forces

4 that are at that locality. General, does this correspond to what the

5 captured soldier had told the security organs almost a month before that

6 in the document that we've just seen?

7 A. Yes. This is a confirmation of that information presented by the

8 captured soldier.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic, this exhibit is referred to on page 18

10 of the statement, paragraph 60. Is the reference there to March 1999

11 inaccurate?

12 MR. VISNJIC: I'm sorry. [Interpretation] No, Your Honour, no.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: So --

14 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] May I give an explanation?

15 JUDGE BONOMY: Yeah, where is the reference in the document to the

16 March 1999 spring offensive?

17 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] In this document there is no

18 mention, but it is mentioned in other documents and I think that -- well,

19 I don't want to interpret what the witness wanted to say. Perhaps we

20 should ask him why he said "March" there.

21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Sorry, sorry.

22 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

23 Q. General, please let me finish speaking to the Judge.

24 A. Sorry.

25 Q. General, would you look at your own statement, paragraph 60.

1 General, in paragraph 60 when you wrote the so-called spring

2 offensive of March 1999, did you mean this document, 3D1038, or rather, on

3 the basis of what did you place the so-called spring offensive in that

4 time-period?

5 A. On the basis of this document where it says that through

6 electronic surveillance information was received about intensive

7 preparations on the part of the terrorists for action throughout Kosovo

8 and Metohija, fleeing from mobilisation there is an increase in the

9 Siptars moving out through Montenegro --

10 Q. Thank you. There is no need for that any longer. I think the

11 Judge wanted to ask you why you said "March," when there is no reference

12 to March in the document.

13 A. Yes, Judge Bonomy is right. I did say March. On the basis of all

14 the information that we had; namely, that this offensive was being

15 prepared for March so what Judge Bonomy said is quite appropriate.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: And your information relates to the month of

17 December; is that right?

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, yes. This information is from

19 the month of December; however, electronic surveillance made it possible

20 to obtain these data about the spring offensive. And as I knew of all the

21 other information, speaking of March, I put March in here, although you

22 are right. There is no explicit reference to March in the document

23 itself.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

25 Mr. Visnjic.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, I just have one more

2 document that I'd like to deal with before the break, but I would like to

3 say that my next documents actually pertain to information containing the

4 spring offensive. So I will be dealing with that when we continue.

5 Please, 3D1048, point 2 and point 6.

6 Q. I'm going to ask the interpreters that we go through this slowly.

7 2.6 on page 2.

8 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: We do not have it on our

9 screens.

10 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, this document has not

11 been translated yet, or rather, we don't have it in e-court yet. So we

12 are briefly going to deal with only a few documents in this way.

13 Q. In 2.6 there is a reference to the village of Pirane, and I am

14 going to read only the first characteristic sentence.

15 "On instructions from the terrorists from the so-called KLA, a

16 considerable number of inhabitants of the village of Pirane, Prizren, on

17 the 27th of February this year abandoned their homes, so in the -- so

18 about 30 families are there now, whereas the abandoned houses were taken

19 by the members of this terrorist organisation."

20 Further on it says who had organised that, and then the last part

21 of this paragraph says: "The fact that the terrorists are based in it

22 constitutes a permanent danger for the movement of members and units of

23 the VJ, of organs of the MUP, and the civilian population."

24 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, before I ask the

25 witness, I would just like to remind you that a Prosecution witness spoke

1 about this village and I believe that we will be referring to statements

2 made by that witness later.

3 Q. General, my question is: Is this yet another example? Now we're

4 in March, that is to say the 2nd of March, 1999, and the KLA is slowly

5 jeopardizing the most important roads. And in this way they're trying to

6 take control of the entire territory.

7 A. That was always their strategic objective.

8 Q. Thank you.

9 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, if I understood what

10 you said correctly, now would be the right time to take the break, right?

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes, thank you.

12 Mr. Gajic, we have to have a break at this stage, that will be for

13 half an hour, and we will resume at 11.00. Meanwhile, could you please

14 leave the courtroom with the usher.

15 [The witness stands down]

16 --- Recess taken at 10.29 a.m.

17 --- On resuming at 11.01 a.m.

18 [The witness takes the stand]

19 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic.

20 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour.

21 Could we have 3D1016 on e-court, please, 2.6, page 2 in the

22 Serbian version and page 2 in the English version.

23 Q. General, towards the end of the first session Judge Bonomy asked

24 you about the spring offensive that the KLA was preparing. We have a

25 document from the 5th of November, 1998, before us now. Can you tell me

1 now on the basis of 2.6 what kind of information was the security

2 administration of the General Staff receiving concerning KLA intentions in

3 the period ahead from November onwards, that is?

4 A. The first information about intentions to carry out a spring

5 offensive, rather, they were talking about a long guerilla war, that is

6 what they called it, in spring 1998. The security administration had that

7 as early as October, mid-October I should say. Through our sources the --

8 this information was confirmed, and at some point the military

9 intelligence department sometime in mid-November received confirmation of

10 this through their own channels. What was pointed out was that this would

11 take place in the spring, in March, a long guerilla war.

12 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the witness please be shown

13 4.1.

14 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic, the transcript, if you look at line 8

15 should, I think, be spring 1999.

16 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] You're right, Your Honour. Thank

17 you.

18 JUDGE BONOMY: Are you continuing with this document?

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Yes.

20 JUDGE BONOMY: Okay.

21 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Paragraph 4.1, the same document,

22 page 3 in the English.

23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes.

24 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, you will probably

25 notice that in this paragraph there is a reference to March for a planned

1 general uprising.

2 Q. General, who is B. Bukoshi mentioned here?

3 A. Bujar Bukoshi who was prime minister of the illegal government of

4 the Republic of Kosovo with its seat in Germany. He is a member of the

5 moderate stream of the late Ibrahim Rugova.

6 Q. Thank you, General.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Now I would like the witness to be

8 shown document --

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, before you do that can we go back to the

10 first page of this document, please.

11 Do you have the first page in front of you now, Mr. Gajic?

12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: Paragraph 1, referring to the situation on the

14 state border, says that there were no provocations or border incidents on

15 the state borders with Albania and Macedonia guarded by the border units

16 of the Pristina Corps.

17 Is that what it says?

18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes.

19 JUDGE BONOMY: Did border units of the Pristina Corps guard the

20 border?

21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] They had taken up the border posts.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: From whom?

23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I'm trying to say that they secured

24 the state border, and they were located in the border posts that had been

25 built there, as is the case anywhere else in the world; that is to say

1 that they controlled the state border, these border posts controlled the

2 state border and prevented illegal crossings, smuggling, and other

3 violations.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: We have the impression that this was the Ministry

5 of the Interior that operated on the border.

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] May I say something?

7 JUDGE BONOMY: No, I would like an answer to that.

8 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

9 Q. General, can you say? Can you answer the Judge?

10 A. This is called the line security of the border, and that was

11 carried out by the Army of Yugoslavia. As for the in-depth security, that

12 was carried out by MUP units; however, later that was changed bearing in

13 mind the change that took place. I think that Mr. Cucak, Colonel Cucak

14 spoke about that. As far as I can remember there were two extensions of

15 the border belt and what the border actually was. I think it was 5

16 kilometres and 10 kilometres, but I'm sure that Colonel Cucak explained

17 that properly.

18 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, I think that we're

19 moving in the completely wrong direction.

20 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Gajic, how is it that you're aware of the

21 evidence of Mr. Cucak?

22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, I followed the broadcast.

23 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

24 Yes, Mr. Visnjic.

25 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, may I give you an

1 explanation for the border?

2 JUDGE BONOMY: By asking questions, yes, you can.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

4 Q. General --

5 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Ackerman.

6 MR. ACKERMAN: Your Honour, I -- there's some confusion of some

7 kind because the -- I think the evidence to this stage- and you can

8 certainly find it in the record- is real clear that the army was in

9 charge --

10 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Ackerman, please sit down and we'll hear the

11 version that this witness wishes to give us.

12 Mr. Visnjic, please continue.

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

14 Q. General, could you please tell me, do you know who controlled the

15 border crossings on the overall territory of the Federal Republic of

16 Yugoslavia, including the borders with Kosovo and Macedonia?

17 A. As far as I know, the MUP controlled the border crossings.

18 Q. And who was tasked with controlling the rest of the border?

19 A. The army.

20 Q. General, could you please tell me, the border battalions that were

21 tasked with controlling the border, the military border battalions, they

22 were part of what units?

23 A. They were part of the Pristina Corps, if we're talking about

24 Kosovo specifically and if we're talking about the other parts of the

25 border they were part of those units corps-strength units, that covered

1 the appropriate zone.

2 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, was this clear enough

3 or should I pursue it any further?

4 JUDGE BONOMY: The only uncertainty that remains in my mind now is

5 the reference to the in-depth security which the witness says was

6 originally the responsibility of the MUP.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

8 Q. General, when the border belt was narrow, a hundred to 500 metres,

9 who was able to perform the in-depth control of the border?

10 A. The army.

11 Q. In what belt?

12 A. Well, in that belt that you just mentioned. MUP had other jobs,

13 regular jobs, regular work that it did further in the depth. As far as I

14 know, the line security is what it was.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: That point remains uncertain.

16 Mr. Ackerman, what was it you wished to say?

17 MR. ACKERMAN: Nothing now. The witness said what I was going to

18 say, Your Honour, it had to do with the MUP was in charge of the border

19 crossings, but the army was in charge of the border.

20 JUDGE BONOMY: And that is indeed our understanding of the

21 situation, and it was complicated by the first paragraph of the letter.

22 The explanation has been given, but the reference to in-depth security

23 being the subject -- or being the area of responsibility of the MUP

24 initially is unclear.

25 But please continue, Mr. Visnjic.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Defence Exhibit 3D1027, paragraph

2 2.3.

3 JUDGE BONOMY: If when you're referring to an exhibit the point

4 that you're making is somewhere in the statement, it would be helpful to

5 be directed to the paragraph.

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I think that it will be

7 a problem for me at this point in time, but I can give you a table later

8 on.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: No, no, I can do that myself and I understand the

10 problem. Please continue.

11 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

12 Q. So, General, this is a report from the 9th of December, 1998,

13 paragraph we're looking at is 2.3. Again, it is stated here that several

14 thousand members of the KLA who had undergone training are preparing for

15 action, and this time it is stated as one of the factors that would enable

16 them to actually operate there the improvement of the weather and now

17 we're talking about the spring of 1999; am I right?

18 A. Yes.

19 Q. Well, according to you, or rather, perhaps this is too broad a

20 question. But why was it favourable for the KLA to launch an offensive in

21 spring and not before, in light of the weather conditions?

22 A. Well, the weather conditions are more favourable. If we're

23 talking about camouflage, there are leaves on the trees so you can

24 camouflage things on the ground and also spring comes after winter,

25 there's no more snow. The border with Albania is specific in this

1 respect, and I think there are some other circumstances that affected

2 their choice of that period because all the other preparations were

3 planned in such a manner that they should be completed by that time,

4 spring.

5 Q. Thank you.

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Now I would like Defence Exhibit

7 1035, paragraph 1.1. 3D1035, paragraph 1.1.

8 Q. General, the information contained in this paragraph, this

9 document is dated the 24th of December, 1998, was obtained from a person

10 who had illegally crossed the border and who had been captured?

11 A. Yes.

12 Q. In the course of giving this statement, he told the investigators

13 that he had been registered as a KLA fighter and that he had been in

14 training. Could you please comment on paragraph 2, the last four lines,

15 or rather, paragraph 1.1 and there you see the second passage in that very

16 same paragraph, 1.1. And there it says what the KLA members were told

17 while they were in training?

18 A. Yes. First of all, we have the confirmation of what we had known

19 and what I stated here, that Tropoje was one of the key training centres

20 for the KLA troops. Second, that officers of the Albanian army took part

21 in the training, and I think that I already answered your question, in

22 fact, when I -- actually, this member of the KLA who had undergone

23 training was told to go home to wait for the call-up and that they were

24 being trained for large-scale clashes that would take place in the early

25 spring.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we please now look at

2 paragraph 2.1 in the same document, that would be on page 2 in the English

3 version.

4 Q. General, could you please tell me, what is ob 14 kog mentioned in

5 the first line?

6 A. That is the security organ of the 14th counter-intelligence

7 group --

8 Q. Let's take it slow. Where was this counter-intelligence group

9 stationed?

10 A. In Pristina, and it covered Kosovo and Metohija operationally.

11 Q. Could you please tell me, this intelligence group, did it have

12 information from a meeting that took place in Switzerland? Could you

13 please tell me in general how this intelligence group could have obtained

14 this information?

15 A. It had its operational positions. It was its task to carry out

16 offensive operations in the territory and to engage operative sources that

17 would target the centres where all the activities against the army and the

18 defence of the country were being organised.

