Page 24864
1 Thursday, 24 July 2003
2 [Open session]
3 [The accused entered court]
4 [The witness entered court]
5 --- Upon commencing at 9.05 a.m.
6 JUDGE MAY: We have apparently not been able to obtain the Ph.D.
7 dissertation, so we will have to get on without it as best we can.
8 MR. NICE: We were alerted yesterday that the accused's associates
9 would be able to provide it. I think they then ran into difficulties and
10 were not be able to provide it for some reason that I can't help you with.
11 There may be a website from which we may be able to obtain it. Efforts
12 are in hand to do so.
13 JUDGE MAY: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.
14 WITNESS: AUDREY BUDDING [Resumed]
15 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] My associates will get hold of it
16 during the day, in the course of the day, Mr. May, because I would like
17 the Ph.D. dissertation to be exhibited as well through the
18 cross-examination of this witness, and that is undoubtedly an important
19 document.
20 Cross-examined by Mr. Milosevic: [Continued]
21 Q. [Interpretation] Ms. Budding, in looking for the historical roots
22 of Serbian nationalism in the twentieth century, you contemporise the
23 past. You blame Serbian nationalists for using Garasanin's work
24 "Nacertanije" until the First World War to include Muslims into Serbs,
25 and you blame them also for counting the Serbs all who use the Stokavian
Page 24865
1 dialect.
2 A. In the course of the report I do certainly mention both Vuk
3 Karadzic's views and Garasanin's "Nacertanije," but I endeavour to place
4 them in the context of their own time. With respect, for instance, to Vuk
5 Karadzic's "Srbi Svi i Svuda," "Serbs All and Everywhere," I specifically
6 state that it was understandable as a linguistic approach to the national
7 question in the context of its own time but that it was ultimately
8 untenable because it claimed as Serbs many people who did not see
9 themselves as Serbs.
10 Q. Does that mean that my impression that when you look for the roots
11 of that Serbian nationalism your approach is not correct?
12 A. No, I would not say that either. Certainly I think the roots of
13 any nationalism in the twentieth century can be sought in the past, and
14 for most nationalism specifically in the nineteenth century, because
15 that's the age of national awakenings, the age of national romanticism.
16 Q. Yes, but if we stencil one situation from one century onto another
17 century, do you as an historian believe that this amounts to one of the
18 gravest methodological mistakes in -- for an historian?
19 JUDGE MAY: What do you mean?
20 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, precisely what I said,
21 Mr. May.
22 JUDGE MAY: No, it's not clear. I don't follow. What do you
23 mean?
24 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] The copying of a historical
25 situation from the end of the twentieth century onto the first half of the
Page 24866
1 nineteenth century, does it amount to the phenomenon of copying, a
2 stencilling of a situation? So I'm asking Ms. Budding is it considered to
3 be one of the gravest methodological mistakes in the science of history?
4 JUDGE MAY: It seems to be absolute nonsense what you're saying.
5 Would you give us -- and explain what you mean by concrete terms. What
6 are you saying that this historian has done which you describe as a grave
7 methodological mistake? What is the mistake, so that we can follow it?
8 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, I said that the mistake
9 consists in projecting a historical situation from the --
10 JUDGE MAY: Stop there. Which historical situation are you
11 talking about?
12 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I said as an example, Mr. May, that
13 the historian blames Serbian nationalists for using Garasanin's
14 Nacertanije, as she writes in her report, from the Second World War,
15 claiming Muslims, Montenegrins as Serbs or blaming Vuk Karadzic for
16 counting as Serbs everyone who uses the Stokavian dialect. That is a
17 projection of a historical situation onto another period which amounts to
18 the gravest methodological mistake in the science of history. If you
19 don't understand this, I have to move on to my next question.
20 JUDGE MAY: No, because it's rubbish. I don't know what you're
21 talking about. If you don't make the question clear, the witness can't
22 possibly answer it. I mean, are you saying that -- is this the point:
23 That historians or people at this period are using Vuk Karadzic, for
24 instance, as an example of Serbian nationalism? Are you saying it has no
25 relevance now? What are you saying?
Page 24867
1 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I want to say that the projection of
2 one historical situation from the end of one century to the first half of
3 another century is a methodological mistake in the science of history, and
4 I'm asking an historian about it, she who knows --
5 JUDGE MAY: Let's try and make sense of this, Dr. Budding. Can
6 you use, I suppose a simpler way of putting it is, can you use a situation
7 that occurred, say, in the nineteenth century when dealing with a
8 situation, say, at the end of the twentieth century? Is it possible to
9 draw parallels between the two, and is it an error if you do?
10 THE WITNESS: I think that in certain instances it can be valid to
11 draw parallels between different historical eras. I think that such
12 parallels should always be made very specifically, but I don't understand
13 what use Mr. Milosevic believes I am making of the Nacertanije in my
14 report.
15 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
16 Q. Well, precisely looking for the roots of Serbian nationalism of
17 the twentieth century.
18 JUDGE MAY: What seems to be put is this, that it is a mistake to
19 look for the roots of what happened at the end of the twentieth century in
20 the nineteenth century. I think that seems to be the point.
21 THE WITNESS: If I might be allowed to address the question a bit
22 more generally, perhaps I could give my own view of how I believe that
23 Serbian nationalism in the nineteenth century might be related to Serbian
24 nationalism in the twentieth century, if I could be allowed to take three
25 or four minutes to set that out.
Page 24868
1 JUDGE MAY: Yes. Your method is being challenged as basically
2 very wrong, so you must have time to answer it.
3 THE WITNESS: Well, as I state in the report and in my testimony
4 yesterday, it's the characteristic of all nationalisms to seek to gather
5 the members of the nation however one defines it inside a state, and as
6 I've said repeatedly I don't see this as specificity of Serbian
7 nationalism. It's almost what defines any political nationalism.
8 So in the report, although my focus is certainly the twentieth
9 century and more specifically the second half of the twentieth century, I
10 went back to the nineteenth century in order to discuss how Serbian
11 politicians of the nineteenth century conceived of this project of
12 bringing Serbs into one state, and in this connection I mentioned
13 Garasanin, Ilija Garasanin, this famous Serbian statesman of the
14 mid-nineteenth century, I mentioned his Nacertanije specifically because
15 it's an extremely well-known document although at the time it was a secret
16 one.
17 My own view of the process of Serbian national unification or
18 aspirations towards it in the nineteenth century is that for most of the
19 nineteenth century it was conceived in relation to the decline of the
20 Ottoman Empire. It was clear to all European observers and certainly very
21 clear to Serbian statesmen that the Ottoman Empire could not indefinitely
22 hold its European possession. So the question was: What would come
23 next? And so Garasanin and others formulated projects for bringing
24 specifically the Serb lands under Ottoman rule in which Garasanin
25 certainly understood the semi-independent state of Serbia as it existed in
Page 24869
1 1844, Macedonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina to be Serbian lands. And I think that
2 this is the predominant form of the Serbian national idea through the end
3 of the nineteenth century. It's the gathering of Serbs under Ottoman rule
4 because the Habsburg Empire at this time is much stronger and a much less
5 possible target with the stipulation I make in the report that
6 Bosnia-Herzegovina remains an object of this Serbian state project.
7 And as far as direct relevance to Serbian nationalism in the
8 twentieth century, I think the most obvious relevance is that many of the
9 same territories are involved, but certainly I would not want to make any
10 claim for an identity of motives between Serbian politicians of the middle
11 or late nineteenth century and Serbian politicians of the late twentieth
12 century. I think that the historical situations are very different and on
13 the whole I would be more comfortable discussing each situation by
14 itself.
15 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
16 Q. Unfortunately we don't have enough time for that, but indubitably
17 in looking for the historical roots of the Serbian nationalism of the
18 twentieth century, you are contemporising the past in your paper aren't
19 you?
20 A. Yes. I think almost by definition in looking for the roots of any
21 historical phenomenon, one goes into the past.
22 Q. All right. I am precisely referring to this projection of one
23 situation onto another, and I find it to be a methodological error, but
24 since you don't agree, I'll move on.
25 Ms. Budding, tell me, you use the terms the first and the first --
Page 24870
1 the first and the second Yugoslavia in your introduction. Do you know
2 that these do not feature as legitimate terms in any official document?
3 Or more precisely, is it true that by using this terminology you call into
4 question the continuity of the Yugoslav state in the twentieth century
5 when saying the first and the second Yugoslavia?
6 A. In speaking of the first and second Yugoslavia, I'm following very
7 broadly established historiographical usage which is used by historians
8 within and outside of Yugoslavia. I'm not making any claim about the
9 legal or international continuity of the Yugoslav state.
10 Q. In the last sentence of your introduction, you use the phrase
11 "broader political and economic trends as they relate to the formation of
12 Serbian national thought." I quoted you precisely. What do you imply
13 under this? What are in fact the broader political and economic trends
14 which have led to the formation of Serbian national thought?
15 A. Well, just to single out a few, what I meant when I spoke of
16 broader political trends was the broader political development of
17 Yugoslavia. Most importantly from my report, the decentralisation of
18 Titoist Yugoslavia and Serbian reactions to that.
19 And on the subject of economic trends, I certainly give them much
20 less importance, but really, what I view as significant for purposes of
21 the report is the Yugoslav economic crisis of the 1980s and the emergence
22 of competing political programmes in response to that crisis.
23 Q. Tell me, please, Ms. Budding, what are the criteria that you used
24 in selecting the literature underlying your work on this topic?
25 A. Well, in general I used what I consider to be the best historical
Page 24871
1 sources in languages available to me for each subject. The languages that
2 I was able to use for purposes of this report were Serbian, French,
3 German, and English, and Slovene to a limited extent. Obviously in every
4 case I gave preference to sources that had a more detailed treatment of
5 what I wanted to cover and to sources that were archivally based or based
6 on eyewitness testimony.
7 Q. Am I properly informed, Ms. Budding, that you speak Serbian very
8 well?
9 A. I certainly speak it. I read it much better than I speak it, but
10 I do speak it.
11 Q. Very well. Are you aware that only about the history of
12 Yugoslavia in the Serbian and Yugoslav historiography we have more than
13 10.000 volumes?
14 THE WITNESS: If I might request the Court's help with something.
15 I had mentioned earlier to an officer of the Court that I sometimes found
16 Mr. Milosevic difficult to hear since he's seated at some distance for me,
17 so we turned my microphones to be B/C/S so that I might be able to hear
18 him, but today I'm not having difficulty hearing him but I'm now unsure as
19 to when the translation is finished and when I should begin my response,
20 so I wonder if I could turn these back to English.
21 JUDGE MAY: One answer may be for you to put your headphones on.
22 THE WITNESS: The difficulty -- I can certainly do that, but then
23 I don't know whether I'm waiting too long to answer because I'm using my
24 screen to tell me when the translation is finished.
25 JUDGE MAY: Well, if you listen -- one answer may be just to put
Page 24872
1 the headphones and put them around your neck, just hang them, if you like,
2 and you should be able to hear the translation if you put it to one of the
3 other channels. See how that goes for a bit.
4 THE WITNESS: Thank you.
5 JUDGE MAY: The transcript is rather confusing because of course
6 it's on a different time scale.
7 THE WITNESS: Thank you.
8 JUDGE MAY: Yes.
9 THE WITNESS: I was not aware of that exact number, but certainly
10 I know that there's a tremendous number of works written specifically in
11 Serbian coming out, I mean, of Belgrade mostly, on former Yugoslavia. And
12 if you look at the sources cited in my report, the great majority of those
13 that are from former Yugoslavia are in fact from Serbia because it was in
14 general Serbian historians who were treating the subjects of my interest
15 in the most detail.
16 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
17 Q. Well, do you believe as an historian that the historians that you
18 quote such as Noel Malcolm, Wolf Dietrich Behschnitt, Ivo Banac, Hans
19 Reuter, are objective in depicting the Yugoslav reality?
20 A. I would not necessarily agree with every word that any of the
21 historians you have written -- that you have cited have written. I've
22 used them among others in developing my own arguments, but I certainly
23 view them as extremely good historians following accepted
24 historiographical practice.
25 If I might add to that, of course those are far from being the
Page 24873
1 only historians I cite. I cite Branko Petranovic, I cite Stevan Pavlovic,
2 I cite Djordje Brankovic; I cite many historians in the course of the
3 work.
4 Q. Well, I have just mentioned those you did cite. But tell me
5 another thing, please: When making your report, did you use or consult
6 -- I'll enumerate a few and you will tell me whether you used them,
7 competent and well-known Serbian historians who wrote about the
8 Nacertanije, the Balkan wars, the creation of Yugoslavia, the Second World
9 War, such as academicians Viktor Novak in his book "Magnum Crimen,"
10 Zagreb, 1948; Milorad Ekmecic, "The War Objectives of Serbia," 1914,
11 published in Belgrade --
12 JUDGE MAY: The witness can't answer a great list like that. You
13 must put them one at a time.
14 Those that have been mentioned so far, Dr. Budding, can you help
15 us with those?
16 THE WITNESS: Let's see. Specifically I did not have occasion to
17 consult the work of Viktor Novak. My treatment of the Ustasha regime
18 which I of course describe as a genocidal regime is a very brief one, and
19 there are many, many works on the Ustasha that I did not use. I've read
20 Milorad Ekmecic "Ratni Ciljevi Srbije", that is "The Warrings of Serbia."
21 I just don't remember whether I specifically refer to it in the report.
22 On the Nacertanije as far as I recall, my main sources were in
23 fact Serbian historians because they've written about the Nacertanije in
24 the most detail. I refer specifically, for instance, to the views of
25 Radovan Samardzic in regard to Garasanin's reference to Dusan's Empire.
Page 24874
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Page 24875
1 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
2 Q. All right. And did you have in mind Ekmecic's book "The Creation
3 of Yugoslavia, 1790 to 1918," or Vasilije Krestic, "The History of the
4 Serbs in Croatia, 1848 to 1918," or perhaps Cedomir Popov --
5 JUDGE MAY: I've stopped your microphone. It's pointless reading
6 out a list to a witness. You know that by now.
7 Did you get the first one, Dr. Budding?
8 THE WITNESS: Yes, thank you. Specifically I have consulted
9 Ekmecic's two volume work, "The Creation of Yugoslavia," but I didn't look
10 back at it in the creation of this report, and I am familiar in general
11 with Professor Krestic's work, but again, I did not use it in the
12 preparation of the report.
13 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
14 Q. Well, I assume that you know that academician Ekmecic is one of
15 the best known living Serbian historians. Isn't that right?
16 A. I think that's undeniable.
17 Q. All right. Now, did you bear in mind the books by academician
18 Vasilije Krestic, Cedomir Popov, another academician? I don't want to
19 enumerate all of them. Vladimir Stojancevic, another case in point?
20 JUDGE MAY: Just a minute. Those three.
21 THE WITNESS: Specifically it would be much easier for me to
22 address the question of sources if I could do it with some reference to
23 some issue where you feel that I have not presented the issue fairly
24 because I have not included a particular source. I'm finding it hard to
25 answer the questions on this level of generality. Do I know the work of
Page 24876
1 such-and-such, yes, I do know the work of most of the figures you are
2 citing, but I'm not sure how to relate that to the question of why I chose
3 particular sources for particular parts of the report.
4 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
5 Q. Well, it does have something to do with the question, and let me
6 ask you something quite specific now. It is my impression, and please
7 correct me if I'm wrong, that your selection of literature is highly
8 selective and that it is used as a function to prove the basic thesis of
9 Serbian hegemonism. Is that so or not?
10 A. It is not so. I did --
11 Q. Greater Serbian hegemonism?
12 A. -- look at my report and say that basically this is one of Serbian
13 hegemonism --
14 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's correction, Greater Serbian.
15 A. -- of sources. Branko Petranovic, I mean, he died in 1994, so I
16 can't refer to him as you did to Ekmecic as one of the best known living
17 historians, but he is certainly one of the most eminent Serbian historians
18 of the twentieth century. Professor Stefan Pavlovic whose work I use is
19 likewise one of the most eminent historians. But to return to what I
20 understand to be your central point, I don't believe that there is
21 anything in the report that supports your contention that the thesis of
22 the report is one of Serbian hegemonism.
23 Q. Very well. Thank you. On page 2 you mention the Serbian state
24 during the times of Tsar Dusan and then Serbian state of the nineteenth
25 century. Now my question to you is this: Why did you skip the history of
Page 24877
1 the establishment of the Nemanjic Serbian state and left out the values of
2 that particular civilisation with respect to culture, legal rights and so
3 on and art? Or to be even more specific, let me put it this way: After
4 mentioning Dusan's Empire, you skip five centuries and go on to the
5 nineteenth century. So why did you avoid saying anything about the
6 onslaught of the Turks in the Balkans, their terror there and so on?
