Page 27295
1 Tuesday, 26 August 2008
2 [Lukic Defence Closing Statement]
3 [Open session]
4 [The accused entered court]
5 [The Accused Pavkovic and Lazarevic not present]
6 --- Upon commencing at 2.16 p.m.
7 JUDGE BONOMY: Good afternoon, everyone. We can now proceed to
8 hear the closing arguments on behalf of Mr. Lukic.
9 Mr. Lukic.
10 MR. LUKIC: Thank you, Your Honour. At the beginning I just want
11 to say that me and my colleague Ivetic divided our work, so at the
12 beginning I will do my part and after that, Mr. Ivetic will probably do
13 the major part of our closing arguments.
14 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.
15 MR. LUKIC: And because of the speed, I'll speak in Serbian and
16 because of the speed Mr. Ivetic will speak in English.
17 [Interpretation] So once again, good day, Your Honours. The
18 Defence of Mr. Lukic will attempt to put forward in a brief outline its
19 case; and to begin with, I would like to refer to what my colleagues have
20 already spoken about, the plan, the alleged plan, to expel Albanians. I
21 think that my colleagues from the other Defence teams have provided
22 numerous arguments. I will deal with a small segment of this issue, and
23 what I wish to add is the following.
24 It is not contested that before all of these events Serbia
25 signatory of the Dayton Accords, which referred to Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Page 27296
1 Those accords were signed in 1995 when hostilities ceased in this former
2 Yugoslav republic.
3 Annex 7 of those accords refers to the return of refugees and
4 displaced persons. Can one imagine that someone who had direct
5 experience with war, the departure and return of refugees in his
6 immediate neighbourhood could imagine that the same rules would not apply
7 to him? Can anyone in their right mind think that Slobodan Milosevic did
8 not know that refugees, should there be any refugees, would not return to
9 their homes once hostilities ceased? To me, it doesn't seem like common
10 sense.
11 The participants in this agreement were inter alia Slobodan
12 Milosevic and Wesley Clark, so there was nothing unknown on that terrain.
13 Everything had already been a subject of long-term negotiations,
14 agreements, treaties, and the implementation of all this. Up to the
15 outbreak of war in Serbia
16 Herzegovina
17 organizations were helping to rebuild their homes and to enable
18 sustainable return. One should know that the Dayton Accords of 1999 were
19 a daily topic in the Serbian media, as they were a daily topic in the
20 media of Bosnia-Herzegovina; and it was also something that those who had
21 fled to Serbia
22 return to Bosnia
23 The return of refugees from Serbia to Bosnia was a Serbian
24 problem, so this was what was happening in 1998 and 1999 on a daily basis
25 in Serbia
Page 27297
1 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Lukic, do we have any evidence of this?
2 MR. LUKIC: I don't think that --
3 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's correction: Line 7, would
4 return, not would not return.
5 MR. LUKIC: -- it's commonly known fact.
6 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, it's certainly not a commonly known fact to
7 me, but if there is evidence it would be helpful if you could point to
8 it.
9 MR. LUKIC: Thank you, Your Honour, I'll try to do it when
10 Mr. Ivetic continues his part, I'll try to find it. Thank you.
11 [Interpretation] According to the Prosecutor, someone had the
12 bright idea of expelling Albanians but first they said, Let's provoke
13 NATO to bomb us. That is not a case which our Defence finds at all
14 credible. I will paraphrase now and deal with what was achieved by the
15 alleged plan to expel Albanians according to the Prosecutor.
16 According to the Prosecutor, the expulsion was already completed
17 for the most part in mid-April 1999, a third of the Albanians had been
18 expelled and now there were only five times more Albanians than there
19 were Serbs, while before there were eight times more. Does this sound
20 credible? How has this changed the ethnic balance in favour of Serbs and
21 what sort of balance has been achieved. Witness Haxhibeqiri said,
22 referring to Djakovica, that there were two to three per cent Serbs in
23 Djakovica, so how many Albanians would have to be expelled from Djakovica
24 in order to establish an ethnic balance. The Prosecutor has failed to
25 show this and he has failed to show that this was done.
Page 27298
1 The next point I wish the Chamber to pay attention to is the
2 following. Wouldn't it be logical for Serbs to expel Albanians from
3 those parts of Kosovo where there was no KLA, from those parts where they
4 were allegedly not protected? Why would the Serbs be expelling Albanians
5 from areas where there was the highest concentration of KLA? What sort
6 of logic is that? Who in their right minds would push their people to
7 get killed when they could do this, whatever they wanted to do, elsewhere
8 with no problems at all?
9 Now I would like to move on to the main topic of our Defence
10 case, and that is the MUP staff and Exhibit P1505, which is a decision on
11 the establishment of the staff dated the 16th of June, 1998. By means of
12 this document, the Prosecutor wishes to show who were members of the
13 staff and what the tasks of the staff were. Our Defence says the
14 following. This document never came to life, either as regards personnel
15 or as regards functioning.
16 Numerous witnesses have testified about these circumstances and
17 written evidence has also been presented which clearly shows that this
18 decision never came to life. We dealt with this in paragraph 690 to 785
19 of our final brief, and the OTP dealt with it in paragraphs 208 to 211 of
20 their final brief. In the course of this trial we have heard the
21 testimony of Mijatovic, Adamovic, we have seen documents on the
22 appointment and the termination of duties of some persons, and those are
23 6D1044 to 6D1052.
24 We will prove, and I think we have proved - but we will show this
25 today - that the members of the staff from the first page of the decision
Page 27299
1 did not include David Gajic; Radoslav Djinovic; Milorad Lukovic, Legija;
2 and Zivko Trajkovic. You can see that from the testimony of Miroslav
3 Mijatovic. We saw that while the staff existed there were personnel
4 changes in the composition of the staff more than once. No decision was
5 issued about that in terms of establishing the staff. So this is a
6 legally imperfect situation but it was what it was. We saw that at the
7 outset.
8 After the issuing of this decision, Miroslav Mijatovic arrived.
9 In the summer of 1998 Dusko Adamovic arrived, after the decision had
10 already been issued, and Desimir Slovic also arrived. The three of them
11 were members of the staff according to what Miroslav Mijatovic, Dusko
12 Adamovic, and Radovan Vucurevic said. We see this from the personnel
13 decisions. For example, Radoslav Djinovic on the 19th of June, 1998
14 stopped being deployed in Kosovo. We saw that Dusko Adamovic left Kosovo
15 because he was wounded when the staff was bombed, although this is not
16 mentioned in this decision, he is not mentioned, and he left according to
17 the decision of the 1st of April, but as Vucurevic said, they already
18 left on the 20th of March, the same day when they were wounded.
19 On the 29th of March, Desimir Slovic also left Kosovo, and he
20 again is not mentioned in this decision, and he was a member of the staff
21 and was wounded when the staff was bombed.
22 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's correction: Line 17, the 29th of
23 March, not the 20th.
24 MR. LUKIC: [Interpretation] On the 15th of February before this
25 bombing, Novica Zdravkovic left. So as of the 15th of February, he was
Page 27300
1 no longer a member of the staff and he was replaced by Tomislav
2 Blagojevic.
3 After they left, that is, Adamovic, Slovic, and Vucurevic, on the
4 29th of March Milenko Arsenijevic took their place as did Petar
5 Bogdanovic and Voja Gucic. In Mijatovic's testimony and in our final
6 brief the documents speaking to this are enumerated. We are convinced
7 that we have managed to prove that the decision of the 16th of June,
8 1998, to establish the MUP staff never came to life as regards unifying
9 the state security and public security departments within the staff. And
10 that we have proved that David Gajic and Milorad Lukovic, Legija, were
11 not members of the staff; and this was confirmed by all the members of
12 the staff who testified here. This is also evident from documents. When
13 members of the staff are listed in documents, especially members of the
14 state security, for example, P1099 and P2085.
15 We proved that Zivko Trajkovic, the commander of the SAJ, was not
16 a member of the staff either. All the members of the staff confirmed
17 this, witness Joksic on transcript page 22026, and this was confirmed by
18 Radovan Vucurevic on page 23056 of the transcript. Milos Vojnovic on
19 page 24148. We also see this from the statement of Dusko Adamovic in
20 6D1613, paragraph 7; then Bozidar Filic on page 23949 and 23965 of the
21 transcript.
22 The next point that has to do with the staff personnel are the
23 members of the SUP -- the chiefs of SUP and the chiefs of the state
24 security department. We are convinced that we have managed to prove in
25 the course of these proceedings that the chiefs of the SUPs and the
Page 27301
1 chiefs of the state security departments in Kosovo and Metohija were not
2 members of the staff, although that's what it says in the decision on
3 establishing the staff. According to this decision, the members of the
4 extended staff would include those persons but that they were not members
5 of the staff was also confirmed by Cvetic Ljubinko on transcript page
6 8146, and this can be seen from Exhibits P1099 and P2805.
7 It's clear then that the decision on establishing the staff never
8 came to life as regards personnel. Mr. Lukic's Defence has dealt with
9 this in its final brief in paragraphs 731 to 755. In point 2 in the same
10 decision, the tasks of the staff are listed and when the OTP describes
11 the tasks of the staff it relies on this decision exclusively without
12 analysing the other evidence adduced in the course of these proceedings.
13 We dealt with this in paragraph 756 to 766 of our final brief, our
14 closing brief.
15 During the proceedings here, we have shown that this situation,
16 that is, that the staff never began to function in the way envisaged by
17 the decision on the forming of the staff for the reason that terrorism in
18 Kosovo and Metohija had escalated to such an extent that a five-stage
19 plan for fighting against terrorism had been adopted at the state level.
20 And the authority to plan activities in relation to anti-terrorist action
21 was removed from the MUP and given to the Army of Yugoslavia.
22 After the global five-stage plan for the fight against terrorism
23 was adopted, which was drawn up by the Pristina Corps according to
24 Djakovic, who testified here, the planning of individual -- joint actions
25 was carried out by the Pristina Corps according to Witness Djakovic, and
Page 27302
1 the excerpts on the maps were delivered to the MUP staff or directly to
2 the PJP detachments. And on the basis of this, the PJP detachments went
3 into action. The MUP staff neither amended or modified these plans in
4 any way. It simply forwarded them to the PJP units, as testified by
5 Witness Dusko Adamovic.
6 We have shown and proved that not a single plan for the carrying
7 out of joint actions of the police and the army was drawn up in the
8 staff. To say the least, the OTP and the Defence teams of the military
9 generals, in spite of all their attempts, have not succeeded in proving
10 such a case. No one has ever seen such a document ever because there is
11 no such document in existence.
12 In the course of these proceedings, attempts were made to say
13 that 6D716 was drawn up in the MUP staff because it says "MUP command" on
14 it. But Mile Djakovic confirmed that he compiled this document and that
15 it is not, in fact, an order, simply a document showing something. This
16 role of the staff as regards planning, the planning of anti-terrorist
17 actions, that is, seemed incredible at the beginning of our Defence case
18 and His Honour Judge Bonomy asked whether this meant that the staff was
19 simply a letter box. The claims made by Mijatovic who told the Chamber
20 that they would get more information about this from Adamovic, and this
21 was confirmed by Dusko Adamovic himself.
22 But we still think that our witnesses were not given credence at
23 that point. The reason for this is that many testimonies from military
24 witnesses about this were heard and they all explained what it was that
25 Mile Djakovic was doing and they all claimed that it was the MUP that
Page 27303
1 made the orders and the excerpts on the maps, those who testified to
2 this. But no one except Stefanovic finally confirmed that it was
3 possible that some excerpts on the maps were sent to the MUP staff.
4 THE INTERPRETER: The interpreters note that there is a sudden
5 echo in the room. Could that be seen to. Thank you.
6 MR. LUKIC: [Interpretation] Milan Djakovic confirmed that all the
7 excerpts on the map were made by the Pristina Corps and sent to the MUP
8 staff. He was shown maps for detachment level and PJP company level,
9 both for 1998 and for 1999, and he confirmed that they were all compiled
10 by the Pristina Corps staff in which he himself worked, or rather, people
11 who worked for him. The excerpts on the maps were produced for the SAJ
12 and JSO, and this can be seen from the following exhibits in this case:
13 4D495, 6D619, 6D1620, 6D1621; and for SAJ: 5D1329.
14 Zivaljevic explained when testifying before this Trial Chamber
15 that the commanders of the detachments could not plan actions if
16 nothing -- for no other reason than for technical reasons. Not only did
17 they not have the necessary knowledge, for example, Zivaljevic had not
18 attended military academy at all, but the MUP detachments had no staffs.
19 So quite simply there wasn't anybody who could do that, and this is to be
20 found on the transcript page 24820/12 to 19.
21 Witness Ilic in response to a question from Mr. Bakrac explained
22 that nobody in the police force had the necessary knowledge to plan any
23 kind of action which went beyond the level of a company and this is to be
24 found on transcript page 24359/21 to T24360/4.
25 Furthermore, we showed that neither the staff nor Sreten Lukic
Page 27304
1 commanded PJP units on the ground nor did they lead any anti-terrorist
2 actions. The PJP had a separate structure from the staff and all
3 commanders of the PJP from top to bottom, including the commander of the
4 PJP himself, throughout the actions were in the territory of Kosovo
5 Metohija, both in 1998 and in 1999. And there were a large number of
6 documents and testimonies to bear that out, and this is particularly
7 dealt with in paragraphs 676 to 773 of our brief.
8 When the PJP commander on the ground -- was on the ground, then I
9 assume it is clear that there can be no parallel command. Who would
10 meddle in any of this from outside?
11 Communication means necessary for commanding units were not
12 accessible to the staff and we heard testimony about this by Defence
13 Witness Deretic and this particularly refers to 1999 when the MUP staff
14 had no means of communication whatsoever in Kosovo and Metohija except
15 for a courier service. It was not possible to command units of the
16 courier service. They had to have communication devices in order to
17 maintain communications, so even if they had wanted to - and they
18 certainly did not - and even if they were authorised - and they certainly
19 were not - the members of the staff would not have been able to command
20 the combat units of the MUP.
21 We provided to the Court and the Prosecution all the daily
22 reviews of the events compiled by the MUP staff, all of them, from July
23 1998 right up until the 20th of June, 1999. I apologise, I meant to say
24 the 10th of June, 1999. They are not all exhibits in this case but they
25 can be easily checked out because the Prosecution has them and the
Page 27305
1 Trial Chamber has them, and we maintain, the Defence of Mr. Lukic
2 maintains that not in a single one of them is there a report from the PJP
3 on combat actions, not in a single one of them. Of course all this holds
4 true for the daily reviews that are part of the documents in this case.
5 A decision to set up the staff and headquarters did not come into
6 effect when it came to the staff guiding and coordinating the work of MUP
7 units in KiM, SUPs, MUPs, border police stations all come under those
8 work organization units. During proceedings we showed the way in which
9 planning worked, we showed in which the way leadership worked, and in
10 which way reporting worked within MUP, and by the same token within the
11 SUP in Kosovo and Metohija it is clear that the staff is not present in
12 any segment of planning and leadership for the work of SUP and smaller
13 organizational units.
14 The only field where the staff does appear is the field of
15 reporting. You will not find the staff anywhere else outside the
16 reporting field, and we see that the staff was informed from the ministry
17 downwards, so from top to bottom, and in parallel fashion when the SUP
18 were informed, and from bottom to the top by the SUPs from Kosovo and
19 Metohija in parallel fashion and up to the head seat of the ministry.
20 And this is evidenced in P1044.
21 And linked to that, the Prosecution in its final brief provided
22 us with a schematic of MUP, a diagram produced by Philip Coo, before any
23 evidence was produced. This diagram has nothing to do with reality and
24 does not reflect the actual situation and therefore cannot be used for
25 any purposes or in any sense.
Page 27306
1 The Prosecution in claiming that the staff, and thereby Sreten
2 Lukic was in a position of superiority to the police in Kosovo and
3 Metohija, claimed that the staff was in fact the ministry in small. The
4 staff should have been paralleled with the provincial secretariat for the
5 interior, and we heard that that secretariat had a thousand employees,
6 whereas the staff just had ten members or even less. The number of
7 policemen, while the provisional secretariat was in existence, was almost
8 the same as the number of policemen that existed in 1999 and 1998; and we
9 heard testimony about this from Bozidar Filic.
10 Therefore, with the establishment of the staff the chains of
11 planning were not interrupted of leadership and reporting within the
12 frameworks of MUP. The staff and not Sreten Lukic either had effective
13 control over the police in Kosovo and Metohija in the critical period.
14 I should like to stress that the -- neither the staff nor Sreten
15 Lukic were able to initiate disciplinary measures and proceedings against
16 members of the MUP, they had no role in any of that and could not have
17 had and could not have taken part in any of that, neither the staff nor
18 Sreten Lukic, either in criminal proceedings or in misdemeanour
19 proceedings against policemen in Kosovo and Metohija. There were many,
20 many documents to bear this out, 6D464, 6D1339, 6D1340, 6D1343, 6D1344,
21 6D1345, 6D1346, and so on and so forth. There are many documents
22 testifying to this that speak about disciplinary measures and criminal
23 proceedings.