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours -- well, this paragraph

20 speaks for itself. I will not be reading it or analysing it, but we have

21 here in detail what proposals were made to the KLA for its strategy in the

22 forthcoming period.

23 Q. One interesting piece of information, General, here, it is stated

24 that the KLA should put under its control broader parts of the territory

25 in order to create conditions for the supply of weapons by air?

1 A. Yes.

2 Q. What does this refer to, because at that time the KLA did not have

3 an air force?

4 A. Well foreign -- it's foreign allies.

5 Q. Thank you, General.

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Now I would like the Defence Exhibit

7 1038, paragraph 2.1.

8 Q. This is the document dated the 29th of December, 1998, and this

9 time we're talking about preparations for the mobilisation. It's a new

10 element in the preparations of the KLA; am I right, General?

11 A. Yes.

12 Q. Everything, again, is linked with the spring offensive?

13 A. Yes, you're right.

14 Q. Thank you.

15 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we now have 1041 on the

16 screen, paragraph 2.2. This is a document dated the 19th of January. We

17 don't have the translation. Could we please see paragraph 2.2 on the

18 screen.

19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, I can't see that paragraph on

20 the screen.

21 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

22 Q. It says: "Unverified intelligence from ob kvo Pristina indicate

23 that the inhabitants in the settlements in the Karadacke area are

24 preparing for the reception of refugees from the areas of Pristina,

25 Urosevac, and Podujevo in case the situation should escalate."

1 General, first of all if you have unverified intelligence, what

2 does it mean?

3 A. Well, it means that the intelligence needs to be further verified.

4 That's the raw data that cannot be taken as accurate, further

5 determination is necessary to determine the actual state of affairs.

6 Q. Thank you. On the 19th of January did the Army of Yugoslavia plan

7 any military operations against the KLA in the area of Pristina, Urosevac,

8 and Podujevo, do you know anything about that, in the period preceding the

9 19th of January and on the 19th of January in light of this time-frame?

10 A. Well, I don't know anything about that in detail. There may have

11 been some plans, bearing in mind the fact that after the agreement was

12 signed there was an escalation, and it was getting closer to the end game.

13 Q. General, do you know whether anything was planned in the Pristina

14 area at all?

15 A. As far as I know, no.

16 Q. Thank you.

17 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] The next exhibit is 1050, paragraphs

18 2.1 and 2.2, 3D1050. This is a document dated the 5th of March, 1999.

19 Q. First, in paragraph 2.1, General, what do we see here?

20 A. Here we see in fact the confirmation of the earlier data that we

21 have already seen, that in the KLA the training and all the other

22 activities involved the active participation of the Albanian army troops

23 and that some orders had been issued to the effect that all Albanian men

24 fit for service should take part and the preparations for the war,

25 building bunkers, digging trenches, fortifying the terrain in a word.

1 Q. This looks like some sort of a mobilisation; am I right, General?

2 A. Yes.

3 Q. Thank you.

4 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we now look at the same

5 document, item 2.2.

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, I can see it.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

8 Q. This pertains to a different territory?

9 A. Yes. This is about Sami Ljustak, one of the leaders or commanders

10 of the KLA, and about the order to evacuate the civilian population at the

11 foothills of Cicavica, that's to the west of Pristina, and to relocate the

12 population to the Vucitrn area. Again, this is part of the preparations

13 that I was talking about.

14 Q. And finally at the end of this paragraph we have the military

15 mobilisation that the KLA is carrying out?

16 A. Yes.

17 Q. And this is now the beginning of March 1999. Now I would like you

18 to look at document 1052, 3D1052. This document is dated the 13th of

19 March, paragraph 2.2.

20 A. This is about the forcible mobilisation on the part of the KLA,

21 it's in the village of Korisa, in the Prizren municipality, on the 11th of

22 March and the 12th of March the villagers were forcibly mobilised and that

23 was just before the NATO aggression, and their training as well.

24 Q. Thank you. And finally, document 1053, also paragraph 2.2.

25 General, this is a document of the 16th of March, which again

1 mentions dislocation of the Albanian population by the KLA?

2 A. Yes. This confirms what has been said so far, but this refers to

3 a part of the border towards Macedonia. And the reason given here is that

4 NATO technical equipment will be brought into this area as part of the

5 preparations for the forthcoming war.

6 Q. Thank you.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, these documents

8 exhaust the topic of KLA preparations for the offensive. In the next set

9 of questions we will be dealing with terrorist activities, and we will

10 begin with document 3D1033. This is a document dated the 19th of

11 December, 1998. Could the witness please be shown paragraph 2.4. It's on

12 page 2 of the B/C/S version. Thank you.

13 Q. General, this is a typical example of certain KLA activities which

14 we have seen in these documents. What characterises this paragraph in

15 your view?

16 A. The contents of this paragraph go to show that the KLA in relation

17 to all suspicious Albanians who they termed spies were subject to

18 repressive measures, such as abduction and even liquidation.

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could Your Honours pay attention to

20 the last paragraph on this document, that's 3.1, it's got nothing to do

21 with this topic; but I'll take this opportunity to put this question to

22 the witness.

23 Q. General, you will have before you now point 3.1 or paragraph 3.1

24 which refers --

25 A. Yes, it refers to Combat Group 1 of the 15th Armoured Brigade from

1 Pristina, the security organs of the Pristina Corps are informing us that

2 on the 19th of December this unit went to its training grounds in the area

3 of Batlavsko Jezero for regular company exercises.

4 Q. Please tell me, General, this document which is a report of the

5 command of the Pristina Corps to the security section, it was not

6 addressed to the General Staff, was it? If I understood you correctly, it

7 was addressed to the security administration; am I right?

8 A. Yes, you are.

9 Q. And you said that the command of the Pristina Corps in the period

10 up to the outbreak of war regularly briefed the security section?

11 A. Yes.

12 Q. Who reviewed these reports and how were they dealt with?

13 A. They arrived, or rather, they were telegrams which arrived usually

14 in the evening, and in the morning when we arrived at work they would all

15 go to the chief of the security administration for him to read and he

16 would extract the information he needed for the ongoing briefings. After

17 that, I would read them as the assistant for counter-intelligence, and

18 then they would be further dealt with by the operations and analytics

19 people.

20 Q. General, the chief of the security administration at the time was

21 General Aleksandar Dimitrijevic?

22 A. That's correct.

23 Q. I wish to draw Their Honours attention to the fact that the

24 definition of combat Group 1/15, combat Group of the 15th Armoured Brigade

25 is also found in 3D1035 and 3D1052.

1 General, did General Dimitrijevic in any way draw attention to or

2 respond to at meetings of the security administration in connection with

3 the reporting concerning this unit and the events in Podujevo?

4 A. No.

5 Q. Tell me, if General Dimitrijevic suspected that his security organ

6 was providing him with incorrect or imprecise information, what would his

7 reaction have been?

8 A. He would have called on the telephone immediately and he would

9 have referred to the telegram, he would have said what page and what

10 paragraph it was in, and he would have demanded a more extensive report,

11 he would have demanded clarification and further details.

12 Q. And do you know, General, whether General Dimitrijevic ever

13 responded or intervened in connection with this report that had to do with

14 training exercises of the 15th or the company of the 15th Armoured

15 Brigade?

16 A. No, he didn't, because had he done so the more extensive report

17 would have arrived and I would have seen it so I would know about it.

18 Q. Thank you.

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, the two exhibits I

20 mentioned 3D1035 of the 24th of December, 1999 [as interpreted], and

21 3D1052 of the 5th of March, 1999 also describe the events in this area,

22 and we will be referring to them in our analysis.

23 Q. General, one more question. This refers to document 1038,

24 paragraph 2.6. Let's go back again to the so-called spring offensive.

25 This is a document of the 29th of December, 1998. Again, there is

1 information mentioned here on KLA activities abroad. Could you tell Their

2 Honours who Bardhyl Mahmuti?

3 A. Bardhyl Mahmuti was a political representative of the separatist

4 leadership abroad, and he belonged to the militant line headed by

5 Adem Demaqi. He was very influential and had many contacts abroad, and

6 among the Albanian political emigres.

7 Q. This document speaks for itself, it refers to the Podujevo area,

8 and it envisages the sending of fresh terrorist groups into the area.

9 This is the 29th of December, 1998.

10 General, document 3D1040 also paragraph 2.6. It's possible that

11 we have no English translation, but it's very brief. I will read this.

12 "The State Security Service has at its disposal information" --

13 excuse me, it's 2.6.

14 "On the 12th of January, 1999, in actions of the so-called KLA

15 with the aim of intimidating the population of Kosovo and Metohija, two

16 Albanians were killed in Urosevac and in Kosovska Mitrovica and two Serb

17 women were expelled from the village of Obrandza in Podujevo

18 municipality."

19 General, very briefly?

20 A. Well, this confirms what has been said so far. It shows how they

21 treated Albanians, honest, decent Albanians who did not wish to join in

22 the armed violence, that they suffered the same fate as the Serbs. They

23 had no mercy towards them.

24 Q. Thank you. Document 1041, 3D1041, dated the 19th of January,

25 1999, paragraph 2.5.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, we have no translation,

2 so we'll ask the interpreters to assist once again.

3 Q. The document says that: "Information available to the security --

4 State Security Service shows that on the 16th of January, 1999, in the

5 house of Rrustem Kelmendi in the village of Bela Crkva, Orahovac

6 municipality, a meeting of the staff of the so-called KLA was held,

7 chaired by Ilir Popaj and attended by Durmi Gashi, Bajram Popaj, Zelfi

8 Kelmendi, Hajrulah Kelmendi, and others and a decision was reached on

9 carrying out terrorist actions against members of the MUP and the VJ on

10 the Zrze-Orahovac road through the village of Bela Crkva with the aim of

11 causing an armed incident which would be used as a pretext for an attack

12 on the village and the taking of the village by members of the so-called

13 KLA."

14 General, this piece of information was obtained in an exchange

15 with the State Security Service. In your testimony you explained that

16 sometimes part of the information you obtained came through that source?

17 A. Yes, and it happened very frequently in Kosovo.

18 Q. Thank you.

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] I will remind Their Honours of the

20 testimony of a number of witnesses as to the events in the village of Bela

21 Crkva, and when we have a translation of this document we will proceed to

22 analyse it further. However in the --

23 JUDGE BONOMY: Perhaps the witness can help us.

24 Why would the KLA wish to attack Bela Crkva?

25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Precisely because there's a part of

1 the text not read by Mr. Visnjic. They wanted to provoke a conflict with

2 the MUP, take the village of Bela Crkva, and then move out the population

3 and so on, and then say to the verification mission that the MUP had

4 attacked Bela Crkva and expelled or killed the population and so on. It

5 says here that after taking Bela Crkva they could massacre some Albanian

6 civilians indiscriminately, and then they would try in a perfidious manner

7 to bring in the verification mission and blame the MUP for what had

8 happened. I don't know whether I've been clear enough.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: And are you aware of any Albanians who survived and

10 can tell us about it?

11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, probably yes, but I couldn't

12 tell you right now. I think that could be checked if the Prosecution is

13 interested.

14 JUDGE BONOMY: The Prosecution are very interested and they've led

15 evidence about this. I'm interested on whether there might be some

16 Defence evidence from people who say this is what actually happened rather

17 than simply Serb intelligence.

18 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, to the best of our

19 knowledge this event did not actually take place, but this was information

20 which existed at the time.

21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The action was being prepared, but

22 why they gave up, that's a different question. The persons who attended

23 the meeting are listed here, so all the elements are there to show that

24 they were preparing this, but not all the actions they were preparing were

25 actually carried out. There were probably some circumstances that

1 prevented it.

2 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] The event in the indictment happened

3 considerably later, Your Honours.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: I'm sorry, that's what I'm thinking. Thank you,

5 Mr. Visnjic.

6 MR. STAMP: Although there is some concern on the part of the

7 Prosecution, perhaps it would be better just later, but I raise it now,

8 that some of the matters discussed in these reports are matters that

9 witnesses who testified would have been in a position to know about and

10 comment about and was not put to these witnesses -- many of these

11 witnesses when they testified. But I think we'll address that later and

12 deliver our position on that point in more detail at a later time. But I

13 think the rules provide clearly in respect to anything the Defence intends

14 to rely upon that if the opportunity arises in cross-examination of

15 Prosecution witnesses, they should have been given an opportunity to speak

16 about this.

17 JUDGE BONOMY: Is this an example?

18 MR. STAMP: I'm checking precisely what was asked of Bajram Popaj

19 or one of the specific witnesses who is mentioned there -- and this is not

20 the first time, so we are checking the records to see exactly what the

21 witnesses were allowed to speak about.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

23 MR. VISNJIC: Your Honour ...

24 [Trial Chamber confers]

25 JUDGE BONOMY: Please continue, Mr. Visnjic.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, if I may be allowed,

2 perhaps I can just give you some information regarding these documents.

3 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes.