7 JUDGE MAY: One thing at a time.
8 THE WITNESS: When this project was first presented to me, I was
9 asked to discuss the political trajectory of Serbian nationalism in the
10 twentieth century and to present an extremely brief discussion of the
11 nineteenth century. As far as I recall, I was actually asked to keep it
12 within 40 to 60 pages including footnotes and obviously it came out
13 somewhat longer. So it simply wasn't possible to discuss the -- the
14 history before the nineteenth, which I obviously cover very, very briefly.
15 My focus is on the twentieth century. I am myself an historian of the
16 twentieth century, and although I could write about the earlier periods,
17 of course making heavy use of other people's work, there's nothing
18 original in my discussion of the nineteenth century.
19 I did not have the space within the scope of this project and I
20 also would not be well qualified to discuss the early modern period.
21 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
22 Q. I just mentioned that, Ms. Budding, because in your expert report,
23 you incorporate a period going back to, as you yourself say,
24 self-appointed Tsar Dusan dating back to the fourteenth century AD. And
25 as you say, he crowned himself as Tsar and then you skip over five whole
Page 24878
1 centuries.
2 JUDGE MAY: She's just answered that question in terms of what it
3 was the witness was asked to do. Yes. Let's move on.
4 The transcript should reflect that I said she just answered that
5 question. Yes. Let's move on.
6 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
7 Q. Do you consider, since you mentioned Dusan's Empire from the
8 fourteenth century and then skipped over five centuries that for a
9 comprehensive approach it would be of importance to look at the facts and
10 see what the contribution of the Serbs was to the struggle of Christian
11 Europe against the Turks, because you know full well that they
12 participated in all the great marches of Christian Europe for liberation
13 from the Turks from the end of the seventeenth century, the so-called Holy
14 Alliance war and then throughout the eighteenth century. Is that right?
15 A. I think no one could dispute that. I simply didn't feel that it
16 was germane to the subject matter of the report because my focus was not
17 on the period of the wars against the Ottomans. The reason that I
18 mentioned Tzar Dusan at all, given that I was not dealing with the
19 medieval period, is that I was dealing with the period of national
20 romanticism in the nineteenth century. So the Serbian statesmen of the
21 nineteenth century whom I do discuss, although briefly, referred to
22 Dusan's Empire. For instance, Garasanin in the Nacertanije refers briefly
23 to Dusan's Empire. And that, within the confines of this report was the
24 only reason for mentioning Dusan's Empire. It wasn't -- it wasn't
25 intended to introduce a discussion about the Ottoman conquests or the wars
Page 24879
1 against the Ottomans in which Serbs of course played a very important
2 part.
3 Q. Well, I thought, Ms. Budding -- I don't want to put words into
4 your mouth, but I gained the impression that looking at this and comparing
5 it all, that this kind of selective analysis of Serbian history that you
6 applied in your report was in the function of some implicit thesis that
7 the Serb nation doesn't have statehood roots and that they are primitive
8 and wild.
9 JUDGE MAY: You must have something to support this. What part of
10 the -- what part of this document could lead anybody to that conclusion?
11 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] The fact that I was referring to,
12 Mr. May, that your expert witness starts out from the fourteenth century
13 and Tsar Dusan and then skips five centuries and catches up with the
14 nineteenth century. I think that I explain that and ask my question in
15 that regard. So this was something that led me to the conclusion I made.
16 Now, if the witness says that that is not correct, we can move on.
17 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
18 Q. Ms. Budding, on page 2, you look at the important events of
19 Serbian history at the beginning of the nineteenth century, events that
20 took place in 1804 and 1815, and you refer to this as Serb rebellions,
21 Serb revolts, and you also say that the Serbs, with the help of the
22 Russians, won autonomy.
23 Now, that is the Serbian -- I would say that you are minimising
24 the Serbian movement. Do you know, for example, that in history these
25 were not revolts of any kind but it was the first and second Serbian
Page 24880
1 uprising, very well known terms, and they had the character of national --
2 of a national and social revolution, in fact, and they were waged because
3 of the untenable Ottoman feudalism and religious stifling and oppression,
4 and they represented part of the world revolution.
5 JUDGE MAY: You must come to a question. What is the question?
6 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, my question is this, if you
7 had the patience to follow what I was saying, Mr. May:
8 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
9 Q. Do you know that these were not revolts but that they were in fact
10 the first and second Serbian uprisings, known as such, and they
11 represented part of European evolution? So I said the first and second
12 Serbian uprising that had the character of a national and social
13 revolution which was organised because -- to combat Ottoman feudalism
14 which was becoming unbearable?
15 JUDGE MAY: This is going on. Insofar as you can, can you answer
16 the question?
17 THE WITNESS: Well, if the question is do I know that these are
18 known as the first and second Serbian uprisings, yes, of course. If we
19 were to discuss the national and social aspects, I think that for the
20 first rising, there's a strong argument to be made for seeing it in its
21 origins as predominantly a social uprising against janissary misrule which
22 then became a national rising.
23 Again, this is somewhat outside my own area of specialisation,
24 when we go back to the beginning of the nineteenth century.
25 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
Page 24881
1 Q. All right. Now, as I said, and I'm sure you know, that this was
2 part of the European revolution. Do you know that that revolution was one
3 of a series of civilian bourgeois revolutions starting with the French
4 Revolution in 1789 right up until the 1908 Turkish revolution and the
5 great Russian revolution in 1917 and that it rocked Europe and that the
6 Serbian revolution in 1804 to 1815, as a national and social revolution,
7 was part of one of the most significant phenomena of European history of
8 the nineteenth century and that in fact with the Serbian revolution a
9 national revival in south-east Europe came to the fore?
10 A. I think in many ways that's a fair statement.
11 Q. Do you know that Leopold Ranke, one of the greatest German
12 historians - I don't have to tell that to you, I'm saying that for the
13 public, I'm sure you know full well who Leopold Ranke is - and an
14 academician too, in 1829 in Hamburg he wrote a work called "The Serbian
15 Revolution." Do you know about the work of Leopold Ranke which was
16 published in 1829 in Hamburg, entitled "The Serbian Revolution and The
17 Uprisings," that is to say the struggle of the Serbian people for
18 liberation --
19 JUDGE MAY: I've stopped your microphone. You must allow the
20 witness to answer.
21 Do you know this work of Leopold Ranke?
22 THE WITNESS: I've read it years and years ago. Yes, of course I
23 know it but I wouldn't at the moment be able to recall much about it.
24 JUDGE MAY: Is it now regarded as a work which is relied on in
25 modern scholarship?
Page 24882
1 THE WITNESS: Well, I think that historical scholarship has moved
2 far beyond where it was in the nineteenth century, so I think the primary
3 interest of this work now would be as an example of very outstanding
4 nineteenth century scholarship.
5 JUDGE MAY: Yes. Senior Legal Officer, please.
6 Yes, Mr. Milosevic.
7 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
8 Q. Do you remember, although as you say you read the book many years
9 ago - although I can't believe that in view of your age, your years - that
10 the struggle of the Serb people was seen by Ranke as an event of
11 exceptional importance for diplomatic and political history of south-east
12 Europe of those days, and that is to say he considered this to be a
13 historical process and a positive trend of the utmost European political
14 importance, denoting the modernisation of Europe, in fact?
15 A. I don't remember that, but it seems to me a perfectly reasonable
16 assessment.
17 Q. Do you consider that he was competent of assessing that at that
18 time when this was happening?
19 A. Certainly.
20 Q. On page 2, the first sentence of the second paragraph, you focus
21 on the efforts made by Serbian politicians to revive Dusan's Empire. That
22 is not correct.
23 A. What I state, if I might be allowed to read both sentences in
24 their entirety, I say: "From the mid nineteenth century to 1918, various
25 Serbian politicians sought opportunities to expand the Serbian state to
Page 24883
1 include more of these Serbs" -- that is, Serbs under Habsburg and Ottoman
2 rule -- "and in certain variants to acquire some of the territories that
3 had been in Dusan's Empire. This statement is not meant to imply that
4 Serbian politicians envisioned recreating Dusan's Empire in its entirety,
5 but rather that it was one of the sources they drew on in defining their
6 national ideas."
7 Q. All right. That's what I was saying. But don't you feel that you
8 are reversing the thesis here, because the fact is that the Serb people in
9 the revolution of 1804 to 1815 struggled for liberating themselves from
10 the five century Turkish yoke and not to win over territories of any kind,
11 as you've just said in quoting the passage from your own report.
12 A. Well, I don't see an opposition between saying expand the Serbian
13 state to include more of these Serbs, and liberate these Serbs. I think
14 there's no question that as the Serbian state expanded that Serbs under
15 Ottoman rule viewed that as a liberation.
16 I think that in this regard the views of Svetozar Markovic in the
17 later half of the nineteenth century are extremely pertinent because
18 Markovic, in the year 1872, used the expression "Velika Srbija" to
19 describe the project of simply expanding the borders of the Serbian state
20 without at the same time carrying out a process of national and social
21 liberation, so that I could not say that in all of -- in all times in and
22 all respects expanding the state meant -- meant liberation, but I think
23 that in many cases it did.
24 Q. Just a technical correction: In the translation it said that you
25 said the seventeenth century. I assume you didn't say that. Svetozar
Page 24884
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25
Page 24885
1 Markovic you couldn't have linked up with the second half of the
2 seventeenth century, so I assume that was an interpretation error.
3 A. It was either an interpretation error or perhaps I misspoke.
4 Certainly what I meant to say is nineteenth century.
5 Q. Just for correctness' sake, these listening to the interpretation,
6 perhaps it was quite all right in the transcript and maybe you did not
7 misspeak.
8 But anyway, without a doubt this revolution in 1804 going up to
9 1815 was a struggle for liberation.
10 A. Yes, I would agree with that.
11 Q. All right. Fine. Now, at the end of paragraph 2 on page 2, you
12 say that winning an exit to the Adriatic Sea was the Serbs' major
13 strategic goal. Now, do you know that the natural geographic trade routes
14 and all other routes from Central and Northern Serbia towards the Adriatic
15 Sea led across the south, that is to say Montenegro and Northern Albania?
16 The route couldn't have led through Hungary and Romania; right?
17 A. Yes. In fact, that's pretty much -- I think that's in a sense
18 what I state, that the aim was to reduce trade dependence on
19 Austria-Hungary on that northern route.
20 Q. Do you know that with the 38th article of the Berlin agreement the
21 independence of Serbia was conditioned, among other things, with the
22 building up of a railway line, the building of a railway line running from
23 Belgrade-Nis to the Turkish border, which was in the keeping with the
24 then-European trends for Northern and Central Europe to be linked up as
25 soon as possible with the South and south-eastern reaches of the European
Page 24886
1 continent to enable the shortest route for the traffic of goods and
2 European forces to the warm seas, and that led through Montenegro and
3 Albania, that route. Is that right?
4 A. I wasn't aware of that article but I'm certainly willing to accept
5 it.
6 Q. On page 3 you say that the weakening of the Ottoman Empire led to
7 political unrest of the Ottoman countries. Wasn't it the reverse, that
8 the rebellions and fighting and revolutions of the Balkan peoples caused
9 the weakening of the Ottoman Empire? Wasn't that how it was?
10 A. We're now entering into a question that's very controversial
11 within the historiography of the Ottoman Empire and which, of course, I am
12 not an expert, but I know that up until rather recently the predominant
13 view was to focus entirely on internal weaknesses of the Ottoman Empire;
14 for instance, on the janissaries relative independence and their abuses.
15 I believe that in some of the most recent historiography there's been more
16 of a tendency to see the Ottoman Empire as in many ways an internally
17 viable state - at least one that was reforming itself - and therefore to
18 lay greater stress on its military defeats by outside powers and also on
19 the uprising of peoples under Ottoman rule, but I really don't feel
20 qualified to express an opinion on the relative importance of internal and
21 external factors in Ottoman decline as a state.
22 Q. Very well, but as I say, on page 3 you use the term "Ottoman
23 lands." Wasn't this a territory on which the Balkan peoples lived for
24 centuries? And the natural and historical rights belong to them and the
25 Turks occupied them in the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries?
Page 24887
1 A. The passage to which I believe you're referring, if I could read
2 it in English because I don't say actually "Ottoman lands" but I don't
3 know exactly how it was translated. I say near the bottom of page 3:
4 "Winning lands from the Ottomans through the treaty of Berlin in 1878 and
5 the Balkan wars of 1912-1913, Serbia had more than doubled its size and
6 population by the eve of the First World War." In other words, "lands"
7 was used in a purely territorial sense.
8 Q. Yes, but that's the point. They were territories on which --
9 which had been inhabited for centuries by the Balkan peoples, and
10 according to their historical and natural right, this land belonged to
11 them and they were occupied by the Turks in the fourteenth, fifteenth, and
12 sixteenth centuries; isn't that right?
13 A. Yes, that's correct.
14 Q. On page 3, you say that Serbia, after its modern revival, up until
15 the formation of the first Yugoslavia, had considerable success in its
16 projects of winning over territories.
17 Ms. Budding, I feel that you're reversing the thesis because it
18 wasn't occupying territories, it was liberating territories which, since
19 the inception of the Serb authorities until the fall of the Ottoman
20 Empire, were within the Serb state. And if you recall, and as this is
21 your field of expertise let me just remind you that these areas were
22 returned to Serbia in stages, first of all in 1830 to 1833 after the first
23 and second Hatiserif [phoen] when Serbia was given autonomy and at the
24 time it was the Krajinska, Mojetska, Palencska [phoen], Kursevelska
25 [phoen], Starovlaska and Podrinjska region. And secondly at the Berlin
Page 24888
1 Congress in 1878, Serbia received back Pirotski, Vranjski and Topoliski
2 region. And third, and this is what you conclude with after the Balkan
3 war and the London and Bucharest peace agreement, Kosovo and Metohija was
4 returned to Serbia by the Macedonia and the Novi Pazar region of Sandzak;
5 isn't that right?
6 A. Yes. If I could return to the point you seem to be raising first.
7 Could you identify for me where the word "osvajanje" is found in the
8 translation? You said on page 3.
9 Q. On page 3, you say that Serbia, from its modern revival to the
10 founding of the first Yugoslavia had considerable success in its projects
11 of winning over territories or the conquest of territories. "In its
12 project of winning territories inhabited by Serbs," the sentence begins,
13 "during the 80-odd years."
14 A. I'm still --
15 JUDGE MAY: We can't find that.
16 THE INTERPRETER: Page 2, interpreter's note.
17 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] May I be of assistance, Your
18 Honours. It is paragraph 1A, the penultimate sentence roughly, with this
19 expression: "It's project of winning territories inhabited by Serbs away
20 from the Ottomans." Paragraph 1A towards the end, the end of the
21 penultimate sentence.
22 JUDGE MAY: We have it, yes. Page 2. Yes. Dr. Budding do you
23 have comment on that sentence? Perhaps it would be simpler --
24 Mr. Milosevic, what is the point that you want to make that it wasn't done
25 in one go, it took several goes. Is that the point?
Page 24889
1 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] No. I'm quoting Ms. Budding as
2 saying that Serbia, since its modern revival, had significant success in
3 its projects of winning territories, and I am claiming that Ms. Budding is
4 making a reversal of thesis, because these were not conquests but
5 liberations of territories, and I indicated three stages of that process.
6 JUDGE MAY: Yes. We have the point. No need to go on. Your time
7 is limited. You're taking it up.
8 Yes, Ms. Budding, you have heard the point.
9 THE WITNESS: Now I have found the passage in both versions. What
10 I stated in English was the Serbian state enjoyed considerable success in
11 its project of winning territories inhabited by Serbs away from the
12 Ottomans. Winning in English is a very knew neutral word. It simply
13 means that the Serbian state did obtain these territories from the
14 Ottomans. I see your point with regard to osvajanje. I, of course, did
15 not do the translation. I can't think for the moment whether possibly
16 there could have been a more neutral word that would have expressed
17 exactly -- exactly what I said in English, but certainly I did not -- I
18 did not use a word that had any connotation of the sense that this was an
19 illegitimate conquest and I don't really see that osvajanje does, but in
20 any case, "osvajanje" is the translation. It's not the particular word
21 that I chose.
22 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
23 Q. Very well. You say considerable success in its projects of
24 conquest of territories or winning territories. That's what you refer to
25 yourself. That's why I'm saying that you're reversing the thesis?
Page 24890
1 JUDGE MAY: No. The witness has explained that and made it
2 perfectly clear that she meant.
3 Now, move on. You are on page 2. Your time is limited. We will
4 consider in the adjournment how much longer you should have, but you've
5 had well over an hour already.
6 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. May, if you don't consider any
7 of my questions relevant, you will tell me so, but there's no other way I
8 can cross-examine this witness who is an expert but by putting this kind
9 of question to her. Please exclude questions that you consider to be
10 irrelevant, otherwise, what's the point of the cross-examination?