24 This general area is regulated in detail by provisions, so we
25 cannot accept the claims of the Prosecution that Sreten Lukic was a
Page 27307
1 general and therefore, by the same token, he must have wielded influence.
2 There is nothing like that in the police force. It's a well-ordered
3 system. It is a system ordered by provisions, and each person's power
4 and authority are precisely determined. You can't say that somebody
5 certainly has influence or certainly does not have influence.
6 Even a Prosecution witness by the name of Cvetic confirmed that
7 the MUP staff had nothing whatsoever to do with these procedures and
8 therefore need not have even been informed about any of this, and this is
9 to be found on transcript page 8152. Only with lacking this segment in
10 the hands of the staff and Sreten Lukic, we clearly see that there was no
11 effective control by the staff. Had they had everything else in their
12 hands, if they were not able to initiate proceedings to take disciplinary
13 measures, then they could not have had effective control.
14 Furthermore, neither the MUP staff nor Sreten Lukic could have
15 appointed anyone or relieved anyone of their duties, that is to say
16 policemen in Kosovo and Metohija, they were not able to replace a single
17 policeman. And we deal with this in our brief paragraph 675 to 685. And
18 there's another essential point. The MUP staff is not an organizational
19 unit of the MUP either, it does not have the authorisation or rights of
20 an ordinary organizational unit. A part of SUP, the territorial part of
21 SUP, is an organizational unit, the staff is not.
22 During these proceedings we have seen a number of minutes from
23 meetings held in the MUP staff and that's what it said, they weren't
24 staff meetings. The only minutes from a staff meeting is the minutes
25 that are denoted as P3120, dated the 23rd of July, 1998, and these
Page 27308
1 minutes from the meetings held in the MUP staff were held once a month,
2 as the Prosecutor noted himself. Now, can -- could one command an action
3 by holding meetings just once a month? Would that be feasible? Is that
4 the way in which actions were commanded? And that's what we find in the
5 Prosecution's final brief in paragraph 214.
6 All the meetings in 1999 during the war were attended by Obrad
7 Stevanovic. He was in Kosovo and Metohija and had all the authority from
8 the minister as being his assistant, and it was as if the minister had
9 attended those meetings. Now, we brought a police -- we brought an
10 expert for police matters. The Prosecution failed to do that. They
11 couldn't find anybody to claim what they were saying, not even Babovic
12 they couldn't even bring Babovic in, and they challenged the credibility
13 of our expert and they say that he didn't deal with the police in Kosovo
14 in his work.
15 Nobody dealt with the police in Kosovo at that time because
16 nothing like that existed at that time. What did exist was the police of
17 the Republic of Serbia
18 same token the police of Kosovo did not exist in 1998 and 1999. It
19 simply did not exist and nobody dealt with those matters because the body
20 did not exist.
21 I'd now like to discuss the importance of Sreten Lukic's role.
22 Many people testified here about that. Now, if some people from outside
23 were to observe Sreten Lukic -- well, it would depend how they viewed
24 him, in what field, in what area. If they looked at him as somebody who
25 provided information, then he appeared important because that was his
Page 27309
1 job. It was his job to know about the security situation in Kosovo. In
2 1998 he sent feedback information to the SUPs, he sent back information,
3 the information he had gathered, to the SUPs in Kosovo and the
4 headquarters in Belgrade
5 possible so the information was just sent to MUP headquarters in
6 Belgrade
7 However, if observers met him in conditions where decisions were
8 called for, then they would have gained the impression that his function
9 and post carried no weight at all. For example, Aleksandar Vasiljevic, a
10 Prosecution witness, has told you here that he was not the number one man
11 but the number ten man. He said this referring to his role in the middle
12 of the war, and during that time the OTP claims that Lukic was the senior
13 officer of MUP in Kosovo and Metohija. And Vasiljevic was testifying
14 about the 1st of June, 1999. Later on the Prosecution changed this and
15 said that Lukic was the highest appointed official in Kosovo and
16 Metohija.
17 Obrad Stevanovic, when he arrives in Kosovo and Metohija or any
18 other functionary from the headquarters or Dragan Ilic, general, the head
19 of the criminal -- the crime police, he was the be-all and end-all. They
20 were the ones who decided what was going to be done. They didn't ask
21 Sreten Lukic, they didn't report to him. They would inform him if they
22 wanted to do so on a need-to-know basis; if not, they wouldn't. General
23 Ojdanic as the Chief of Staff of the Supreme Command describes him as an
24 adjutant in the middle of the war on the 11th of April, 1999, and this is
25 to be found in Exhibit 3D1125 on page 75.
Page 27310
1 Sakic claims that Protic told him that Lukic didn't give him an
2 apartment when he was chief of the public security department and that he
3 was the fifth wheel again and second violin and this is to be found on
4 transcript page 22156. After the war Sreten Lukic was appointed to a
5 post where a colonel -- the rank of colonel would have been sufficient,
6 whereas he had the rank of lieutenant-general. Naumann doesn't remember
7 Lukic having been present at meetings at all and this is to be found in
8 the transcript on page 8378.
9 Judge Bonomy, you asked him: "Was Mr. Lukic present at any of
10 these meetings?"
11 And he says: "I don't remember."
12 The agreement and the annex was signed by Djordjevic and Byrnes,
13 and it is something that exclusively refers to Kosovo and Metohija. This
14 annex relates specifically to KiM. We will see that at meetings Gajic
15 was separately informed from Lukic and he was subordinate to him. It
16 would be sufficient if Lukic were to report for both of them, surely.
17 Abrahams doesn't write to Lukic, doesn't write letters to Lukic in 1998.
18 Dimitrijevic doesn't claim that for Kosovo and Metohija Lukic was the
19 main person. So if we look at the segment of decision-making and
20 leadership, then there's no staff there and there's certainly no Lukic
21 there either.
22 And this brings us to why the new government decided to as the
23 take is to include Sreten Lukic in the security department and
24 Mr. Zivkovic testified to that, the former premier, and he explained the
25 type of information they required both from domestic and foreign
Page 27311
1 intelligence agents and agencies.
2 The OTP attempts to draw an inference from 1998 to 1999. They
3 say that what happened in 1998 certainly happened in 1999 also, and we
4 say this is not correct and that the evidence shows it is not correct.
5 Some of the elements which certainly cannot relate to both time-periods
6 are the following.
7 As we know, on the 24th of March, 1999, the NATO air-strikes
8 began. This was something that was not happening in 1998. A state of
9 war was declared and this means that there was specific circumstances
10 such as mobilisation which did not obtain before. Some laws and bylaws
11 came into force which were not in force in peacetime. The numbers of the
12 KLA increased from 18.000, it increased greatly and the KLA began
13 forcible mobilisation. In 1999 the KLA was much better organized and
14 Mr. Byrnes worked a lot on that. He worked on the organization of the
15 KLA, they were better armed. And this was done for the most part during
16 the stay of the KVM in Kosovo. The KLA took territory and was preparing
17 for a spring offensive and for cooperation with NATO. And we heard in
18 the course of these proceedings that they did cooperate, that they did
19 provide NATO with information. In Rule 70 documents we saw the manner in
20 which this was done, we saw how they sent information to the other side
21 which was bombing Serbia
22 air-strikes.
23 In 1999 urban terrorism escalated. It should be observed that
24 NATO was bombing columns of civilians returning to their houses, to their
25 homes, in Korisa and Bistrazin. Not a single column leaving the country
Page 27312
1 was bombed. Not a single bridge, road, or railway leading out of the
2 country towards Macedonia
3 not a single one.
4 And now briefly about the engagement of the MUP in 1998 first.
5 As the KLA committed the most brutal crimes in 1998, murders, abductions,
6 and so on, the MUP of Serbia was obliged under the law to take measures
7 to prevent these crimes. They were duty-bound to do so by the Law on
8 Criminal Procedure, the Law on Ministries, the Law on the Interior on
9 Internal Affairs, and many other pieces of legislation. There was no
10 special decision needed for the engagement of the MUP, no special
11 decision, least of all a decision by the president of the FRY, Slobodan
12 Milosevic. The MUP was simply acting in accordance with the law, both as
13 a whole and each individual member of the MUP did the same. They didn't
14 need anyone's decision to do that.
15 When terrorist activities outgrew the ability of the MUP to deal
16 with that evil and to protect the citizens, the state leadership of the
17 FRY decided to engage the Army of Yugoslavia, and this began in July
18 1998. Before that, the state leadership reached a decision that the plan
19 should be made. The plan was drawn up by the army. When the plan was
20 adopted, it began to be implemented through the planning of individual
21 actions. And let us repeat that the MUP staff for KiM never drew up
22 these plans, either in 1998 or in 1999, although this is listed as one of
23 its tasks in the decision on its establishment dated the 16th of June,
24 1998.
25 And now briefly about the credibility of witnesses. We have seen
Page 27313
1 that the OTP objected to the credibility of Defence witnesses because
2 they were participants in these events, and truly the Defence did attempt
3 to bring in as many witnesses as possible who did participate in these
4 events and have first-hand knowledge. Does this mean that only witnesses
5 with second-hand knowledge are credible? That's what the OTP would seem
6 to claim. The OTP was able to examine each of our witnesses. They were
7 able to collect documents to impeach our witnesses. And as we have seen,
8 it was far easier for the OTP to gain -- to obtain documents than it was
9 for the Defence. For example, Cedomir Sakic's statement, which the
10 Defence attempted to obtain for a year with no success. You know that we
11 were engaged in litigation with either the FRY or Serbia and Montenegro
12 We had great problems with the MUP of Serbia; they wouldn't allow us
13 access to documents. When we finally managed to gain access to
14 documents, they punished the person who made it possible for us to access
15 the documents acting on the minister's orders. The situation has
16 improved recently, we have to admit. But this meant that we were short
17 of time and that we were late in obtaining evidence we needed.
18 Let me stress briefly that Adamovic is misquoted in paragraph 215
19 of the OTP final brief. He is not speaking about a meeting of the staff
20 but about the meeting at which the five-stage plan was discussed with
21 members of the army. This was not a meeting held in the MUP staff. It
22 was quite a different meeting, but this is misinterpreted here and you
23 can see this from Adamovic's testimony.
24 Now we wish to refer Albanian witnesses. Very often one had the
25 impression that witnesses who were Albanians and who were allegedly
Page 27314
1 victims of crimes had been instructed on what to say. For example, what
2 they say about the armbands they saw on the Serb forces, that is, the
3 members of the MUP at the beginning of the air-strikes from the 24th of
4 March until mid-April. It can be seen from the evidence that members of
5 the MUP did not wear armbands before the 15th of April, 1999
6 Albanian witnesses described armbands which must have been shown to them
7 from photographs of the police in 1998 and this is best illustrated by
8 the fact that they often saw the police wearing white armbands. In 1999
9 the police did not wear white armbands at all. Before the 15th of April,
10 1999, they wore no armbands and throughout 1999 they never wore white
11 armbands. Every witness who claims to have seen a policeman with a white
12 armband is not telling the truth, he has been instructed to say that
13 based on photographs taken in 1998.
14 We have also seen that all the witnesses of Albanian ethnicity
15 deny that the KLA was present in the villages. This is contrary to all
16 the evidence, combat reports, the testimony of Zyrapi, and so on. We see
17 that actions and combat were conducted only in villages where the KLA was
18 present. Of course, the two-villages tactic was used as General
19 Lazarevic explained to us, but no action was undertaken unless the KLA
20 had first conducted an attack. We saw the testimony of Witness Gavranic
21 for the territory of Gnjilane
22 not attack the police and the army and no anti-terrorist actions were
23 conducted on his territory except for two in marginal areas in the
24 direction of other municipalities because there was no need, no one had
25 been attacked, although there was intelligence to show that the KLA was
Page 27315
1 present there. However, the fact that they did not attack the police was
2 sufficient for there not to be any anti-terrorist actions in the area.
3 Of course the witnesses are afraid, very afraid. It wasn't that someone
4 paid them not to tell the truth or asked them not to tell the truth.
5 Most of them were probably afraid for their lives because we know what
6 happened in other cases where Albanians were accused. We saw the
7 situation described by Shaban Fazliu, the situation prevailing in Kosovo.
8 The KLA is in control of Kosovo today and of course an Albanian
9 testifying in open session here will not tell us what he knows.
10 As regards credibility, I will comment briefly on Protic and
11 Sakic. Protic arrived, and in the evaluation of this Defence team he
12 lied shamelessly in certain parts of his testimony. The OTP says that
13 what he claims is for the most part true. The Defence does not deny that
14 he participated in transporting the bodies but that is not crucial for
15 this case. What is crucial for this case is what contacts he had with
16 Sreten Lukic. He was brought here to incriminate Sreten Lukic, not to
17 tell us about the transport of the bodies. We heard about that from
18 other witnesses, from people working on investigations, from people who
19 exhumed the bodies. There's nothing being challenged there. What is
20 being challenged is what contacts he had with Sreten Lukic.
21 Does anyone in this courtroom know how many times Protic
22 allegedly called Sreten Lukic or the voice which to him sounded like
23 Sreten Lukic? Was it three times, two times, or only once? We don't
24 know because it all depends on which of his statements we read.
25 On page 11310 my learned friend Mr. Stamp put to Protic that he
Page 27316
1 testified in Belgrade
2 to review the record of these three different occasions when you spoke
3 about these events in 1999?"
4 And Protic says: "Yes, after each of my testimonies I was given
5 records of my testimony."
6 And Mr. Stamp: "And was what you said in each one of these three
7 occasions true to the best of your knowledge and belief?"
8 And Protic said: "Yes, of course."
9 And then the first disaster that Protic was engaged in took
10 place. Stamp asked him about the voice which sounded like Sreten Lukic
11 and now things become complicated. Protic says that Lukic addressed him
12 by his first name Bozidar in all his statements, and yet here before this
13 Tribunal he said three or four times that Sreten Lukic addressed him by
14 his last name, Protic. We find this on page 11311, 11312, 11313 of the
15 transcript.
16 Judge Bonomy -- well, at the insistence of His Honour Judge
17 Bonomy my learned friend Mr. Stamp asked him again and tried again to get
18 him to say that Sreten Lukic addressed him by his first name, but he
19 persisted in saying that Sreten addressed him by his last name.
20 According to Protic, he went to the staff in order to call the
21 staff; that's his testimony. According to him, on each of those three
22 occasions he happened to be given a telephone which had a direct line
23 with Belgrade
24 dial the extension for Belgrade
25 to assist him, he happened to grab a telephone which had a direct
Page 27317
1 connection. And witness Deretic explained how many such telephones there
2 might have been in the staff during the war, one or two, and both in the
3 same office. So if one were to analyse this evidence, Protic enters an
4 office and uses a telephone which is in the same office where Sreten
5 Lukic is answering the telephone.
6 Then on page 11329 my learned friend Mr. Stamp tells him that he
7 called Sreten Lukic three times, so each time he called Sreten Lukic.
8 The first time he explains but he wasn't sure on cross-examination
9 whether he was dialling a Belgrade
10 again how he dialled the number, what sort of voice he heard, and so on.
11 But in cross, again he's not sure what city he called.
12 And then we come to the third occasion, we'll take this as our
13 example to illustrate all this, he explains and says, This person told me
14 to go to the parking lot behind Rilindija and there were trucks there. I
15 would be met there by some men who would tell me which truck to take.
16 There were four or five other trucks on the parking lot and I was to take
17 only one. That's on transcript page 11327.
18 On page 11328 my learned friend Mr. Stamp asked him: "On that
19 occasion you took the bodies to the 13th May police centre in Batajnica.
20 Why did you take the bodies there?
21 "A. That's what I was told.
22 "Q. By who?
23 "A. The voice I had a telephone contact with."
24 During cross-examination Protic admitted that he didn't call
25 anyone the third time. So all these explanations are false, fabricated.
Page 27318
1 He is not telling the truth. In his statements Protic said that the
2 liaison person was a man waiting for him in a burgundy-coloured Golf, but
3 he denied that before the Court and said he had never seen that man's
4 face and that this man met him only once when he was going to Janjevo.
5 The next thing Protic claims is that he had been Sreten Lukic's driver
6 for six months, he was the personal driver of Sreten Lukic for six
7 months, and he repeats that here too. He repeats that on page 11329.
8 He says: "I was able to recognise his voice because I was his
9 driver for six months."
10 Later on on page 11330 he claims again that he was Lukic's
11 driver. During the cross-examination on page 11377 he says that he
12 wasn't Sreten's driver but Obrad Stevanovic's driver and that perhaps
13 from time to time he might have driven Sreten Lukic somewhere, and he
14 repeats that later on at 11378 and 11379. And he acknowledges that
15 Sreten Lukic had his own driver who was another person and also confirms
16 that he never drove Sreten Lukic after July 1990 and this is on page
17 11380. And he said that he'd never even talked to Sreten after the time
18 he left Kosovo in 1990.