4 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] This group of documents was obtained

5 by General Ojdanic's Defence. I don't have this information right now in

6 front of me, but less than two months ago -- not more than two months ago.

7 And we had been trying to obtain it over the past three years, to say the

8 least, in order to be able to verify some things. And another thing I

9 want to note here is that I would be the luckiest person in the world to

10 have had these documents when we had the witness from Bela Crkva, at least

11 about whether the KLA was in that area or not and we did cross-examine on

12 that particular issue.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: I suspect it's because it's a complicated matter

14 that Mr. Stamp is taking the approach he is, since we would find it

15 difficult to resolve anything here and now. So you should continue.

16 However, Mr. Visnjic, it's not particularly helpful to have snippets

17 referred to from each document; on the other hand, we do understand that

18 in relation to some of these you will wish to pin-point items on which the

19 witness can supplement the material available in the document. But

20 remember the position we've taken consistently here, that you have to

21 prioritize. In the interests of everyone involved in the trial, including

22 your co-accused in particular, you have to find ways of presenting a

23 reasonable body of material within a reasonable time. And you don't have

24 the luxury of going through absolutely every piece of material that in a

25 different environment, in an ideal world, you might be able to do.

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, let me just assure you

2 that what we exhibited so far is not every single piece of the material,

3 it's just the tip of the iceberg of the information contained in the

4 documents that we exhibited in full through this witness. And in order to

5 comply with your order in some way, the next topic I intend to deal, that

6 is weapons supply, I just wanted to say to the Trial Chamber that 3D1044,

7 items 2.7, 2.8; 3D1045, paragraph 3; and 3D1051, paragraph 2.4 speak about

8 the arming and supplying the KLA. I don't want to waste our time. Please

9 consider that I have examined the witness about those items, but I beg for

10 your patience on the next topic. We will be using six documents --

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Yeah, to be clear, though, Mr. Visnjic, I'm --

12 we're not making any order on this. We are simply trying to --

13 MR. VISNJIC: Oh, I'm sorry.

14 JUDGE BONOMY: -- Manage, as far as is possible, for us the way in

15 which the case is presented. And if you were to disagree with any

16 suggestion I made about the way in which you presented the evidence that

17 would be your privilege and you would be able to present it, subject

18 obviously to our overall control of the time taken in the interests of

19 everyone. On the other hand, it's because -- it's complicated a little

20 because you've adopted a different approach from the approach in the

21 statement itself. The approach you've taken is very helpful. I think you

22 were wise to change your approach. Here, though, we have a reference to a

23 document 3D1044 -- two of them -- three of them, 44, 45, and 51. Now, are

24 they actually referred to in the statement? It may be that they're not.

25 Well, I've found 51.

1 Now, you can take it if the witness refers in the statement to a

2 document and there's no objection from any party to that document being

3 exhibited to the extent that -- to being exhibited, then we will have

4 regard to if it's referred to in the statement.

5 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, the documents are

6 mentioned in paragraph 129 as a group of documents that includes those

7 that I just referred to.

8 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes, thank you.

9 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] And let's bring this to a close

10 slowly. Our last topic is the conduct of the members of the Kosovo

11 Verification Mission and other foreign representatives in the territory of

12 Kosovo and Metohija regarding the problems related to the KLA and the

13 attack launched by NATO on the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. And in

14 this respect I would like to tender our first document, 3D1030, paragraph

15 2.6. This is a document dated the 15th of December, 1998.

16 Q. General, you will see paragraph 2.6 in front of you momentarily,

17 but before it does -- well, it's already here. Can you please tell me how

18 did the KLA understand the function of and how did it use the Kosovo

19 Verification Mission?

20 A. Well, they understood it to be- and they actually used the mission

21 and abused it indeed or at least tried to abuse it- as party that was

22 favourable to them, that favoured them.

23 Q. It says here that they considered the arrival of the mission to be

24 favourable because they would be able to move freely and carry out their

25 tasks. What tasks are they talking about, General, that the KLA carried

1 out?

2 A. As far as I could remember, this was the 15th of December. This

3 is the time where -- when they were working on reorganizing and

4 strengthening the KLA and taking all those actions aimed at the civilians,

5 MUP, and the army, the time when they prepared for this long guerilla

6 warfare that would start in March 1999.

7 Q. Thank you, General, very much. The same document, paragraph 2.10.

8 A. I don't have it in front of me.

9 Q. That's in page 3 of the Serbian version, page 3 of the English

10 version.

11 A. I have the English.

12 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] We have English version on both

13 sides.

14 Q. General, this is about a conversation that was intercepted by

15 radio surveillance. Could you please tell us what it is all about?

16 A. What paragraph?

17 Q. What is it, radio surveillance?

18 A. Well, it's using equipment to listen in.

19 Q. Paragraph 2.10.

20 A. Yes. Again, this is the 15th of December and this radio

21 surveillance, listening in to the conversations, yielded information about

22 two KLA members, they were talking to each other, and they said that it

23 was a good thing that the verifiers were there because -- they say: "Now

24 we are carry out our actions because the conditions are favourable now.

25 They will not do anything to us."

1 Q. Thank you.

2 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Now I would like document 3D1041,

3 paragraph 2.6. This is the document dated the 19th of January, 1999.

4 Q. General -- well, this document - and we don't have the translation

5 so I will read it very briefly - "according to the State Security Service

6 information, members of the OSCE verification mission on several occasions

7 visited the area of the Vitina municipality, the village of Letnica, which

8 is in the border belt facing Macedonia and the surrounding area, showing

9 interest in specific buildings, facilities, the bridges, and locations for

10 the helicopter landings."

11 General, as far as you know, did the Kosovo Verification Mission

12 need this information to control the cease-fire in force between the KLA

13 and the security forces?

14 A. I don't think so, but I think that this was part of something

15 else, preparations for what actually happened in March.

16 Q. Thank you.

17 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] 3D1044, paragraph 2.1.

18 JUDGE BONOMY: What did happen in March in relation to these

19 buildings, facilities, bridges, and locations?

20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Judge Bonomy, this has to do with

21 checking or determining possible locations for the helicopters, the

22 strength of the bridges, because there were some indications as part of

23 NATO actions that there could be a ground attack, that ground forces could

24 be involved in the NATO interventions. And that is why the strength of

25 the bridges is being checked and as for possible helicopter landing sites,

1 of course we all know that forces come in and land using helicopters.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: And did they?

3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I don't understand your question.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, did the helicopters come in with troops and

5 land on the areas inspected?

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No. No, because there was no ground

7 operation.

8 JUDGE BONOMY: So your intelligence was wrong, was it?

9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, it was not wrong. From the

10 point of view of gathering information, analysing the terrain for a

11 possible ground invasion. So on the basis of the information that was

12 gathered, reports were sent in and that was being considered; but then it

13 was decided that there would be no ground operation, only air-strikes.

14 JUDGE BONOMY: Are you able to name any people in the OSCE-KVM

15 mission who were actively working in support of or in preparation for NATO

16 action in March?

17 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, no, I don't have any specific

18 data because after all --

19 JUDGE BONOMY: Can you name any person you suspect from the KVM

20 mission to have been operating under cover for NATO?

21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, suspicion is one thing and

22 data, verifiable data, accurate data, is another thing. As an

23 intelligence officer I can express my suspicions, but I would not like to

24 imply anything about anyone without having accurate, verified data. I do

25 know that Mr. Walker was an intelligence officer and was quite favourable

1 and that he probably did send intelligence reports.

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, perhaps the answer to

4 your question lies in document 3D1044, paragraph 1 -- paragraph 2.1.

5 [Trial Chamber confers]

6 JUDGE BONOMY: Sorry, Mr. Visnjic.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] So I said that perhaps the answer to

8 your question lies in document 3D1044, paragraph 2.1. I will read this

9 document which says the following: "The available operative data from the

10 security organise of the 14th kog indicate that some of the KDOM EU

11 members, mostly members of the French armed forces, are being sent to the

12 NATO rapid intervention force, stationed in the Republic of Macedonia.

13 "One of them is Frederik Gauthier, who even before leaving Kosovo

14 and Metohija stated that 'the use of NATO forces in early spring is

15 certain,' and we bring this in connection with the announcements made by

16 the terrorists of the so-called KLA, that in the same period they would

17 carry out an incursion of the sabotage groups" -- or rather, I'm

18 sorry, "that they would break through the state border of the Republic of

19 Albania and start carrying out massive terrorist attacks against the VJ

20 and the MUP in the whole territory of Kosovo and Metohija."

21 JUDGE BONOMY: And we now know that that didn't happen, which must

22 be a factor to be taken account of in evaluating all of this evidence.

23 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, we know that this did

24 not happen, but we don't know that it was not being prepared.

25 JUDGE BONOMY: If --

1 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] In any case, the second part of this

2 did happen, that in the same period they would cross the state border from

3 the Republic of Albania and begin large-scale terrorist attacks. This did

4 happen, and as you know from other --

5 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes, that's a different matter. And I think this

6 Chamber would also have to consider carefully the difference between KDOM

7 and the KVM. My question was related to the KVM.

8 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Let's look at the next exhibit,

9 3D1048. Your Honours, excuse me, I don't know whether I need to question

10 the witness about the previous exhibit.

11 Q. General, do you have anything to add concerning paragraph 2.1 in

12 connection with this French member of the armed forces?

13 A. No, no.

14 Q. Thank you.

15 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, Exhibit 3D1048,

16 paragraph 2.7. It's on page 2 in the Serbian version and probably page 2

17 in English, but I don't have it here. I don't have the English version.

18 It's rather brief. I apologise for the interpreters once again.

19 Q. Paragraph 2.7: "Through a reliable source information had arrived

20 that members of the verification mission, mostly persons from the American

21 team to a large extent are providing logistical assistance to the

22 terrorists, to whom they regularly forward the information they have on

23 movements of the police and army and the actions taken, so that the

24 terrorist groups have time to withdraw or come to the aid of other

25 terrorist groups who are in conflict. Also, information is available that

1 they have been instructed by the verifiers to reduce their activities for

2 now up to the meeting in Rambouillet on the 15th of March of this year, so

3 as not to be blamed for a deterioration of the situation and a possible

4 failure of the meeting."

5 I will also read paragraph 2.8, which says: "According to

6 operative information of the security organs of the 14th, several cases of

7 forwarding information on the movements, strength, and activities of the

8 VJ and MUP have been registered for the verifiers of the regional centre

9 Pristina by correspondence of the terrorist organisation, the so-called

10 KLA, which indicates that they are in league with the terrorists -- that

11 there is a league between the terrorists and the Kosovo Verification

12 Mission."

13 JUDGE BONOMY: Two questions arising out of that. Paragraph 2.7,

14 just answer this question yes or no, do you know the identity of the

15 source?

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I don't know, but it can be checked.

17 JUDGE BONOMY: My second question is: What was done at the

18 highest level of the state to raise with the KVM concern about their

19 alleged collaboration with the KLA?

20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] There was a Federal Commission for

21 the implementation of the agreement which had been achieved with the OSCE,

22 or rather, the verification mission. This information of ours - and there

23 is much more of this - was summarized by us until the regular information

24 we sent to users in the top state leadership so that they were aware of

25 all these problems. But I don't know what steps they took to deal with

1 this. Our task was only to inform them, to indicate what the problems

2 were; what they did about them, I couldn't say. All I know is they were

3 informed.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you, Mr. Gajic.

5 Mr. Visnjic.

6 JUDGE CHOWHAN: I have to ask a question. Now, this -- close

7 your -- this appear to be a serious allegation when a mission which is

8 supposed to be neutral, it is alleged, was trying to be in league with

9 the -- one of the parties. Now, was there a public protest? Because a

10 very senior person from the government was trying to cooperate with the

11 KVM and he was the vice-president. So was there a public protest

12 vociferously speaking of this sort of conspiracy or league of these two

13 against yourselves? Because merely if it was only buried in documents

14 that's another thing, but it ought to be if that was an issue.

15 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I agree with you. As far as I know,

16 the chairman of this commission, Mr. Sainovic, did have a meeting in

17 connection with the problems observed in cooperation with the verification

18 mission. I do not know whether this problem was touched on. Let me add

19 one thing, Your Honours, by your leave, something I witnessed which is not

20 found in these documents. On the 26th of August, 1998, I was in Kosovo,

21 and on that occasion members of the 14th counter-intelligence group in the

22 town of Orahovac confiscated several thousand statements taken by -- or

23 taken from Albanians. All these statements had the OSCE heading. They

24 were formalised. There was identifying data in Albanian and a statement.

25 When we looked at these statements and had them translated from Albanian,

1 we found that they all followed the same pattern. We tried to check what

2 this was about, and we found that all over Kosovo a survey of the Albanian

3 population had been made, so to speak. Some sort of evidence was being

4 gathered about the difficult situation and mistreatment of the Albanian

5 people. We then went further and tried to check to see whether the OSCE

6 had also surveyed Serbs, Montenegrins, and other non-Albanians in order to

7 get an objective picture of the situation, and we found not a single case

8 of that. I tried --

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Gajic, you've departed completely from the

10 question that you were being asked. Please confine yourself to what

11 you're being asked about.