11 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
12 Q. Ms. Budding, on page 5, in the second sentence of the second
13 paragraph you make the allegation that the Serbian state in the Balkan
14 wars won Kosovo, Vardar Macedonia, and a part of Sandzak and that the
15 population of those regions came under its composition who were non-Serbs.
16 Do you know that the Serbian army at the time liberated both the Serb
17 people and the rest of the population in the region from Turkish rule? It
18 didn't conquer them but it liberated them from Turkish rule.
19 A. I cannot agree with the idea that the non-Serb population of those
20 regions and specifically the Albanian population considered these events
21 as a liberation.
22 Q. Very well and do you know that the area of Kosovo, Vardar
23 Macedonia and a part of Sandzak constitute a single geographic and
24 historical entity known as the old Serbia which was the central region of
25 the medieval Serbian state which the Turks conquered when arriving in the
Page 24891
1 Balkans. They didn't become part of Serbia in 1830 but only after the
2 Balkan wars. Isn't that right?
3 A. Certainly.
4 Q. Do you know that in Serbian history a number of works have been
5 published by prominent scholars who refer to Old Serbia, Stara Serbia, as
6 the centre of Serbian statehood? I'm sure you know of Stojan Novakovic,
7 The Balkan Question and Historical Notes on the Balkan Peninsula, 1806,
8 1905, Jovan Cvijic, The Basis for the Geography and Geology of Macedonia
9 and Old Serbia, 1906 the book was published. Svetislav, Sea of Nature,
10 Old Serbia and the Albanians, Belgrade 1904. I'm sure you are aware of
11 these publications.
12 A. Certainly I'm aware of Stojan Novakovic, of Jovan Cvijic. Again,
13 I'm not a specialist on the pre-modern period and so certainly I'm
14 familiar with the usage of "Old Serbia" to mean these regions, but their
15 pre-modern history, their medieval history is simply not what I work on.
16 Q. Let me just correct you: Cvijic is not an historian but a
17 geographer.
18 And do you know that up until the beginning of the nineteenth
19 century in Western European history the area of Old Serbia - that is
20 Sandzak, Kosmet, the Vardar Macedonia - were described as the central part
21 of Serbia, so that on the map of the well-known geographer, Cornelius,
22 Corso Geographico, in 1692, Serbia stretches to south of Skopje. Serbia
23 is similarly depicted on Austrian maps. Austrian Captain Adam von Wijn --
24 JUDGE MAY: This is the way we waste time, with you reading out
25 these lists.
Page 24892
1 Dr. Budding, you see the point that there were maps apparently in
2 the sixteenth century, or a map in the sixteenth century which showed Old
3 Serbia? Is there any relevance in any of this? I mean, so what one is
4 tempted to say.
5 THE WITNESS: I do not myself understand the relevance to the
6 subject matter treated in my report of the existence of Austrian maps
7 using the expression "Old Serbia."
8 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
9 Q. I do see the relevance precisely because you make the assertion,
10 and I quoted it for you - you've probably lost the flow - on page 5,
11 paragraph 2, second sentence, that the Serbian state in the Balkan wars
12 had conquered Kosovo, Vardar Macedonia and part of the Sandzak. And what
13 I am saying now are the facts which show that this territory which you
14 claim was conquered in the Balkan wars by the Serbian state constitute Old
15 Serbia according to all the historians and cartographers from a period far
16 before the time when you say that Serbia conquered those areas. And I
17 quoted the scholars and the maps, including an Austrian and an Italian, et
18 cetera, in support of that. So you can't say that the Serbian state in
19 the Balkan wars conquered Kosovo, Vardar Macedonia and part of the Sandzak
20 because it's indicated on all maps.
21 JUDGE MAY: Let the witness answer.
22 THE WITNESS: The difficulty I'm having is that you're repeating
23 the word "osvojiti" and I wrote this report in English, and as far as I
24 was concerned, the words that I was using were relatively neutral words
25 simply expressing the fact that the Serbian state, through military means,
Page 24893
1 took control of these territories from the Ottoman Empire.
2 If we were to discuss -- I've already said that I believe that the
3 Serb population of these areas regarded these events as a liberation and
4 that the non-Serb population in many instances did not, but I can't -- I
5 did not use the specific word "osvojiti" because I was not writing in
6 Serbian.
7 JUDGE MAY: Let's move on to another point.
8 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
9 Q. Yes. But let me just remind you before I move on to another point
10 that Old Serbia and the regions that you say could not be considered
11 liberated by the people who were non-Serbs, that these areas were Old
12 Serbia, and Aleksandar Hufilding [phoen] wrote about this in 1859; an
13 Englishman Edmund Spencer in 1850; a German travelogue Hanits [phoen] who
14 also uses the same term "Old Serbia"; an Austrian professor, Theodore
15 Rippen; a professor from Graz, Edward Richter; et cetera. Gaston Gravier
16 [phoen] also in his work on Serbs and Albanians published in Paris in
17 1911. He talks about the -- discusses the borders of Old Serbia,
18 emphasising that it includes the Kosovo-Metohija, Prizren, the Vardar
19 valley, the Skopje region, et cetera. I assume you're familiar with all
20 these works and publications by historians?
21 A. No, I don't know the specific publications but I don't in any way
22 dispute that the expression "Old Serbia" was widely used for these areas.
23 Q. Very well. My point was to underline that this was a liberation
24 of Old Serbia, not a conquest of Old Serbia.
25 On page 3, you mention that the Serbs applied the definition of
Page 24894
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2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12 Blank page inserted to ensure pagination corresponds between the French and
13 English transcripts.
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
Page 24895
1 nationalism given by Ernest Gellner: The aspiration of peoples to rally
2 all their compatriots within one state. Do you know that in accordance
3 with that definition national states were created by many European nations
4 in the nineteenth century? For example, the Germans, the Italians, the
5 Greeks, the Poles, the Romanians, the Bulgarians?
6 A. Certainly. In fact, the point I was making in citing Gellner, I
7 wasn't saying that the Serbian politicians involved applied Gellner's
8 definition but rather I was applying Gellner's definition to point out the
9 parallels between nineteenth century Serbian nationalism and other
10 European national movements.
11 Q. So it is the same thesis, that is the same method in which other
12 nations achieved this. This is applicable to all, is it not, those I
13 mentioned; the Greeks, the Romanians, et cetera?
14 A. Yes, of course every case has its own specificity, but I think
15 that the national movements in Europe of the nineteenth century are in
16 many ways very similar to each other.
17 Q. Very well. Ms. Budding, on page 4, you claim that the advocates
18 of Yugoslavianism were mostly Croatian intellectuals and some Serb
19 supporters. Which Serb adherents are you referring to?
20 A. Well, I think we can certainly see the two Svetozars - Svetozar
21 Miletic, Svetozar Markovic - as adherents of broader Yugoslav ideas, for
22 instance.
23 Q. Do you know that Serb Count Mihajlo Obrenovic, so the prince, was
24 one of the greatest protagonists for the creation of a large community of
25 South Slav peoples in the nineteenth century? And in the twentieth
Page 24896
1 century among the Serbs, the greatest supporter of the Yugoslavism were
2 the well-known geographer that we just mentioned, Jovan Cvijic, and a
3 literary critic Jovan Skerlic, also one of the most reputed Serb
4 intellectuals of his day.
5 A. I think that certainly the only point that I intended to make with
6 the contrast that I drew between support for Yugoslavism among Croats and
7 among Serbs was that, for Croats, clearly the idea of creating a South
8 Slav unit within the monarchy relied on some kind of broader Yugoslav
9 Serb-Croat cooperation. That was the situation on the ground, so to
10 speak. Whereas for Serbs, the point that I was making was simply that for
11 Serbs in Serbia as opposed to Habsburg Serbs, the Serbian state idea was
12 stronger because the Yugoslav state idea, until very close to the First
13 World War, was a utopian one. And for instance, Stojan Novakovic wrote a
14 piece, I believe it was in 1911, right around then, in which he imagined
15 Belgrade a century from now and he imagined Belgrade as the capital of a
16 Yugoslav state. But he -- he saw that in -- just before the First World
17 War as a utopian project, and that -- that was the point that I was making
18 in respect to Serbian versus Yugoslav state projects.
19 Q. I'm just -- I'm claiming that that is not true because Prince
20 Mihajlo Obrenovic of Serbia was one of the greatest protagonists of the
21 creation of a large community of South Slav peoples. That is incorrect.
22 JUDGE MAY: The witness has answered the question. Let's move on.
23 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Very well, Mr. May.
24 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
25 Q. On page 4, you say that Serb and Croat ideologues were prone to
Page 24897
1 consider Slav Muslims as members of their nation. And do you know that
2 the greatest majority of Muslims, before converting to Islam during the
3 Turkish conquest and Turkish rule, were Serbs? A part of them were
4 Croats, but they accepted Islam to avoid terror and violence by Turkish
5 authorities, save their lives, protect their properties from destruction
6 and plunder.
7 A. Well, as I've said, I'm not an expert on the Ottoman period, but
8 my understanding of the process of conversion, particularly in Bosnia, is
9 that most experts now believe that most of the converts came from the
10 Bosnian church, which was relatively loosely organised, which simply was
11 not institutionally able to stand up to the Ottoman conquest as well as
12 the Orthodox or Catholic churches, so that your statement that most of the
13 converts were Serbs is not -- it's not one that I would necessarily be
14 prepared to accept, but I'm also not really prepared to contest it because
15 this is not my period and I view the whole argument as in a sense
16 anachronistic. Are we to say that all members of the Serbian church at
17 that time had a Serbian consciousness that all Catholics had a Croatian
18 consciousness in the period before the Ottoman conquest. It just -- it's
19 not something that I can discuss with expert knowledge.
20 Q. Very well, then. I won't ask you any more questions about that,
21 but you probably know that in Bosnia and Herzegovina, it was clearly known
22 which families were of Turkish origin, and in fact, they did not even mix
23 with the Bosnian Muslims or the Islamised Christians regardless of whether
24 they were Islamised Serbs or Croats, that is whether they were of Orthodox
25 or Catholic faith but in any way Christians.
Page 24898
1 A. If I understand your basic point, I certainly would agree that
2 there was a distinction made between Slavic converts to Islam and Turkish,
3 ethnically Turkish people, and in fact, as we know, the Slavic Muslims in
4 some cases called themselves Turci, but they still drew a distinction
5 between themselves and the Ottomans whom they called Turkusi.
6 Q. We agree on that point. But do you know that Ilija Garasanin, in
7 his liberation programme acknowledging the Yugoslav origin and language of
8 the Muslims envisaged close and friendly cooperation with the Bosnian
9 Muslims in the struggle against Turkish rule and offered many concessions
10 even to the detriment of Serb interests on many occasions? And you
11 probably know, as you studied this, that some Muslims families in the 60s
12 of the nineteenth century, famous families cooperated with the Serbs, such
13 as, for instance, the Rizvanbegovic from Herzegovina, the Halilovici from
14 Sarajevo, the Kulanovici, the Filipovici, the Miralamici [phoen], the
15 Azifagici [phoen], Idrizbegovici from the Bosnian Krajina. You probably
16 do know about these things.
17 A. I'm having trouble following the entire question but to respond to
18 the point about Garasanin, certainly. For instance, in Nacertanije, he
19 speaks of the need to guarantee religious freedom for Orthodox, Catholic,
20 and Muslim believers.
21 Q. On page 4 of your report in footnote 9 you mention an article by
22 Vuk Karadzic, Serbs all and everywhere which, according to you, founded an
23 idea -- established an idea which proved to be a source of future
24 misunderstanding. Do you claim that a nation is based on a communality of
25 language and the Stokavian was the language of Vuk Karadzic?
Page 24899
1 A. Do I personally claim that a nation must be based on a common
2 language? Is that the question?
3 Q. No. No. The question is: Are you claiming that the idea that a
4 nation is a community of language and the Stokavian is a Serbian language
5 and this is the idea of Vuk Karadzic?
6 A. Yes, I do maintain that Karadzic said that nations should be
7 defined linguistically.
8 Q. So you do believe that this was his idea; right?
9 A. Well, not his personally, of course. It was the general
10 definition of nationhood at the time. I think it would most be associated
11 with Herder.
12 Q. Very well. But you quoted him, and he founded an idea which
13 proved, according to you, to be a source of misunderstandings in the
14 future. I'm asking you now do you know of the names Johan Kristopher,
15 Adelung who lived in 1732 to 806? He was a grammar and lexicographer
16 expert? Do you know the name of Johan Herder, also a German writer,
17 historian and philosopher?
18 JUDGE MAY: What is the point? What is the point of this list of
19 names?
20 THE WITNESS: If I could make a --
21 JUDGE MAY: No. Let the accused answer.
22 What is the point of this list of names?
23 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] The point of the list of names, as
24 you weren't listening, Mr. May, to my previous question which had to do
25 with an allegation in footnote 9, page 4 of the report, an Article by Vuk
Page 24900
1 Karadzic, Serbs all and everywhere, which according to Ms. Budding was the
2 founder of an idea which proved to be a source of future
3 misunderstandings. My question was to her whether she claims that a
4 nation is a community, a linguistic community and that the Stokavian
5 language is a Serbian language was the idea of Vuk Karadzic. And then I
6 asked her a question in this connection, these names, you probably know
7 that name too, Johan Fihte, a German philosopher and all these others.
8 JUDGE MAY: Just try to ask the question if you want to be allowed
9 to ask the witness it. What is the point of the list of names? Just tell
10 us if you can.
11 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Of course I can, Mr. May, though it
12 is my turn to ask questions, not you. Do you know that these names, this
13 list that you're not letting me read out and which is lengthy and it
14 consists of the most prestigious European intellectuals, do you know that
15 they as representatives of European rationalism were the creators of the
16 idea of a nation as a community of language, not Karadzic who only took
17 over that idea from them and accepted it?
18 THE WITNESS: Excuse me, but in my previous response before you
19 asked this question, you asked me do I believe this is Vuk Karadzic's
20 idea, and in my response I said well, of course not his personally. I
21 said it's especially associated with Herder, and then you went on to ask
22 me whether I've heard of Herder.
23 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
24 Q. Very well. It's not just Herder, Adelung, Fihte, Renard [phoen],
25 Matini [phoen], Jernej Kopitar, isn't that so, Ms. Budding?
Page 24901
1 Representatives of European nationalism were the creators of this idea of
2 a nation as being based on a community of language; is that right?
3 A. And if I could cite what I actually say in the report about
4 Karadzic which is extremely brief, on page 3 I say in the context of his
5 time and of his own anti-clerical struggles, Karadzic's insistence that
6 nations must be defined by language and not by religion was quite
7 understandable. By the context of his own time in that sentence, I meant
8 precisely the fact that linguistic definitions of nationhood were at the
9 time dominant in European thought.
10 Q. Yes. But I understood you to stay in footnote 9 this article,
11 Serbs all and everywhere, you quote it as being something at the basis of
12 an idea which was to prove to be a source of future misunderstandings.
13 A. Well, I say it actually in the text of the report. The sentence
14 in the top paragraph of page 3. I say nevertheless, his definition of
15 Serbdom proved untenable because it was rejected by many of those whom it
16 claimed to include.
17 Q. Very well. Are you aware that Adelung that we mentioned a moment
18 ago claimed that the old Slavonic language broke up into three languages;
19 Polish, Serbian, and Russian, and that all South Slav languages were
20 derivatives of the original Serbian language? This is not what Karadzic
21 claims but Adelung.
22 A. If I can respond to what I understand to be the basic question,
23 Does Vuk Karadzic in his statements of the time reflect broader European
24 concepts of linguistic thought and of how nations are constituted, I think
25 absolutely he does.
Page 24902
1 Q. Very well. Thank you. And are you aware of the fact that as
2 early as 1849 the Habsburg government took a decision on issuing the
3 Official Gazette in ten provinces of the Empire, among others in the
4 Serbian language, and that the Croats could call it the Croatian or
5 Illyrian language?
6 A. No, I didn't, not that.
7 Q. Does it seem to you that this negates the allegation that Karadzic
8 felt that all those speaking Stokavian were Serbs?
9 A. I don't understand how a decision by the Habsburg government is
10 relevant to establishing what Vuk Karadzic thought.
11 JUDGE MAY: Very well. It's half past ten. We will adjourn now.
12 Mr. Milosevic, you can have the next session with this witness.
13 You must conclude your cross-examination -- no. We've considered this.
14 You have had a long time already. It's a matter for you how you use your
15 time. If you don't use it effectively, it is your own -- a matter for
16 you, not for anybody else. So you have the next session.
17 Mr. Tapuskovic, do you have any questions?
18 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, I would have some
19 questions, depending on the time allotted me.
20 JUDGE MAY: If you would keep it fairly short. We certainly don't
21 have anything more than half an hour, but if you could do it in quarter of
22 an hour, so much the better. Thank you.