19 So nine years went by since the time when he talked to Sreten
20 Lukic for the last time and it was only several times before that.
21 I should like to stress that Protic was a person who entered a
22 flat illegally, a policeman looting a flat and moving into it, and he
23 asked Sreten Lukic to legalise this illegal entry into that flat which
24 the latter refused to do. Sreten Lukic refused to have any contact with
25 him when he asked him for advice as to what to testify in reference to
Page 27319
1 this indictment and the counts in it. So he's angry with Sreten for
2 having sent him to the south of Serbia
3 retired him. Well, had Sreten Lukic considered that he was guilty and
4 that this man had something to hide, he surely would have wanted to
5 satisfy him and meet his requirements rather than act contrary to what he
6 demanded had he thought there was any danger and had he had anything to
7 hide. There was discussion whether he told the truth in Belgrade. Judge
8 Bonomy asked him. He said, Yes, I did tell the truth in Belgrade. Then
9 he said, No, I didn't tell the truth in Belgrade, in fact, I'm telling
10 the truth here and now. He changed his testimony in that respect.
11 With regard to the credibility of Protic's testimony we heard
12 testimony from a number of witnesses and we pin-pointed Aleksandar Kostic
13 and Sakic, Kostic regularly cooperates with the Prosecution of this
14 Tribunal, and Dragan Furdulovic, another witness. It is clear that all
15 of them expressed doubt as to the credibility of the testimony of Bozidar
16 Protic.
17 Witness Sakic who took part in the events painted quite a
18 different picture than the one painted by Protic, particularly with
19 respect to the critical part, that is to say how Protic calls him and he
20 says that it's not true that Protic used a stable telephone line but used
21 a mobile telephone, that it was not true that he separated from him, that
22 it was not true that they turned in to Pristina and went to the centre of
23 Pristina and so on and so forth.
24 We'd like to stress that had the Prosecution had Mr. Sakic's
25 statement given to the investigating organs in Serbia, as we said the
Page 27320
1 statement was not accessible to General Lukic's Defence or Sakic himself,
2 and this is the way in which the MUP treated the Lukic Defence, an
3 illustration of that. It is quite obvious that Sakic said the same thing
4 in Belgrade
5 asked him that, that is to be found on transcript page 22161, and I'd
6 like to point out that the Prosecution did not include Sakic's statement
7 in Belgrade
8 court the same as he did in Belgrade
9 Now, as far as the transportation of bodies is concerned, I don't
10 think it was shown that the staff or that Sreten Lukic had anything to do
11 with any of that. Of course we have to exclude Protic there. I think I
12 have sufficient elements to prove to the Trial Chamber that they should
13 not believe him and not trust him and not trust his credibility.
14 As far as the transport of bodies is concerned, we heard
15 testimony from Gvozden Gagic and saw the discussions held in the staff.
16 We saw that General Ilic spent time in Kosovo and Metohija during that
17 period, from the 23rd of May to the 1st of June, 1999, and (redacted)
18 (redacted)
19 (redacted)
20 (redacted)
21 And now finally or to close my part of the presentation, I would
22 like to say that there was an error in our brief and we failed to deal
23 with 72(C), deportation from Srbica, the village of Vocnjak
24 Izbica, Tusilje and Cirez and if there's enough time later on I shall
25 deal with that topic in greater detail after my colleague Mr. Ivetic
Page 27321
1 completes his closing arguments. If not, we should like to challenge the
2 allegations in the indictment as to that. Thank you.
3 MR. IVETIC: Members of the Panel, as you know, my name is Dan
4 Ivetic --
5 JUDGE BONOMY: Just a second, Mr. Ivetic, until I see what
6 Mr. Lukic is referring to at the end of his submission.
7 Mr. Lukic, you're saying you omitted to say anything about Srbica
8 in your final brief, is that it?
9 MR. LUKIC: Yes, Your Honour, we omitted that.
10 JUDGE BONOMY: And what is the point you're trying to make?
11 MR. LUKIC: We are trying to use this opportunity at least to say
12 that we don't agree with the allegations from this part of the
13 indictment.
14 JUDGE BONOMY: Indeed.
15 MR. LUKIC: And I think that Mr. Lazarevic's Defence refuted this
16 part, so ...
17 JUDGE BONOMY: So what is it you now want to say on that?
18 MR. IVETIC: I think, if I could perhaps lead it up, our position
19 is that the omission of 72 -- of arguments relating to paragraph 72(C) in
20 our final brief in no means should be considered a concession of those
21 allegations and that we do, in fact, contest and deny those allegations
22 based upon the evidence that has been presented at this trial.
23 JUDGE BONOMY: And is that the extent of the submissions you have
24 to make on that?
25 MR. IVETIC: Well, if we have time depending on how fast I can
Page 27322
1 get through with this, Mr. Lukic does have a brief -- brief submission on
2 that part that we would do orally, I'm going to try and leave some time
3 for if I can cut corners here and there on my submissions on the
4 remainder of the case.
5 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, please continue then, Mr. Ivetic.
6 MR. IVETIC: Thank you, Your Honours.
7 I want to remind you that these proceedings are to be viewed in a
8 serious manner, not only because of the crimes that are alleged being
9 serious but also because of the severity of the potential and unjust harm
10 that could result to an innocent accused such as, we submit, Mr. Lukic,
11 if the Prosecution case is to be believed. Given the severity of the
12 foregoing, it is truly astounding to me the manner in which the
13 Prosecution has prosecuted this case, without regard for detail, without
14 regard for getting it right. They have recycled allegations and ignored
15 the evidence that we have all heard in the interim two years of trial.
16 Yet, this is apparently the best case the Prosecution cares to
17 put forth after two years of trial. Your Honours, at the outset I wish
18 to remind you that you have a dual responsibility for, just as you have a
19 duty to provide justice to victims, you also have a duty and obligation
20 to protect and uphold the rights of the accused including ensuring that
21 the findings are based upon full and true facts, not
22 mis-characterizations by the Prosecution, not guilt by association, and
23 lastly you have a duty to uphold the right of freedom and acquittal for
24 an innocent accused when the facts so dictate.
25 This needs to be borne in mind for this is a case where countless
Page 27323
1 Prosecution witnesses came and changed their story, dramatically changed
2 their previous sworn testimony and statements upon appearing at this
3 trial with this Prosecution. I call upon you to recall your own words,
4 Judge Bonomy, on the 31st of August, 2006, that it would have been the
5 grossest miscarriage of justice if the Prosecution's written witness
6 evidence had been presented without cross-examination and confrontation,
7 you shuddered to think what might have happened without
8 cross-examination.
9 I submit that the case being presented by the Prosecution now in
10 writing and orally is primarily the same pre-trial, pre-cross-examination
11 version and therefore must be subject to the same caution and reason for
12 scrutiny that was called for during the trial. Flashy PowerPoint
13 presentations have been presented to provide materials out of context and
14 dress up bare allegations or misrepresentations.
15 The Chamber will recall how this case began, with the Prosecution
16 trying to resubmit wholesale questionable documentary evidence from the
17 Milosevic trial, including footage of strife in South America which they
18 cast as being Kosovo refugees in Albania and then they presented footage
19 of graves predating the indictment as purported evidence under the
20 indictment. Indeed, I submit this is a story of the case thus far has
21 been an overzealous Prosecution seeking victory for its case at all costs
22 even if truth, justice, the integrity of the proceedings and the innocent
23 accused are sacrificed in the process. I have the utmost faith and the
24 experience of distinguished members of this panel will not succumb to the
25 Prosecution's arguments and will not allow these things, including the
Page 27324
1 trial's integrity, to be sacrificed merely to reward the Prosecution.
2 Now, I propose that I begin with something that I was stunned and
3 shocked to hear about in the Prosecution's submissions. My colleague
4 Mr. Stamp asserted that the Podujevo killings by SAJ reservists was the
5 lead illustration, indeed one of only two illustrations that he had to
6 show Lukic had command responsibility over and was directly linked to
7 perpetrators of crimes.
8 Since we have an indictment in this case, albeit a rather general
9 and overexpansive accusatory document, the only crimes Mr. Stamp can be
10 talking about are required to be those in the indictment. Podujevo is
11 not in the indictment, never was charged in the indictment. Why after
12 two years of intense litigation and even more years of preparation on
13 their part is the leading cause for the Prosecution against Sreten Lukic
14 the killings in Podujevo something for which legal liability cannot
15 attach in these proceedings.
16 It does not make sense but it shows how misguided and
17 misrepresenting the Prosecution's submissions are. Remarkably the
18 Prosecution quotes Goran Stoparic, an insider police witness but they
19 cite only to his witness statement which they drafted and they ignore the
20 greater bulk of his testimony, his own words. Why doesn't the
21 Prosecution want the whole story to be shown to the world that is
22 watching these proceedings? Why is the Prosecution afraid of drawing to
23 the Court's attention Stoparic's sworn testimony of how the Podujevo
24 tragedy actually occurred and its aftermath? Simply put, the truth hurts
25 them. They cannot obtain a conviction if forced to deal only with the
Page 27325
1 sworn testimony and the truth. But we must point out and address the
2 testimony, the truth to reveal the Prosecution's deck of cards.
3 Now, Stoparic, rather than being ordered to commit any crimes
4 against civilians, explains how the SAJ reservists at Podujevo had been
5 unloaded from their transport and were waiting for instructions when
6 certain individuals just on their own opened fire. Stoparic verified
7 that during his entire stay in Kosovo as a reservist in SAJ, police
8 superiors never issued orders to kill civilians. That's at transcript
9 page 727. Stoparic further stated that the actions of police officials
10 at Podujevo possibly prevented further killings. Transcript page 725.
11 Most telling is Stoparic's own words at transcript page 744, line
12 25 through 745, line 7.
13 "Q. Therefore, we may conclude that the killings of those people
14 was not intentional or planned by the SAJ or the police for that matter?
15 "A. I have been testifying several times concerning that event
16 and I kept repeating that no one had ordered anything of that nature. I
17 never ordered such a thing and no one did. I'm quite positive about
18 that."
19 Your Honours, Stoparic could not be more explicit in debunking
20 the myth of the Prosecution's case. These words are the death now to
21 Mr. Stamp's submissions of the key crime he alleges against Lukic, the
22 non-indicted Podujevo that he perhaps is prosecuting in some other case
23 but surely cannot be seriously prosecuting here. We have a wide range of
24 evidence that the Serbian MUP in Podujevo not only reacted quickly to the
25 crime by saving survivors, offering medical assistance, and doing an
Page 27326
1 on-site investigation, but also gathered up all the SAJ reservists and
2 sent -- not just the shooters, and sent them on their way back through
3 Kosovo. Paragraphs 316 through 323 of our brief details some of the
4 evidence in these efforts. I will not repeat that, but I do feel I have
5 to highlight a portion of the testimony of Mr. Stoparic at transcript
6 page 748 through 750.
7 He described how the commander of the SAJ was swearing at them
8 and took them out -- took out the SAJ reservists and was angry at them.
9 He said: "I still remember clearly his words and I can quote them quite
10 precisely if you want me to.
11 "Q. I don't believe that is necessary but you may as well if you
12 want the Trial Chamber to hear it.
13 "A. His behaviour was such that one could conclude he was very
14 worried about the things that took place and in his brief speech he told
15 us: You are not the people to be counted on, one can't work with you. I
16 was under the impression that he wasn't very happy about the things that
17 took place.
18 "Q. Were you under the impression that this incident was a shock
19 for the other policemen as well?
20 "A. There was a person, a man whose nickname was Vuk, Wolf, he
21 was a very good professional, an SAJ officer and he used even harsher
22 words. He even took one of the children out to the street to bring him
23 to the ambulance that was there. None of the members of the SAJ as far
24 as I could see was happy about that, were not happy but they were
25 probably horrified."
Page 27327
1 How can anyone using common logic and reason draw from this
2 testimony the inference that the Podujevo killings were intended, ordered
3 or planned by the MUP? Only Mr. Stamp, I submit.
4 Stoparic himself testified that on the bus ride back from Kosovo
5 the SAJ reservists were criticised and chastised and the perpetrators
6 were eventually arrested and eventually convicted and more importantly,
7 the perpetrator was not redeployed to Kosovo again. All the other
8 testimony and evidence from this Prosecution through Stoparic, through
9 Vasiljevic is that there's no other crimes alleged against the SAJ
10 reservists, or some like to call them and try to engage in guilt by
11 association, former Skorpions, during their entire stay in Kosovo.
12 Now, the entire lack of authority by Lukic over the SAJ and their
13 commander Trajkovic is discussed in our brief at paragraphs 410 through
14 415 so I'll not go into details about this. But as for Mr. Stamp's focus
15 on the fact that the judgement against the perpetrator of the shootings
16 came too late in 2003, this conveniently avoids the evidence led from
17 several witnesses about the functioning of the MUP and the judiciaries in
18 Serbia
19 responsibilities of the same cease upon the presentation of the criminal
20 denunciation report and file to the prosecutor with the prosecutor being
21 independent of the police and bearing all further responsibility to
22 prosecute the case. This was testified to by Judge Danica Marinkovic,
23 transcript pages 23469, 23471, 23472, and also by witness Dragan
24 Furdulovic at transcript page 24744 and 24749.
25 Another matter that the Prosecution fails to bring to the Court's
Page 27328
1 attention is the testimony we had that Sreten Lukic after becoming chief
2 of the public security sector and assistant minister after the democratic
3 government was elected into power, in that position he authorised
4 measures to permit the surviving victims of Podujevo to be safely and
5 securely brought to testify against the perpetrators resulting in a
6 conviction of the maximum sentence. We had testimony from Mr. Furdulovic
7 about that at transcript page 24708. I am shocked that Mr. Stamp
8 believes that someone who exercises his official duties to assist in the
9 protection of witnesses and bringing them to court to reveal the truth
10 and obtain justice is to be considered a criminal.
11 Now if I can move on to another point a closely related matter.
12 There were two charts that were -- well, there were multiple charts but
13 there were two charts I want to focus on from the brief and from the
14 closing arguments. Annex E is the chart on the structure of the MUP
15 forces in Kosovo during the indictment period. There is no citation to
16 the record to indicate where this information was proven and upon which
17 the OTP relies; however, we know this to be the exact same chart produced
18 long before the evidence opened and without hearing the evidence by the
19 then-OTP in-house expert Captain Philip Coo, formerly of the Canadian
20 navy -- Canadian army, who since that time has been disqualified, and
21 rightly so, for not being a proper expert witness and who never was
22 presented as an expert on the MUP. It is simply astounding that the OTP
23 would try to recycle such assertions in this case, which had not been
24 credibly adjudicated or supported by the trial evidence.
25 JUDGE BONOMY: Which annex are you referring to, Mr. --
Page 27329
1 MR. IVETIC: Annex E, Your Honours, that's the annex --
2 JUDGE BONOMY: Annex to what?
3 MR. IVETIC: Pardon me, to the OTP brief, it's cited at paragraph
4 7 of the OTP brief. It's a chart with the structure of the Ministry of
5 the Interior MUP in Kosovo during the indictment period and I believe
6 they flashed it during their closing arguments.
7 JUDGE BONOMY: But it's not an exhibit?
8 MR. IVETIC: It's not an exhibit, correct, Your Honour.
9 JUDGE BONOMY: So it's simply part of a submission, it's not
10 evidence in the case, it's just something presented to guide the
11 Trial Chamber?
12 MR. IVETIC: Correct, to misguide the Trial Chamber.
13 JUDGE BONOMY: All right. Thank you.
14 MR. IVETIC: And also --
15 JUDGE BONOMY: I think -- well, just a moment, now that --
16 perhaps you want to reflect on what you've just said. That may be its
17 impact, but I hope you're not suggesting that is its deliberate impact.
18 MR. IVETIC: No, no, the impact of presenting such evidence leads
19 to that regrettable possibility.
20 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.
21 MR. IVETIC: Also, Your Honours, we have annex C and the
22 Prosecution has also identified at paragraph 7 of their submission which
23 is supposed to be a death chart. I actually looked through this, Your
24 Honours, and calling it a proof of death chart is not only misleading,
25 it's inaccurate. If one includes such a chart, one at least ought to
Page 27330
1 highlight the fact that hidden deep within is a concession by the
2 Prosecution that there is no proof from this trial from any of the
3 victims listed in the indictment that they actually are deceased and no
4 proof of bodies or proof of the manner of death.
5 We also have -- it is -- Ms. Kravetz in talking in her closing
6 arguments talked about Mala Krusa and Mr. Stamp chose to focus -- did not
7 talk about Mala Krusa and Mr. Stamp also likewise did not talk about Mala
8 Krusa. I submit that it's perhaps due to the fact that annex C
9 demonstrates that none of the victims scheduled in the indictment for
10 Mala Krusa have been proven dead and in fact one of them has been proven
11 alive. This simply cannot be proper evidence upon which this Chamber is
12 expected to convict anyone.
13 Likewise, the proof of death chart demonstrates that the
14 Prosecution is trying to assert criminal liability for unscheduled
15 victims, an incredible 15 for Krusa that are not in the indictment, and
16 that is the case for some of the other crime scenes as well.
17 JUDGE BONOMY: Is that a convenient time to interrupt?
18 MR. IVETIC: Yes, Your Honour, I forgot we were on the one and a
19 half hour schedule. That would be a convenient time, Your Honours.