12 Mr. Visnjic.

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, before I proceed, let

14 me draw attention to the testimony of John Clark, a member of the KVM,

15 Exhibit 6D106 --

16 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic, we don't want witnesses here prompted

17 by references to what others have said. You can make your submissions

18 about that in due course. We're listening at the moment to the knowledge

19 of this particular witness.

20 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour.

21 3D1052, paragraph 2.3.

22 Q. General, please tell us, what information did you have about this

23 event?

24 A. Well, this confirms what we have been saying so far. It's about

25 the engagement of the members of the KVM in bringing in food and assisting

1 in the care of wounded members of the KLA in an improvised hospital. It

2 doesn't say here precisely which improvised hospital because probably the

3 location could not be precisely established.

4 Q. Thank you. And Exhibit 3D1053, paragraph 2.3. This is a report

5 of the 16th of March, 1999. General, what did this information mean to

6 you, that members of the KVM insisted on new pseudonyms and codes,

7 numbers, for locations where members of the terrorist groups were?

8 A. Well, it means that the circumstances at the time changed and what

9 was about to happen, the events we just spoke about -- we have just been

10 speaking about, and it confirms that these contacts were, or rather, that

11 these contacts amounted to cooperation and mutual assistance.

12 Q. This document is dated the 16th of March, 1999, which is just a

13 week before the attack of NATO on Yugoslavia and is there any connection,

14 in your view?

15 A. Well, in my view there is a connection because these were secrecy

16 measures to have the codes changed, to protect the locations and the

17 activities. This means that some kind of confidential links had been

18 established.

19 Q. Thank you.

20 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] If Your Honours do not have any

21 questions, we will round off this topic and conclude these documents

22 concerning KLA activities.

23 I would now like the General to comment on 3D685, page 65, line 9,

24 I know I didn't say, about documents concerning the KVM and the KLA, I

25 omitted to say that.

1 Q. General, you recognise the document before you?

2 A. Yes.

3 Q. Can you tell me, General, whether your administration participated

4 in compiling this document?

5 A. Yes, one segment of it.

6 Q. This is the assessment of the intelligence and security situation

7 and danger to the security of the FRY?

8 A. Yes, that's the title of the document.

9 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we have page 3, both in

10 English and in B/C/S.

11 Q. General, can you tell Their Honours, these are the contents, but

12 can you tell Their Honours what part of this document your administration

13 participated in compiling?

14 A. Number 2: "Influence of the internal factor," and 2.1 and

15 2.2: "Situation in Kosovo and Metohija" and "situation in the

16 Raska-Polimlje district." 2.3 was done by the administration for morale

17 and information.

18 Q. Thank you.

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the witness be shown the text

20 on page 12, and in English it's page 13, paragraph 4. Could we scroll

21 down in the B/C/S version, please.

22 Q. General, the document speaks for itself so we need not go into

23 detail, but what does this show in relation to some of the information we

24 saw in the previous documents?

25 A. Well, it's a more complex assessment of the security and

1 intelligence situation focusing on Kosovo and Metohija and the

2 Rasko-Polimsa 12.29.01 area. That area was focused on because there was a

3 latent threat that the violence might spread there from Kosovo.

4 Q. Let's stick to Kosovo and Metohija now, General.

5 A. Very well.

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the witness be shown the next

7 page, please. B/C/S page 13, English page 14.

8 Q. General, do you have in front of you the assessment of the KLA

9 forces based on the intelligence the army had at its disposal in February

10 1999 when this document was compiled?

11 A. Yes. This is the gist of all the intelligence gathered by the

12 counter-intelligence service and other services that we were able to

13 obtain by exchanging information related to terrorism in Kosovo and

14 Metohija.

15 Q. Since we have numbers and strength of some of the brigades here,

16 could you please comment on just the last passage that starts with the

17 words: "The operational zone commands ..."

18 A. Yes. We had had rather reliable information at that time that the

19 first recording of all Albanian men of military age was carried out in

20 1997, as early as then. And now, in light of the previous events, they

21 again went to update their records. All the staffs made and updated

22 records of all Albanian men of military age for their voluntary or

23 forcible mobilisation in order to set up new units and staffs or to

24 reinforce the existing ones.

25 Q. General, in the footnote, or rather, could you please tell me,

1 what does it mean, which makes it possible for them to increase their

2 forces over a very short period of time?

3 A. Well, precisely because they had all records of men of military

4 age, Albanian men of military age, and the measures they took to mobilise

5 them voluntarily or forcibly, as we mentioned in my previous evidence and

6 there is more information about that, they were able to increase their

7 forces, the strength of their forces, substantially over a very short

8 period of time.

9 Q. Thank you. In the footnote of this document - and the Trial

10 Chamber will have the opportunity to peruse it in more detail, we have a

11 statistical overview of the incidents in 1998. General, I wanted to ask

12 you a question, the Yugoslav Army, did it have any reason to overestimate

13 the strength or the danger in that period of time or to falsely represent

14 the number and gravity of incidents?

15 A. No, I don't think. I think that these are quite realistic data.

16 Q. Was this document meant for external use, was it going to be sent

17 to somebody outside of the system, an external agent who perhaps needed to

18 be shown some data that were not actually realistic, that did not exist?

19 A. No.

20 Q. Thank you.

21 A. Well, I'm sorry, I know how this document was drafted. Now,

22 whether some information contained therein was used in communication or

23 contact with any external factors, I don't know about that.

24 Q. Thank you, General. General Obradovic explained to us how this

25 document was put together, now I'm asking you about this portion that you

1 yourself drafted.

2 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Now could we go to page 16,

3 paragraph 2 of the English text and page 15, paragraph 2 in the B/C/S

4 version.

5 Q. Could you please comment very briefly on what the Army of

6 Yugoslavia still considered to be the key problem? You see paragraph 2,

7 right there at the top.

8 A. You mean "all this shows"?

9 Q. No. "Securing the state border ..."

10 A. Yes, I do. The state border with Albania was the constant problem

11 in this respect because Albania was the main logistics base for the KLA.

12 Q. General, let me interrupt you. We've heard evidence about that,

13 so could you please tell me, at the time when this document was drafted

14 did the Army of Yugoslavia, in considering the problems it had with the

15 KLA, what was defined as the biggest problem in solving the issue related

16 to the KLA?

17 A. Well, one of the key problems was to cut off the supplies for

18 the -- the illegal channels for smuggling in of terrorists and weapons

19 from Albania.

20 Q. And when it says at this time they have the appropriate quantities

21 of all light and infantry weapons, MES, what's that?

22 A. Mines and explosives.

23 Q. As well as anti-aircraft weapons, what does it mean, "appropriate

24 quantities"?

25 A. It means that some basic units were well-supplied with all those

1 and some elements there where the KLA was stationed, and that for the most

2 part, in particular Metohija, in the Dukagjin Operative Zone and in

3 Drenica, they did not have sufficient quantities of those things and they

4 were preparing for a war.

5 Q. Did I understand you correctly that their efforts to procure

6 weapons did not follow the mobilisation, the increased mobilisation

7 efforts?

8 A. Yes, because they never had any problems with money.

9 Q. Now let me draw your attention to the last passage in this chapter

10 which reads as follows: "Because of systematic terrorist attacks,

11 killings, abductions, pressures and threats against the Serbian and

12 Montenegrin population, there is a realistic danger of those people

13 organising resistance on their own, which may further complicate the

14 existing situation in Kosovo and Metohija."

15 A. Yes.

16 Q. General, my question to you is: Those people arming and

17 organising themselves to put up resistance, this was a problem for the

18 army, not something that it supported?

19 A. Yes, what you say is correct.

20 Q. Now, what was your fear expressed in this assessment?

21 A. We were afraid that the Serbs and Montenegrins and others who

22 were, objectively speaking, in a very difficult situation under constant

23 pressure to move out and their lives were at considerable risk, we were

24 afraid that they might take up arms. There were arms about. It was not

25 difficult to get them, at least infantry weapons. We were afraid that

1 they would take up arms and that there would be clashes because the

2 Albanian villages, the Albanian villages had already been armed by the KLA

3 and they had some Territorial Defence units set up to defend their

4 villages but they could also be used in an attack. And there could follow

5 some inter-ethnic clashes, and we are indeed pointing to this risk.

6 Q. Thank you, General.

7 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Gajic, you're not the first person to tell us

8 that the border had not been secured. Do you know why that was?

9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, I think, Judge Bonomy, that

10 the main problem was lack of troops. We didn't have enough troops, and

11 this problem was stressed several times. And quite objectively speaking

12 this was not easy to solve. Secondly, as far as I can remember, the

13 Pristina Corps command in 1999, during the war in fact, did an analysis

14 and they found that -- I think that this is correct, that there were 175

15 locations where the state border could be crossed illegally and where

16 weapons, ammunition, and terrorists could be smuggled in aside from the

17 control posts, border posts, and it was physically impossible to control

18 all of it.

19 JUDGE BONOMY: Even though you could identify the number of places

20 that such crossings could take place? We appreciate it's a very difficult

21 terrain that forms the border, but that, in a sense, also reduces the

22 potential places for crossing the border and you've been able to confirm

23 that there was a recognised number of those. Was it not possible to

24 have -- would it not have been possible to man these sufficiently to

25 secure the border?

1 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] You are right, your conclusion is

2 quite proper, and measures were, indeed, taken in the course of the

3 anti-terrorist operation, the main channels leading from Albania to

4 Metohija and further into the depth. That was a problem. When these

5 channels were cut off, people from the KLA top said that getting weapons

6 from Albania became a big problem for them because the channels had been

7 cut off.

8 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you, Mr. Gajic.

9 Mr. Visnjic.

10 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

11 Q. General, in response to Judge Bonomy's question you said that the

12 Pristina Corps command did an analysis, and it says here that you said

13 that it was during the war. I assume that you meant it was done just

14 before the war?

15 A. It's possible. I'm not quite sure, but I know that a detailed

16 analysis was done.

17 Q. We will be calling other evidence on this issue so I don't think

18 it would be controversial in any way, but I just wanted to clear this up.

19 General, do you know that just before the war the border belt was,

20 indeed, extended on the border facing Albania?

21 A. Yes, I do know that it was done in May or July, that it was

22 extended.

23 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, I'm not quite sure how

24 we're set for time. Is the break coming up now?

25 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes. Is the answer at line 10 the one you

1 anticipated?

2 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

3 Q. No, I'm asking you about 1999. Do you know that in 1999 on the

4 eve of the war the border belt was extended?

5 A. I don't think so.

6 Q. Thank you. Just one brief question. General, in your statement

7 you dealt with the removal of General Dimitrijevic and the appointment of

8 General Farkas. I want to ask you, is it true that there was an option

9 that envisaged General Dimitrijevic still remaining as the head of the

10 service?

11 A. Yes.

12 Q. What do you know about that?

13 A. He was offered the post of the assistant to the federal minister

14 of defence for the coordination of the military intelligence and

15 counter-intelligence service of the Army of Yugoslavia.

16 Q. When did General Farkas take over?

17 A. It was stated that as of the 24th of March he was the new head of

18 the security administration. I was told that by General Dimitrijevic, and

19 on the 25th of March I submitted my report, I was one of the people who

20 did so, to General Farkas. Other people followed.

21 Q. And is it true that General Dimitrijevic remained in the service

22 in the VJ for some sometime afterwards?

23 A. Yes, because according to the law and regulations, there is a

24 certain period of time for the handover of duty. Once I and my

25 subordinates reported to General Farkas, this was not over. So he and

1 General Farkas remained there for a while doing this handover.

2 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] I think, Your Honours, that this is

3 a convenient time for a break.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

5 MR. STAMP: If I may just raise something before we pause. There

6 have been a lot of leading questions earlier. There was no -- probably no

7 need to object because much of it was in the statement, much of what was

8 being led was in the statement or in the documents. However, now we are

9 moving away from the documents and the statement and the last set of

10 questions have been entirely leading, but you Captain -- I can't pick them

11 up in time. The witness is saying "yes," by the time I'm getting the

12 translation, so I ask if we are moving out of matters that are in the

13 statement that is in evidence already that we could refrain from leading

14 the witness because there's no possibility to object before the witness

15 answers.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you, Mr. Stamp. I'm not entirely in

17 agreement with you that that was a series of leading questions; however,

18 it's important to observe --

19 MR. VISNJIC: I understand.

20 JUDGE BONOMY: -- The comment made, Mr. Visnjic. Thank you.

21 We have to break now for an hour, Mr. Gajic, so could you again

22 leave the courtroom and we'll see you again at 1.45.

23 [The witness stands down]

24 --- Luncheon recess taken at 12.48 p.m.