23 MR. NICE: Your Honour, I don't certainly forecast much or any
24 re-examination. I would, however -- I don't forecast much or any
25 re-examination. I would, however, press the Chamber to invite the accused
Page 24903
1 to deal with the matters that come at the end of the report because it
2 will be --
3 JUDGE MAY: We've got to 1849.
4 MR. NICE: And pages 1 to 9 are a mere introduction leading us to
5 the twentieth century, and it will be a matter of considerable regret if
6 the accused fails to join issue with the historian on the matters that are
7 really relevant, which come in the last 20 pages particularly of the
8 report, given that she's here, as the Chamber recalls, to assist the
9 Chamber at the Chamber's request, and also to assist Mr. Tapuskovic at his
10 request, we having, as you know -- although we're delighted to hear the
11 evidence, which is very interesting -- nevertheless, having made the
12 decision we did.
13 JUDGE MAY: Very well.
14 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. May, please. It is my opinion
15 that is absolutely inappropriate to explain the report and to say whether
16 something in it is relevant or irrelevant. If I have been served with an
17 expert report, the report as such as relevant, and it's not up to Mr. Nice
18 to tell me which part of the report, according to him, is more relevant.
19 The report as such has been filed here. I'm asking again what is the
20 point of cross-examination if I'm not allowed to go through the whole
21 report? I will certainly cover the whole report. That is my intention.
22 But if you limit my time, already the press is writing that the key issue
23 here is the clock and nothing else.
24 JUDGE MAY: Very well. We will adjourn now. Twenty minutes.
25 --- Recess taken at 10.33 a.m.
Page 24904
1 --- On resuming at 10.53 a.m.
2 JUDGE MAY: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.
3 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
4 Q. So let us continue, Ms. Budding, where we left off. Do you know
5 that Vuk Karadzic took over from Jernej Kopitar the idea about the
6 Stokavian dialect as a definition of Serbian sometime in 1811?
7 A. Yes, I've read of the influence of Kopitar's ideas on his. I
8 could not speak to the date.
9 Q. And do you know that Vuk Karadzic was a philologist, not a
10 politician, that he only dealt with linguistic issues and under the term
11 "nation"? He did not imply any political organisation.
12 A. [Previous translation continues]... linguist rather than a
13 politician. He's one of the most famous Serbian linguists really.
14 Q. And did you have occasion to learn that he wrote in 1861 a text
15 called "Serbs and Croats" where he presented the following stand: If a
16 nation as a community of language cannot survive, then nothing else can be
17 done, he writes, except for us to divide according to law and religion.
18 He who adheres to the Orthodox law will not renounce his belonging to
19 Serbdom, and he can call himself a Croat whoever wishes.
20 A. [Previous translation continues]... life and work because, after
21 all, I only give him one sentence. I had to cover the nineteenth century
22 very briefly. The specific point that I was making had to do with was the
23 linguistic definition of nationhood ultimately a tenable one, and so I
24 cited "Srbi Svi i Svuda" in much the same way I cite Garasanin's
25 Nacertanije but I don't in any way dispute that at other times Garasanin
Page 24905
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Page 24906
1 put forward state projects which were different from those in the
2 Nacertanije, and I certainly don't dispute that Karadzic at other times
3 put forward views that, you know, are not those expressed in "Serbs All
4 and Everywhere."
5 Q. And do you know that a Croat, Ljudevit Gaj, in 1830 made a
6 proposal about the unification of Serbs and Croats into one nation and the
7 unification of their religions and churches as an equalisation of their
8 dialects into a common literary language? And there is a historical trace
9 that he repeated the same thing in 1848, talking to a Pole, Bistranovski,
10 when he added that Belgrade should become the capital of the future common
11 state because of its favourable geographical position and the national
12 feeling. You can find that in the book of academician Ekmecic, "History
13 of Yugoslavia" published in 1972. So this reference to Belgrade as a
14 capital is not exactly as you mentioned it, but even a Croat, Ljudevit
15 Gaj, speaks of it in 1830 and 1848 in his conversation with Bistranovski.
16 Are you aware of that?
17 A. Well, certainly I'm aware that Ljudevit Gaj and the Illyrian
18 movement in general considered Serbs and Croats to be one people. It's
19 because of that that the Illyrianists make the linguistic choices they did
20 that made possible a unification in a sense of the language. I didn't
21 quite understand the further point of the question.
22 Q. And the second point is in what he said in his conversation with
23 Pole, Bistranovski when he said that Belgrade should become the capital of
24 the future joint state and he states his reasons for that, and even
25 Ljudevit Gaj, back in 1848 speaks of Belgrade as a common capital.
Page 24907
1 A. I was not aware that Gaj had made that specific proposal but it
2 certainly seems to me in keeping with the rest of his thought.
3 Q. Since you mentioned -- right now you said you mentioned Vuk
4 Karadzic only once, whereas I had understood that you think of him as one
5 of the founders of Serbian hegemonism. If I'm wrong, then there is no
6 need to discuss it any further?
7 A. I wonder if you would be willing to define the phrase "Serbian
8 hegemonism" for me because you've used a few times and I'm not sure what
9 you mean by it.
10 Q. Well, the aspiration for Serbs to achieve prevalence over everyone
11 else.
12 A. No. I would not in any way link Vuk Karadzic with that idea.
13 Q. Okay. Are you aware that Ivo Pilar, otherwise a vigorous advocate
14 of Croat Bravo movement and Croat rights movement, Party of Rights, in one
15 book said that Vuk Karadzic is the founder of Serbian imperial hegemonism
16 and that is what Ante Starcevic also says in his book "Serbs in Zagreb in
17 1931".
18 A. No, I was not aware of either of those statements made in those
19 books.
20 Q. All right. You speak in your report about the unclear borders of
21 Serbdom in the first sentence of the second paragraph on page 2. You
22 speak of the unclear borders of Serbdom, boundaries of Serbdom. How did
23 the differing and unclear boundaries of Serbdom enable Serb politicians to
24 continue the dream of unifying all Serbs in one state?
25 A. I would not say it enabled them to continue, but I would say that
Page 24908
1 it contributed to a lack of clarity in their thoughts between the idea of
2 the unification of all Serbs and the idea of the creation of a South
3 Slavic state more generally. In other words, my contention in the report
4 is that many Serbian politicians in the period prior to the creation of
5 the Yugoslav state did not clearly distinguish in their minds between the
6 creation or the continued extension of a Serbian state and the creation of
7 a South Slav state that Yugoslavia considered as a separate project.
8 Q. All right. Then tell me what enabled other European nations to
9 dream about their unification, if I can put it that way. Is it again the
10 varying and sometimes blurred boundaries?
11 A. Well, I think we would have to bring up the case of a particular
12 people to discuss that question usefully. I mean, the Italian
13 unification, I think, is a particularly interesting parallel because many
14 people have estimated that at the time of Italian unification only about 2
15 per cent of the population spoke what came to be standard Italian, and in
16 fact that if people from Milan were walking down the streets of Naples
17 they could not make themselves understood. So I think that that's, for
18 instance, another case where the boundaries were unclear.
19 Now, if we were to taking the case of France instead, I think that
20 would be an interesting parallel in a different way, because it shows how
21 in a situation where state borders were relatively stable over a long
22 period, it was possible to make peasants into Frenchmen in the title of
23 the famous work that describes the process of national -- the creation of
24 the French nation between 1870 and 1918, but I don't quite know how to
25 address the question generally because I don't think there is one European
Page 24909
1 model of how the creation of nation states came about.
2 Q. On page 4, in footnote 10, citing literature, particularly
3 Nacertanije, you quote a book of Vasa Cubrilovic and an article of
4 Jelavich from 1848 where he describes it as a great Serbia programme. Do
5 you know that hundreds of books have been written about the Nacertanije or
6 the outline?
7 A. I'm sure that that's accurate and I would point out that I also
8 cite a book that was published by the Serbian academy, a collection of
9 articles I think simply called "Ilija Garasanin." I cite, for instance,
10 Radovan Samardzic's piece in that. Earlier I believe I cited another
11 author's piece on the Nacertanije.
12 Yes. In fact, if you will look at footnote 5, that's where I cite
13 Radovan Samardzic's piece from the international conference that was held
14 at SANU in 1987 in commemoration of Garasanin.
15 Q. Tell me, please, is the reason why Charles Jelavich is considered
16 by you competent on the issues of Nacertanije the fact that he claimed
17 that he -- it was the source of great Serbian hegemonism?
18 A. Jelavich does not in fact make that claim. The reason that I
19 cited Jelavich's article is that he sets out Frantisek Zach's draft on
20 which, of course, the Nacertanije was based, and he also includes the text
21 of the Nacertanije, and he addresses the specific question of in what
22 respects did Garasanin alter Zach's text. And the specific point that he
23 makes is that Garasanin in many places replaced phrases where Zach had
24 used South Slav, Garasanin put Serbian.
25 Now, the separate point of whether that makes this a great Serbian
Page 24910
1 programme, as I state in the footnote, I think that arguing about the
2 Yugoslav or great Serbian character of the Nacertanije, as so many people
3 have done, is really anachronistic because Garasanin writing in the 1840s
4 was considering what was possible and realistic for the Yugoslav state to
5 do. I've already stated that I think most Serbian politicians including
6 Garasanin saw Yugoslavia a Yugoslav project as a more utopian one,
7 certainly one that would have to be put off for a later time.
8 So my point about Nacertanije is partly that it simply deals with
9 the lands under Ottoman rule but also that Garasanin does not -- does not
10 clearly distinguish in his mind or does not ascribe great importance to
11 the fact that some of the lands he believes should form part of the
12 Serbian state, for instance, Bosnia-Herzegovina, have inhabitants who do
13 not consider themselves Serbs. He is clearly aware of that, as I stated
14 earlier. He speaks of the need for religious tolerance, but I don't think
15 that he in his own mind distinguishes, says to himself, "Well, therefore
16 this would be a creation of a new kind of state, a union of South Slavs
17 rather than a continuation of the Serbian state." And that was really my
18 point with regard to the Nacertanije.
19 Q. Very well, although I believe it is inappropriate to shorten my
20 questions on the report like yours, I will ask you concisely. Did you
21 have occasion to read many Serbian, Croatian and foreign historians who
22 also wrote about Nacertanije but did not consider it as a great Serbian
23 programme? They considered it, rather, a Yugoslav programme whose
24 objective it was to create a great Yugoslav state; Vasil Popovic, "The
25 Policy in the Balkans," or Dragoslav Stranjakovic at the Yugoslav national
Page 24911
1 state programme, "Princedom of Serbia, 1844." The book was published in
2 1931. Or "How Nacertanije Came About," 1939; Slobodan Jovanovic,
3 "Constitution Defenders and Their Government, 1838." It was published in
4 1953. And even the American historian David McKenzie published a book
5 "Ilija Garasanin, Balkan Bismarck, 1985." You also have Prince
6 Czartoryski and the book of Henry Batovski.
7 JUDGE MAY: Another list. What's the question?
8 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I asked a question, Mr. May, but you
9 obviously can't hear what I'm asking.
10 JUDGE MAY: No, I can't when you read out a list. You begin by
11 saying, "I will ask you concisely," and then you read out a whole long
12 list.
13 It may be Dr. Budding has got the point generally. Just a moment.
14 Let her answer what you've mentioned so far. No. I'm going to let the
15 witness answer.
16 THE WITNESS: If I understood the general purpose of the question,
17 it was what were my most important sources in considering the Nacertanije.
18 Besides the --
19 JUDGE MAY: No. Let the witness finish. Let her deal with the
20 sources and then you can ask your question.
21 Yes.
22 THE WITNESS: Well, besides the sources that I've cited in the
23 report, I made use of a book called "Nikar Nacertanije" [phoen]. The
24 author is Rados Ljusic, and it came out in Belgrade perhaps in '96. It
25 concludes an extremely useful historiographical review which summarises
Page 24912
1 the views of many of the authors that you've just referred to. So that I
2 think I'm broadly familiar with the development of Yugoslav and foreign
3 historiography about the Nacertanije, but I certainly would not be
4 equipped to state exactly what each author says. I think concretely in
5 general the Nacertanije was interpreted in Yugoslav historiography in the
6 inter-war period as a Yugoslav programme; in the post-war period as a
7 great Serbian one. I've already stated that, in my view, this whole
8 opposition is rather anachronistic.
9 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
10 Q. Yes, but it is indubitable therefore that a great number of
11 authors, both Serbian, Croatian, and foreign considered Nacertanije a
12 Yugoslav programme, not a great Serbian programme. You are aware of that,
13 I suppose, Ms. Budding?
14 A. I don't know about a great number but I think it's certainly true
15 to say that there have been many interpretations of Nacertanije as a
16 Yugoslav programme.
17 Q. Very well. Are you aware that especially in Croatia, Germany and
18 Austria in their historiographies, in the '20s and '30s, political
19 propaganda was started, taken over by Charles Jelavich and his followers
20 who took Nacertanije as the source of all evil in the Balkans, taking it
21 as proof of Serbian hegemonism.
22 A. There's nothing at all like that in the Jelavich article. It's
23 simply a scholarly article that does a textual comparison of Zach's draft
24 of the Nacertanije and Garasanin's Nacertanije.
25 Q. Well, it is the opinion of a great number of historians that
Page 24913
1 misunderstandings of scholars about Nacertanije started when the German
2 political ideology after 1930 started to accuse Serbia that it was to
3 blame for the war in 1914, linking that to its national policy. It seems
4 to me that you should know very well that this thesis was launched by the
5 Austrian General Stefan Sarkosic in his book "Banja Luka Process," 1933,
6 and it was continued by other historians. "Hotel Lambert and Croats" is
7 one of the books, 1942-1943, that is during the Second World War.
8 Then Petar Simunic, "Nacertanije, A Secret List of Serb
9 National --"
10 JUDGE MAY: I'm stopping you now. There is a question at the
11 beginning which has then gone off into a list, Dr. Budding, if you have
12 it, about the Germans accusing Serbia.
13 THE WITNESS: Well, I think that, broadly speaking, that's true.
14 I couldn't speak to all the sources that have been cited. I think that
15 many people have made tendentious interpretations of the Nacertanije, and
16 that's why I specifically state in my footnote to the report that, in my
17 view, the whole discussion of whether the Nacertanije is great Serbian or
18 is Yugoslav is in many respects an anachronistic one. I think it's like
19 any other historical document, it should be understood in the context of
20 its own time, which is the 1840s.
21 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
22 Q. Precisely in 1844. And do you know that Nacertanije was not the
23 fruit of great Serbian hegemony but the idea of British and French
24 governments who played a key role in defining Nacertanije because they had
25 advised the Serbian Prince Milos Obrenovic to conduct a policy that would
Page 24914
1 separate him from Russian protectorate and therefore propose the creation
2 of a great Slav federation which would include not only Serbia but
3 Montenegro, Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and others? They were
4 afraid that the government in Serbia, after the fall of Milos in 1839,
5 would abandon the idea of Yugoslav unification and turn to Russia. So the
6 idea is British. It was framed by the French and Adam Czartoryski, a
7 Pole, was an intermediary. You can find all that in Ekmecic's book
8 "Creation of Yugoslavia," 1918. Have you had occasion to see that?
9 A. When you refer to Zach's role, that's exactly what I was just
10 discussing; the differences between Zach's text and Garasanin's text. I
11 would not agree with the contention that it was the initiative of the
12 British and French governments, although I think it is fair to say that
13 they were, broadly speaking at this time, receptive to such an idea. It
14 does come very specifically from the Polish emigres circles around Prince
15 Adam Czartoryski. After all, Zach was his envoy to Garasanin.
16 And I would agree with the point as regards Russia. In fact, to
17 me -- I mean, since we seem to be talking about Garasanin, to me what
18 makes Garasanin stand out from other Serbian statesmen of the nineteenth
19 century is precisely his great degree of caution and even suspicion toward
20 Russia and its intentions in the Balkans.
21 MR. NICE: Your Honour, there's about an hour of cross-examination
22 by the accused left. I realise the Chamber has decided it's a matter for
23 him how he uses his time, but the report was, of course, responsive to the
24 needs of the Chamber and indeed to the Chamber's interest in modern rather
25 than earlier periods of time, and it might help the accused if, through
Page 24915
1 the Chamber, I make it clear that if the parts of this report, the
2 majority of the report which deals not just with the twentieth century but
3 with the matters really in hand, including, of course, in detail with the
4 memorandum and with the accused himself, if those parts aren't challenged
5 in cross-examination, it will be open to the Prosecution in its closing
6 address to this court to say that they stand unchallenged, and that will
7 be what we will obliged, and indeed happy, to do. I can do no more than
8 make that point in an effort to encourage, through the Chamber, the
9 accused not to waste his time but use it to value.
10 JUDGE MAY: He knows the time which he has available. He knows
11 entirely if he chooses to spend his time in the nineteenth as opposed to
12 the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, that's a matter for him.