20 JUDGE BONOMY: I should make it clear to you that we are very
21 conscious of the difficulty that's posed by trying to establish the death
22 and the cause of death of large numbers of personnel, that there may be
23 aspects of the chart you're referring to which fail to provide all the
24 detail that one would wish. The Trial Chamber's very conscious of the
25 detail into which we shall require to go to establish that individuals
Page 27331
1 were murdered beyond reasonable doubt. On the other hand, Mr. Ivetic,
2 the fact that people were killed without necessarily establishing who
3 exactly may be an element of the general assertion about murder being one
4 of the means by which the joint criminal enterprise was implemented. So
5 the chart when it refers to unscheduled victims may nevertheless assist
6 us in determining whether or not there were people killed who do not
7 feature necessarily in one of the lists of individual victims.
8 It's a matter for you how much time you spend on this, but it's
9 very difficult to -- for you to achieve a great deal, I suspect, beyond
10 the very general statements, for which there is some foundation in what
11 you've already said.
12 So we shall resume at ten minutes past 4.00.
13 --- Recess taken at 3.47 p.m.
14 --- On resuming at 4.11 p.m.
15 MR. LUKIC: Your Honour, I owe you these references for Dayton
16 Agreement. The actual agreement is not part of our evidence but it's
17 mentioned and discussed in some -- in some documents. For example, it's
18 3D559, it's 1D32, those are stenographic notes from the parliament of
19 Republic of Serbia
20 before the bombing. It's also 2D16, 2D241, there are talks in between
21 federal minister Jovanovic with minister of foreign affairs of Germany
22 Mr. Fischer, P403, P605, which is Mr. Sainovic's interview, and P560.
23 That's what I found in this short period.
24 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.
25 MR. LUKIC: Thank you.
Page 27332
1 JUDGE BONOMY: Now, Mr. Ivetic, while I'm the last person who
2 would wish to cramp your style, I'm told that when you are reading you
3 were speeding up. I think it was noticeable you were trying to pace your
4 delivery, but when you read just be conscious of the need not to go too
5 fast. Thank you. Please continue.
6 MR. IVETIC: Thank you. Thank you, Your Honour, for that and I
7 will try as hard as I can. I know we're all anxious to try and get these
8 proceedings concluded.
9 JUDGE CHOWHAN: I think Lord Bonomy wants you to be relaxed and
10 speak nicely is what it is.
11 MR. IVETIC: Thank you, Your Honours.
12 If I could just finish up on the annex relating to the death
13 charts and focusing on the words of Judge Bonomy before the break about
14 these charts being important for showing persons who were murdered. I
15 would point out and perhaps Your Honours have already seen, so but the
16 charts also have persons for which the forensic evidence shows they died
17 non-violent deaths, that is to say they were not murdered. You have Agim
18 Hyseni from Vucitrn, who died a natural cause of death. Some had
19 respiratory problems, Hyseni Kada. Some had unascertained causes of
20 death. So I would ask you to look at that evidence very carefully to see
21 what it actually does prove and why the Prosecution is providing it.
22 As to Vucitrn, the witnesses that the Prosecution called did not
23 testify to the massacre of civilians that the Prosecution keeps
24 presenting. They testified as to one or two persons, a handful of
25 things, and we have the exhibit of Sabrit Kadriu, P2377, where this
Page 27333
1 witness is not giving names based on any kind of personal knowledge that
2 could be considered proper evidence in this trial. He's merely reciting
3 a list that he and others compiled based on information gathered after
4 the fact with no regard to the nature and manner of the death nor even
5 the location. And perhaps that explains why we have persons listed for
6 Vucitrn who were not killed but had, as I indicated, natural causes --
7 natural and non-violent causes of death.
8 So I ask you to look at that carefully.
9 Moving along. Ms. Kravetz on behalf of the Prosecution talked
10 rather briefly about the Milosh Giliq Street in Djakovica incident and
11 curiously she claimed that there were no KLA in Djakovica in April. This
12 quite simply is incorrect. We have the benefit of the cables that were
13 sent to and from the American State Department which rely upon their
14 sources, intelligence and others on the ground, information which was
15 received by this Defence and which is allowed to be unclassified for use
16 in these proceedings under Rule 70. These sources cannot be argued to be
17 unauthentic. They cannot be said to be prepared or influenced by the
18 accused and they are contemporaneous with the events alleged.
19 If we look at just a few of these I would highlight 6D1637,
20 6D1638, and 6D1639, they are covered at paragraph 155 of our brief. We
21 see that the KLA not only was in Djakovica, it controlled a quarter of
22 the city itself and was actively trying to take over the city centre. It
23 controlled all the area around Djakovica, again all according to the
24 information available to the US State Department. Under such
25 circumstances where the Djakovica SUP doesn't even control its own city,
Page 27334
1 let alone the entire area under its jurisdiction. How can they have been
2 sure of everything that was going on in the city interior? We have the
3 testimony of Mr. Zlatkovic who showed the chaos that was prevailing in
4 Djakovica resulting from the NATO bombings, the daily attacks of the KLA,
5 and fires resulting, power outages, et cetera. He confirmed that the SUP
6 Djakovica knew nothing of the tragic events at Milosh Giliq and therefore
7 nothing could be done about it or reported.
8 How was Sreten Lukic who was dodging NATO bombs in far-away
9 Pristina with no phone lines to Djakovica, how was he supposed to know
10 about this event? Indeed, the daily situation reports or bulletins that
11 my colleague Mr. Lukic talked about prepared by the MUP staff based upon
12 the reports that were sent by courier from the SUPs was the method of
13 communications available. These reports show, as indeed the Prosecution
14 concedes at paragraph 1091 of its brief, these bulletins do not include
15 Milosh Giliq nor the Suva Reka killings, for that matter, even though
16 they include reports of other crimes that were being investigated and
17 processed.
18 Now, the problem with the Prosecution is that they think that
19 this is evidence that the crimes were being hidden by Mr. Lukic and the
20 MUP staff. We submit otherwise, that they show that they were not aware
21 of these incidents and therefore could not have been put on notice of
22 these crimes.
23 We have dealt with Milosh Giliq -- with the Milosh Giliq incident
24 in our brief so I will not go into more detail on it, but I will
25 highlight the fact that the evidence before this Panel is that this
Page 27335
1 tragic event occurred at the hands of persons from the neighbourhood with
2 evidence of these persons engaging in drinking and perhaps drug use.
3 There's no evidence that the persons were acting in their official
4 capacity, in any official capacity with the police whatsoever and only
5 one is said to have been a firefighter within the SUP. Simply put, the
6 facts do not support the overreaching allegations of the Prosecution.
7 Now I wish to turn to Suva Reka. Ms. Kravetz for her part
8 briefly dealt with Suva Reka and the Berisha killings. Again she
9 indicated and represented to you that there was no KLA presence and no
10 fighting going on. I have to point out that this is yet again incorrect,
11 albeit not critical to the events in question because we have the
12 testimony of one of the participants, but we do have evidence that
13 one-half of Suva Reka was in the hands of the KLA. That's at transcript
14 page 25443.
15 Now, as I said, this is not material to the Court's consideration
16 of this incident because of the following. But first of all let me
17 correct another part. Mr. Stamp talking about Suva Reka claims that
18 Goran Stoparic gave evidence that Colonel Mitrovic and his unit led the
19 so-called Operation Suva
20 killed. Now, Goran Stoparic did not, in fact, testify at all about Suva
21 Reka and likewise there is no evidence that the Berisha family killing
22 took place as part of any operation. The perpetrators alleged were all
23 members of the OUP, that is to say the ordinary town police department
24 but neither Ms. Kravetz nor Mr. Stamp seemed to be interested in the
25 specific facts or details of this crime and tragedy, but Your Honours
Page 27336
1 must be, for that is what you have to base your decision on to do
2 justice.
3 The best witness we have for this incident is the Prosecution's
4 own K-83, another touted police insider. This is a man who was a
5 participant in the event and an eye-witness participant in the actual
6 murders themselves. At no point in time did this witness ever allude to
7 or indicate that he and others received any instructions or orders to
8 shoot at or kill anyone, least of all the Berisha family members who were
9 in the pizzeria on that day. In describing how the event transpired and
10 how and why his cohorts began shooting and threw grenades into the
11 pizzeria, the witness illuminated how misguided and wrong the
12 Prosecution's theory is, for after on their own and without warning
13 shooting several persons outside the Berisha home, the individuals
14 involved consumed an astounding two bottles of one litre each of hard
15 liquor. And how did they drink it? The witness said like water. That's
16 at transcript page 3990. Then in the stupor of their private drinking
17 party they proposed to one another on their own accord again that they
18 throw grenades into the pizzeria, which they did and which they followed
19 with shooting. There's no operation, no plans or orders from the police
20 superiors.
21 Look at transcript page 3988 and 3989. This crime is tragic, but
22 as it boils down to it, it is a private act and conduct of persons
23 perhaps drunk or perhaps on their way to getting drunk engaged in a
24 frolic, a departure from any official duties that they could have had
25 with the OUP Suva
Page 27337
1 Now, the Prosecution cites to efforts by the perpetrators and
2 others to cover up this crime by removing the bodies or some of the
3 bodies. There simply is no credible evidence that Sreten Lukic had any
4 role in the burying of bodies at the firing range or their subsequent
5 removal. It is clear that the event was hidden at the level of the
6 perpetrators and locals of Suva Reka. We have evidence that when the
7 Prizren SUP sent a criminal investigative team to investigate the initial
8 bodies of males who had been killed outside the Berisha home, they were
9 not told about the pizzeria incident nor taken there, and in fact one of
10 the perpetrators of the crimes served to provide security for the
11 investigative team and of course he didn't mention anything about what
12 had transpired.
13 We have evidence that, as was established in Belgrade where this
14 case is subject to criminal investigative proceedings, not even the OUP
15 chief in Suva Reka had knowledge, this is from 6D1631, paragraph 64.
16 With no one reporting the incident, there cannot be any notice and any
17 subsequent duty to investigate or discipline, and the evidence is clear
18 that neither the OUP chief, the SUP chief, nor the criminalistic police
19 in Prizren had any information on this event, and therefore the
20 information reported to the MUP staff did not contain any information
21 about this event.
22 So accordingly as to this indictment -- as to this incident there
23 cannot be established any breach of duty or act or omission leading to
24 the liability of Mr. Lukic.
25 I would stress that this is the very same Sreten Lukic who to the
Page 27338
1 contrary was instrumental until the efforts to illuminate this crime, to
2 have it investigated and then turned over to the prosecutorial
3 authorities when he was the assistant minister and head of the RJB.
4 Indeed we heard from Witness Furdulovic and other evidence including
5 6D1068 and transcript page 24699 through 24701 as to the proper discharge
6 of his duties by Lukic authorising the interviews of witnesses and
7 suspects who were employees of the ministry per the requirements and the
8 rules as his position holds and the support that he gave to the
9 investigations that have ultimately resulted in this case being pursued
10 in Belgrade
11 back authorisation for anyone to be interviewed as part of the
12 investigation, showing his openness and professionalism, not a man with
13 anything to hide. We will return to that later.
14 Moving along to Kotlina, which Ms. Kravetz highlighted in the
15 oral submissions last week. Curiously this is one of the few times in
16 their closing arguments that the Prosecution did not have the assertion
17 that there was no KLA presence in the village. Perhaps because we have
18 the paragraphs of the KLA headquarters found in the village, the pictures
19 of the deceased persons with weapons near their bodies, near the bunker
20 that was in the shape of a well, too much evidence for the Prosecution to
21 overlook. However, they do claim that "extensive" evidence supports
22 their case when in fact it boils down to one witness, Mr. Hazbi Loku for
23 whom the forensic evidence, even that of the Prosecution contradicts
24 vital aspects of his claim. Now, the Prosecution did not touch much on
25 the forensics in their oral submissions. At least they did not dwell on
Page 27339
1 the actual forensic findings. They merely wanted to misstate that the
2 forensic findings corroborated the manner of death described, but the
3 forensics do not, in fact, corroborate the Prosecution theory of how this
4 event occurred. I would point to the substantial discussion of this
5 event and the findings of the forensic pathologist and expert
6 Dr. Stankovic. His experience in the field is very significant and I
7 believe that at the end of the day looking at the submissions and the
8 evidence you'll find that missing body parts and impossible placement of
9 bodies and injuries tell a tale different from that presented by the
10 Prosecution. And surely given this forensic evidence, it is not possible
11 to say that the only or even the most reasonable inference of what
12 happened is the OTP side, particularly not when their star witness
13 describes injuries and a manner of death for named persons whom he
14 supposedly eye-witnessed that do not coincide with the forensic evidence
15 of the Prosecution. Surely this shoddy evidence would be an affront to
16 the integrity of these proceedings if accepted.
17 I think we have discussed Izbica in our brief and have adequately
18 addressed the evidence that was led by the Prosecution and illustrating
19 the forensic problems with the Prosecution's case and that evidence;
20 however, as the Prosecutors have raised that in their closing arguments,
21 including Mr. Cepic, I have just a few points to highlight.
22 Liri Loshi and his vaunted tape. The forensic evidence and the
23 forensic examination of -- forensic testimony of Dr. Stankovic saying the
24 bodies are not filmed in their natural positions at the location of death
25 or what's called the situs. Forensics, this time of the Prosecution in
Page 27340
1 their written evidence, say some of the graves never had any human
2 remains in them. Prosecution witnesses say that the bodies -- that
3 bodies were even brought from elsewhere and buried there months later,
4 albeit the witnesses for the Prosecution give conflicting numbers as to
5 the total number of people that perished and/or were buried at Izbica.
6 The neutral evidence in this case shows a strong KLA presence in and
7 around Izbica and continued combat in the area over a span of months with
8 civilians present every time.
9 So no one forced them to leave, and, Your Honours, a critical
10 fact that the Prosecution either did not know or did not bring to the
11 Court's attention and Liri Loshi had to have known and did not bring to
12 the Court's attention but which was revealed by KLA documents and the
13 testimony of General Bislim Zyrapi, Chief of Staff of the KLA, Liri Loshi
14 was the KLA commandant for Padalista, this is far from independent,
15 trustworthy evidence. All this together provides the highly reasonable
16 and we submit almost certain inference that the Izbica evidence was
17 fiddled with, was staged by the KLA.
18 Addressing Mr. Cepic's remarks that the military prosecutor
19 transferred the case to the civilian prosecutors, when was that? Where
20 are the documents? Was it when the military courts were shut down after
21 the war because then all pending files were transferred. Your Honours,
22 this is no more than smoke -- more smoke than substance from Mr. Cepic.
23 We direct you to review the evidence that is before you, not Mr. Cepic's
24 allusions to evidence that is not before anyone. We think the evidence
25 is clear that the Prosecution has not proven the case as to Izbica that
Page 27341
1 can be the basis for a conviction against anyone in this courtroom.
2 Your Honours, I will briefly move to what was said about sexual
3 assaults briefly, for two reasons. First, because I cannot say much
4 without going into private session and I think that we have covered that
5 in the relevant portions of our brief, our final brief, but briefly also
6 for another matter, because despite the prominence of the allegations of
7 sexual assault in the opening statements, which we've highlighted in our
8 portion of the brief dealing with this, and the provenance of allegations
9 of sexual assaults in the closing arguments, it must be remembered how
10 very little evidence was actually led by the Prosecution in this case and
11 presented about sexual assaults. This is not a case about persons
12 alleged to be direct participants in a sexual assault or rape, and thus
13 it must really be shown more than the mere fact that such and assault
14 occurred. People, the right people had to know about it and it had to be
15 part of a widespread and systematic plan for purposes of these
16 proceedings.
17 Respectfully, Your Honours, the purported sexual assaults of a
18 handful of persons by unidentifiable persons -- by unidentifiable
19 perpetrators does not make a case before this Tribunal against these
20 accused, and again I have to keep pointing out how remarkable it is how
21 the Prosecution chose to present its case. They knowingly presented
22 K-63, the husband of a victim, and used his testimony to allege
23 conclusions about the perpetrators, the colours of uniforms, their
24 association with the police, et cetera. They then did not ask the actual
25 victim to identify the perpetrators. I asked the victim about -- when I
Page 27342
1 asked the victim about this, she not only told us about her husband's
2 problems differentiating colours and other concentration problems that
3 would affect his credibility as a witness, of which the Prosecution
4 surely knew of if they interviewed the persons. She also flatly refuted
5 his identification of the perpetrators, saying that they certainly were
6 not the Serbian police. Now, the Prosecution ought to have had this
7 information. They did their investigation. Why would they present such
8 inaccurate evidence on such a critical matter? And let's not forget that
9 K-63 was also the witness who repeatedly denied speaking with the
10 Prosecution in advance and in preparation for his testimony and only
11 relented after the Prosecution itself admitted to such contact. Are we
12 to believe that K-63 is really credible evidence? I suspect not. And
13 again I will not belabour the point because we have covered sexual
14 assaults in our brief.