25 --- On resuming at 1.45 p.m.

1 [The witness takes the stand]

2 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour.

4 Q. General, now I would like us to move to a different period, that's

5 the war.

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] And I would like 3D584 to be shown

7 to the witness, please, page 2, both in the English and in the B/C/S

8 version.

9 Q. General, in your statement in the sections that relate to your

10 function explained where you were and what you did at the beginning of the

11 aggression or the attack of the NATO alliance against Yugoslavia.

12 General, do you recognise the document that's now in front of you?

13 A. Yes.

14 Q. Could you please tell us briefly what this is all about. Other

15 people will testify about the way in which this document was drafted and

16 so on, but very briefly could you tell us what this document is.

17 A. Well, this is the minutes from the reporting or from the briefing

18 to the chief of Supreme Command Staff. The date is the 31st of March,

19 1999, it started at 8.30, and I think that it's actually a mistake because

20 it ended at 2200 hours. And all those persons who were present there are

21 clearly listed with their functions.

22 Q. General, thank you. Could we please move on to page 2 of this

23 document, it's both in English and in B/C/S.

24 A. What is the question, please?

25 Q. The question is: You attended this briefing and you, yourself,

1 submitted a report?

2 A. Well, it says here that the deputy chief of the security

3 administration is present, that would be me. That's what I was at the

4 time.

5 Q. In the middle of this page I see your name. Could you please tell

6 me, you reported certain data you had about NATO and the sabotage

7 terrorist groups, and by that they mean the KLA; is that correct?

8 A. Yes.

9 Q. What information did you have on the 31st of March, 1999?

10 A. Well, we already had intelligence that intense training was

11 underway in the KLA. They were undergoing training in the centres in

12 Albania. We also learned, however - this was operational intelligence -

13 that such training was going on in Macedonia. We also had information we

14 received from KLA prisoner whom we interrogated that in the course of the

15 training of the KLA in the centres of Albania that the officers from some

16 NATO country -- some NATO-member countries were also involved.

17 Q. General, thank you.

18 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we now look at P1475.

19 Q. After those meetings did General Ojdanic issue any orders or give

20 any tasks?

21 A. Yes, after each briefing General Ojdanic assigned tasks in a very

22 accurate manner and often there -- in most cases there would also be

23 deadlines set for the tasks.

24 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we now look at P1475.

25 Q. And could you please comment on it briefly.

1 A. This is an order dated the 2nd of April, 1999, it's a preventive

2 order, as indicated in paragraph 1. It deals with the treatment of the

3 members of the enemy armed forces who surrender or laid down their arms,

4 how they're to be treated, and they should be treated in accordance with

5 the provisions of international law of war and the Geneva Conventions.

6 Q. General, thank you.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we move on to another

8 document, 3D721, that would be page 1 in the B/C/S, the last two pages,

9 and in English that would be page 1, the last four lines.

10 Q. General, we have another briefing, the date is the 3rd of April,

11 1999, as indicated on this document you were again present?

12 A. Yes.

13 Q. This time you tell the Chief of General Staff and his collegium,

14 if we may call it that, about certain problems that occur in the

15 territory. You had already received information that some crimes had been

16 committed; am I right?

17 A. Yes. I think that this report contains very important information

18 and that's about the purported 500.000 refugees. We had this information,

19 and General Krga I think presented some similar data regarding the number

20 of refugees in Kosovo and that figure was placed around 500.000.

21 Q. Could you please look at page 2, that is the intervention by

22 General Krga.

23 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the witness please be shown

24 page 2.

25 Q. Your report begins on page 1, continues into page 2 --

1 A. About the Pentagon?

2 Q. No, I mean the problem with the paramilitary formations. You say

3 here that: "We have information that they were volunteers," and so on?

4 A. Yes, that was the initial data indicating that there were

5 paramilitaries operating in Kosovo, but we were unable to identify them,

6 who was there. We did some research on the orders of the chief of Supreme

7 Command Staff, who insisted that it be determined whether there were any

8 paramilitaries there, and particularly whether any of them relied on the

9 Yugoslav Army. So this was the initial raw intelligence that we had and

10 we went on to verify it.

11 Q. And is it correct that on the very same day the Chief of General

12 Staff on the basis of this information related to the problems related to

13 volunteers and paramilitaries issue any orders that would be --

14 JUDGE BONOMY: That's plainly building up to a leading question.

15 MR. VISNJIC: I'm sorry, Your Honour. I'm sorry, Your Honour.

16 [Interpretation] That would be Exhibit 1477, P1477, I'm sorry.

17 Q. General, could you please comment on this.

18 A. Yes. This is a preventive order again. It is related to the

19 processing of those who committed crimes, as indicated in paragraph 1, and

20 then in paragraph 2 it is further stated that the chief of the Supreme

21 Command Staff who signed this order orders that conscripts, soldiers, and

22 volunteers who committed any crimes should be treated in the same way or

23 any acts that are in contravention of the Law of War and Geneva

24 Conventions.

25 Q. When was this order issued?

1 A. On the 3rd of April, 1999.

2 THE INTERPRETER: Could the witness and counsel please not

3 overlap.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic, another warning there about

5 overlapping questions and answers.

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Thank you.

7 Q. General, could you please look at the next Exhibit, that's P1476.

8 This is again an order from the Supreme Command Staff dated the 3rd of

9 April, 1999. Could you please comment on it.

10 A. I don't have it on the screen yet. Yet. This is again an order,

11 a preventive order, confirming what I have just said, that the chief of

12 the Supreme Command Staff accords the same treatment to the enemy, to the

13 friend and foe when it comes to investigating any acts that are in

14 contravention of the international law of war and Geneva Conventions.

15 This is about gathering physical evidence, about the use of inhumane

16 weapons by NATO in the course of combat.

17 Q. By that time, General, was there already some evidence that NATO

18 was using - I'm not going to say "unlawful," - but I'm going to say

19 inhumane weapons in combat?

20 A. Yes, this was about cluster bombs and about depleted uranium. We

21 were dealing with that at the Supreme Command level and at the order of

22 the Supreme Command Staff a presentation was done to acquaint people with

23 it because many of us did not know all the facts.

24 Q. Thank you.

25 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we now please see Defence

1 Exhibit 3D482. This is an order of the Supreme Command Staff dated the

2 16th of April, 1999.

3 Q. Could you please just comment briefly on it.

4 A. Yes. This is again a warning order, a warning in fact. Some

5 problems had been noticed regarding the conduct in the course of combat

6 operations on our side that are in contravention of the provisions of the

7 international law of war and the chief of the Supreme Command Staff

8 considered that there was a need to warn all the subordinate commands,

9 that those isolated incidents could not be allowed to spread, and that all

10 the perpetrators should be treated energetically in accordance with the

11 law.

12 Q. Could you please look at page 2 in particular of this page -- of

13 this document, paragraph 3.

14 A. Yes. In paragraph 3 we have the special warning binding the

15 commands and all the professional organs, including the security organs

16 and the military police units, to prevent all forms of crime - and it is

17 specified what forms of crime are considered - because this was shaping up

18 into a problem. The chief of the Supreme Command Staff is warning

19 everybody that they should act strenuously and vigorously.

20 Q. When the chief of Supreme Command Staff issues such an order, whom

21 is it sent to and what happens with such an order?

22 A. It is issued to the subordinate strategic commands and other

23 commands at their level.

24 Q. And who would that be in Kosovo?

25 A. The commander of the 3rd Army, the commander of the 3rd Army --

1 Q. Could you please slow down for interpretation.

2 A. Yes, I do apologise, I will. The commander of the 3rd Army

3 pursuant to their order will draft his own order, and in this order he

4 will refer to the order of the Supreme Command Staff. This order would

5 then be sent to his subordinate units, that would be the Pristina Corps.

6 The Pristina Corps commander in his turn writes his own order, perhaps

7 adding some elements that have been noted, that are specific, referring

8 again to the previous orders, and then this order goes on to his units.

9 Q. I would like to ask you --

10 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we now look at P1454, page

11 1 --

12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I have only the English version.

13 It's okay now. May I comment on it?

14 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

15 Q. Yes, I would like you to.

16 A. Well, this is precisely what I said. The commander of the 3rd

17 Army, this order from the Supreme Command Staff was dated the 16th of

18 April, and now the 3rd Army commander issues an order on the 17th with his

19 signature to the commander of the Pristina Corps referring to the warning

20 issued by the chief of the Supreme Command dated the 16th of April.

21 Q. Thank you.

22 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we now please look at P1672.

23 Q. General, do you see this document?

24 A. Yes. This is a document from the 3rd Army command sent to his

25 subordinates ordering, stating - you can see that in the preamble - that

1 problems had been noted with -- involving weapons, uniformed people with

2 arms moving around the outside of the area of responsibility using their

3 weapons in contravention of the regulations and referring to the order of

4 the chief of Supreme Command Staff he orders measuring to be taken to

5 prevent that. That is to say that what preceded was an order by the Chief

6 of Staff of the Supreme Command.

7 Q. Thank you, General.

8 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Let us now have a look at Exhibit

9 P1688.

10 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, this is a preventive order yet

11 again and its author is the sector for logistics, and it was signed as

12 well by the Chief of Staff of the Supreme Command and it has to do with

13 military conscripts. It was noted that some of them had psychiatric

14 problems; that is to say that this was something that the commissions for

15 admitting recruits had done wrong, volunteers, conscripts. Obviously the

16 medical commissions fell short of what they were supposed to do, so that

17 was supposed to be redressed. Let me just add one more thing, in the

18 previous order as well as in this order, at the end it is always stated

19 that regarding all measures reports should be sent through regular or

20 extraordinary reports.

21 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

22 Q. Thank you. Now I'd like to ask you to look at 3D483. General,

23 please give us your comment regarding this order dated the 10th of May,

24 1999.

25 A. Yes, this is an order dated the 10th of May, 1999, and - how

1 should I put this? - it's a warning, actually. It is an order but it's

2 also a warning. It has to do with problems in terms of violations of

3 international humanitarian law and law of war and the Geneva Conventions.

4 In the reports that came in, these problems were noted and the Chief of

5 Staff of the Supreme Command reacted, and in paragraph 3 he makes it

6 incumbent upon all commanders and all commanding officers to make personal

7 measures to prevent violations of international laws of war and the Geneva

8 Conventions and that every officer bears personal responsibility if he

9 does not take regular measures, properly measures in accordance with the

10 law with respect to all perpetrators of crimes or disciplinary

11 infractions.

12 Q. General, in the Serbian version --

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Can we actually show page 3 to the

14 witness in Serbian.

15 Q. I'm not sure that it's in the English version of this document,

16 too. There were probably some difficulties in terms of translation.

17 Could you just tell the Judges what accompanied this order?

18 A. Along with this previous order that I commented upon, there was

19 this attachment concerning criminal liability for war crimes and other

20 grave violations of international law of war and crimes against humanity

21 and international law. So there are certain provisions here where it is

22 stated what the law of war implies and it is clearly stated.

23 Q. So these are provisions of various laws or the Geneva Conventions,

24 right?

25 A. Yes.

1 Q. General, we have dealt with this set of preventive orders issued

2 by the Chief of General Staff. As for the briefing on the 31st of March,

3 you said to the Chief of General Staff, or rather, your drew his attention

4 to the problem of law violations on the part of certain volunteers. I

5 would like to ask you to look at Defence Exhibit 3D481.

6 General, you saw this document while preparing for your testimony

7 here?

8 A. Yes.

9 Q. Can you give us your comments regarding this order, but only from

10 the aspect of security because other witnesses are going to testify about

11 this document later.

12 A. Yes. This is an order dated the 14th of April that relates to the

13 acceptance and distribution of volunteers in the Army of Yugoslavia. The

14 first order about this was issued on the 2nd of April, 1999, but then this

15 order overrules that one. This is very precise and very specific. It is

16 stated exactly what the centres are through which volunteers are received

17 and taken in. What is to say -- what I'm trying to say is there are three

18 centres --

19 Q. Just from the point of view of security, General, please.

20 A. What else is regulated is that in each one of these centres there

21 are going to be security organs who in line with their own duties they

22 will actively take part in receiving these volunteers and processing them

23 from a security point of view and ultimately assigning them to specific

24 units.

25 Q. Just slowly, please. Now go on.

1 A. Thirdly what is regulated is the question of their training, their

2 arming, and specifically where they are being assigned. It is stated that

3 they cannot be assigned all together to one unit. Not more than five

4 volunteers can be in an individual unit. I think that was very important

5 because until then there had been quite a few problems in that respect.

6 Q. Thank you. General, I'd like to ask you to look at Defence

7 Exhibit 3D587. Sorry, I beg your pardon. 3D729, page 3 of this document,

8 please, in Serbian and in English as well.

9 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, this is a briefing to

10 the Chief of Staff of the Supreme Command dated the 12th of April, 1999.