13 Yes.
14 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. May -- Mr. May, I can only
15 interpret this as violence, because cross-examination makes absolutely no
16 sense if I am not able to go through the entire report. I will not
17 abbreviate my cross-examination. You can turn off my microphone whenever
18 you want. And the fact that Mr. Nice wants to note that I didn't
19 challenge something because you didn't give me enough time is the way you
20 work. I have already said generally that all this is intended to rewrite
21 history. You brought an expert on history here, and you are not allowing
22 me to cross-examine her precisely on the issues which matter.
23 JUDGE MAY: It's a matter for us to say, but if you choose, as
24 I've said, with the one historian that we have here, to dwell on events
25 long past as opposed to events that are more recent and relevant, we're
Page 24916
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Page 24917
1 not going to stop you, but your time is being limited. And if you
2 challenge the conclusions, particularly those involving yourself, then you
3 should do so in the hour that remains. That's the only point that's being
4 made.
5 Dr. Budding, you're feeling all right, are you? You don't want a
6 break? If you do want one, just say.
7 THE WITNESS: Thank you. I'm fine.
8 JUDGE MAY: Yes.
9 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Of course, of course I challenge
10 this, but I will come to that when I reach that part of the report, and I
11 don't think you should cut short my cross-examination simply because you
12 are using the clock as the criterion rather than something else.
13 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
14 Q. Do you know, Ms. Budding, who is David Urkvart? He used to be a
15 British diplomat, the secretary of the embassy in Istanbul.
16 A. I don't know that name.
17 THE INTERPRETER: Constantinople; correction.
18 Q. Do you know that it was precisely Urkvart? I'm saying this
19 because you said a moment ago that it was not the British idea that 1832
20 and 1833 he presented on behalf of the British government the Serbian
21 Prince Milos Obrenovic with the idea of Nacertanije. Just tell me yes or
22 no.
23 A. I don't think I understand the question. You're claiming that in
24 the 1830s someone suggested creating the document that then appeared in
25 1844 as Nacertanije?
Page 24918
1 Q. Yes. This Urkvart, on his visit to Serbia in 1832 and 1833
2 presented Milos Obrenovic on behalf of the British government with the
3 idea on the creation of Nacertanije. Do you know that? Yes or no?
4 A. This isn't making sense to me. I mean Nacertanije is, of course,
5 prepared under a Karadjordjevic King. I simply don't know what you mean
6 when you say that 15 years before the document was created and I think
7 there's no doubt at all that it was created on the basis of Zach's draft
8 coming from Polish emigre circles. I don't understand what you mean when
9 you that much earlier someone suggested creating it to a king from a
10 different dynasty.
11 Q. Yes. It was precisely Urkvart, and I think you're making a
12 mistake here --
13 JUDGE MAY: This is the last question on this topic. We've spent
14 a long time on it.
15 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
16 Q. Well, do you know that Urkvart in the magazine of the foreign
17 office called Portfolio in 1843, when the Obrenovic dynasty ruled, what
18 was the year of Nacertanije? So what is it Karadjordjevic or Obrenovic?
19 A. [Previous translation continues]...
20 Q. That's not true. 1844.
21 JUDGE MAY: One at a time. One at a time. Let's move away from
22 this. Let's get on to something else.
23 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
24 Q. All right. Do you know that in 1844, Urkvart published the first
25 version of Nacertanije called the project memoir of the Serbian
Page 24919
1 government, that is a year before Garasanin compiled the text which is
2 taken as an example of great Serbian hegemony. And the sources for this
3 are in the legacy of Urkvart in the Balliol College in Oxford?
4 A. If I could address one part of that question, you have used the
5 expression "Great Serbian hegemonism" repeatedly, but I have never used
6 either in this report or anywhere else so I don't understand how you can
7 say that I present Nacertanije as a document of great Serbian hegemonism.
8 I've also stated specifically several times now that I view the whole
9 debate about the Nacertanije's great Serbian or Yugoslav character as
10 fundamentally an anachronistic one.
11 JUDGE MAY: Move on to another topic.
12 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
13 Q. You say that Bosnia-Herzegovina was in the focus of Serb ambitions
14 after in 1878 having moved from Turkish administration to Austrian
15 administration. Do you know that the Berlin Congress gave Austria the
16 mandate to occupy Bosnia-Herzegovina and that the Serb prince and former
17 King Milan Obrenovic so it was still the Obrenovic dynasty and
18 unfortunately made a mistake there and a slip and his successor Aleksandar
19 had no aspirations towards Bosnia-Herzegovina because they waged an
20 Austrophilic policy and this was particularly true of Milan Obrenovic?
21 Are you aware of that?
22 A. I think that's entirely true that the later Obrenovics follow an
23 Austrophile policy and by that token are not seeking to appropriate lands
24 under Austrian rule. When I spoke of Serbian aspirations at that point, I
25 really meant if in a broader sense, that clearly Serbian intellectuals
Page 24920
1 still considered Bosnia and Herzegovina to be Serbian lands. If we were
2 to jump forward a little bit to 1911 and the statute of the organisation
3 unification or death they refer to Bosnia-Herzegovina among others as
4 Serbian lands, but I do not dispute your point with reference to the
5 foreign policy of the later Obrenovic Kings.
6 Q. On that same page on page 5 speaking about the ethnic and
7 religious picture of Bosnia-Herzegovina, you don't give us any concrete
8 specific data. Do you know that according to the results of the
9 population census of Bosnia-Herzegovina of the 10th of October, 1910,
10 which was composed by the statistical institution of the government of BH,
11 on the territory of Bosnia, not to read all the figures but just the
12 percentages, 43.9 per cent were Serbs, Orthodox, 32.25 per cent were
13 Muslims, and 22.17 per cent were Roman Catholics, and according to the
14 census in 1921, that percentage was as follows 43.9 Serbs, 31. --
15 JUDGE MAY: Let's deal with one at a time. 1910 census. Are
16 those figures roughly correct?
17 THE WITNESS: Yes. And as I state in the report, even at the time
18 of the first post-1878 census Serbs were the largest single -- or to be
19 precise, because the census was done on a religious basis, Orthodox
20 believers were the largest single religious group in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
21 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
22 Q. All right. And do you know that that proportion, the ratio of the
23 relative Serbian majority persevered until the 1960s?
24 A. Broadly speaking I would agree. I think the initial post-war
25 censuses are a bit hard to interpret because of the point we brought
Page 24921
1 yesterday, the very different options made available to Muslims in
2 consecutive censuses to in what way they could declare themselves.
3 Q. In the first sentence of paragraph 2 on page 5, you mention Serbia
4 as a potential Piedmont of the South Slavs. Do you know what that means
5 figuratively, Piedmont? Do you know that it means the centre of the
6 movement for liberation and unification according to same movement in
7 Italy?
8 A. I don't see it as figurative because after all that's literally
9 the role that was played in Italy, but yes that's exactly the point I'm
10 making that people, you know, both in Serbia and among the Habsburg Slavs
11 were seeing in Serbia that potential.
12 Q. And tell me why the liberation of Serbs is equated by you -- well,
13 never mind. I'm not going to ask you that. You explained that it was
14 translation, a question of translation.
15 When you speak of Kosmet, you always leave out the concept of the
16 whole, Kosmet and Metohija. Why?
17 A. I guess for the same reason that typically I've said Bosnia rather
18 than Bosnia-Herzegovina because it's common usage to use the first part of
19 the name to include the whole.
20 Q. So you always mean the term as a whole. On page 8, footnote 19
21 and 21 and before that in footnote 16 and in the text itself, you quote
22 "Kosovo, a short history" by British publicist Noel Malcolm. So I'd like
23 to ask you this now: Do you know that the historical institute of the
24 Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences organised a round table meeting to
25 discuss the values and worth of the book? And I don't suppose you're
Page 24922
1 challenging this but taking part were very leading academicians, Djordje
2 Bodozem [phoen], Lubov Dimic [phoen], Mila Bjelajac, and all the rest of
3 them and that they challenged the worth of the book and were highly
4 critical towards that work and stressed that it wasn't a scientific book
5 but quite simply a forgery and warmongering and a pamphlet, political
6 pamphlet. And on the basis of the discussions they had, the debate, there
7 was a response to Noel Malcolm's book, "Kosovo, a short history." And
8 have you had a chance to see that work?
9 A. Yes, I have and I thought that the contributions of Mila Bjelajac
10 and of Slubica Dimic [phoen] were particularly, as I recall there may have
11 been others, but I think that they made some quite valid points. I would
12 not be prepared to stand by Malcolm's book as a whole, but I did use it
13 and I used in the same way secondary literature by Miranda Vickers because
14 I don't read Albanian myself and so I wanted to use in addition to the
15 Serbian sources which are much more accessible to me. I of course wanted
16 to use the work of historians who do read Albanian.
17 Q. On page 8 you claim that after the Berlin Congress right up until
18 1912, there was sporadic acts of violence against the Slavs in Kosovo. And
19 whenever you speak about Kosmet, you mention the Slavs. Who were these
20 Slavs? Were they Russians, Czech, Polish people, Bulgarians, Slovenes?
21 Why don't you say that they were in fact Serbs and Montenegrins?
22 A. Well, I suppose I used Slavs to avoid constantly saying Serbs and
23 Montenegrins. In my testimony yesterday you suggested that in using the
24 term "Serbs and Montenegrins," when I used that phrase that I was somehow
25 denigrating Montenegrin nationhood. When I use the phrase "the Slav
Page 24923
1 population," I did specifically mean Serbs and Montenegrins.
2 Q. All right. I'm glad we've clarified that at least. In footnote
3 19, page 8, you state that the figures of Serb emigres from Kosovo are
4 questionable and you quote Stevan Pavlovic's information of 150.000 and
5 Malcolm who quotes 60.000, the figures; 150.000 and 60.000. Now, was the
6 reasons for their exodus of a political nature due to terror and crimes
7 committed by the Albanians that they were forced to leave?
8 A. Broadly speaking I think that's true. It has to be understood in
9 the context of the overall breakdown of political order in the European
10 parts of the Ottoman Empire and as I state in the report, I think that
11 events in Kosovo after 1878 also have to be understood in the context of a
12 great worsening of inter-communal relations with the arrival of Muslim
13 refugees from the areas newly taken over by Serbia.
14 Q. Yes, but as I mentioned, the figures that you use, Pavlovic,
15 150.000 and Malcolm 60.000, and you say that this is disputable because
16 there are vast differences and you can see, does it mean anything to you,
17 something that I am sure you know, by a respected anthropologist, a
18 Slovene, Niko Zupancic, and an historian, a Czech, Konstantin Jiriczek, in
19 1913 presented at the University of Vienna the figures that from Kosovo
20 from 1886 to 1912 150.000 Serbs were expelled?
21 A. I did not know that particular work. I think that all the numbers
22 in relation to Kosovo are extremely hard to establish, and in fact it's
23 true for the twentieth century as well. The censuses there are viewed as
24 particularly unreliable. I mean, in general, it's not an area with a
25 strong government, in some cases it's not an area with any functioning
Page 24924
1 government, and because of that I think it's extremely difficult to make
2 statements with any precision about the exact number of refugees at any
3 given period, but I certainly do not dispute the fact that there were at
4 this time very substantial numbers of Slavs driven out by the general
5 worsening of the situation and by violence directed against them.
6 Q. Well, I'm precisely talking about 1886 to 1912 when 150.000 Serbs
7 were expelled, and that was presented in Vienna by Jiriczek and Zupancic.
8 And do you know that a large number of reports which were sent by
9 foreigners during those years from Kosovo, sending out from Kosovo, spoke
10 about the great terror of Albanians against the Serbs? For example, the
11 Manchester Guardian, on the 1st of September, 1883, in fact, wrote that in
12 Kosovo, on a daily basis, there were the killings of Christians by
13 Albanians, and that is quite literally what it says in the Manchester
14 Guardian. In Kosovo, the daily presence of killings of Christians by
15 Albanians. And English archaeologist Arthur Evans, a renowned
16 archaeologist, on the 16th of September, 1885, in that same newspaper
17 wrote after having visited Kosovo that tyranny is ruling there, is
18 reigning there by the Mohammedan terrorists, and that's what Arthur Evans
19 wrote in 1885.
20 A. I was not aware of those specific sources but in the report I make
21 the point that I think you are making, that there was violence directed
22 against the Slavic population and that it worsened in this period.
23 Q. Well, all right. That tyranny is present to the present day.
24 Now, it is -- because 250.000 Serbs from Kosovo were expelled under the
25 auspices of the UN.
Page 24925
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Page 24926
1 JUDGE MAY: No. We're dealing with history now. Let's move on.
2 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Very well, Mr. May.
3 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
4 Q. Now, do you know about information and figures by diplomatic -- by
5 British diplomats, British diplomatic documents published in London in
6 1904 about Albanian terrorism against the Serbs? For example, the British
7 ambassador in Belgrade, Sir George Bonham, on the 7th of May, 1901, wrote
8 to the Minister of Foreign Affairs that 40 Serb families had fled into
9 Serbia under the threat of Albanian terrorism, and another consul in 1901
10 wrote to the minister that Old Serbia - and I quote him, "Old Serbia,"
11 that is to say Kosmet - was still a region of unrest because of racial
12 hatred on the part of the Albanians and Serbs are continuing to be
13 expulsed; and in December 1901 said that a further 250 families had to
14 flee to Serbia under the pressure of Albanian terrorism. Have you seen
15 those facts and figures, perhaps? Because it was diplomatic -- British
16 diplomatic documents that testify to it.
17 A. No, I haven't seen those sources but I think they're fully
18 consistent with the statements I make in the report.
19 Q. And do you know that the government of the Kingdom of Serbia
20 published diplomatic documents of crimes in Kosovo between 1899 and
21 onwards for the conference in The Hague in 1899? Did you have occasion to
22 see that document?
23 A. No, I didn't. As you're aware, this is an area that's covered in
24 two sentences in the report which does not deal in any depth with the
25 nineteenth century, so I haven't consulted any of these sources.
Page 24927
1 Q. All right. On page 8 you say, and I'm quoting you, that "this
2 sequence of events did not promise anything good in the position of
3 Albanians in the newly established state, which is quite apart from their
4 anomalous position as non-Slavs in a professly South Slav state." So
5 where do you see this unnatural position of the Albanians, or anomalous
6 position? It didn't incorporate Bulgarians who are South Slavs, for
7 example.
8 A. If I could, I'd like to read the sentence in English, because I --
9 sometimes there can be a shade of difference. I'm not making any
10 complaint about the translation, but I don't feel able to defend the
11 specific words as expressed in Serbian because they're not the particular
12 words I chose.
13 What I state in English: "This sequence of events did not bode
14 well for Albanians' position within the new state quite apart from their
15 anomalous position as non-Slavs in a professedly South Slav state." This
16 is near the bottom of page 5. The word "anomalous" I think does not carry
17 quite the same connotation as "unnatural." It simply refers to an
18 exception. Yugoslavia was created as state of the South Slavs. Even
19 under its original name of Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, it's
20 clear that the state idea, even before the name was taken in 1929, was a
21 South Slav idea, and it's because of that that I refer to the Albanians'
22 anomalous or exceptional position as obviously non-Slavs.
23 Q. And do you know that the new state, which you mention, in 1918
24 took over international responsibilities guaranteeing the legal status of
25 national minorities, including the Albanians by the same token?
Page 24928
1 A. Yes, it did. This was the common pattern in Eastern Europe
2 between the two world wars, that many guarantees of minority rights were
3 -- were taken on as legal obligations by the new states, the successor
4 states.
5 Q. Yes, but not only rhetorically and nominally as legal obligations.
6 Do you know that with the efforts of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, that
7 state which brought in laws linked to that particular subject matter in
8 regions inhabited by Albanians in Kosovo after 1920, 1.400 schools were in
9 fact opened and 480 buildings erected for schools, 2.000 teachers
10 employed. So all that in conformity with those legal obligations and that
11 in the languages of the minorities. Did you have access to those -- that
12 information and figures?
13 A. I could not speak to the numbers of schools or the numbers of
14 teachers. My basic understanding is that the state made an effort to
15 provide specifically Bosnian Muslim teachers to teach in Serbia and that,
16 other than that, the main form of schooling for the Albanian population
17 was in the Turkish language schools.
18 If I understood the broader point about the position of Albanians
19 in the inter-war state, I think that what's perhaps most important in
20 considering the Yugoslav government's attitude toward its Albanian
21 minority is its concerted efforts to change the demographic composition of
22 that region both by encouraging or colonising the region with Serb and
23 Montenegrin settlers and by seeking agreements with the government of
24 Turkey for the transfer of populations; in other words, for large numbers
25 of Albanians to be sent from Yugoslavia to Turkey.