15 Now, another thing that astounded my from the oral presentations
16 of the Prosecution was that they seriously suggested that due to the fact
17 that the border region saw heavy bombing, it was illogical for persons,
18 Albanian civilians or anyone for that matter, to willingly flee in that
19 direction. Now, as a corollary to this it was presented that identity
20 cards were taken as a planned widespread and systematic method of
21 identity cleansing - I think that's the first time we heard this word -
22 identity cleansing at the border to try and erase all records of the
23 persons' existence and in this regard it was also seriously suggested by
24 the Prosecution that using Pristina as an example they would show the
25 same tactics were used throughout Kosovo, that Pristina was an exemplar
Page 27343
1 and model for all.
2 First and foremost, it is entirely logical and supported by the
3 evidence that a land invasion by NATO was feared by everyone, that the
4 air war was hitting all within Yugoslavia
5 Therefore, we submit, it is entirely within the bounds of human logic
6 that persons caught in a war zone would want to try and escape from that
7 war zone, and to do that you have to go where the bombs aren't falling.
8 NATO was not bombing the countries surrounding Yugoslavia, and for Kosovo
9 residents the closest choices were Macedonia and Albania
10 was highly reasonable and logical for persons to cross dangerous ground
11 to get to an area of safety. I simply cannot believe that the
12 Prosecution would try to say that that is illogical or impossible. Such
13 a stance is incredible.
14 Also we have evidence that the roads and bridges near the border
15 with -- with -- near the Kosovo border with these countries were not
16 bombed by NATO, perhaps with an aim towards a ground invasion and perhaps
17 in view of the fact that the refugee flow was resulting from the
18 bombings. Either way, this deeply undercuts the representations made by
19 the Prosecution.
20 We have evidence from Mr. Zlatkovic and from other sources of the
21 situation where multiple convoys of Albanian civilians heading back to
22 their villages from the border were bombed by NATO, Meja, Bistrazin near
23 Djakovica. We even saw the footage, the video footage of the efforts of
24 the police including Mr. Zlatkovic to assist victims of the NATO crime.
25 So I submit it does not support the Prosecution's assertion.
Page 27344
1 Now, as to this newly coined identity cleansing, we have the
2 considerable testimony that even assuming for the sake of argument,
3 arguendo, that identity documents were taken, this act would not in any
4 way erase the records of one's existence nor prevent one from entering
5 back into the country is seeking replacement documents. In this regard
6 we have the testimony of Mr. Vucurevic and of Mr. Dujkovic that there was
7 simply no way to filter out and destroy only Albanian citizenship records
8 because the original books were kept in duplicate and they did not
9 differentiate based on ethnicity.
10 Likewise, there was significant evidence that no such orders
11 existed for the taking of identity documents. Mr. Ognjenovic from the
12 Vrbica border crossing testified that the Albanians were doing it on
13 their own. Even after passing the border in the no-man's land between
14 Yugoslavia
15 preserving them, sending them to issuing SUPs in accord with the law and
16 then eventually left a sack at the border crossing upon their withdrawal,
17 turning that over to the international officials that monitored the
18 withdrawal. Nobody was destroying these documents. Efforts were being
19 undertaken to preserve the documents.
20 But the most compelling evidence on this score ought to be
21 considered from Ms. Kravetz who said that the pattern for this crime came
22 from Pristina which served as a model for the rest of Kosovo and
23 Metohija. There is a slight problem with this picture, however. Not a
24 single one of the witnesses that this Prosecution brought from Pristina
25 testified that their identity documents were taken from them at the
Page 27345
1 Djeneral Jankovic border crossing. Indeed, we had Ms. Bala, Mr. Kabashi,
2 K-63, K-62, none of them testified that they had their personal documents
3 taken or destroyed while passing through Djeneral Jankovic. What does
4 that mean? Likewise we have three witnesses from Urosevac of the
5 Prosecution, Mr. Hyseni, Mr. Krasniqi, and Mr. Bucaliu, all of whom also
6 went through Djeneral Jankovic and who again did not testify that their
7 documents were taken away or destroyed, because they weren't.
8 We had two other witnesses, Mr. Shaqiri and Mr. Qamil from
9 Gnjilane who went through the Globocica border crossing and they too did
10 not have their documents taken away. Not a single one of these witnesses
11 brought by this Prosecution supports their case. And yet Pristina, and I
12 presume the border crossing the Pristina witnesses went through is
13 supposed to be the linchpin to their identity cleansing experiment. I
14 submit that if Pristina is a model, that with the other evidence
15 indicates that there was no plan to take identity documents.
16 And of course let's not forget that there was evidence persons
17 crossed into -- from Kosovo into Montenegro
18 without having their documents taken away from them.
19 So what are we left with on the part of the Prosecution? Let us
20 not forget one of their star witnesses as to this identity cleansing,
21 Ms. Sadije. For the moment let us not focus on a fact that she changed
22 her testimony 180 degrees from her sworn statement nor the conflicting
23 accounts of how she was being shot, when she was shot, et cetera. The
24 Prosecution cannot change her testimony and cannot change the fact that
25 this testimony was shown to be false by the official response from the
Page 27346
1 government that she did not previously have issued identity documents and
2 also it's remarkable given this plan that she was successful to get proof
3 of her citizenship, this plan that the Prosecution alleges of erasing
4 person's identities, that one of the persons was able to go in the year
5 2008 and get proof of citizenship issued and get identity documents for
6 the first time at that time.
7 So this story of identity cleansing and destroying all trace of
8 persons who left, it's not true at all. This case it shows you can't
9 come up with a big fancy buzz word to try and cover up just how weak your
10 evidence is in this matter, and surely the Trial Chamber, as experienced
11 it is, will not fall for such a ploy on the part of the Prosecution.
12 Now, the Prosecution's case is dependent upon the assumption that
13 persons did not leave Kosovo and Metohija for reasons other than criminal
14 reasons, that is to say the criminal plans or actions of Yugoslav and
15 Serbian forces. This is the basis of the expert report by Mr. Patrick
16 Ball and until recently this was the mantra of the Prosecution. But in
17 the closing statements it is not any longer said that the crimes
18 themselves made them leave but simply that the "actions" of forces was
19 "mainly" the reasons persons left. This is at transcript page 26778,
20 lines 3 through 7, and I believe it was Ms. Kravetz.
21 This is intriguing and baffling, but it is a concession on the
22 part of the Prosecution, a telling one I think, conceding that their
23 prior allegations and arguments, including those of Mr. Ball, are not
24 accurate. Certainly there are a whole bunch of actions of armed forces
25 that are legitimate in nature and which cannot be the basis for criminal
Page 27347
1 liability of these accused that are the legitimate and
2 understandable reasons -- that there are also legitimate and
3 understandable reasons for people to become frightened and/or leave their
4 homes and the country, particularly in the middle of a war zone that are
5 not related to crimes.
6 Some examples from the evidence have been cited in our brief, and
7 by way of example the Chamber will recall the testimony of the SUP chief
8 from Gnjilane, Mr. Gavranic. First of all, recall that this man
9 persuaded a convoy of Albanian citizens -- Albanian civilians to return
10 to their homes, arrested persons engaged in crimes against Albanians, and
11 in the end was requested by one of the witnesses -- the Albanian
12 witnesses here to provide a -- to provide an escort for their convoy,
13 which he did, to escort them wherever they wanted to go. In short not
14 even the Prosecution can attack the credibility or good character of this
15 witness.
16 Mr. Gavranic testified as to his knowledge of persons leaving,
17 and this was precisely because of the NATO air-strikes, that it struck
18 military installations in the nearby area near these settlements in
19 Gnjilane and when troops legitimately redeployed to other areas, the
20 citizenry wanted to leave for fear that the nearness of these forces to
21 Gnjilane and the villages in Gnjilane would draw NATO strikes and thus
22 present the possibility of collateral damage upon them if NATO missed or
23 used excessive force. Now, Gavranic explained how he and his officers
24 tried to persuade people to stay but they were adamant about going. This
25 is at transcript page 22700 through 701.
Page 27348
1 Well, given how small we have heard Kosovo and Metohija is,
2 imagine the situation that during daily air-strikes, both the Yugoslav
3 Army and the Serbian MUP are constantly having to move around to avoid
4 being hit, changing their locations even multiple times in a day, et
5 cetera. Well, this activity of troops of the VJ and the MUP is not
6 hostile, is not combat, is not even malintentioned, but it still can
7 bring the civilian population to fear risk from NATO bombs, not from the
8 forces themselves.
9 Now, to get a full grasp of the picture, it should be recalled
10 what amount of forces that we're talking about that would be legitimately
11 moving around to avoid being struck by these NATO bombs that were seeking
12 them out wherever they were. We have evidence that the MUP strength was
13 10.021, approximately, before the war and grew to 15.000 during the war
14 period. On the VJ side we have 6D-164, page 2. As of the 18th of April,
15 1999, 71.668 members of the Pristina Corps. Imagine what these units of
16 the VJ and the MUP spread out over Kosovo and moving around, it is
17 legitimately reasonable to assume some civilians left because they had
18 fears that NATO was going to strike these forces and perhaps strike their
19 villages.
20 However, this in no means is conduct that can be labelled
21 criminal on the part of the Army of Yugoslavia or the Serbian MUP. And
22 if this is the type of conduct the Prosecution is relying upon when it
23 says actions of forces rather than crimes led people to mainly leave,
24 then the indictment in this regard must fail.
25 While we're talking about reasons why persons left I would be
Page 27349
1 remiss if I did not note that Patrick Ball not only engages in creating
2 his own science, as my colleagues pointed out and as the expert testimony
3 of Dr. Fruits provided. The exercise of Mr. Ball also engages in
4 extraordinary creation of a new psychological study, because although the
5 Prosecution fails to provide us with any of the credentials of Mr. Ball
6 or criteria used by Mr. Ball or credible sources of Mr. Ball in the field
7 of psychology, it does expect us to embrace and accept as true Mr. Ball's
8 conclusion that fear among civilians from bombings lasts only two days
9 and then dissipates, which of course would conveniently allow him to
10 remove fear of bombing as a potential reason for flight and thus
11 re-affirm his own results. Congratulations, Mr. Ball. But I submit that
12 is not a proper way of conducting evidence at a trial.
13 Now, again the Prosecution selected Pristina and highlighted
14 Pristina as the role model, the suitable model for how things happened
15 elsewhere in Kosovo during the indictment period. Well, let's look at
16 Pristina and what the evidence has to offer for us. I think the most
17 instructive place to look is the evidence provided to us, thankfully, by
18 the Rule 70 provider, the United States of America who produced 6D1637
19 which has information based upon their own contacts on the ground in
20 Pristina during the height of the war. This exhibit provides that both
21 ethnic Serbs and ethnic Albanians in Pristina were becoming increasing
22 concerned, huddling together in bomb shelters, and growing afraid and
23 uncertain because NATO started bombing during the day. It further says
24 that due to the bombings, there is a lack of work, many factories are
25 shut down, and many persons, including ethnic Serbs, are leaving the
Page 27350
1 city, because with lack of work they are not being paid and do not know
2 how to make ends meet in Pristina anymore. This is very substantial
3 evidence. This is something that does not fit into the Prosecutor's neat
4 little picture nor in Mr. Ball's theorys, but it is a fact,
5 uncontroverted evidence in this case, evidence that I think warrants a
6 close scrutiny of the Prosecution's allegations.
7 The reserve police detachments, RPO. I honestly had thought I
8 would not have to discuss the RPO too much, but with the insinuations
9 that the Prosecution and Mr. Cepic made in closing arguments I see the
10 record has to be set straight. Both the Prosecution brief and I think
11 the submissions of Mr. Cepic mix and match reserve policemen with the
12 RPO, as if they are the same thing; they are not. As a preliminary
13 matter it is our position, and I believe it's born true by the evidence,
14 that the RPO were disbanded with the start of mobilisation and the
15 proclamation of war as military conscripts and reservists had to go to
16 their wartime units and reserve policemen therein had to go to their
17 police posts. This is borne true by discussions held at meetings at the
18 premises of the MUP staff. I think P1996 is one example.
19 Now, the genesis of the RPO begins with Exhibit P1415. We see
20 that document does not mention the MUP staff or the MUP for that matter
21 having responsibility for this. From P2166 we see that it is not Lukic
22 or anyone from the MUP talking about the RPO, and indeed the RPO and the
23 defence of villages was something that was part of the global plan to
24 suppress terrorism, and Mr. Djakovic told us who drafted that plan and
25 that no MUP members were involved. P1114, from this document dealing
Page 27351
1 with the area Kosovska Mitrovica we see that the RPO in the town of
2 Vucitrn is entirely made up of 32 VJ reservists, not a single reserve
3 policeman, and the RPO in Cvjenarej [phoen] is commanded by a VJ
4 reservist, commanded by a VJ reservist, has one police reservist and 110
5 VJ reservists. The documentation is clear that the RPO comprised
6 primarily of army reservists and therefore when mobilisation and the war
7 were called up these bodies ceased to exist because mobilisation would be
8 impossible and it would be impossible to grow to the record -- to the
9 number of 70.000 members without the RPO disbanding.
10 It should be recalled that even Mr. Cepic presented evidence that
11 army personnel could not be commanded by the police, apart from being
12 labelled police and having communicated with the police and having some
13 police reservists therein, the RPO did not have a role within the
14 Ministry of the Interior command structure.
15 The MUP have lists of them because in accordance with the law
16 they had to keep lists of everyone who had legally possessed fire-arms.
17 P1063, P1060, P1065 all are communications within the Ministry of
18 Defence. None are sent to the MUP. I hope that answers the questions
19 posed by Mr. Cepic. And further I would only note that Mr. Cepic has
20 provided no proof for his assertion at paragraph 757 and in his
21 submissions yesterday -- or yesterday that the RPO continued to exist
22 after the mobilisation declaration of war, none whatsoever. The minutes
23 from the SUP staff meeting state otherwise.
24 Paragraph 754 of the Lazarevic submission says that many had
25 military uniforms due to lack of police uniforms, but surely that's not
Page 27352
1 true because VJ reservists are given VJ uniforms. 755 of the brief of
2 Lazarevic states that Mitic claims that there was a problem with
3 unauthorised registration of men who were military conscripts by the MUP
4 and there is a document cited, 5D1014 and also I think you need to look
5 at P1415 because you'll see that the registration was actually done by
6 the military district in Pristina, not by the MUP. And again, 5D1014,
7 this document is dealing with reserve police, not the RPO. Again, the
8 military defences keep misconstruing and misunderstanding how the police
9 works.
10 But in the end we would submit that the Prosecution has presented
11 no evidence of the involvement of any of these persons in any crimes.
12 Turning back to P2166, Mr. Hannis the other day commented that
13 one of his favourite exhibits was P2166. I don't know if it's because
14 they cite to it so much in their brief, because they do, but I submit
15 that they ought to have spent more time reading it because they surely
16 don't. First off, I think we would be remiss if we did not take into
17 account the testimony of a witness brought here by the Trial Chamber,
18 General Dimitrijevic, himself at the head of the intelligence security
19 service of the VJ General Staff for many years and who testified that no
20 stenographic notes or minutes were kept at these type of meetings and
21 that P2166 does not correspond to his recollections of the same. This is
22 at transcript page 26597 through 26599. Likewise, Dimitrijevic also
23 concluded that P2166 was written at some later date and does not
24 accurately reflect what was said. That's at transcript page 26615.
25 Respectfully, Your Honours, Mr. Hannis's favorite document has to be
Page 27353
1 considered in light of Mr. Dimitrijevic's telling testimony.
2 Going further, it is important to take a look at what is actually
3 contained in the document and what precisely is attributed to Mr. Lukic
4 and what the author of this document, Susic, has put into it, recalling
5 that there's been some indication that this was put together from several
6 meetings. Lukic in his briefing as set forth in the document nowhere is
7 attributed as actually uttering the words "Joint Command," and further,
8 the briefing by Lukic focuses exclusively on what would be considered
9 routine police affairs. Others talk of the conduct of actions under the
10 general plan for suppression of terrorism as we have indicated.
11 And now as for the references to the Joint Command in this
12 document, it must be taken into account that General Dimitrijevic
13 testified that the name Joint Command was in fact not used during these
14 meetings and in fact did not exist. In reality, what does Mr. Hannis's
15 favourite exhibit really tend to show us anyway, that the highest state
16 leadership of Yugoslavia
17 the job of such organs in every country. Is the state of the union
18 speech in the United States some big criminal conspiracy just because the
19 legislative members, executive members, and governmental organs are
20 present? Is it a crime for a servant of a state to meet with the
21 president of the country to report on activities of the governmental
22 organ? Well, I have yet to see any support for either of the foregoing
23 being a crime or proof of a crime, and I would submit if it were, jails
24 around the world would be full and countries governmentless. The
25 propositions being made by the Prosecution simply are not, are not the
Page 27354
1 only, let alone the only, reasonable conclusions or inferences to be
2 drawn from the evidence, no matter how much Mr. Hannis likes this
3 exhibit.
4 Another topic we need to briefly touch upon is the evidence of
5 trains and the evidence of Mr. Bucaliu. It is truly remarkable that the
6 Prosecution would steadfastly cling to the flawed testimony and analysis
7 of Mr. Bucaliu that has already been discredited at trial, but at
8 transcript page 26781 through 26782 Ms. Kravetz in claiming the frequency
9 of number of trains was increased again cites to Mr. Bucaliu. The
10 problem with this logic and argument is the same as it was during this
11 trial. Common logic and mathematics coupled with the Prosecution's own
12 exhibits, the very same exhibit brought by Bucaliu debunked his claims
13 soundly.