11 The document shows that the witness took part in this briefing, but I wish

12 to ask him about a specific point on this page, and that is point 3.

13 Q. General, can you give us your comments. First of all, who is

14 issuing instructions here?

15 A. I can't see.

16 Q. And could you give us your comments with regard to point 3?

17 A. I don't know -- I don't find this very clear.

18 Q. Look at the bottom of the page, will you.

19 A. Oh, yes. Right. The chief of the Supreme Command Staff, since it

20 was pointed out during these briefings that there were problems with

21 paramilitary formations, so the chief of the Supreme Command Staff, as I

22 have already said, always at the end of a briefing he issues very specific

23 tasks, often with special deadlines. He asked us for information on

24 paramilitary formations, what it was that we specifically had on

25 paramilitary formations, what it was that we had established actually.

1 Q. Thank you. Now, could you please look at 3D586, pages 1 and 2.

2 Your remarks start on page 1 and continue on page 2. The situation is

3 similar in the English text. General, could you please look at what you

4 said on page 1 --

5 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] And then could he please see page 2.

6 Q. So could you please give us your comments.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Let's look at page 2 in B/C/S.

8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] But may I just deal with this first

9 sentence on page 1, please. So on orders of the Chief of Staff of the

10 Supreme Command at every subsequent briefing at the very outset we would

11 have to report on what we had done in terms of the realisation of our

12 previous tasks, the tasks that we had been assigned the previous briefing.

13 So now you see here in my own remarks what is underway is the completion

14 of the task received at the previous briefing, and that is what everybody

15 was supposed to do.

16 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

17 Q. Very well. While we are still on page 1 there is some activity

18 that is referred to concerning the discovery of alleged mass graves in the

19 territory of Kosovo and Metohija. Could you tell the Trial Chamber

20 something about that?

21 A. Well, yes, we had information from the media mostly, from

22 journalists, because I'd like to say already then in Belgrade a press

23 centre had been established where there were about 700 accredited

24 journalists, both from home and abroad. And there was quite a bit of --

25 well, perhaps I shouldn't say misinformation, but there were various

1 references to various situations. We tried to check things out as much as

2 we could, but I believe that nevertheless I should point out that that was

3 going on but that we couldn't really ascertain anything. I would say that

4 this was media manipulation. I can't remember now who the journalists

5 involved were. At the time I did know.

6 Q. Thank you, General.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could he please have a look at the

8 next page in B/C/S.

9 Q. We see here on the top of page 2, we see your remarks continued.

10 A. Yes.

11 Q. And now what had to do with General Ojdanic's orders in respect of

12 paramilitary formations from the previous briefings, that is.

13 A. I really don't understand your question. What is referred to here

14 is Montenegro.

15 Q. Did General Ojdanic at one of the previous briefings issue

16 instructions to you that information be submitted to him on the existence

17 of paramilitary formations?

18 A. Yes.

19 Q. Can you tell us now what kind of information you gave him and what

20 it pertained to?

21 A. We gave him information, although we were still checking this

22 information out, but we got some rather specific information about the

23 engagement of the paramilitary formation of the Skorpions commanded by

24 Slobo Medic, Boca. However, this information that was presented to the

25 Chief of Staff was still being double-checked. And in mid-May, we

1 established the full accuracy of this information. I do apologise.

2 Q. I do apologise. I'm looking at -- what we have here is the

3 formation of paramilitary formations that are within the MUP of

4 Montenegro. What does that refer to?

5 A. Yes, we were following the situation in Montenegro too because

6 there was a spillover in a way in Kosovo and Metohija because Montenegro

7 was a transit area and so on and so forth. So through our own operatives

8 we established with quite a degree of reliability that what was under way

9 there was the establishment of three paramilitary formations. One was the

10 liberation army of Cetina.

11 Q. We don't need to go through all the details.

12 A. Three paramilitary organisations, and we even discovered who the

13 organisers were and even identified a number of the members of these

14 paramilitary organisations.

15 Q. Thank you.

16 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the witness please be shown

17 Defence Exhibit 3D587, the Serbian text again page 1, the bottom of page

18 1, and --

19 JUDGE BONOMY: That's a document we've already seen.

20 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] 587, Your Honour, I thought that we

21 had seen 586.

22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, we haven't seen this document

23 yet.

24 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] 3D587.

25 Q. This has to do with briefing on the 15th of April -- sorry, the

1 16th of April, 1999.

2 A. Yes. Could I have it back, please.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Since the General saw this first

4 page where his remarks begin, could you please display page 2 for him.

5 And -- yes, the English is all right.

6 Q. General, tell me, what information did you have available on the

7 16th of April, 1999, in connection with paramilitary activities?

8 A. Two things. One has to do with Loznica and the establishment of a

9 paramilitary formation and in connection with that paramilitary formation

10 this piece of information that about 400 Albanians were liquidated.

11 Allegedly this paramilitary formation did this. According to this initial

12 information, the formation had previously been in Kosovo and was now

13 preparing to go to Kosovo again. We checked this information, but it

14 proved to be incorrect. What was correct, however, was that they were

15 carrying out certain preparations to go to Kosovo and we informed the

16 state security about what we had learned, and they most probably responded

17 because we were monitoring this situation and that group did not go to

18 Kosovo.

19 The second point I raised at the briefing was that in Belgrade a

20 volunteer unit was being formed to do with Kosovo. This was a group of

21 men originating from the Republic of Serbian Krajina and Republika Srpska

22 who had been members of the paramilitary formations there, and in Belgrade

23 they kept in touch and they talked about going to Kosovo. They would

24 argue and then they would make it up, and then they would say they were

25 going, and then they would say they weren't going; and we were monitoring

1 the situation and they did not go. Afterwards when we checked we found

2 that they had not gone to Kosovo. Some individuals might have gone

3 because there were individuals who went there purely to loot. There was a

4 lot of looting in Kosovo.

5 Q. Thank you, General.

6 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we now turn to page 4 of the

7 text in Serbian and also page 4 of the text in English of this same

8 document, 3D587.

9 Q. General, on that day, the 16th of April, 1999, you received

10 certain orders from the Chief of the General Staff.

11 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we please zoom in on point 6

12 on this page.

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. This -- well, the Chief of

14 Staff of the Supreme Command was not fully satisfied with the information

15 we presented to him, and he insisted that the security administration

16 should be more active and establish the facts. He was especially

17 interested in whether there were paramilitaries, either in or in

18 connection with the army and whether there were any paramilitaries in all

19 of Kosovo. So here he is reiterating this task and insisting that we

20 should be far more active in checking this and establishing the facts.

21 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

22 Q. Thank you.

23 JUDGE BONOMY: Can I ask about this. I find it very strange that

24 the army can't say one way or another whether there are paramilitaries

25 operating in any given area. Do you not find it strange that that is

1 difficult to establish?

2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, it's not unusual.

3 First of all the people who got together as members of paramilitary

4 formations, if they were not linked to any of the security forces down

5 there they did it in the greatest possible secrecy and their main aim was

6 theft and looting as well as robbery I would add. There was violence as

7 well. These were very closed circles. These people originated from

8 Croatia, many of them, they had been through the war and the

9 paramilitaries there. They had been to Bosnia-Herzegovina, they had

10 embarked on a life of crime, and they were very cautious. So it was very

11 difficult to penetrate those circles and establish the true situation.

12 JUDGE BONOMY: You've given us a lot of information today about

13 the activities of the KLA and the KVM, and yet here there doesn't seem to

14 be any concrete evidence of ever proving criminal activity on the part of

15 the -- of any paramilitary organisation.

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] What we established was first in

17 connection with the army in 99.9 per cent of the cases there were no

18 paramilitary formations in the army but there was several linked to the

19 MUP. I mentioned Slobodan Medic, Boca, and the Skorpions; there was

20 Arkan's unit; and there was one unit from Republika Srpska, the Wolves

21 from the Drina. That's what we established.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: And what had you established had been done by the

23 Skorpions in Kosovo?

24 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] We established that on the 31st of

25 March in Podujevo they committed a crime. They killed ten children and

1 two grown-up civilians, two adults. They were brought back to Kosovo to

2 Prolom Banja, but they turned up in Kosovo again. And this was a topic of

3 discussion and we'll come to that at a meeting with Slobodan Milosevic on

4 the 17th of May, 1999.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: What did you establish Arkan's group did in Kosovo?

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] We established that in the centre in

7 Kosovo Polje there was some sort of centre there for the reception of

8 these volunteers. They committed a crime. They killed two elderly

9 persons, a husband and wife. And as we were told - and this came from the

10 state security - proceedings were instituted against them, they were under

11 investigation.

12 JUDGE BONOMY: That's it, two elderly deaths?

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, that's what we knew.

14 JUDGE BONOMY: And what did you establish had been done in Kosovo

15 by the Wolves from the Drina?

16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] They were under the command of

17 Nedeljko Karisak known as Legenda who had been the commander of special

18 anti-terrorist units of Bosnia-Herzegovina. We established that they were

19 in Kosovo Polje, but we were unable to establish what their activities

20 were, what was going on there, and whether they had caused any trouble or

21 not because this was not within the purview of the military security

22 service.

23 JUDGE BONOMY: Could bodies like that operate without their

24 conduct or their acts being established, without them being protected in

25 some way by either the MUP or the VJ?

1 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] My answer to this question is that

2 in the case of these three paramilitary formations they did not go through

3 the procedure according to the orders of the chief of the Main Staff of

4 the 16th of April, 1999, concerning the reception, processing, and sending

5 of volunteers. Had they applied in the centre, they would not have been

6 accepted as volunteers and they would not have been sent to Kosovo.

7 JUDGE BONOMY: My question is rather different. How is it they

8 can operate in Kosovo without the cover of either the MUP or the VJ?

9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, I understand your question.

10 According to our information, which I believe is correct, all of them,

11 Boca, Arkan, and the Drina Wolves wore SAJ units, MUP units.

12 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic.

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honours.

14 Exhibit 3D592, please, page 1 in both versions. Also a report of

15 the 22nd of April, 1999.

16 Q. According to this order of the Chief of the General Staff of the

17 16th of April, you provided some more information at this briefing

18 concerning paramilitary formations. Could you please take a look.

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we scroll down on the Serbian

20 version, please, thank you.

21 JUDGE BONOMY: Before you go into that, line 7 on page 93, my note

22 of that answer was that each of these groups wore MUP uniforms. Is that

23 consistent with the answer given by the witness in Serbian?

24 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] The witness said both SAJ and MUP.

25 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you. It was only translated in English

1 as "MUP," but that's helpful. Thank you, Mr. Visnjic.

2 MR. STAMP: I also thought that there was another element to the

3 answer I heard translated that the witness said that they wore MUP -- they

4 wore SAJ/MUP uniforms. That's what I thought I heard but I might be

5 wrong.

6 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, in English we certainly heard uniforms.

7 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, why not ask the

8 witness.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Can you clarify that, Mr. Gajic, please.

10 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, SAJ uniforms.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Did you simply say SAJ uniforms or did you say SAJ

12 and MUP uniforms?

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I said MUP because the SAJ is part

14 of MUP, but in actual fact it's SAJ.

15 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

16 Mr. Visnjic.

17 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, at this briefing, if you are

18 referring to this bit about Montenegro.

19 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

20 Q. Yes.

21 A. Although we had provided specific information at some of the

22 previous briefings, we continued to monitor this and we established that

23 there were not only members of paramilitary formations coming from

24 Montenegro but that they were participants of the war in Krajina because

25 the border between Republika Srpska and Montenegro was completely open

1 because of the black-marketeering that went on and the smuggling and other

2 things.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] English page 4, Serbian page 4,

4 please.

5 Q. General Ojdanic made a comment and gave an order. Can you tell us

6 what this is about, just wait a little bit, it will appear on the screen,

7 it's point 6.

8 A. I don't know whether this referred to us in the security

9 administration. It's not quite clear to me. I don't remember what

10 document is in question, but here it says the main commander in the area,

11 which means that nothing can be done without the knowledge of the

12 commander.

13 Q. General, are you aware that the Army of Yugoslavia issued a

14 document called: "Instructions for officers and fighters"?

15 A. Yes. At the briefing I think of the 18th of April, 1999, the

16 chief of the Supreme Command Staff ordered General Curcin, who was in the

17 operations staff sector to prepare and make 1.300 copies of these

18 documents, on the basis of which each soldier would have certain

19 provisions built in and that this should be sent to the Pristina Corps.

20 And as far as I know, General Pavkovic and General Lazarevic, pursuant to

21 this, made sure that each soldier was given the most important provisions

22 of the Geneva Conventions and the international laws of war and that both

23 the commanding officers and the men were trained in this respect. That's

24 what I know.