Page 24929
1 Q. Very well. I won't quote to you how many pupils there were.
2 14.415, for example, is the figure for pupils of the non-Serb inhabitants
3 in 1924 and 1925. Otherwise, between 1931 to 1934, in addition to what
4 I've quoted, 451 Muslim schools were opened with a lot of muftis and 500
5 imams working. And 73 private Madresas where the Albanians were educated.
6 I'm sure I know those figures.
7 A. I don't know those figures but it's consistent with what I've said
8 about the use of, you know, Muslim teachers and also the use of Turkish
9 language religious schools essentially.
10 Q. All right. I'm going to leave that topic behind, then, to speed
11 up matters.
12 You say that most of the Serbs knew -- didn't know much about the
13 South Slav peoples, relatively little, and therefore were not well
14 prepared for life in a multinational Yugoslavia. Could you explain to me
15 on the basis of what you claim that? The Slovenes and Croats, did they
16 know something more about the Serbs perhaps?
17 A. I'm just trying to find the passage.
18 JUDGE MAY: Yes. Which page is that on?
19 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Page 9: "The vast majority knew
20 relatively little."
21 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
22 Q. Did the Slovenes and Croats know more about the Serbs then?
23 A. No. In fact, I make that point in the report, that I say that the
24 Serbs -- I can't seem to find the passage just at the moment, but as far
25 as I recall, I say the Serbs in common with other peoples now in
Page 24930
1 Yugoslavia knew relatively little about the others. So certainly my
2 implication was --
3 JUDGE KWON: Page 6, the first paragraph. Last sentence.
4 THE WITNESS: Thank you. I stated: "The great majority of Serbs,
5 in common with the other future peoples of Yugoslavia, knew relatively
6 little of other South Slav peoples and in that sense were unprepared to
7 live in a multinational Yugoslavia."
8 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
9 Q. All right. Now, the Sicilians, during the creation of Italy, were
10 they prepared to live in the mixed region of the Apennines or the
11 Bavarians for the Prussian concept of German unification, for example?
12 JUDGE MAY: I don't think that will help us. We're trying to deal
13 with concrete matters here. Yes. Let's move on.
14 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
15 Q. You mentioned the Nis declaration of Nikola Pasic in 1914 and
16 Regent Aleksandar's statement in 1916, once again within the context of
17 the Greater Serbian idea. Now, could you explain to us what there was
18 that was Greater Serbian in those texts by them. Was it perhaps that they
19 advocated a strong Serbia in order to create a strong Yugoslavia?
20 A. My specific point in relation to their texts was that they make no
21 distinction between the idea of Velika Srbija and the idea of Yugoslavia,
22 that in the Nis declaration the great endeavour of the Serbian state is
23 seen as a continuation of what the Serbian state has been doing in uniting
24 all Serbs. In Prince Aleksandar's statement, the statement "So that we
25 can make Serbia great so that it will include all Serbs and Yugoslavs so
Page 24931
1 that we can make it a strong and powerful Yugoslavia," it seems to me
2 extremely clear that in his mind Great Serbia, Velika Srbija, is a synonym
3 with Yugoslavia.
4 And I would note also - because it's in the footnote - that my
5 source for that quote is a book which itself is called "Velika Srbija,"
6 "Great Serbia" published in Belgrade in the 1920s by a Bosnian Serb
7 historian, Curovic, from Mostar. And I use that book as an example not
8 only because it contains this passage but because it was twice published
9 in Belgrade in the 1920s, actually, once under the title "Velika Srbija,"
10 "Great Serbia," and once under the title "Ujedinjenje," "Unification,"
11 and in that book the events of 1918 are very explicitly presented as the
12 culmination of the process going on through the nineteenth century, the
13 gathering of Serbs into one state. In other words, the Yugoslav state is
14 not conceived as something fundamentally new. I'm not in any claiming
15 that no Serbs were able to make the distinction between Serbia and
16 Yugoslavia. If we look specifically at some of the Belgrade University
17 intellectuals involved with the creation of Yugoslavia, some of them
18 envisioned a federal state. They very clearly understood that there was a
19 difference. My argument is simply that the dominant political current at
20 the time was not one that clearly understood the difference between Velika
21 Srbija - Great Serbia - and Yugoslavia.
22 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. May, the nature of this
23 cross-examination is such that the witness has to give lengthy answers,
24 and so I really would like to ask you to rethink your decision to restrict
25 my time in the manner that you have done.
Page 24932
1 JUDGE MAY: We will consider it, of course, but speaking for
2 myself, you have spent the best part of three hours arguing with the
3 witness mainly on, as far as I can see, totally irrelevant matter, or
4 certainly matter of very little relevance to the events today. You've
5 chosen to do that, you've taken up your time doing it. Now, let's move
6 on.
7 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. May, I don't expect you to learn
8 Serb history in the course of one session here, one sitting, but I do
9 expect you to bring your attention to bear on the very important facts,
10 for example, which have to do with the notorious truths that Serbia did
11 not occupy Kosovo but that for centuries Kosovo was a part of Serbia, and
12 a series of other matters which you consider to be important.
13 Now, as we are otherwise here for the most part redrawing the map
14 of history, then I consider this to be important.
15 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
16 Q. Ms. Budding, as you say -- actually, you mentioned the Nis
17 declaration yourself. It is in the Nis declaration that it says that the
18 First World War should end with the unification of the Serbian, Croatian,
19 and Slovenia people into a united Yugoslav state. So you can't call that
20 Greater Serbian. It was precisely in the 1914 Nis declaration that the
21 unification of the Serb Croats -- Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes was
22 mentioned. Isn't that right? Just give me a yes or no answer, please,
23 not to waste time.
24 A. I think that's fair. In the Nis declaration what I was trying to
25 convey was that the Serbian state idea was used as a synonym with the
Page 24933
1 incorporation of Yugoslav peoples, but I would agree that it's different
2 from what I just cited, for instance, in Prince Aleksandar's statement.
3 Q. All right. I cannot waste any more time to clarify this
4 thoroughly, but tell me just one thing: Why didn't you mention the Corfu
5 declaration from 1917 and the stand of the Slovene and Croat politicians
6 gathered around the Yugoslav committee who wanted to create a common state
7 together with the Serbs in order to avoid the fate of defeated nations
8 after the fall of the axis because their nations had fought on the side of
9 Austria and Germany against the British, French, Russians, and Serbs who
10 were on the same side, allied? Why did you skip the Corfu declaration?
11 A. Well, because I wasn't writing a history of what led to the
12 unification of Yugoslavia during the First World War. I mean, if --
13 obviously the Corfu declaration is extremely important, if I had been, but
14 I was trying to treat the whole period before the creation of the first
15 Yugoslav state as concisely as possible.
16 Q. All right. You were trying to be concise and that must be the
17 explanation.
18 You say on the bottom of page 10 that with the creation of the
19 Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes the Serb issue was resolved because
20 all Serbs ended up in one state. Didn't the same principle apply to
21 Croats and Slovenes who also resolved their national issues because they
22 all found themselves united within one state? Is that true or not?
23 A. Well, I wasn't addressing that point, but it really isn't true
24 because after all, large parts of the Adriatic coast in Istria at that
25 point were still with Italy. And as for the Slovenes, a significant
Page 24934
1 number were left in Italy in and Austria. So I wouldn't agree that the
2 creation of the Yugoslav state meant including all of those peoples in one
3 state, the creation of the first Yugoslav state.
4 Q. Well, Serbs also remained outside that state, in Hungary, Romania,
5 for instance, and you must know that. But I will now have to skip a
6 certain part because of these restrictions which I really believe to be
7 violence. On page 11 you say that during the Second World War on the
8 territory of Yugoslavia about a million people were killed. This figure
9 is not correct, Ms. Budding. The official figure published after the war
10 is 1.706.000 killed. Do you know that?
11 A. It's certainly true that that was the official figure presented
12 after the war for the purpose of claiming German reparations, but it's
13 well established in the more recent scholarship that that figure included
14 demographic losses, that it in fact was not the number killed during the
15 war but it included people who were not born because of the war.
16 Q. All right. So you questioned this. On page 15 you say that the
17 Ustasha extremist emigration was a marginal group in the Croatian people
18 in politics. If this is true, how it is possible that such a marginalised
19 group ruled for four years the Independent State of Croatia and managed to
20 organise and carry out a genocidal campaign against the Serbs who amounted
21 to one-third of the population of Croatia, according to your own
22 recognition, and killed 700.000 Serbs? You call it "hundreds of
23 thousands."
24 A. Before I address the broader question, I have a translation
25 question. You -- the translation that has appeared on my screen says,
Page 24935
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13 English transcripts.
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Page 24936
1 "You call it hundreds of thousands," which is correct, I call it hundreds
2 of thousands. But I thought that I heard you say I call it stotinu
3 [phoen], in other words, 100.000. Could we clarify that? Because I did
4 not call it 100.000.
5 Q. What did you call it?
6 A. I said hundreds of thousands. I think in the footnote I may have
7 given the estimate of approximately 300.000. The numbers remain to be
8 fully ascertained for reasons we could go into.
9 May I address the broader question about how did this marginalised
10 group managed to rule for four years?
11 JUDGE MAY: Yes, if you would, please.
12 THE WITNESS: They couldn't have if the Germans had not put them
13 in place. I think that's very clear. When we say they managed to rule,
14 in what sense? I mean, they managed to rule a so-called independent state
15 which was divided between the German area and the Italian area, and even
16 with that immense help, they obviously were not able to maintain any kind
17 of control over large parts of the territory.
18 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
19 Q. Well, why were you silent about the methods of genocide of the
20 Ustasha rule over the Serbs and their attempts to exterminate Serbs? It
21 was precisely a Croat who wrote about this, Viktor Novak in his book
22 "Magnum Crimen" and he emphasised the role of the Catholic church whose
23 priests advocated and even were involved in the crimes against Serbs. Is
24 that in dispute?
25 A. I think I see two questions. Why did I not discuss the questions
Page 24937
1 of Ustasha genocide, and I of course use the phrase -- I say that the
2 Ustasha committed genocide, and in my view, that is not in any way
3 debatable. I didn't have a reason in the context of the report, and again
4 trying to be brief, to talk about all the various methods that they used.
5 And as far as the role of the Catholic church, I think that undeniably
6 there were priests who participated in the persecution, the killing, and
7 also in the forced conversion of many Serbs.
8 Q. Well, you maybe read the book of John Cornwall, "Hitler's Pope:
9 The Secret History of Pius XII," published in 1998.
10 A. No, I haven't read that. I wasn't writing a report about the role
11 of the Vatican.
12 Q. Somebody will have to write a report on that too. But tell me,
13 since a moment ago you largely minimised the number of Serbs killed during
14 that genocide, in my opinion --
15 JUDGE MAY: That is not a fair characterisation of the response.
16 Let us move on. What is the question?
17 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
18 Q. Well, if that is not true, I want to ask this: Do you know, and
19 I'm not now going to read out from encyclopaedias, lexicons and other
20 books, for instance, in the encyclopaedia "Holocaust" published in
21 Jerusalem, the figure is quoted on Jasenovac of 600.000, 600.000 killed
22 only in Jasenovac. This is the encyclopaedia on Holocaust. Are you
23 questioning that figure?
24 A. I don't believe that 600.000 people died in Jasenovac. I don't
25 think that in saying that I in any way minimise the evil that occurred
Page 24938
1 there. I've already said that I used the word genocide for what the
2 Ustasha regime attempted against its Serb population, and I don't believe
3 that any other word would be appropriate.
4 With regard to the exact figures, I've relied on the views of two
5 historians or demographers whose work last been the most respected, the
6 most accepted in the 1980s and whose work is fully consistent with the
7 figures we have for demographic and other losses. Nobody knows exactly
8 how many Serbs died in the independent state of Croatia. We can
9 approximate the total number who died. Nobody is able on the basis of
10 current knowledge to give an exact breakdown, how many were killed in
11 Jasenovac, how many were killed in villages, herded into churches and
12 burned, how many were killed in Jamaj at the pits. I don't myself see
13 that this alters the nature of what the Ustasha did, this dispute over
14 figures and exactly how many died at Jasenovac.
15 Q. Well, I think it does amount to disputing if you minimise the
16 figure, although genocide is also something you recognise. But on page 16
17 you say that during the Second World War, tens of thousands of Serbs were
18 expelled from Kosovo, whereas we have research to the effect that from the
19 Italian occupation zone, over 40.000 Serbs were expelled from Kosovo, and
20 German authorities in Pristina were asked to approve the expelling of
21 another 70.000 Serbs, and this is written about by Pavle Dzeletovic in his
22 book, "The Balistic Movement." He quotes the figure of 93.330 expellees
23 from Kosovo. Do you also take that into account?
24 A. Again, I think that in discussing any of these figures we have to
25 recognise that we're dealing with incomplete sources. I think that the
Page 24939
1 estimate of the German regime in Belgrade I believe in 1944 that about
2 40.000 Serbs had been expelled up to that point is likely to be Serbs and
3 Montenegrins, is likely to be an accurate one because the Germans in
4 general were keeping track of this kind of thing. They were very greatly
5 concerned about the chaos created in their, you know, occupation of Serbia
6 by the arrival of great numbers of refugees both from the Ustasha state
7 and from Italian-controlled Kosovo.
8 THE ACCUSED: All right. Mr. May, you are not going to extend my
9 time, are you?
10 JUDGE MAY: No.
11 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
12 Q. Well, do you dispute the fact confirmed in her -- in their book on
13 Kosovo and Metohija by a group of authors that over 10.000 Serbs were
14 killed in addition to those 70.000 and 93.000? Some figures go up to
15 200.000 were killed by these Albanian Balisti.
16 A. I would guess that the figure of about 10.000 death is probably
17 reasonably accurate. Again, the numbers here are very difficult to get a
18 handle on on the basis of the available data. I mentioned before that I
19 have relied primarily for wartime losses on the works of Zerjavic and
20 Kocevic, and for most regions of former Yugoslavia, they arrive at figures
21 for real losses which are within a few percentage points of each other but
22 for Kosovo they offer very different figures. Part of the reason for that
23 is that the censuses in that area are particularly unreliable. So that
24 I'm reluctant to commit myself to specific numbers, but 10.000 seems about
25 right to me. Whether they were all killed by the Balistis as opposed to
Page 24940
1 other groups, I think that's harder to say.
2 Q. All right. I obviously have to hurry up, but even so, I won't
3 manage to ask you a lot.
4 On page 48, you say that Serbs were particularly suspicious of
5 Yugoslavism. Why do you say that, because in previous texts you said that
6 Serbs in Yugoslavia had completely united. In other words, wasn't
7 Yugoslavia the realisation of their dream to unite in one state?
8 A. Where do I say that Serbs were particularly suspicious of
9 Yugoslavism? I'm looking at page 48. I can't imagine I would have said
10 such a thing, and I also can't find it.
11 MR. NICE: If the accused tells us he is using the B/C/S version,
12 and he tells us as much, we can make that available immediately for the
13 witness.
14 THE WITNESS: I have it. I'm just - thank you - trying to find --
15 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
16 Q. I said it's on page 48. But let us go on. We don't have any more
17 time. If you didn't say that.
18 On page 56 and 57, you speak of philosopher Mihajlo Djuric and you
19 say that his speech about the injustice of internal boundaries caused
20 tragedy in the beginning of the 1990s. What was the scientific method
21 used by you in order to make such a claim? Do you know very soon after
22 that Mihajlo Djuric became a professor of the university in Vienna and
23 member of the European Academy of Sciences?
24 A. When I speak about Mihajlo Djuric's speech, I don't say anything
25 about the 1990s, so I'm not clear what statement you're referring to.
Page 24941
1 Could you quote me my words?
2 Q. I cannot. I don't have time.
3 On page 88, you say that Slobodan Milosevic radically reduced the
4 autonomy of the provinces. Tell me, what was this reduction of autonomy
5 all about? How was it displayed? But please answer quickly. I don't
6 have much time left?
7 A. Again, what I was referring to were the constitutional amendments
8 passed in the spring of 1989. The main purpose of those amendments being
9 to remove the guarantee contained in the constitution of 1974 that the
10 republican constitution could not be changed without the consent of the
11 parliaments of the autonomous provinces. And then the new Serbian
12 constitution passed in September of 1990.
13 Q. Yes. But all this happened within Serbia and did not hurt the
14 rights of any other republic in Yugoslavia. It must be clear to you,
15 isn't it?
16 A. Well, I would not agree that it did not affect the rights of other
17 republics in Yugoslavia, because of course since the provinces were
18 constituent elements of the Federation and since that did not change when
19 the amendments subordinated the provinces to Serbia, there were
20 substantial effects on the federal level, specifically that the Kosovo and
21 Vojvodina representatives on the Presidency on the Federal Presidency
22 could now be considered as under Serbian control, that we might say that
23 Serbia by virtue of the change in the province's status now had three
24 votes on the Federal Presidency while other republics had one.