14 Looking at P1331, that is the train log-book from Bucaliu we see
15 that 228 trains were registered for the 78 days of the NATO bombing
16 campaign. Bucaliu himself testified that the regular traffic was about
17 ten trains a day. Now, that would amount to 780 trains during the stated
18 time-period of the NATO war and the indictment period. Bucaliu testified
19 that P1331 was authentic and that all trains passing through had to be
20 registered. So if the regular train traffic was ten trains a day, there
21 should be something more than 780 trains that were registered in this
22 book. There were not. Indeed, there was no increase in trains but
23 rather a drastic decrease. Now, it should be noted that this
24 contradiction was itself acknowledged by Judge Bonomy at transcript page
25 3044 that the OTP is continuing to promote such damaged goods as this
Page 27355
1 evidence is quite telling as to the weakness of their case.
2 We have set forth in our brief the evidence establishing that all
3 joint anti-terrorist actions were conducted in 1998 pursuant to the
4 global five-stage plan with all actions being planned and maps being made
5 by the Pristina Corps and that 1999 the functioning of the joint actions
6 was conducted in the same manner. And again, we had -- as my colleague
7 indicated, we had the person most involved in the VJ and MUP
8 interactions, Milan Djakovic, come and tell that he and the corps drafted
9 the plan, made all the maps, et cetera.
10 Now, I do have to touch on some issues of VJ and MUP interactions
11 since I need to satisfy Prosecutors Hannis, Stamp, Kravetz, and Cepic and
12 to clarify some points. It boils down to not understanding how the
13 police operates and not analysing the documents. Indeed, the Law on
14 Defence is important to understand the activities of the police during
15 war and so are the instructions received from the ministry leadership in
16 Belgrade
17 for you to consider, it comes from the chief of the public security
18 sector General Djordjevic and demonstrates the genesis of VJ and MUP
19 interaction and indeed the communications between the two.
20 Section 16 of Djordjevic's dispatch is also important. It
21 directs all MUP organs to get in touch with other state organs, such as
22 the -- and including the VJ. This dispatch is not limited to Kosovo,
23 rather, it tasks SUPs all throughout Serbia, all throughout Serbia
24 get together with the VJ in the area in regard to exchanging information
25 with the aspect -- or with the defence of the country in mind, a
Page 27356
1 perfectly legitimate and reasonable and logical instruction. This was
2 also sent to the MUP staff in Pristina and this is the reason why Lukic
3 had meetings with the military generals. Those are the meetings he's
4 talking about in his interview which the Prosecution has latched on to.
5 These are perfectly legitimate meetings and these are not any kind of
6 parallel institution bypassing the MUP or otherwise -- the MUP chain of
7 command or otherwise establishing some sort of separate command.
8 Let me touch on the Lukic interview. Your Honours, respectfully,
9 the translation is horrid and the questioning by the OTP is horrid. They
10 mix terms and topics and do not accurately reflect what was discussed.
11 We have previously filed an objection on this topic and stand by it.
12 Take note that the Prosecution provides the term Joint Command to Lukic.
13 Lukic starts off saying in his interview so-called and then adopts the
14 Prosecution's shorthand because they keep repeating it so much. But
15 they, including the interpreter, don't even always use the same term, the
16 same Serbian term to describe it. Sometimes it's "zdruzena komanda" and
17 sometimes it's "zajdnicka komanda." But Lukic is clear these are merely
18 meetings to exchange information and we submit they are in compliance
19 with the instructions from chief of sector in 6D269. Now it should be
20 noted that this dispatch and those that follow it from Djordjevic and
21 which are in the record never once tasked anyone in Kosovo, anyone from
22 the MUP in Kosovo with getting in touch with a Joint Command. If such a
23 thing had even existed in 1999 wouldn't Djordjevic, chief of the RJB, and
24 someone who the Djakovic notes show was present for a large number of
25 these meetings that have somehow come to be labelled Joint Command
Page 27357
1 wouldn't he direct people to go to it? And doesn't it follow if he's
2 directing people to go to meetings with the army at the level of each
3 SUP, is the Prosecution's case -- does it mean that there had to be seven
4 or eight more Joint Commands somewhere in Kosovo? It just doesn't make
5 sense.
6 Another matter for the Prosecutors including -- and also
7 Mr. Cepic to consider which I think Your Honours will see right away.
8 The dispatches from the MUP in Belgrade
9 look at the language there, 6D291, for instance, the PJP detachments are
10 not sent to Kosovo to be deployed at the MUP staff or to take orders from
11 it; rather, the language used says that they are sent to the assistance
12 of the SUPs, they go directly to the SUPs. If the PJP were to be under
13 the MUP staff, then it would be logical for them to be deployed to the
14 staff but they are not. Very telling and yet very much ignored by the
15 Prosecution.
16 THE INTERPRETER: Could counsel kindly slow down for the
17 interpretation. Thank you.
18 MR. IVETIC: What the Prosecution also ignores is the evidence
19 that they themselves have presented.
20 I apologise, I didn't have it on the right channel to hear the
21 interpreter's request. I will slow down.
22 What the Prosecution also ignores is the evidence that they
23 themselves have presented. I do not have time to highlight all the
24 errors in the Prosecution's brief. Later I will highlight some egregious
25 ones that relate to my client; however, for the moment I would like to
Page 27358
1 focus on some that relate just to Lukic's interview.
2 Paragraph 228 of the Prosecution brief in claiming that the Joint
3 Command issued orders for joint actions and that Lukic acknowledged this
4 and that his role was to ensure that the orders were carried out by the
5 MUP, well, first of all, there is simply no citation in the brief for
6 this assertion that -- as to what Lukic's role was. That part is sheer
7 fabrication by the Prosecution. As for the Joint Command commanding the
8 actions, the Prosecution cites to the Lukic interview, and I think it is
9 instructive to read this part so I would refer Your Honours to take the
10 time to read page 49 of the Lukic interview and to see that it does not
11 in fact mention any Joint Command task in commanding these actions,
12 rather, Lukic says very clearly, very succinctly that the tasks were
13 defined by the Pristina Corps for joint VJ and MUP actions after the
14 general decision by the state leadership to adopt the global plan in
15 1998. That is exactly what the other evidence in this case has proven.
16 His interview is consistent with it. The only thing that is not
17 consistent is the reading and inference that the Prosecution provides for
18 this, which is not even remotely possible, given the plain language of
19 the interview, and for this they seek life in prison given a
20 mis-characterization of the evidence. That is something that I am
21 shocked and disgusted at, Your Honours.
22 Another matter that needs review, the allusions in the brief at
23 paragraph 219 of the Prosecution that Lukic admitted that his predecessor
24 had command over certain special units. Your Honours, I would tell you
25 to closely check the pages cited from the Lukic interview because my
Page 27359
1 reading of the same reveals that Lukic is talking about the time he
2 became chief of the RJB, that is to say 2001, not when he became manager
3 of the MUP staff in Pristina in 1998 and 1999.
4 Lastly on this topic the Lukic interview was cited several times
5 in the brief, for instance, at paragraph 1004 of the Prosecution and by
6 Mr. Stamp in his oral closing remarks to demonstrate that Lukic admitted
7 to a dual reporting by the PJP to him as well as to the PJP commander
8 Lieutenant-General Obrad Stevanovic. Your Honours, it's truly and
9 honestly a shame that the Prosecution did not read the interview, perhaps
10 because it was a poor translation, perhaps because there was no
11 transcript until February of this year, even though the interview was
12 taken sometime in I believe 2003.
13 Lukic in this section that they cite is talking about the year
14 1998 and 1998 alone. During that time-period the commander of the PJP,
15 Obrad Stevanovic, was in Belgrade
16 staff in Pristina had obligations toward the Kosovo Verification Mission
17 to report manoeuvres, police presence, et cetera, to pass along
18 communications. You'll recall that Mijatovic, his deputy, was the main
19 liaison of the MUP with the mission. Likewise, the staff acted as a
20 logistics forwarding communications to Belgrade and from Belgrade
21 office, if you will. That is the sense in which the dual responsibility
22 is talked about. But in 1999 logic and common sense dictate that when
23 the commander of all PJP, assistant minister, head of the police
24 administration, Lieutenant-General Obrad Stevanovic comes down to Kosovo,
25 as we've heard in the evidence, when he spends the entire time, the
Page 27360
1 entire Kosovo war at the MUP staff, using the staff as his own office as
2 his mailing address, as we heard from several witnesses, there is no need
3 for any dual responsibility. Stevanovic is there. He remains -- he
4 remains as the commander of the PJP, he remains to be the last person,
5 the last member of the MUP to withdraw from Kosovo and Metohija. So the
6 role of the staff in this regard ceases, particularly with the KVM no
7 longer on the scene. You really have to look at the context of the
8 evidence, Your Honours, not stitch together a patchwork of assumptions
9 and misquotations as the Prosecution has done.
10 Ljubinko Cvetic, he was highlighted in the Prosecution's oral
11 submissions and as well as in the written submissions. This vaunted
12 police insider witness whom Chester Stamp rallied to the defence of in
13 his oral submissions, well, the final brief of the Prosecution is replete
14 with citations to incredible propositions for many of which the sole
15 evidence of record is Ljubinko Cvetic. Now, however, Mr. Stamp does not
16 seem aware that Mr. Cvetic's evidence is inconsistent with the proffered
17 command chart of the MUP, the document prepared by Philip Coo that we --
18 we have the Prosecution presenting again. And, Your Honours, we had our
19 discussion before, I am told that that chart is, in fact, tendered into
20 evidence as P255.
21 JUDGE BONOMY: Yeah.
22 MR. IVETIC: Mr. Stamp does not seem aware that Mr. Cvetic's
23 evidence is inconsistent with this chart. Is it a case of seeking out
24 victory rather than truth and justice? I don't know. But we have a very
25 interesting thing. The linchpin of the Prosecution case against
Page 27361
1 Mr. Lukic is Exhibit P1505. Ljubinko Cvetic is the key insider witness
2 against the police, the former SUP chief in Kosovska Mitrovica. What did
3 Ljubinko Cvetic say about P1505 in these proceedings? Nothing. The
4 Prosecution failed to present it to him. Why would they fail to present
5 such a key bit of evidence to one of their key witnesses to comment on?
6 Could it be that they were concerned that he would not give them answers
7 that were supportive of their case? Not a single Prosecution witness,
8 fact or expert, was presented as to the nature and scope of P1505 in the
9 functioning of the staff. Multiple witnesses were presented by the
10 Defence demonstrating that P1505 did not come to life as my colleague
11 Mr. Lukic pointed out. The Prosecution here has a live witness that they
12 failed to present this to. They are relying upon a mere document to
13 prove their case. Remarkable. Incredible.
14 Now, in short, since I know we're -- I'm trying to condense as
15 much as I can, the topics for which Cvetic is used within the
16 Prosecution's brief are the so-called Joint Command and the MUP staff.
17 However, we must take into account that Cvetic, according to his own
18 testimony, never was a member of the MUP staff for Kosovo and Metohija,
19 that's at page 8146 of the transcript. Now, this flies in the face of a
20 critical averment to the Prosecution, again which is based on P1505, and
21 they claim that all SUP chiefs were part of this expanded MUP staff
22 managed by Sreten Lukic. How is it that the OTP's key police insider
23 witness negates this claim soundly? Ergo, the Prosecution's claims as to
24 P1505 cannot be supported by their own evidence.
25 Secondly, as Mr. Cvetic was not a member of the MUP staff, Cvetic
Page 27362
1 cannot be considered to have reliable, credible knowledge about the
2 activities of that staff.
3 Now, in a similar nature Cvetic testified under oath and very
4 explicitly that he was never present nor participated in any information
5 exchanges that the VJ General Djakovic has christened as the Joint
6 Command. His testimony in this regard is at transcript page 8080, lines
7 16 through 17. Now, coincidentally while we're on the topic Djakovic
8 testified a few times that he had a habit of interpreting things via or
9 utilizing military shorthand or terminology or logic. It is interesting
10 to note that in discussing coming up with the informal name for these
11 meetings with Mr. Pavkovic that Djakovic used the term command, both in
12 describing the MUP staff, he calls it the MUP command, and for the
13 meetings themselves.
14 It should be noted in this regard that when questioned about the
15 regular offices of the MUP staff he conceded that by his military logic
16 any office is to be considered a command post. That's transcript page
17 26456 and also 26521. Thus, Djakovic's use of the term command must be
18 taken with a grain of salt, as otherwise it can lead to mistakes in
19 interpretation given such a dilute and lax criteria for something being
20 referred to as a command according to him.
21 Now, returning to Cvetic, by ordinary logic his allegations
22 relative to these meetings cannot have a high level of probative value or
23 credibility. He simply doesn't have first-hand knowledge. Now, this is
24 especially true given the evidence we have of Cvetic and his behaviour
25 whilst acting as the SUP chief in Kosovska Mitrovica. The Chamber ought
Page 27363
1 to be reminded this man defended by the Prosecution was actually
2 dismissed from his post in the middle of the war because his SUP had not
3 undertaken to uncover and investigate a single crime on the territory,
4 see P1989 in this regard. He boldly claimed that not a single policeman
5 was processed for the murder of an Albanian in all of Kosovo and
6 Metohija. While this was perhaps true for his SUP while he ran it, it
7 certainly is not true nor corroborated by the evidence of record.
8 Indeed, after he was removed, even the Kosovska Mitrovica SUP returned to
9 its job of investigating and processing reports of crimes and detaining
10 or arresting perpetrators and submitting them for prosecution, including
11 MUP employees. See, for instance, the testimony of Mr. Bogunovic in this
12 regard or the exhibit relating to JSO reservist Goran Vasilinovic
13 [phoen].
14 We have had multiple witnesses testify as to the charges
15 investigated, processed, and filed against perpetrators of crimes
16 including police members, civilians, and VJ members. We have some of
17 that in the portions of 6D614 that were admitted into evidence. There
18 simply is no way for the credibility of Cvetic to stand in the face of
19 such overwhelming documentary and testimonial evidence to the contrary,
20 particularly when it is alleged that he hid in the basement of the SUP
21 and neglected his official duties to investigate crimes.
22 Paragraph 276, and there's others in the Prosecution brief
23 relying upon Cvetic, therefore must be disregarded to the extent they
24 claim a lack of investigations and the evidence is contrary to this fact.
25 We have heard the evidence presented by various witnesses as to the
Page 27364
1 investigations conducted by the MUP, the creation of the KiM dossier to
2 collect and continue investigations as to crimes committed, the testimony
3 of 62, Mr. Kostic, Mr. Furdulovic, and even K-84, among others, in this
4 regard and we have the KiM dossier with the 20-odd thousand files that
5 one of the witnesses testified to, several dozen against police members
6 for murder all processed properly, cases against civilians, cases against
7 the VJ. Simply put, there's no way to account for the wide disparity
8 between the evidence and Mr. Cvetic's testimony of no processed cases at
9 all, at least not in any way that preserves the testimony of Cvetic.
10 General Drewienkiewicz or DZ, I must make a few comments to draw
11 to the Chamber's attention another of the Prosecution's vaunted
12 witnesses. First of all, the Prosecution cannot, as we have said time
13 and again, make up for their own failure to call a police expert by
14 asking military and lay persons with no training or knowledge of the
15 Serbian MUP to opine on what they believe the role of Sreten Lukic was
16 and what the staff did. For one thing recall that all of General
17 Drewienkiewicz's interactions would have been through a translator and we
18 have seen how difficult it can be for certain things to translate
19 correctly. Documents in this case by the KVM and by military personnel
20 have given a variety of titles for Sreten Lukic, almost all of them
21 incorrect. Proper evidence must be analysed as to Sreten Lukic's role
22 and authority as we presented it already.
23 But returning to General Drewienkiewicz, please recall, Your
24 Honours, that General Drewienkiewicz was sent as deputy head of the
25 OSCE-KVM mission to monitor and verify, among other things, one of the
Page 27365
1 main things that he was supposed to do down there was the withdrawal of
2 the agreed number of MUP forces from the province.
3 Now, we've heard testimony and evidence that the KDOM stood in
4 place of the KVM, negotiating agreements on behalf of the KVM, one such
5 agreement was this base-line agreement that we've heard about, the 10.021
6 policemen that were allowed to remain in Kosovo and Metohija. We saw a
7 Rule 70 document confirming the withdrawal of the specified number of
8 police and we saw the documents about this reduction.
9 Shaun Byrnes, the head of the US KDOM who negotiated the
10 agreements, told us about this base-line, told us that all documentation
11 was turned over to the KVM and that he personally told them and gave it
12 to them. General Maisonneuve, the KVM sector chief in Prizren, a
13 subordinate of General Drewienkiewicz, he knew about the base-line and
14 compliance with the reduction. However, for some reason General DZ
15 spends from October to March of the next year in Kosovo and Metohija
16 supposedly to verify the police draw-back of forces and claims that the
17 Serbs refused to give him a base-line figure and that he does not have a
18 base-line figure. KDOM was uncooperative, KVM never had a base-line.