25 Q. Let's move on to the next document, 3D593.

1 JUDGE BONOMY: Was the strength of the Pristina Corps 1300?

2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, because it was not possible to

3 make a copy for each and every soldier, but pursuant to the commander of

4 the 3rd Army the most important provisions, referring to certain points in

5 the international laws of war and the Geneva Conventions, had to be -- had

6 to be communicated to each soldier so that each soldier would know about

7 it and every commander, every leader, was given these documents.

8 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

9 Mr. Visnjic.

10 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

11 Q. General, to clarify once again, so the entire brochure was

12 instructions for commanders, and soldiers were given only excerpts?

13 A. Precisely so.

14 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] 3D593, B/C/S page 1, English page 1.

15 It's the 23rd of April, 1999, it's a briefing.

16 Q. General, you are giving two pieces of information here to the

17 Supreme Command Staff referring to Montenegro. Is that what you were

18 referring to?

19 A. No, I was referring to paramilitaries and crime. I'm providing

20 information about the paramilitaries in Krusevac, that's a place in the

21 south of Serbia. The Serbian liberation army, which we as security

22 officers observed and monitored, we documented their activities, we

23 submitted a criminal report, and they were all sentenced. The leader of

24 that paramilitary formation had the same last name as me, although we're

25 not related, his name was Gajic.

1 Q. But this group has nothing to do with Kosovo; am I right?

2 A. Only insofar as they were preparing to go to Kosovo. They were

3 preparing weapons and they were also threatening the commander of the 3rd

4 Army, General Pavkovic, saying they would liquidate him. What was your

5 other question?

6 Q. The next piece of information that you gave down the chain of

7 command, property-related crime is being prevented. What does that mean?

8 Stable situation, et cetera?

9 A. Yes. We did have this kind of problem, property-related crime,

10 especially arms and ammunition. This was a permanent problem, and then we

11 presented all of this information to the command in order to have measures

12 taken by them within their jurisdiction, and these measures inter alia

13 were to have arms, ammunition, explosives, ordnance be placed in more

14 secure storage and to work hard on finding the perpetrators of crimes.

15 Q. Thank you.

16 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could the witness please be shown

17 P1902.

18 Your Honour, it was admitted into evidence twice, once as P1902

19 and once as P1490, lest there be any confusion I would like to draw your

20 attention to that straight away.

21 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

22 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

23 Q. General, now after all this information that you submitted to the

24 Supreme Command Staff, what is it that we have before us now?

25 A. An order dated the 26th of April, General Ojdanic, the Chief of

1 Staff of the Supreme Command, where he insists yet again on checking on

2 the presence of paramilitary formations and their activity and he orders

3 measures that have to be taken in order to eliminate them from the area of

4 Kosovo and Metohija, starting with disarming and then also Prosecution in

5 accordance with the law. Tasks are given there what commands should do

6 and what security organs should do with regard to that matter. Also under

7 number 4 a report is asked for in this regard.

8 Q. Thank you, General. General, in your statement -- well, we're not

9 going to go back to it in detail, but I would just like to take you to the

10 next time-frame that I would like you to deal with. You stated that the

11 chief of the security administration went to Kosovo in the beginning of

12 May or the end of April, I can't remember exactly. Can you tell me what

13 the reasons were why General Farkas made this trip?

14 A. Yes, General Geza Farkas stayed in Kosovo-Metohija from the 5th

15 until the 6th. There were three basic reasons for that. The first reason

16 was, if I can put it that way, was a regular visit because it was our

17 practice to see all security organs during the course of the year, not

18 practice, but this is what was regularly done, and the previous one took

19 place on the 3rd and 4th of March where I was on the inspection team --

20 Q. General, General, let's go back to General Farkas, why did he go?

21 A. This was a regular visit. Secondly, due to this knowledge that we

22 had regarding paramilitary formations, well the situation was not quite

23 clear to us. So the third reason was that there were some problems

24 related to the engagement of the military police that was not always in

25 accordance with the law and other regulations and, generally speaking, to

1 look at the work of the security organs with regard to current issues and

2 all important issues.

3 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could Defence Exhibit 3D606 be

4 shown, please. This is the briefing of the 6th of May, 1999, the English

5 text page 3, the B/C/S text page 3. Page 3, please, in both versions.

6 Q. General, you see at the bottom of the page in B/C/S, it

7 says: "Chief of Staff of the Supreme Command," concluding remarks and

8 tasks. And the first question that was put by General Ojdanic was whether

9 there were any paramilitary formations in the territory of Kosovo and

10 Metohija?

11 A. Yes, that's what he asked and my answer was, regrettably, yes. I

12 talked to General Farkas, he returned on the 6th, I had spoken to him and

13 I had initial information on what it was that his findings were down

14 there. We spoke briefly on the telephone but he told me that there were

15 major problems down there and inter alia he told me that there were

16 problems relating to paramilitary [Realtime transcript read in error

17 "apartment"] formations. However, that on the following day, that is to

18 say on the 7th, at the morning collegium meeting he would tell me about it

19 in greater detail.

20 Q. What did General Ojdanic specifically ask you to do, General?

21 A. He asked for specificity, if I can put it that way. That is what

22 he says here. We're not going to do anything through making general

23 conclusions. He really wanted to have this cleared up, and he said that

24 if there were such persons in Kosovo that they should be expelled, that

25 legal measures should be taken, so he was very precise on that as always.

1 So what was going on --

2 MR. ACKERMAN: Just a second. Your Honour, page 99, line 14, I

3 think it might be important to know what was said there, I'm sure it

4 wasn't apartment formations.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: No, it was paramilitary formations --

6 MR. ACKERMAN: Thank you, Your Honour, I missed it.

7 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, let me see, yes, paramilitary formations.

8 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

9 Q. General, can you tell us briefly now what it was that happened

10 during the course of the following few days after that meeting that was

11 held in the evening on the 6th of May at 8.00 p.m.?

12 A. On the morning of the 7th of May, we had a collegium of the chief

13 of administration for security, and General Farkas presented in the

14 briefest possible terms what his observations were from his visit in

15 Kosovo and Metohija. He gave an assessment concerning the work of the

16 security organs and he said that the security organs were working well;

17 however, that there were problems down there. And he just mentioned them

18 one by one. He did not go into any detail because he didn't really have

19 time to do all that -- and he said --

20 Q. [Microphone not activated]

21 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone for Mr. Visnjic, please.

22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] When he was in Kosovo, that's what I

23 am talking about, and he said specifically that there were paramilitary

24 formations, that there was looting down there, that there were rapes, and

25 that there were crimes, that there were many thefts. That was the core of

1 the matter. Then we talked about that in terms of what should be done

2 further and the proposal made to him was to familiarise the Chief of Staff

3 of the Supreme Command straight away. He indeed spoke to him on the

4 telephone and he probably gave him this kind of information briefly. I am

5 not aware of the details, but I know that the Chief of Staff of the

6 Supreme Command ordered that on the 13th of May we meet, that a meeting be

7 held at his office, and that on the 13th of May at that time this day was

8 the holiday of the security services that was still being observed at that

9 time. So we came there, General Geza, General Vasiljevic, and I.

10 General Geza provided information to the Chief of Staff of the

11 Supreme Command roughly along these lines, that there were problems down

12 there, and that this was the first time that we heard of those problems in

13 terms of what they actually were, that there was crime there as well, and

14 that it would be a good thing for it to be discussed truly and to see what

15 should be done further. We suggested on the basis of these remarks --

16 well, then the Chief of Staff of the Supreme Command said, I am going to

17 inform the president about that now and I think it would be a good thing

18 for a meeting to be held. He called Milosevic and told him briefly that

19 there were problems down there, that Geza was down there and that there

20 were serious problems down there. And I think that he mentioned that

21 crimes had been committed too and it would be a good thing to have a

22 special meeting held. Milosevic said to him on the 17th of May at 0930

23 hours, Meeting at my place. So we were supposed to be there, we from the

24 army and representatives of the MUP, too. Then General Ojdanic

25 immediately on the telephone there while we were preparatory called

1 General Pavkovic, and after saying, Hello Nebojsa, what's up, are there

2 any problems down there? And he mentioned the problem of crimes. And

3 General Pavkovic answered that there were problems and that he had

4 documentation about that and that he had everything.

5 General Ojdanic then ordered on the 16th of May at 2000 hours

6 meeting at the command post and that all this documentation he should

7 bring along with him.

8 Q. General, I'm going to show you Exhibit 3D1055. General, tell us,

9 what is this about, the 13th of May, 1999, is the date of this document,

10 so that's the same day when you had a meeting with General Ojdanic.

11 A. Thank you for reminding me. We took along this information about

12 the activities of the paramilitary formation of Slobodan Medic, Boca, and

13 we gave it to General Ojdanic. He read it and he said that he would give

14 this information to Milosevic too. Everything that we informed him about

15 was based on this, so that was the problem and I don't want to repeat

16 everything about the meeting that was scheduled for 8.00 in the evening

17 and going to see Milosevic and so on, everything that I said.

18 Q. Thank you. General, can you tell us just briefly you were present

19 at the meetings on the 16th of May and on the 17th of May. Can you

20 describe for us briefly what happened at these meetings?

21 General Vasiljevic already testified about that, so let us not be too

22 extensive on this. Can you just give us some brief information about

23 that?

24 A. On the 16th of May we met at the command post. General Ojdanic

25 was present, General Pavkovic, General Vasiljevic, General Geza, and I.

1 An introduction was made by General Ojdanic. He pointed out a few things

2 there. As for war crimes that every case had to be urgently investigated

3 and documented, and if it is established that somebody had committed a war

4 crime they should be arrested straight away. That is literally what he

5 said, Criminal report, arrest, straight to court. If it belongs to the

6 military judiciary, then it should be resolved urgently, but if it is from

7 the jurisdiction of the civilian courts, then the civilian judiciary

8 should take this upon themselves to resolve the matter, whereas we in

9 terms of resolving these problems related to war crimes and other crimes

10 that are in contravention of --

11 Q. General, please slow down a bit.

12 A. I am sorry, everything that is against international law --

13 Q. You haven't really slowed down. Would you please slow down.

14 A. Sorry, I really have that problem. He said that as far as war

15 crimes were concerned, nothing should be forgiven, no one should be

16 forgiven, and that war crimes and everything else that is in contravention

17 of international laws of war and the Geneva Conventions could compromise

18 the Army of Yugoslavia. He also said the MUP and the state and that we

19 should not allow that to happen. As for paramilitaries and volunteers, he

20 also said that every case has to be investigated and things should be

21 clarified and measures taken. Again he stated that on the following day,

22 on the 17th, we'd have a meeting at Milosevic's and that this was a

23 preparatory meeting. He said that Geza had been down there and he said

24 briefly what it was that Geza had seen down there, and then he gave the

25 floor to General Pavkovic. General Pavkovic had all of that

1 documentation, and I have just referred to a few things that he had spoken

2 about. He said that in Prolom Banja he had a contact with Boca. He

3 couldn't remember his name and surname straight away, and he said that

4 this person belonged to some paramilitary formation. And he said that

5 Boca told him during that conversation that he had not been in Kosovo;

6 however, he said, he lied to me. Because afterwards when speaking to

7 General Djakovic, and he was head of the operations department in the 3rd

8 Army, he said to him that he had indeed been in Kosovo and that Rodja had

9 called them, that is Djordjevic, nicknamed Rodja, and they should be

10 engaged in Kosovo when some most complex and most difficult tasks are to

11 be carried out. That is what he said about Medic. Secondly, he spoke

12 about the problem of war crimes and that there were a few problems related

13 to that. One problem has to do with the crimes committed, because the

14 army has one set of information, the MUP had another set of data, and the

15 truth is somewhere midway.

16 Q. Just slow down, General, please.

17 A. I will. He said that as for what had been investigated to date

18 had to do with the figure of 271. And as far as the MUP was concerned,

19 the figure is 326.

20 Q. General, what does this relate to?

21 A. Crimes.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Before you move on. What happened about Boca?

23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I think in late April, until the

24 10th of May, they were there and then they were expelled from Kosovo.

25 What happened after that, I really don't know.

1 JUDGE BONOMY: How does that -- how does that tie in with this

2 idea that we will take action against everybody who's suspected of a war

3 crime? Why was nothing done about him?

4 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That was not within the competency

5 of the military judiciary, but rather the civilian courts which -- well,

6 they were to -- they had to be arrested and they had to be reported, and

7 the civilian courts should have dealt with that. The army did what it was

8 up to the army to do.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, I thought you told us that General Ojdanic

10 said that as for paramilitaries and volunteers, every case has to be

11 investigated. Things should be clarified and measures taken. Did that

12 not apply to Boca?

13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, it did, but the army dealt with

14 what was within the competence of the military and the military courts.

15 But matters that had to do with the civilian judiciary, that was up for

16 the civilian judiciary to deal with. Boca was within the competence of

17 the civilian judiciary, not the military courts.

18 JUDGE BONOMY: That may be so, but why -- you've just told us what

19 General Ojdanic said about paramilitaries, that you should be taking

20 action against them. Why would he do that if you had no power to do

21 anything?