25 JUDGE MAY: Mr. Milosevic, we will give you -- we will give you --
Page 24942
1 you were asking for more time. We will give you an extra ten minutes
2 until twenty-five past. You can have an extra ten minutes beyond the
3 time.
4 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] All right, Mr. May.
5 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
6 Q. On page 87, you say that it was not only the Serbian nationalism
7 that was responsible for the collapse of Yugoslavia but also Slovene and
8 Croatian nationalism, but the Serbian one is to blame the most.
9 Ms. Budding, by selecting historical facts and lopsided
10 conclusions, throughout your report you emphasise the thesis that Serbs
11 are to blame for everything.
12 JUDGE MAY: No, Mr. Milosevic. You can't cross-examine in this
13 way. First of all, you refer to page 87. That presumably means 57.
14 You'll have to point to a passage which you say is lopsided. If you can
15 do that, of course you can ask about it. But to make general allegations
16 of that sort is not a proper way to cross-examine. It's not fair to the
17 witness. It's not fair at all.
18 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] All right. All right. I really
19 have no time to look through the books themselves.
20 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
21 Q. Do you believe that the Serbs are to blame because they wanted
22 equal rights in Yugoslavia as everyone else? Did they ask for more than
23 equal rights?
24 A. I think that Serbs in seeking a revision of the province's status,
25 I think that there were many legitimate grievances that they were seeking
Page 24943
1 to address, but I also think that it was not possible to carry it through
2 in this way without changing the balance of power at the federal level in
3 a way that was bound to threaten others. I mean, just as a hypothetical
4 case, if after the provinces were reincorporated into Serbia, if the
5 Serbian leadership had said, "Well, now the provinces are no longer
6 constituent parts of the confederation, they in fact should no longer have
7 representatives on the Federal Presidency," then that would not have in
8 the same way changed the federal balance of power. There would obviously
9 have been many other issues. But I think that the particular way that it
10 was carried through was not -- was not one that had the result of making
11 Serbs simply equal in Yugoslavia but one that did raise for others the
12 fear that Serbia was going to wield ultimate control in Yugoslavia.
13 Q. Well, what you are saying is precisely what happened through
14 changes in the constitution of Yugoslavia, the provinces were erased as
15 constituent parts of the Federation and Serbia became just one equal
16 republic. You know that. It was a process. It couldn't happen in one
17 day.
18 A. Is there a question in that?
19 Q. Yes. I'm asking are you aware of that.
20 A. Well, I'm aware that the changes had the effect of making the
21 provinces no longer constituent parts of the federation. What I'm saying
22 is that then to be consistent in that approach it didn't really make sense
23 for the provincial representatives to continue to sit on federal bodies
24 where they would act in essence as two more representatives of the
25 Republic of Serbia.
Page 24944
1 Q. They continued to sit by virtue of inertia, pending changes which
2 were immediately proposed to the constitution of Yugoslavia. So it was a
3 process. And I suppose you are aware of that.
4 I have very little time.
5 Please, on page 89, beginning of paragraph 3, you cite a part of
6 the programme of the Socialist Party of Serbia concerning attitude to
7 Serbs outside of Serbia. My question is: Do you know that the basis of
8 the programme of the Socialist Party of Serbia, at least in this respect,
9 is underpinned by the Stockholm declaration and the Socialist
10 Internationale of 1989 and that particular part was taken over from the
11 programme of the German SDP party which is almost identical?
12 A. [Previous translation continues]....
13 Q. Very well. You quoted yesterday from the minutes of a meeting
14 held in Villa Dalmatia. I cannot remember exactly now, but I believe it
15 was the first meeting of presidents of republics to discuss the future of
16 Yugoslavia. There was a series of such meetings in Slovenia, Sarajevo,
17 here and there later. Do you remember that?
18 A. Yes. This was the meeting in March.
19 Q. So here is my quotation where I support the idea of Yugoslavia:
20 "Yugoslavia as a state community of equal peoples within internationally
21 recognised borders exists, and any change of its state structure is
22 possible only based on the freely expressed will of each of its peoples at
23 a referendum in view of the right of every nation to self-determination,
24 including secession. In the event of exercising this right it is
25 necessary to previously regulate the issue of borders, while respecting
Page 24945
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Page 24946
1 national, cultural, historical and other interests of each Yugoslav
2 nation." Repeat: Each. This is my approach, speaking of equality.
3 And further below, it says: "It is not an issue of perfection.
4 Perfect borders do not exist anywhere. But by applying this confederal
5 formula, there is no people more divided than would be the case with the
6 Serbian people," and so on and so forth.
7 Later --
8 JUDGE MAY: One moment.
9 Do you remember that, Dr. Budding?
10 THE WITNESS: Yes, I do.
11 JUDGE MAY: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.
12 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
13 Q. I only just received the newspaper Politika of the 29th of March.
14 Ms. Budding knows this newspaper. "Negotiations at the Yugoslav Summit
15 Completed in Split" is the heading. "Do everything to find a way out of
16 the crisis." And then it goes on to say: "Presidents of republics have
17 agreed that the state political crisis of Yugoslavia should be resolved
18 based on respect for civil, national and other rights in a democratic way
19 by negotiation. Yugoslav as a democratic community of equal nations
20 within internationally recognised borders and its state structure can be
21 changed only based on the right of nations to self-determination," et
22 cetera. "This is the beginning, the beginning of these talks."
23 Do you remember? I don't know whether it was the third or the
24 fourth summit meeting of the presidents of republics but it was held in
25 Sarajevo where Izetbegovic and Gligorov presented their platforms and gave
Page 24947
1 a compromise proposal, if I can call it that, as to the possible survival
2 of Yugoslavia, do you remember that?
3 A. [Previous translation continues]... it was only that first meeting
4 that I've had access to the transcript, and so my knowledge of the other
5 meetings would be from the press and would be far more general as to what
6 was said by whom.
7 Q. Well, I'm sorry to hear that, but at that meeting where two
8 presidents acted jointly, Izetbegovic and Gligorov presenting this
9 Izetbegovic-Gligorov plan, the Serbian leadership - that is I as its
10 representative - accepted this approach of Izetbegovic and Gligorov,
11 although it was a major compromise and a major sacrifice for us, but it
12 was precisely for the sake of a peaceful solution. Do you know that?
13 It's common knowledge.
14 A. I think that as we move forward in -- in 1991, there are certain
15 events occurring publicly and others occurring behind the scenes and that
16 I'm, for that period, much more aware of the ones occurring publicly so
17 that it becomes harder for me to place events in their context and to say
18 exactly what -- what weight should be given to proposals you've accepted
19 at that time.
20 Q. All right. But Ms. Budding, on one of the pages you take only one
21 minutes that was not in the public domain, but it was the same as minutes
22 from all the other meetings. What was communicated to the public is what
23 I read from this newspaper, namely that the understanding is to resolve
24 the situation in a peaceful, democratic way, respecting the right of
25 nations to self-determination and the right to equality but the solution
Page 24948
1 had not been found yet. That was public knowledge.
2 And as to these other meetings, we would again have to look at the
3 minutes to establish what the stances of respective republics were
4 concerning the preservation of Yugoslavia. What I'm asking you is this:
5 Do you know that this platform Izetbegovic-Gligorov offered at this summit
6 meeting at Sarajevo was accepted by me, that is the Serbian leadership?
7 Do you know that or don't you?
8 A. I don't remember that particular meeting and what was said at it.
9 Q. Well, then I'm not going to ask you any more questions about this.
10 You say on page 75 that Kosmet underwent limited modernisation and
11 urbanisation. Do you know that from the beginning of the 1960s, from the
12 fund for the development of underdeveloped regions, for the purposes of
13 economic development of Kosovo and Metohija, a daily allocation was made
14 averaging 1.3 million dollars?
15 A. I couldn't speak to the figure but I think certainly the
16 contributions from the fund for the less developed of Kosovo were
17 extremely great over the period from the mid 1960s through the 1980s.
18 Q. Well, Ambassador Christopher Hill told me, and he was at one time
19 head of mission in Albania, that when I go from Albania into Kosovo, it's
20 as if I was entering Disneyland. That's what he said.
21 Now, are you conscious of the different levels of development
22 between Kosovo, which in Yugoslavia was considered to be a backward
23 region, an underdeveloped region and that is why it received those
24 allocations, and Albania, on other hand, where without any Serb terror
25 whatsoever the Albanians themselves were able to build up their economy,
Page 24949
1 their country, and how shall I put it, their well-being, sought to their
2 well-being themselves and that there was an enormous difference between
3 the two regions?
4 A. I think that's very true. It -- I mean, it depends on the context
5 you place it in because of course Kosovo's relative position in Yugoslavia
6 worsened I think right after the war that the per capita income may have
7 been a quarter of that in Slovenia and by the -- near the end of the state
8 it was one-eighth. But I would not contest in any way that the Yugoslav
9 state made great efforts to develop Kosovo.
10 JUDGE MAY: You have two more questions, Mr. Milosevic.
11 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
12 Q. Now, is it clear to you that this continuity of care and attention
13 devoted to the development of Kosovo was in place until the occupation of
14 Kosovo that has just taken place under the wings of the United Nations?
15 A. I could not speak to the period of the 1990s, I mean obviously I
16 have some knowledge of this, but it's not expert knowledge.
17 Q. Ms. Budding, I just can't get through all these questions and ask
18 you several more things that I intended to ask, but let me just ask you
19 one more question. In your doctoral thesis, you quote on several
20 occasions as the reason for which Serbs couldn't agree to a
21 confederalisation of the country and then the destruction of Yugoslavia,
22 you say the geographic dispersion of the Serbs into several federal units.
23 I assume that is not being contested, although you don't have before you
24 your Ph.D. dissertation. So they couldn't agree to confederalisation and
25 destruction within the boundaries because of this dispersion of Serbs, the
Page 24950
1 greatest geographic dispersion. Isn't that right?
2 A. In the dissertation I refer many times to the fact that the Serbs
3 were the nation most dispersed within Yugoslavia and that this affected
4 their political views and attitudes toward the decentralisation of
5 Yugoslavia, but I never state that Serbs could not accept a confederal
6 solution.
7 JUDGE MAY: Thank you. We will adjourn for 20 minutes.
8 Mr. Tapuskovic, when we come back, it's for you to examine.
9 --- Recess taken at 12.29 p.m.
10 --- On resuming at 12.56 p.m.
11 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. May.
12 JUDGE MAY: Yes.
13 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] You interrupted me in the middle of
14 my last question that you authorised me to put.
15 JUDGE MAY: I don't think I did, but if you want to ask it again,
16 you can. Just one more.
17 MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]
18 Q. And that is the question half of which I put to you, that in your
19 doctoral dissertation you said that the Serbs couldn't agree to
20 confederalisation and the break-up of Yugoslavia along existing borders
21 because of their dispersion beyond those borders, and in your expert
22 report you criticise the Serbs for thinking solely about national unity
23 and envisaged common historical experience through the Drina Serbs on a
24 certain territory. Does that mean that this historical experience with
25 the Croats in this territory, including the genocide they went through
Page 24951
1 that we spoke about, is a greater motive for this than communality with
2 the Serbs? And do you think that there is a leader who is entitled to
3 make a decision to make discontinuity without a national referendum? Even
4 Izetbegovic organised a referendum without the Serbs and provoked the war.
5 A. Well, first, the point about my dissertation as I stated before, I
6 don't say that Serbs could not accept confederalisation. The broader
7 point about national referendums, I stated yesterday that I don't see -- I
8 simply don't see that as a realistic proposal because there were so many
9 heavily mixed areas, particularly urban areas. What would a national
10 referendum have meant?
11 I think that people of course have national interests. They have
12 interest in not being oppressed. They have interests in being able to use
13 their language. But people don't live in nations. They live in houses or
14 apartments, and they live with people of other nations.
15 JUDGE MAY: Yes. Mr. Tapuskovic.
16 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Thank you, Your Honours.
17 Questioned by Mr. Tapuskovic:
18 Q. [Interpretation] Dr. Budding, I shall focus exclusively on your
19 positions contained in your report, only your own opinions and nothing
20 more. I may perhaps refer to certain well-known facts, but I will base my
21 examination exclusively on your own positions and also on the time period
22 between 1918 and 1945 onwards, because this is not just history for the
23 people living in those regions in view of the average lifespan of 80. So
24 many people are still alive who have lived through both the First and
25 Second World Wars. Would you agree with that?
Page 24952
1 A. [Previous translation continues]...
2 Q. I would begin with paragraph 4B of your report which deals with
3 the period from 1918 up until 1945 so as to provide some explanations to
4 members of the Trial Chamber.
5 A. Okay.
6 Q. Where you talk of continuity and contrasts, 4B?
7 A. [Previous translation continues]... oh, yes, continuities and
8 contrasts took place.
9 JUDGE MAY: Paragraph 4B.
10 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
11 Q. To avoid reading it by you I would like to read it for you, the
12 first paragraph and ask you whether you confirm that to be your general
13 position. "In the factors that defined Serbs' relation to the socialist
14 Yugoslav state, there are significant continuities with the first
15 Yugoslavia but equally important differences. Structurally, one might say
16 that the Serb position was unchanged. The Yugoslav state continued to
17 exist within similar borders, and Serbs were still the largest single
18 national group. Moreover, Serbs could feel that (through their
19 participation in the partisan movement) they had played a leading role in
20 creating the second Yugoslavia as well as the first. These factors
21 offered a basis for a continuing attachment to the Yugoslav state as the
22 state that united all Serbs and a special sense of Serbian guardianship
23 over the state." Is that correct?
24 A. Yes, that does represent my view.
25 Q. I would now like to know, is this attachment of the Serbs --
Page 24953
1 unfortunately I have to focus on this even though Their Honours may view
2 this differently, but I think I need to address this with you. This
3 attachment of the Serbs to such a state reflected the need to guarantee
4 over a longer period of time their physical integrity.
5 A. I'm not sure I understood. Are you saying --
6 Q. Allow me to explain. I should like to refer to two facts. You do
7 know that the first Yugoslavia was formed after all the able-bodied male
8 population of Serbia -- that 65 per cent of the male able-bodied
9 population of Serbia had been killed. That's correct, isn't it? And you
10 said that in the Second World War 1 million people had been killed. In
11 your report you refer to this figure.
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. And you took the position that out of that 1 million, just over
14 500.000 were Serbs. This is also to be found in your report.
15 A. [Previous translation continues]...
16 Q. So the needs of the Serbs to live in that state, was it in order
17 to avoid any such tragic situations in the future when they would get
18 killed again?
19 A. I think that the deaths of the First World War happened in their
20 own historical context of world war, obviously. The deaths of the Second
21 World War are different in that so many of them are due to the
22 specifically fascist nature of the regime; the Independent State of
23 Croatia and other factors in other parts.
24 I think it's worth pointing out that for the Second World War that
25 number of dead among Serbs does not include only Serbs killed by other
Page 24954
1 people but also Serbs killed by other Serbs in battles between Chetniks
2 and Partisans.
3 Q. I agree with you. I'll come to that too, but I would just like to
4 finish what I started.
5 In answer to a question from Mr. Nice, you were saying - and this
6 is to be found in your report, too - that in those lands there were always
7 -- the interests of the great powers were always -- had always clashed.
8 You even said rivalry between the great powers - this is to be found in
9 your report - that wanted to expand their influence over this area.
10 A. Yes, I state that.
11 Q. Now I would like you to explain to Their Honours, if you can,
12 whether anything could have happened through the will of any one of the
13 peoples of the former Yugoslavia as well as the peoples living under the
14 Habsburg Monarchy, could they have taken any decision about unification,
15 linking up, the formation of new states if this had not been approved by
16 the big powers?
17 A. Through the Second World War, I would say that it was not possible
18 for such things to happen independently of the will of the great powers.
19 Q. Thank you. That's the first point I wanted to make, though all
20 these things are interconnected.
21 Then also in that same chapter, 4B, in the very next paragraph you
22 spoke about the period after 1945, and you said: "After 1945, the
23 Partisans' assertion that they had solved Yugoslavia's national problems
24 by creating the federal state." Is that so?
25 "In the first years, post-war years, Yugoslav federalism served
Page 24955
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Page 24956
1 mainly propaganda purposes. The Yugoslav state at first followed its
2 Soviet model formerly federal but effectively centralised by party
3 control." Is that right?
4 A. Yes, I state that.
5 Q. My question would be, was it not only under the control of the
6 party but also the army and especially the authority of Josip Broz Tito?
7 Would you agree with that?
8 A. [Previous translation continues]... the inner party leadership,
9 and of course especially Tito.
10 Q. Then you go on to say: "Partisans' speeches hammered home the
11 contrast between their brotherhood and unity -" in quotation marks -
12 'based on national equality expressed through a federal system and the
13 false forced unity of the inter-war state." Is that right?