19 What on earth was Drewienkiewicz doing on the ground in Kosovo? How is
20 it possible everyone around him including his own subordinate had access
21 to and knew the base-line and he didn't? This is simply too incredible
22 to believe and we must question the real reason for Drewienkiewicz's
23 presence and deployment to Kosovo and Metohija as a result.
24 It should be recalled that General Drewienkiewicz refuted another
25 subordinate's claim, Ciaglinski, that he handed over evidence of burned
Page 27366
1 passports to him for safe-guarding. Drewienkiewicz did not verify that.
2 How could he not remember that if it happened? It didn't.
3 Ciaglinski's claim in that regard can also -- Ciaglinski's claims
4 included the horseshoe plan which Drewienkiewicz also refuted, as did --
5 as did Colonel Kotur and other evidence that we have, including from
6 Prosecution witnesses such as Pesic, Loncar, and Abrahams, who debunked
7 the existence of said plan, and indications are that the horseshoe plan
8 was a myth, a hoax thought up by German intelligence to bolster support
9 for the war. This Trial Chamber must take such information with a grain
10 of salt and certainly, certainly the evidence of Drewienkiewicz does not
11 come up to par to convict someone for 20 years to life.
12 Just briefly on two witnesses utilised by the parties in their
13 oral submissions, Shaun Byrnes and K-25. First of all, K-25 did not have
14 any personal dealings with the staff and he was not in a position, we
15 submit, due to his rank and function to make any valid conclusions about
16 the functioning of the staff or even the planning and command of actions,
17 how that was undertaken. He was at too low of a level. Shaun Byrnes,
18 this is a man who testified after August 1998 the VJ did not participate
19 in any anti-terrorist actions, and yet we have a whole bunch of other
20 evidence that in fact all operations were the legitimate anti-terrorist
21 actions of the VJ and the MUP. His credibility is put in doubt by the
22 fact that he could be so wrong about this point.
23 Now, likewise, for all his complaints voiced here about Lukic and
24 MUP, remarkably the Rule 70 documents from the United States authored by
25 him and by others contemporaneously about the events do not have the same
Page 27367
1 information nor the same complaints. This is very curious indeed. Why
2 would you say one thing publicly to the press and to the world and then
3 say something privately when reporting to your superiors? You have to
4 take into account the very significant evidence of his contacts with the
5 KLA, his encouragement that they save quality troops to be used later, a
6 reverence to what Joksic testified about meant the spring offensive that
7 the KLA was planning.
8 You have all those rather detailed information sheets from the
9 RDB, I think there was seven of them, of suspicious contacts between
10 Byrnes and KLA members. And then you have Byrnes who does not even try
11 to explain any of that. He just blanket denies them all like they didn't
12 happen. This was not my translator, no, I was never there. The last
13 time I heard such a blanket denial without explanation, respectfully --
14 the last time that I heard such a blanket denial without explanation,
15 respectfully, was President Clinton with respect to Monica Lewinsky and
16 he was ultimately found to have -- the blanket denial turned out not to
17 be accurate. I suspect that is the case here as well.
18 But what is more revealing is the Rambouillet negotiations and we
19 heard testimony that Shaun Byrnes himself arranged for and permitted the
20 KLA leadership, persons even he called criminal terrorists to carry guns
21 onto the plane and take them to the peace negotiations in France. Have
22 you ever heard of such a thing? Imagine what kind of information and
23 mistruths did Byrnes have to give and what he had to hide to get -- to
24 get that past the officials at both airports that criminals were carrying
25 guns. That goes towards his credibility, which I submit is quite suspect
Page 27368
1 and marred.
2 Vasiljevic, Aleksandar Vasiljevic, I would be remiss if I did not
3 take a few moments to review this star insider witness of the Prosecution
4 of the VJ's military intelligence branch. Now, albeit the testimony of
5 Vasiljevic did change quite a bit from his sworn statement, including the
6 testimony in the Milosevic trial as regards the MUP and the way he
7 testified here. Originally in his statement and in Milosevic Vasiljevic
8 tried to place blame for an event in Gnjilane to the SAJ that he calls
9 Skorpions. However, at trial in our proceedings he did admit that it was
10 a VJ group that was responsible for the same and that his service had no
11 evidence of any post-Podujevo crimes by the SAJ reservists whom he calls
12 Skorpions.
13 And as my colleague indicated, Vasiljevic admitted that Lukic was
14 the ninth piglet or the lowest ranked at the meetings, at the one meeting
15 he attended but this was only after being confronted with the transcript
16 and the video recording of his own words. This is the witness we're
17 supposed to believe. Until he gets caught with his pants down, he'll
18 continue to say a lie. His credibility is suspect and it ought to also
19 be recalled that he was a suspect before he became a favourite of the
20 Prosecution. So you have to recall even he said, well, I gave that
21 interview as a suspect, I may not have been telling the truth.
22 In any event, given his propensity to say untrue things and then
23 later correct them, one wonders if it's a matter of time before he
24 corrects everything false that he has said. One such falsehood that he
25 did not get around to correcting was his testimony that among the JSO
Page 27369
1 were persons who had a combined 150 years of jail sentences, according to
2 information from his service he says at the time. Unfortunately for him
3 and the Prosecution, General Dimitrijevic, the Trial Chamber's own
4 witness and himself the former head of the VJ military intelligence
5 refuted Vasiljevic, saying that VJ intelligence had no such information.
6 This is at transcript page 26755 through 26756. So of course we can't
7 take Vasiljevic's claim for this and there is no other evidence to show
8 that this is -- that this would be true.
9 It should be noted in this regard that at the time of formation
10 of the JSO Vasiljevic was actually retired, whereas Dimitrijevic headed
11 the intelligence service. So who are we going to believe has the more --
12 better intelligence or information, Vasiljevic or Dimitrijevic?
13 Another factor the Chamber should take into account is the sworn
14 testimony of two of the subordinates of Vasiljevic, indeed the very
15 persons that he pegged as the source for his allegations about various
16 crimes by the MUP in Kosovo and Metohija. That would be General
17 Stojanovic and Sergej Perovic. Both testified in the defense of the
18 co-accused, General Lazarevic, and asserted that investigations by their
19 service could not confirm any of the alleged crimes and indeed Perovic
20 denied ever having reported to Vasiljevic anything about bodies at a bus
21 station in Kosovska Mitrovica, thus the value of Vasiljevic's testimony
22 is decreased, I submit very significantly.
23 And lastly on this topic it ought to be pointed out in the bodies
24 there at Djakovica, I apologise, not Kosovska Mitrovica. So the value of
25 Vasiljevic's testimony is decreased particularly since Perovic was
Page 27370
1 situated in Djakovica.
2 Now, Vasiljevic does have a reason to shade his testimony against
3 Mr. Lukic. Let's recall that he was arrested by the MUP, by the RDB and
4 imprisoned for some time, as he testified to. He had some run-ins with
5 the RDB after that during the time of the Kosovo conflict and similarly
6 he has another reason to shade his testimony against Mr. Lukic for when
7 Lukic was head of the RJB in 2003 and during the anti-corruption
8 crack-down led by the police under Mr. Lukic after the assassination of
9 Prime Minister Djindjic and called the sabri or Sabre Operation,
10 Vasiljevic's colleague and then the chief of VJ intelligence General
11 Tomic was indeed apprehended and detained as part of this corruption
12 crack-down.
13 Now, the Prosecution's final trial brief presents unsupported
14 assertions that present an incomplete, incorrect, skewed and unreliable
15 record of the proceedings that have been conducted to date. As I think I
16 said, I cannot point to all the of them, for we do not have time for that
17 but I think I have a duty to assist the Trial Chamber by handling some of
18 the most egregious and representative of these absurdities.
19 As to the -- Your Honours, I'm told by my colleagues that it's
20 time for a break. I thought we had another 15 minutes in this session.
21 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, we would have a break in about five minutes
22 or so, I imagine, but I thought you might be winding up anyway and that
23 we would allow you to complete our submission and then have our break.
24 MR. IVETIC: I think I can do that probably.
25 JUDGE BONOMY: Yeah, very well, please continue.
Page 27371
1 MR. IVETIC: Thank you, Your Honour.
2 As to the MUP staff, the Chamber will find in the Prosecution's
3 brief an assertion by the Prosecution that the RDB chief in Kosovo, David
4 Gajic, was a member of the staff and that the JSO commander Legija was
5 also a member. I ask you to note that the citation given for these
6 assertions which gives the impression that the citations are supportive
7 of these assertions is 180 degrees s counter. They cite to Joksic, a
8 Defense witness who spent a great deal of time negating this assertion
9 and proving that Gajic and Legija were not members of the staff. If one
10 reads the citation to the record provided by the Prosecution, all that
11 the references say is that Gajic was head of the RDB in Kosovo and that
12 Legija was head of the JSO. None of the cites offered support the OTP
13 proposition which is the linchpin of their case. This is incredible
14 misrepresentation of their brief. You will also see in the brief, I
15 don't have the citation in front of me, but relative to Gornje Obrinje.
16 It's one of the only citations to Gornje Obrinje. You will see that
17 witness Paunovic and other witnesses testified that the killings in
18 Gornje Obrinje were retaliation by the VJ and MUP forces. Not a single
19 one of the citations says this and not a single witness was called or led
20 to make such a preposterous claim. You cannot believe a word of what is
21 contained in the OTP's brief because they make a mockery of candour and
22 honesty in their citations.
23 Looking at paragraph 197 closely, neither -- the Gornje Obrinje
24 paragraph is paragraph 62 of the OTP's brief. I thank my colleague for
25 that assistance.
Page 27372
1 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Ivetic, I'm not prepared to sit back any
2 longer and listen to allegations of lack of candour when there have been
3 many instances in this trial when the Lukic briefs have been less than
4 accurate without the allegation being made against you of lack of
5 candour. Do you consider that what you're doing is an appropriate way to
6 be addressing us in regard to matters which do not simply on the face of
7 your assertion justify that claim?
8 MR. IVETIC: Well, Your Honours, perhaps candour is a strong word
9 but I submit when these allegations and when this document is being
10 presented and asking for 20 years to life in prison, depriving someone of
11 their liberty for the rest of their life, that's a very serious matter,
12 and when after two years of trial the citations are exactly 180 degrees
13 the allegations, and I'm not talking about one or two but all throughout,
14 that is a very serious matter especially when it's the Prosecution doing
15 it. And so therefore, I only ask that the Trial Chamber take very
16 careful notice of what is being presented by the Prosecution and what
17 actually they are citing to because in my opinion, they as the
18 Prosecution have a duty to present a truthful account of the evidence.
19 And if the evidence says one thing and they -- and indicative of
20 innocence and they twist that to make it indicative of guilt, it's
21 certainly something that is a cause for concern in my book.
22 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Ivetic, we'll break now because I'm going to
23 listen to what you've said. I don't think it's been recorded in the
24 transcript, and then we'll deal with it after the break and that will be
25 at five minutes past 6.00.
Page 27373
1 --- Recess taken at 5.34 p.m.
2 --- On resuming at 6.12 p.m.
3 JUDGE BONOMY: Now, Mr. Ivetic, your actual remarks were that the
4 Prosecution submissions make a mockery of candour and honesty, and that's
5 just one of a series of remarks that bear the interpretation that there
6 is a deliberate attempt on the part of the Prosecution to mislead the
7 Bench. Now, we recognise the highly charged atmosphere which surrounds
8 this stage in the proceedings; nevertheless, we regret that you have not
9 had the courtesy to recognise that the language you've just used is not
10 appropriate language for counsel appearing in any Tribunal. At this late
11 stage in the proceedings, we choose to simply record that we do not
12 accept that there is a basis for claiming that the Prosecution
13 deliberately set out to mislead the Bench.
14 Now, please continue and complete your submissions.
15 MR. IVETIC: I will, Your Honour, and for the record I think
16 you'll note that I did upon recollection say that I just wanted the
17 Chamber to take close note of the citations and make sure that they
18 support what the Prosecution alleges in the part just before the last
19 break, and really that is all that is important here is to make sure that
20 truth and justice are done.
21 With respect to religious objects, I will just state that we have
22 had evidence of SUP chief from Prizren, Vojinovic, that of the over 15
23 mosques in his city, not a single one was damaged during the war. That's
24 at 6D1532, paragraph 29, as well as transcript page 24198. And now the
25 final part of my submissions about Sreten Lukic the person.
Page 27374
1 I will not belabour the submission to point to the specifics of
2 his health condition. Through our confidential filings relative to
3 provisional release earlier in the case they are of record. The Chamber
4 has access to his health there and we urgent you to take them into
5 account and also to seek a report from UNDU for an update as to his
6 health now. Sreten Lukic according to the evidence was instrumental in
7 investigating and urging an investigation by the Serbian authorities of
8 war crimes not only in Kosovo but elsewhere in the former Yugoslavia, a
9 man who exerted so many efforts to promote and foster the rule of law and
10 to establish meaningful cooperation with among others the ICTY. You
11 heard the testimony of Kostic, Furdulovic, former Prime Minister Zivkovic
12 and even the Prosecution's own insider witness K-84 crediting Sreten
13 Lukic as the man responsible for directing the MUP to illuminate and
14 investigate and prosecute crimes, even those within their own midst.
15 Prosecutions are now underway in Serbia including sometimes against
16 police personnel for individual crimes committed in Kosovo, including
17 Suva Reka, for instance, as one of the indictment locations all because
18 of the courage that Sreten Lukic had and his good ethics and
19 professionalism in empowering the police to investigate everyone and
20 anyone, including those in the MUP.
21 You heard about the efforts under the tutelage of Lukic to
22 establish the KiM dossier and you heard that the MUP established full
23 cooperation with the ICTY even before the Government of Serbia had
24 established a law and a formal obligation to do so. Lukic, like any good
25 policeman in Serbia
Page 27375
1 greater good. It was not very popular to take the stand that he did when
2 he became chief of the RJB, to reform the MUP, to arrest persons, and
3 stamp out corruption in Operation sabre, including persons with
4 connections to political parties in the government. I recall -- I recall
5 and I ask you to remember evidence presented by a protected witness in
6 this case that death threats were issued against Lukic by Serbs for his
7 stance against crime and in investigating the crimes of the past during
8 that stage. The democratic changes in Serbia were congratulated and
9 supported by the West including the ICTY and in that atmosphere Sreten
10 Lukic was selected as the best possible person to lead and reform the
11 MUP. And I think if you convict such a person you have to think about
12 what kind of message that would send to the outside world about those who
13 would take the hard road and stand up for law and foster investigation
14 and prosecution of crimes, and indeed I submit that a conviction in this
15 case would stifle any future persons in a similar situation.
16 Indeed, a conviction would reward the Prosecution but it would
17 also encourage future generations to hide crimes rather than fight
18 against and investigate them, because what is the use of being a
19 professional, committing your life to illuminating, investigating, and
20 preventing crimes if at the end of the day you can be held just as
21 accountable as the perpetrators merely by -- because of guilt by
22 association or the fact that you wear the same police uniform as some of
23 the persons.
24 This would be the first time that a subordinate like Lukic is
25 charged for what is alleged and purported to have been said and done by
Page 27376
1 his superior officers, such as Minister Vlajko Stojiljkovic, deceased;
2 deputy minister and chief of the RJB, Lieutenant-General Djordjevic;
3 assistant minister and chief of the police administration and commander
4 of the PJP, Lieutenant-General Obrad Stevanovic; assistant minister and
5 chief of the UKP, General Dragan Ilic.
6 Lukic cannot stand in place of these persons. Just because one
7 is deceased and the OTP is choosing him to be the poster child for their
8 case does not change the fact that the Prosecution has made a mistake.
9 For Lukic is not a perpetrator of crimes. If anything, the evidence
10 shows he is a victim. We would ask you to acquit Mr. Lukic on all counts
11 and in every respect as to the Prosecution's indictment, and at this time
12 I would like to say it has been an honour and privilege for myself and
13 for Mr. Branko Lukic to represent and act as counsel for Mr. Sreten
14 Lukic, who we feel is a very just person.
15 At this time I have two corrections for the transcript. I will
16 state them. If the Chamber feels that they need to be verified they can
17 be done so. At page 73, line 6, I was talking about General Tomic,
18 T-o-m-i-c, the transcript reflects a different surname. And at page 71,
19 line 22, it is reference should be to the JSO, whereas the initials in
20 the brief I think state JAS or something of that sort. I hope that that
21 can be located and corrected. That is I believe all for the Lukic
22 Defence, Your Honours. Thank you.
23 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you, Mr. Ivetic.
24 However, Mr. Lukic indicated a desire to say something to rectify
25 the omission of references to paragraph 72(C) I think.
Page 27377
1 MR. LUKIC: Yes, Your Honour. If I can get ten minutes.
2 JUDGE BONOMY: Yes.
3 MR. LUKIC: Thank you.
4 [Interpretation] We are dealing with deportation from Srbica,
5 paragraph 72(C), the village of Vocnjak
6 Tusilje, and Cirez. At the beginning of the NATO bombing they were in
7 the area of deployment of the KLA which was confirmed and expounded by an
8 OTP witness, Mr. Zyrapi. There were KLA headquarters in some places such
9 as Turicevac where the headquarters were in the school and people kept
10 joining up there. We have that in P2241, the statement by Hadije Fazliu.