22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Perhaps I did not express myself

23 well or perhaps we misunderstand one another. He just said in general

24 what had to be done in relation to paramilitaries as well as volunteers

25 who committed some illegal actions, but each had to deal with matters

1 within their own competence. If it was a volunteer and he had been

2 dismissed and then he came under the competence of the civilian judiciary,

3 he would have to be the -- proceedings would have to be before the

4 civilian judiciary. If someone left the army and became a civilian, then

5 the case had to be handed to the civilian courts, and the same applies to

6 paramilitaries. That's another category. And if they fall within the

7 competence of the civilian judiciary, it was up to the civilian judiciary

8 to deal with them.

9 JUDGE BONOMY: And when would paramilitaries fall within the

10 military jurisdiction?

11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, for example, if they were part

12 of the army and if while they were still in the army they had been

13 arrested and so on and so forth. But from the point of time they left the

14 army, the army could submit a criminal report but it would be the civilian

15 judiciary that would deal with the cases.

16 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Gajic, it may be a translation issue, but my

17 understanding of the word "paramilitary" presupposes that the person is

18 not in the military.

19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, paramilitary or parapolice or

20 whatever, but whoever puts on a uniform we call them paramilitaries.

21 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic.

22 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

23 Q. To continue on, to link up with what His Honour asked you. Please

24 tell me, do you know what the Pauk or Spider group was?

25 A. Yes.

1 Q. Can you tell the Court.

2 A. Jugoslav Petrusic had a group. There were about 23 of them. They

3 were in Kosovo. They were in Metohija, the border belt that is. They

4 went there without going through the proper procedure and through the

5 reception centre, although we do have information --

6 Q. Just a moment. What unit was that group a part of?

7 A. It was part of the 125th Motorised Brigade.

8 Q. Hypothetically speaking, had that group or members of that group

9 committed crimes or criminal offences, who would have been competent to

10 prosecute them?

11 A. While they were still part of the army, had proceedings been

12 instituted, it would have been done by the military judiciary. But from

13 the moment they were sent back and dismissed from the army, then that case

14 would have been handed over to the civilian judiciary.

15 Q. But as long as they were members of the army they would fall

16 within the competence, under the jurisdiction of the military courts?

17 A. Yes.

18 Q. General, have we finished with the 16th of May? Can we now deal

19 with the 17th very briefly?

20 A. Well, I haven't finished what I was saying. General Pavkovic said

21 that this was one of the problems, and he proposed that a commission be

22 established, that's the expression he used, which would have the task of

23 establishing and drawing up a list, a correct list, which would show

24 precisely what the army was suspected of, what the MUP was suspected of,

25 and that commission would then set out to resolve all these problems. The

1 whole process of investigation, gathering of evidence, and submitting

2 criminal reports would be dealt with. He also spoke about the issue of

3 volunteers. He said that as regards the volunteers joining the 3rd Army

4 or the Pristina Corps, there were no serious problems. They were all

5 going through the reception centre, but a certain number of them in the

6 units had been causing trouble and those were sent back. He mentioned the

7 example of the 175th Brigade, from which I believe 303 volunteers were

8 sent back because of misbehaviour. That was what General Pavkovic said,

9 that was the gist of it.

10 Q. And then on the 17th there was a meeting at President Milosevic's?

11 A. Yes.

12 Q. Can you tell us briefly what happened at the meeting, it's already

13 been mentioned elsewhere.

14 A. We all attended the meeting -- all of us who had attended the

15 meeting on the 16th, that is. Milosevic chaired the meeting, and

16 Mr. Sainovic and Rade Markovic, the chief of the state security sector,

17 were also there. At the previous meeting of the 16th of May, it had been

18 agreed after a brief introduction by Milosevic, General Vasiljevic should

19 present his remarks followed by General Pavkovic. General Vasiljevic

20 presented the information we had concerning the paramilitaries, he

21 mentioned Boca, Jugoslav Petrusic, the Pauk group, the Drina Wolves, and

22 Nedeljko Karisak, known as Legenda, and as far as I can remember he

23 mentioned some operative groups and he said that there had been some

24 problems and crimes connected with these. That was what he spoke about,

25 and then he was followed by General Pavkovic, who repeated what he had

1 said on the previous meeting, the meeting of the 16th of May, but he added

2 a new proposal and this was that a state commission be set up to visit

3 Kosovo and to help clarify all this. And his suggestion was supported by

4 General Sainovic, who said it was a good idea. We left the meeting,

5 however without this proposal being considered. We simply parted and that

6 was it.

7 THE INTERPRETER: Mr. Sainovic, interpreter's correction.

8 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Page 108, line 23, Mr. Sainovic.

9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, I did say Mr. Sainovic.

10 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation]

11 Q. It said "General."

12 A. Mr. Sainovic.

13 Q. General, in paragraph 156 of your statement you described in

14 detail the measures taken by the Army of Yugoslavia after the meeting in

15 President Milosevic's office on the 17th of May, 1999.

16 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, I am not going to show

17 this again. I simply ask you to refer to that paragraph.

18 Q. General, a decision was made that a group should be sent to carry

19 out an inspection and it would consist of you and General Vasiljevic, you

20 would be members of the group. And a decision was made that this group

21 should be sent to Kosovo urgently, that's in paragraph 157. Can you tell

22 us what you learned and, first of all, when you visited Kosovo; and

23 secondly, what you learned in relation to crimes that had been

24 perpetrated.

25 A. Everything you've said is correct, but let me add something. I

1 was not fully precise. After I signed the statement, I later realised

2 that I had not been precise enough. General Ojdanic told us that we had

3 to go to Kosovo, that's the real truth, but then a problem cropped up, the

4 problem of an infantry brigade. It was the 7th Infantry Brigade. It was

5 a brigade of reservists from the Krusevac area because a battalion had

6 left its positions and arrived in Krusevac. And then the chief of the

7 Supreme Command Staff said that General Vasiljevic and I should go to

8 Krusevac to see what could be done about the situation and to send the

9 battalion back. And we were engaged in that task until the 31st of May,

10 which is why we were unable to go to Kosovo immediately. We completed

11 that task on the 31st, and then we stayed in Kosovo from the 1st to the

12 7th. We visited 16 security organs, by means of briefings in the security

13 section and later through visits to subordinate security organs, we didn't

14 have time to go into every detail but the we gained an impression of the

15 problem of war crimes and other activities contrary to the international

16 laws of war. What we established was first that security organs were very

17 active in investigating, documenting, and submitting criminal reports for

18 the processing of these war crimes. But there was another problem. We in

19 the security administration did not have information about this, so there

20 was a problem in reporting. So we found that they were indeed very

21 active, that they had the full support of the command, but that they did

22 not submit reports on this. So that was the first time we heard about

23 some of the crimes that had happened there.

24 Q. General, when you returned to Belgrade, did you submit a report

25 and to whom?

1 A. We returned to Belgrade on the 7th and we immediately compiled a

2 report consisting of two parts. There was a text and also tables, and 42

3 cases were dealt with in that report. There was some cases where more

4 than one person was involved, for example, Lieutenant-Colonel Stosic and

5 six others. General Farkas submitted the report to the Chief of Staff of

6 the Supreme Command and he said that he would inform President Milosevic.

7 This report went missing, and I know that General Ojdanic when preparing

8 for this trial sought this document but was unable to find it. General

9 Vasiljevic and I also searched for it but couldn't find it and I still

10 fail to understand what happened to it.

11 Q. General, could you please look at Defence Exhibit 3D479, that is a

12 briefing of the 8th of June, 1999.

13 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we see page 1, please. B/C/S

14 page 2, please, line 4. Could we just lift up the B/C/S version a little

15 bit. Thank you. And the text in English, we're interested in the last

16 line of the first page and on page 2 -- in page 2, could we turn to page

17 2, please. Could you please turn to page 2 in the English text.

18 Q. General, this is a briefing of the 8th of June and General

19 Farkas's remarks. You did not attend that briefing?

20 A. General Farkas told me -- I was supposed to attend the briefing,

21 but then he told me, I'll go, and what you and Aco found in Kosovo I will

22 inform briefly the entire Supreme Command Staff about this. He probably

23 spoke about this to the chief of the staff. I didn't go.

24 Q. General, you and General Farkas in the course of the war were not

25 physically in the same buildings?

1 A. No, no.

2 Q. You were in the Supreme Command Staff and General Farkas was in

3 another place where the security administration was; is that correct?

4 A. Yes.

5 Q. What General Farkas is saying here, these notes from the meeting,

6 do they correspond to what you briefly told General Farkas at the meeting

7 on the 7th?

8 A. Yes. That's the core of the matter, that's the most important

9 information that General Farkas felt had to be passed on to the Supreme

10 Command Staff.

11 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Could we look at page 4 in English

12 and also page 4 in B/C/S, the bottom part of both versions.

13 Q. General, please look at the last two paragraphs of this text

14 before you.

15 A. Yes. The chief of the Supreme Command Staff in the conclusions

16 praised the security administration for the work they had done in Kosovo

17 in connection with these problems, and he demanded that it should not stop

18 at that, but that further action should be taken, that there should be

19 documentation, investigation, and that investigation should be conducted

20 against those who had committed crimes and other unlawful acts. And he

21 even prioritized this.

22 JUDGE BONOMY: Does this document refer to the report?

23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, Judge Bonomy.

24 JUDGE BONOMY: When was the report given to General Ojdanic?

25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] This report was given I think

1 already only the 8th, in the morning General Ojdanic had it. I'm not

2 quite sure about the time. Possibly General Farkas took this with him

3 when he went to the briefing. I cannot be very precise on that, but it

4 had been completed by the 7th.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: So you didn't see it being handed over?

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I can say that it was handed over on

7 the 8th. Now, whether it was sent before the briefing or whether it was

8 handed over on the 8th during the briefing on the 8th, whether it was

9 handed over to General Ojdanic then, I cannot say. But we gave it to

10 General Farkas.

11 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Visnjic.

12 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Our last exhibit for today, 3D487.

13 Q. General, tell me what it is that you see before you now and

14 explain it briefly, the first point, that is.

15 A. This was a meeting that was held, as far as I can remember, with

16 military judicial organs, the Chief of General Staff on the 28th of May.

17 Q. No, look at the date of the document.

18 A. Oh, yes, the 8th of June. That is to say that meeting when

19 General Farkas was there, when General Farkas was there. Then this had to

20 do with the tasks that the Chief of Staff gave to the military judicial

21 organs, and in relation to war crimes and other acts and contravention of

22 international laws of war and cases that needed to be prosecuted, and then

23 there are four numbers there. First are violations of international laws

24 of war; second is crime; and then it's war crimes and so on and so forth;

25 then desertion and other crimes. So he put in the first place what we had

1 discussed previously.

2 MR. VISNJIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, I have less than half

3 an hour left for this witness. If I organise myself even better, perhaps

4 I'm going to cut it even shorter.

5 JUDGE BONOMY: Do you want me to take a vote on what wants to stay

6 and hear the next half-hour? I think Mr. Ackerman would be the first to

7 volunteer.

8 Before we decide on further action can I ask you one -- a question

9 about one matter. You referred a number of times to the Supreme Command.

10 What was the Supreme Command?

11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The Supreme Command was the

12 president of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the General Staff.

13 JUDGE BONOMY: I take it from that answer it did not include the

14 president of Serbia or the president of Montenegro?

15 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Correct. They were the Supreme

16 Defence Council which was a political body that made decisions from -- in

17 the area of defence. The president of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia

18 as Commander-in-Chief conveyed those decisions and issued orders to the

19 Chief of Staff of the Supreme Command, who further on through his own

20 orders conveyed that to his subordinates.

21 JUDGE BONOMY: Did the Supreme Command always exist or did it come

22 into existence at a particular time?

23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, as far as I know - and I think

24 that I do know - I think that from the point of view of the law things

25 were not really regulated. There were proposals and some things were

1 taken over from the former Yugoslavia when there was the Presidency as the

2 collective organ. Some things were taken over but there wasn't enough

3 time to define this in the constitution and in other laws.

4 JUDGE BONOMY: Did the Supreme Defence Council meet in the months

5 of March, April, May, and June?

6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I don't know about that.

7 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

8 That completes our sitting for today, but you will require, I'm

9 afraid, to return on Monday to continue with your evidence. The court

10 will be sitting from 9.00 to 1.45 on Monday, so you should be here ready

11 to resume your evidence at 9.00. It is extremely important, as I

12 explained to you yesterday, that you don't discuss any aspect of the

13 evidence in this case with anyone between now and Monday morning. Could

14 you please now leave the courtroom with the usher and we'll see you at

15 9.00 on Monday.

16 [The witness stands down]

17 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 3.35 p.m.,

18 to be reconvened on Monday, the 10th day of

19 September, 2007, at 9.00 a.m.

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