11 Witness Hadije Fazliu says on the 26th of March Serb forces shelled the
12 village of Turicevac but there were no casualties they went to the
13 village of Tusilje, which means going in-depth into KLA territory. Now
14 this method of movement and capturing civilians was something Mr. Zyrapi
15 testified to, IC105. He drew the withdrawal of the KLA into regions F
16 and then G. So the KLA is using the civilians as a human shield.
17 Witness Fadija Fazliu in a statement also says that on the 29th of March
18 in the village of Tusilje
19 that of the policemen that they were dark blue camouflage uniforms. OTP
20 witnesses such as K-25 and K-79 and then Defence witnesses Vladimir Ilic
21 and Zivaljevic, Nikcevic Radojica, and others testified that the police
22 units which took part in the anti-terrorist actions, the PJP, in 1999
23 wore green camouflage uniforms with combat vests where it was clearly
24 written in front and at the back the word "police."
25 From the village of Tusilje and Turicevac where in the area of
Page 27378
1 operations at that time when an anti-terrorist action was being carried
2 out in the area of Drenica and that is order number 455/73, otherwise
3 P1968. The witness says that they were told to go to Klina, which meant
4 pulling out the civilians from the combat zone. The witness also
5 mentions that in passing through her own village of Turicevac
6 on in the village and that no forces arrived there but that they had no
7 food. Once again, P2241. When the witness Hadije Fazliu says in her
8 statement that on the 1st of April policemen arrived with civilian
9 vehicles and that they were wearing uniforms and that they asked the
10 citizens to go to Glina [as interpreted], the witness does not describe
11 the uniforms and she refers to these men as policemen who arrived in
12 civilian vehicles, civilian cars. Therefore, there's no certain
13 indicator of the fact that they were policemen of the MUP of the Republic
14 of Serbia
15 After they reached Jasenica they returned to Brocna the following
16 day. She says that at the border crossing they weren't asked to show any
17 ID cards or produce any money. In the entire statement the witness
18 doesn't say at any time that anybody ordered her or other civilians that
19 they had to go to Albania
20 this is -- if you compare this to the statements of Milazim Thaqi from
21 which it emerges that at the same time in the direction of Djakovica from
22 Izbica his family was moving along that route and that the Serbs returned
23 them to the village of Tusica -- or rather, Kladernica and Izbica. That
24 is P2246, the statement by Milazim Thaqi, page 6, paragraph 5. And that
25 the witness wasn't stopped anywhere by the police or escorted by the
Page 27379
1 police or followed by the police anywhere, which meant that she could go
2 back because nobody forced her to go to Albania. The witness Rrahmani
3 Xhevahire, an OTP witness, says in her statement that two days after the
4 bombing from her village of Bukos
5 the village of Kozica
6 village. This is shown in Exhibit P2239, page 2, para 6.
7 From this we can see that the reason, exclusive reason for these
8 people leaving the village was the start of the NATO bombing. Three days
9 later from Kozica they set out for Srbica. However, the police returned
10 them to the check-point, at the check-point sent them back, and they
11 decided to go to Glodjane to her husband's uncle where they stayed for
12 some ten days. So they decided where they were going to go themselves.
13 After that, they decided to go back to Kozica.
14 Defence witness Bogunovic Nenad testified in the following
15 manner. He said in the region of Cirez and Kozica on the 29th of March,
16 1999, there was not a single police unit present. The Exhibit is 6D614,
17 paragraph 97. Witness Rrahmani in his statement says that in mid-April
18 while they were in Kozica which is high up in the mountains they saw a
19 unit in Cirez three or four trucks and several tanks and in the regions
20 of Kozica and Cirez in mid-April there were no MUP units. This can be
21 seen from an order of the 37th Motorised Brigade in point 5 of that
22 order, 11, which defines independently without the MUP reconnaissance
23 work being carried out. It is P2239. I apologise. Apart from P2239 you
24 can also see it in 5D1029. Also in the combat report of the 37th
25 Motorised Brigade dated the 19th of April in point 4 the state in the
Page 27380
1 territory it is noted that NATO on the 18th of April in the evening hours
2 acted against the brigade units in the village of Cirez
3 targeted the units in Cirez, and it is 5D1023. Also in a report of the
4 37th Motorised Brigade of the 21st of April, 1999, point 2, it is stated
5 that the 3rd Motorised Brigade was deployed in the region of the village
6 of Cirez. 5D1087 is the relevant exhibit.
7 And that in the region of Kozica and the village of Cirez
8 beginning of April there were no MUP units present, and this is confirmed
9 by an order of the 37th Motorised Brigade of the 4th of April, 1999
10 is Exhibit P2813, point 4.13.(redacted)
11 (redacted)
12 [In English] We have to redact this, Your Honour.
13 JUDGE BONOMY: That will be done. Please continue.
14 MR. LUKIC: [Interpretation] Prosecution witness K-24 in a
15 statement dated November 1999 with respect to the events in Cirez at one
16 place says that she is -- that a policeman came to the door of the cellar
17 wearing a dark blue camouflage uniform. That is P25848. However, during
18 the cross-examination of this witness she showed her clothing. She was
19 wearing black and she said that the policeman was wearing that same
20 colour. The transcript is 4792, lines 7 to 22. In her statement she
21 mentioned no hats. She didn't mention that anybody was wearing hats.
22 She describes in her statement of 2006, however, seven years later she
23 says they were wearing hats and she said that they had a double-headed
24 eagle emblem and the emblem of a tiger. There is no evidence to show
25 that anybody of the Serbian members had a tiger or a double-headed eagle
Page 27381
1 as their emblem, members of the MUP, that is.
2 OTP witness Salihu Abdullah in his statement when he explains
3 that he was taken prisoner with a group of men on the 29th of March,
4 1999, states that some of the members of the Serb forces on their
5 shoulders had blue, yellow, and red bands. That is P2255. As far as
6 members of the MUP are concerned, the bands began to be worn on the 15th
7 of April, as we said today, and there were never three colours worn at
8 the same time and this can be seen from 6D237.
9 The same witness in his statement says that when they were taken
10 to Glogovac into custody they were beaten and that the policeman who
11 secured them allowed a paramilitary to separate one of the men, Rahman
12 Topilla, and that he then killed them. He also said that they were
13 interrogated by Momo Peljevic who ordered another policeman to beat them.
14 Defence witness Petar Damjanac who was the chief of Glogovac officially
15 up until the 1st of May, 1999, and came several days later after that in
16 no way had any knowledge about anything like that ever having happened.
17 Now, as far as the inspector is concerned, Momo Peljevic, witness
18 Damjanac claims that an inspector like that never existed in Glogovac or
19 in the entire Pristina SUP for that matter and that is at transcript page
20 23769, lines 7 to 15.
21 Witness Salihu who at the end of his statement says that when the
22 war was over and when the Serbs withdrew he returned to his village of
23 Baks and says that his family was still in Vucitrn. Therefore, the
24 family was in Vucitrn throughout. In a statement witness Salihu explains
25 that he was taken prisoner on the 20th of September, 1999, in an action
Page 27382
1 launched by Serb forces that lasted for three days, that is Exhibit
2 P2255, and that he was in the triangle between Baks, Vrboc and Cirez
3 himself. At the time in that area we have the 37th Motorised Brigade
4 present carrying out anti-terrorist actions in which the members of MUP
5 did not take part and this can be seen from a report of the 37th
6 Motorised Brigade, Exhibit 5D1036 and 5D1058.
7 And this is supported by the combat report of the Pristina Corps
8 dated the 2nd of May, 1999, 6D1470, point 1, last paragraph. This
9 witness explains the kind of uniform of the men killing the prisoners,
10 shooting them, and although he was in the immediate vicinity he did not
11 mention any insignia or markings that can be linked to the police. He
12 explains that all the members of the paramilitaries who took him prisoner
13 had Seselj's insignia and blue eagle, a square with a blue eagle, but no
14 police unit had such insignia.
15 JUDGE BONOMY: I suspect you did say something after "insignia"
16 and didn't just collapse, so thank you, Mr. Lukic, for your submission.
17 Now, you've already heard that there will be some Prosecution
18 rebuttal. Can I ask of the Defence whether any Defence counsel intends
19 to say anything or at least to seek to say anything in rebuttal of any
20 other Defence submission.
21 Mr. Bakrac.
22 MR. BAKRAC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, as you may suppose, I
23 don't know what my learned friend Mr. Hannis will say, although a lot was
24 said at the expense of my colleague Mr. Cepic who has been moved to the
25 other side of the courtroom. There are many things that do not deserve
Page 27383
1 any comments. So we will have just 10 or 15 minutes.
2 JUDGE BONOMY: But I'm concerned only at the moment whether you
3 have anything to say in rebuttal of anything submitted by any of the
4 other Defence counsel.
5 MR. BAKRAC: [Interpretation] Yes, yes, Your Honour, with respect
6 to the sixth Defence team we will speak for 10 or 15 minutes.
7 JUDGE BONOMY: I see.
8 And Mr. Fila.
9 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] With respect to my colleague
10 Mr. Ackerman, two to three minutes; and I hope so Mr. Hannis and I will
11 not have to disappoint.
12 JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Aleksic.
13 MR. ALEKSIC: [Interpretation] Your Honour, in connection with the
14 Lukic Defence I have two or three references for the transcript to add to
15 what my colleague Mr. Lukic said.
16 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.
17 [Trial Chamber confers]
18 JUDGE BONOMY: What we've decided to do is to hear Defence
19 rebuttal at this stage because in the course of rebuttal something might
20 be said that has an impact on the Prosecution case when it's too late for
21 the Prosecution to say anything about it. So we want you to treat
22 discretely what you now have to say about any other Defence case and the
23 first person that has something to say I understand is Mr. Fila. So
24 we'll hear your submissions in relation to your rebuttal of Ackerman now,
25 Mr. Fila.
Page 27384
1 MR. FILA: [Interpretation] Your Honour, as I said, I'll be very
2 brief. Mr. Ackerman said that at the meeting in Nis Pavkovic spoke about
3 his request to stop working -- I'm trying to speed up. This is Exhibit
4 P1468, these are minutes from the Joint Command of the 26th of October,
5 1998. My colleague Mr. Ackerman said that Pavkovic asked that the Joint
6 Command stop with its work, and Pavkovic did put forward a request by the
7 command of the 3rd Army that the Joint Command stop its work because
8 probably by mistake Mr. Ackerman identified Pavkovic with the command in
9 Nis
10 appointed only later on, he was at another post at that time, and a
11 document should be looked at which is referred to by the Prosecutor which
12 is a letter from the federal government from which it is evident that
13 after that discussion these military documents on the so-called work of
14 the Joint Command were sent to Slobodan Milosevic's secretary, that's
15 P1317, and that the Joint Command ceased working. That's the first
16 point.
17 And one should also note that Minic chaired this meeting, which
18 was the meeting before the last, which shows that what the Prosecutor
19 said is incorrect, that Minic presided over the Joint Command until the
20 14th of September, 1998, but it was rather until the 28th of October,
21 1998, which means that Minic presided over the Joint Command throughout
22 its duration and this is evident from the fact that he opened and closed
23 meetings and he did that in other situations and you never find that with
24 Sainovic.
25 And the third point that has to be raised is the conclusion of my
Page 27385
1 colleague Mr. Ackerman that the Joint Command should be compared to the
2 combined General Staff of the USA
3 staff does not contain any police units so we don't think it's a good
4 comparison, but I do accept that it's normal for there to be coordination
5 between the army and the MUP in wartime. Thank you, that's all.
6 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you, Mr. Fila.
7 Mr. Aleksic.
8 MR. ALEKSIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour. Very
9 briefly. Today my colleague Mr. Lukic on page 7 from lines 21 to page 8,
10 line 4 spoke about the testimony of General Milorad Djakovic concerning
11 planning and my colleague Mr. Lukic said that the excerpts of these
12 decisions and maps were delivered to the MUP staff or directly to the PJP
13 units and on the basis of this he said the PJP units and the commanders
14 went into action. I ask the Chamber to look at the testimony of General
15 Milan Djakovic, pages 26396 to 26398, especially transcript page 26398,
16 lines 2 to 13, where General Djakovic responded to Your Honour's
17 questions, to questions of the Presiding Judge, and said some things
18 slightly different. He said that these documents which were received
19 from the Pristina Corps were the basis for the unit commander. And when
20 he received those he had to work for at least four or five hours to draw
21 up his own decision based on that, and then that was the basis for
22 action. So it was the PJP unit commander who issued a command which was
23 the basis for the PJP going into action.
24 Thank you, Your Honours. That's all.
25 JUDGE BONOMY: I take it you have nothing to say in rejoinder to
Page 27386
1 Mr. Fila's submission?
2 MR. ALEKSIC: [Interpretation] That's correct, Your Honour. Thank
3 you.
4 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.
5 Mr. Cepic.
6 MR. CEPIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour. I'll be very
7 brief and less temperamental, referring to the words of my colleagues
8 Ivetic and Lukic. First of all, I wish to mention the following. I'll
9 start with the decision on the establishment of the MUP staff, exhibit
10 number P1505 in e-court. My colleague Mr. Lukic said that it was never
11 implemented, that we have not, to put it more precisely, found evidence
12 in these proceedings that it was implemented. I would like to refer to
13 the testimony of one of their Defence witnesses and also to the testimony
14 of Philip Coo who on pages 12071 to 12073 and later on 12074 to 12075
15 explained quite clearly what the situation was which he found in the MUP
16 archives. There were only a few reports not to the number of reports
17 there should have been that the shelves were empty, whereas in the
18 military archives the shelves were full of documents which were all there
19 in good order. One of the Defence witnesses of General Lukic in his
20 statement which is under seal 6D1631 in paragraph 120 explained quite
21 clearly that the PJP reports were sought but were not received and that
22 efforts were made to find them.
23 We saw that they exist because we saw 5D1418, which is a dispatch
24 of one of the police brigades sent to the superior command --
25 MR. LUKIC: [Previous translation continues]... I don't see
Page 27387
1 that --
2 JUDGE BONOMY: Just a second, Mr. Lukic. You were speaking over
3 the translation.
4 MR. LUKIC: Sorry.
5 JUDGE BONOMY: Please continue.
6 MR. LUKIC: I don't see that this has anything to do with our
7 closing arguments today. If it's analysis of our final brief, they
8 should have done it before, but this is not rebuttal.
9 JUDGE BONOMY: Well, it's rebuttal of your submission about P1505
10 and that I think -- beyond that, Mr. Cepic has not strayed. He'll be
11 conscious of the restraints upon him at this stage of the proceedings,
12 but what we've heard so far falls within the Rules.
13 So please continue, Mr. Cepic.
14 MR. CEPIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honour. Point 2 of
15 that document which speaks of planning, organizing, and control is the
16 basis of my intervention and we have an example 5D1418, a combat report
17 of the 25th of May, 1999
18 wasting time, and I would also like to refer to the allegations put
19 forward by Mr. Ivetic that military judicial organs did not exist or did
20 not operate after the end of the state of war, which does not correspond
21 with the truth. Not only do we have testimony and documents, but it's an
22 indubitable fact that military judicial organs continued doing their job
23 until 2004 or 2005. And clear analysis of all this can be found in 4D171
24 which is a report of the army prosecutor Stanimir Radosavljevic, where in
25 the paragraph before last investigative activities are mentioned in
Page 27388
1 relation to the site of Izbica which is mentioned here.
2 And let me conclude by saying that Gordana Tomasevic, a
3 Prosecution witness also spoke of this and pointed out that civilian
4 judiciary organs began investigation in that direction. Thank you. I
5 have nothing further to say.
6 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you, Mr. Cepic.
7 Mr. Ivetic or Mr. Lukic, do you have any rejoinder to any of
8 these submissions?
9 MR. LUKIC: Just this document 5D1418 is self-explanatory, has
10 nothing to do with planning or actions.
11 JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.
12 Mr. Hannis, this is probably a good time to adjourn for this
13 evening.
14 MR. HANNIS: I would agree, Your Honour, and I would agree to
15 take seven minutes off my presentation tomorrow if we can adjourn seven
16 minutes earlier tonight.
17 JUDGE BONOMY: We have no need to take seven minutes off your
18 presentation tomorrow. You, as we already indicated, should take the
19 time you feel is appropriate. You've already indicated restraint
20 prevails, but it is not helpful to us to avoid dealing with some --
21 anything significant on which you feel that we can be further assisted.
22 So anything that's important to the determination of the case, we ought
23 to be fully addressed on within reason.
24 We've changed the schedule for tomorrow since time became
25 available in the morning. We are sorry that we cannot move it earlier,
Page 27389
1 but we're restrained to 10.45. The indications we have had informally
2 are that it may be possible to complete the case within the morning, but
3 we have available time in the afternoon and will not be surprised if at
4 least some of that time has to be used.
5 So we shall now adjourn until 10.45 tomorrow morning.
6 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 6.55 p.m.
7 to be reconvened on Wednesday, the 27th day of
8 August, 2008, at 10.45 a.m.
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25