14 A. Yes, I state that.
15 Q. Then Tito himself returned to this theme many times in the early
16 post-war period and beyond. The Versailles process, he said, had produced
17 an artificial creation; a Yugoslavia that existed on paper only but not in
18 the hearts of the citizens. Is that right? You have that speech of his,
19 don't you?
20 A. Yes, I incorporate that speech.
21 Q. "This oppressive state had sown hatred between the Yugoslav
22 peoples and so was responsible for the catastrophe of 1941." Those are
23 Tito's words, aren't they?
24 A. That's correct. I'm paraphrasing there so it's not in direct
25 quotes.
Page 24957
1 Q. And then what I consider to be most important, again a quotation
2 of his which you're perhaps also paraphrasing: "Real Yugoslav unity had
3 been achieved only in 1945. We have divided ourselves formally by
4 creating the federal units so that we would better unite ourselves in
5 reality." Is that right?
6 A. Yes, that's correct.
7 Q. So my question is: He said here loud and clear that the federal
8 units existed only formally, whereas in reality there was unity based on
9 the principle of brotherhood and unity?
10 A. I think that's an accurate presentation of Tito's views. In fact,
11 he has other quotes about borders such as the one at the founding party of
12 the Congress of the Serbian -- the founding Congress of the Serbian party
13 where he states that borders are not terribly important because we're not
14 creating the borders of states that are going to fight with each other.
15 Q. Precisely so. And that is how it was up until his 82nd birthday,
16 because that was when changes occurred linked to the constitution,
17 especially the constitution of 1974.
18 A. With regard to the exact year, I would just point out that some of
19 the most important decentralising changes are really associated with the
20 amendments of 1971.
21 Q. I agree. But please look in paragraph 4B where you refer to
22 decentralisation and the arousal of national consciousness. This is a
23 large chapter. 4D, 4D, page 20. You say that there was a
24 decentralisation of the Yugoslavia party and state; is that right?
25 A. [Previous translation continues]... to the paragraph that
Page 24958
1 begins -- or, rather, it has in it the sentence "Kakua Yugoslavia
2 postijela decentralisopina" [phoen] or do you have another passage in
3 mind?
4 Q. No, that one. Paragraph or chapter 4D.
5 A. [Previous translation continues]... yes. I see the passage now.
6 Q. You refer to this process that started in 1968 or 1971, doesn't
7 matter, this process of decentralisation of the party and state; is that
8 right?
9 A. That's correct.
10 Q. And in one place you say: "The constitutional amendments of 1968
11 to 1971 vitally changed the position of the autonomous provinces of
12 Serbia. Thanks to those amendments, Kosovo and Vojvodina acquired greater
13 independence in relation to Serbia and greater authority in the process of
14 decision-making at the federal level."
15 A. That's correct.
16 Q. And then you also said: "Pursuant to those amendments, the
17 republics had prime sovereignty and all the other powers." Is that right?
18 A. I'm having trouble finding that passage. Could you perhaps give
19 me a page number or describe --
20 Q. Can we assist. Page 22. "These amendments resulted in both
21 federal decisions on economic matters being taken by consensus of the
22 republics and provinces whereby the republics and provinces had the right
23 to veto, which was the most radical measure." Is that right?
24 A. Yes, that's correct.
25 Q. And you conclude that chapter by saying that all those factors as
Page 24959
1 well as those factors linked to certain economic reforms and changes had
2 created a climate which enabled unheard-of national self-consciousness,
3 self-assertion. In these years, the Croats rallied behind a movement that
4 shook the very political foundations of Yugoslavia and was by far the best
5 known national movement known as the Croatian Spring, then the Slovenes
6 claimed that they had special status, the Macedonians also claimed the
7 right to an Autocephalous Church, then the Muslims acquire -- in Bosnia
8 acquired the status of nation, and the Albanians came out against the
9 Serbs and Serbia. That is your position, is it not?
10 A. The only thing I would note is that you seem to be reading from a
11 slightly different translation, but broadly speaking, yes, that's correct.
12 Q. This is the latest version that we have been given which has been
13 revised in relation to the first one. So I wouldn't spend any more time
14 on that talking about the Albanians who declared themselves, as we know,
15 the way they did. And then you end that chapter by saying that in
16 November, in 1968, among the students in Pristina demonstrations broke
17 out. And then you say that this period from 1961 to 1971 was typical by
18 the emigration of Slavs from the province in drastic quantities as you
19 mention in your report. This is the period 1961 to 1971.
20 A. I don't believe I spoke of a --
21 Q. The very end. The last sentence of that chapter?
22 A. What I have in my translation is "isalavenje slovena isopo Krajina
23 dovna --" [phoen]
24 JUDGE MAY: I'm afraid, could you speak in English for these
25 purposes.
Page 24960
1 THE WITNESS: We have different translations, but sorry. The
2 emigration of Slavs from the province. Well, let me actually find it in
3 English then to be sure that I'm ...
4 I said: "Slavic emigration from the province resulted in a net
5 drop in its combined Serb and Montenegrin population in decade between the
6 censuses of 1961 and 1971."
7 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
8 Q. I have to ask you first whether those emigrations actually started
9 with the amendments or in the case of the Albanians, was it in evidence
10 throughout those decades?
11 A. The emigration appears to have picked up speed after 1966, but
12 yes, to some extent it's present throughout the 1960s.
13 Q. Very well. Now look at the next chapter, please, 4E, "Serbian
14 reaction: Dilemmas of decentralisation." That is the heading?
15 A. Yes, I have that passage.
16 Q. First paragraph. And I think this is rather important for the
17 Trial Chamber, and I hope -- I think it will be of significance.
18 You say that: "The Croatian movement could appear threatening for
19 different reasons. As Yugoslavia's second-largest people, the Croats
20 could jeopardise the state's existence in a way that Montenegrins or
21 Macedonians could not. Moreover, any moves toward Croatian independence
22 revived memories of Serbian suffering in the fascist Independent State of
23 Croatia. Kosovo's central place in the Serbian national myth meant that
24 in the Serbian national imagination, the Albanian movement was arguably
25 the most traumatic of all." That is what you say.
Page 24961
1 A. Yes, that's right.
2 Q. Now I have to go back to paragraph 3A.
3 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Your Honours, if I can have a
4 little more time to complete my examination, please. It has to do with
5 the Second World War in Yugoslavia.
6 Q. "The New Regimes of the Independent State of Croatia and in
7 Kosovo."
8 A. [Previous translation continues]... Yes, I have that now.
9 Q. And you say here: "Hitler's April 1941 attack on Yugoslavia was
10 followed by the state's quick collapse. In the subsequent dismemberment,
11 various territories were awarded to the Reich, Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary
12 and Italy"; is that right?
13 A. Yes, that's correct.
14 Q. And then you speak of the campaign of genocide. I won't go back
15 to that because you have been examined about it. And then you make
16 assessments of the casualties of that war, and at the end you say a
17 relatively small number of victims in Serbia; is that right?
18 A. Yes, that's correct.
19 Q. And on page 20, Partisans and Chetniks, that is 3B --
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. -- it says, and this is your position: "As the preceding
22 discussion has indicated, during the Second World War Serbs were not only
23 exposed to the general rigours of occupation but were also the specific
24 targets of large-scale violence in both the Independent State of Croatia
25 and Kosovo."
Page 24962
1 So my question is the following: If you're talking about the
2 general rigours of occupation, did you have in mind the fact that there
3 were civilian victims in places where parts of Serbia were under the
4 Hungarians or the -- under the Bulgarians in Eastern Serbia? Were you
5 familiar with the civilian casualties in those places?
6 A. I'm more familiar with the casualties in the areas with mixed
7 Hungarians -- mixed Hungarian populations. For instance, the New Year
8 massacre in Novi Sad.
9 Q. And who were the victims?
10 A. The Serbs. I must say I don't know how many.
11 Q. I have to draw your attention to the fact that the only towns that
12 were bombed in the area of the former Yugoslavia when Hitler decided to
13 wage war against those lands was Belgrade and other towns in Serbia; is
14 that right?
15 A. To the best of my knowledge. I can't think whether he would have
16 had occasion to drop bombs anywhere else, but certainly the bombing of
17 Belgrade is the greatest action at that phase.
18 Q. And you also know that it was only in Serbia that for one German
19 soldier a hundred Serbs were executed, especially in Kraljevo and
20 Kragujevac; is that correct?
21 A. Yes, it's absolutely true.
22 Q. And therefore, this was not general rigours. It was slightly
23 different, because in the Balkan areas, the most radical measures were
24 taken against the Serbs.
25 A. In terms of the German occupation, yes, I think broadly speaking
Page 24963
1 that's correct. Except that I would say that the German treatment of the
2 Poles was really, if possible, more brutal.
3 Q. Very well. And now in this same chapter in which you speak about
4 the regimes in Serbia, and at 3A you say, in the second paragraph: "In
5 Kosovo during the Second World War, another change occurred in its status,
6 a second change in the twentieth century, with a foreseeable disastrous
7 effect." That's what you said. And then you referred to footnote 40, and
8 you say: "By returning to the situation prior to 1912 and during most of
9 the First World War, the Serbs and Montenegrin citizens of the region
10 became secondhand citizens again, whereas the Albanians took up positions
11 that were similar to the ones they had during the rule of the Turks." Is
12 that right?
13 A. [Previous translation continues]...
14 Q. Is it true that whenever there was a regime change and whenever
15 other powers got involved and changes occurred this happened? Started
16 interfering, in fact?
17 A. [Previous translation continues]... cycle of status reversal.
18 Q. I'm nearing the end of my examination. Now we come to 5A, chapter
19 5A, the very end of your report. And you say: "The third element of the
20 Yugoslav crisis, the demonstrations of the Albanians in Kosovo in the
21 spring of 1981 could have at first glance appeared to be a local problem,
22 even a trivial one as compared to the two others, however the event in
23 Kosovo were in fact of key significance for shaping the future of
24 Yugoslavia. The emigration of Serbs and Montenegrins from Kosovo became
25 the main national problem of Serbia in the '80s," and you end by saying,
Page 24964
1 "Actually this conflict assisted in speeding up long-lasting
2 inter-republican conflicts over the '74 constitution. As a result, Kosovo
3 became a catalyst of the break-up of Yugoslavia." Is that also your
4 position?
5 A. Yes, it is.
6 Q. And my last question in that connection is on page 25, the
7 paragraph just above the heading for 4B, and again your position, and I
8 quote: "Each time when the unity of Yugoslavia weakened culturally and
9 politically, the need arose for cultural or political unity of all Serbs."
10 Is that what we were saying, that there was always the danger present that
11 a repetition could occur of the things that had happened during the First
12 World War and the Second World War?
13 A. I'd like to take a moment to find the passage in English because I
14 don't believe I used a word that would be translated as "potreba." Could
15 you perhaps remind me of what was the section where this appears?
16 Q. It's 4A. The very end of that passage.
17 MR. NICE: Page 14, I think. 15.
18 THE WITNESS: Thank you. What I stated was over the 30 years
19 preceding Yugoslavia's collapse, the report will argue every decline in
20 cultural or political Yugoslav unity evoked a mobilisation for the
21 cultural or political unity of all Serbs. So I think in saying "evoked a
22 mobilisation" I was simply describing what happened. I did not say that
23 the need arose, which, in my view, would be making a value judgement.
24 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation]
25 Q. And the apprehensions, did they exist in view of the memories of
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Page 24966
1 the Second World War?
2 A. Certainly. I think that this fear existed.
3 Q. And I will end very briefly with the problem around the
4 memorandum. You said in that connection that in the memorandum, little
5 new was said, that these were all the same things that the law faculty
6 professors had said as early on as '71.
7 A. I don't -- yes. There's little that's new in it, and most of the
8 intellectual currents that are present in the memorandum do appear before
9 the memorandum itself. I wouldn't trace all of it as far as back as '71.
10 Q. And my last question has to do with the platform of the SPS party
11 when you said, "The platform also says that the new constitution of
12 Yugoslavia should enable the formation of autonomous provinces within
13 Yugoslavia, and the main aim of that proposal which appeared in a similar
14 form during the debate on the constitutional amendments in '71."
15 So it's the same things that were demanded in '71, the autonomy of
16 the Serbs in Croatia and no territorial claims at all; is that right or
17 not?
18 A. In regard to the specific proposal for founding autonomous
19 provinces, yes, I think that's right.
20 MR. TAPUSKOVIC: [Interpretation] Thank you.
21 MR. NICE: One question in two very short parts.
22 Re-examined by Mr. Nice:
23 Q. Dr. Budding, in the question where the accused was corrected as to
24 his manner of questioning he nevertheless advanced the proposition that
25 throughout your report you emphasised the thesis that the Serbs were to
Page 24967
1 blame for everything. Has that ever been your thesis?
2 A. No, and I state explicitly at various points that the subject
3 matter of this report is Serbian nationalism but that does not mean that I
4 hold Serbian nationalism exclusively responsible for the break-up of
5 Yugoslavia.
6 Q. And the second part of the same question: At page 60 in the
7 English version as filed, we find this represented in the following two
8 sentences. You have page 60, in the middle of the page, where you pick it
9 up with an analysis of your report, saying that the report is not -- the
10 content of the report "is not intended to imply that Serbia's leaders" -
11 so not just Serbs but Serbia's leaders - "bore exclusive responsibility
12 for Yugoslavia's collapse. Independently of Serbian actions, forces in
13 favour of independence existed in both Slovenia and Croatia. But
14 Milosevic's policies and rhetoric - especially once they began to operate
15 in the context of post-Communist electoral competition - helped those
16 forces move from marginal to dominant political positions."
17 That was the view in your report. Is it still your view?
18 A. Yes, it certainly is.
19 MR. NICE: No other re-examination of Dr. Budding.
20 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. May.
21 JUDGE MAY: Yes.
22 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] A request that this doctoral thesis
23 by Ms. Budding be exhibited.
24 JUDGE MAY: When we get it we will consider how best to deal with
25 it but we'll bear that in mind and we'll deal with it tomorrow when we
Page 24968
1 actually physically have it.
2 Dr. Budding, that concludes your evidence. Thank you for coming
3 to the Tribunal to give it. You are free to go.
4 THE WITNESS: Thank you.
5 [The witness withdrew]
6 MR. NICE: May we actually deal with the exhibiting of the thesis
7 on Monday when I'll be here? I shan't be here tomorrow.
8 JUDGE MAY: Very well.
9 MR. NICE: Ms. Bauer is going to the next witness. The only other
10 administrative matter is that the witness list that I promised earlier,
11 that is the complete witness list, the revised version of it will probably
12 not now be available until Monday. Apart from presenting that to you, I
13 don't forecast that we will need very much if any time for administrative
14 matters next week. It may be sensible just to take five minutes to map
15 out where we see ourselves going for the last part of the Prosecution's
16 case of the trial.
17 JUDGE MAY: Yes. We will deal tomorrow, then -- but you say a new
18 witness list. The order, I take it, will be --
19 MR. NICE: This is the -- this is not --
20 JUDGE MAY: The general witness list.
21 MR. NICE: The general witness list --
22 JUDGE MAY: Not the particular one.
23 MR. NICE: -- that explains where we are. That will be coming on
24 Monday.
25 JUDGE MAY: Yes, but I should say that tomorrow we'll try and deal
Page 24969
1 with at least some of the 92 bis statements we've got to deal with it.
2 MR. NICE: Certainly. Mr. Groome is on notice to deal with that.
3 JUDGE MAY: He's ready to deal with that.
4 Very well. Let's call the next witness.
5 MS. BAUER: Your Honours, the Prosecution calls the witness Stanko
6 Erstic.
7 For Your Honours' information, pursuant to a court order on the
8 11th of April, 2003, portions relating to paragraphs 11 and 15 of his
9 statement will be led viva voce.
10 [The witness entered court]
11 JUDGE MAY: Yes. Let the witness take the declaration.
12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I solemnly declare that I will speak
13 the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
14 JUDGE MAY: If you'd like to take a seat.
15 WITNESS: STANKO ERSTIC
16 [Witness answered through interpreter]
17 JUDGE MAY: Yes, Ms. Bauer.
18 Examined by Ms. Bauer:
19 Q. Sir, please state your name. Sir, can you hear me?
20 A. Yes, I can hear you.
21 Q. Please state your name for the record.
22 A. Stanko Erstic.
23 Q. Mr. Erstic on the occasion of the 19th of June, last month, did
24 you review your statement in the presence of a representative of the
25 court, and did you sign a declaration attesting to its accuracy?
Page 24970
1 A. Yes.
2 MS. BAUER: Your Honours, I would offer this statement into
3 evidence.
4 THE REGISTRAR: Prosecution Exhibit 510, Your Honour.
5 MS. BAUER: I will commence with the summary.
6 The witness is a mason by profession. He's a resident of the
7 village Medvidja which before the war was a mixed village of about 70
8 households situated in the municipality of Obrovac on the border of
9 municipality of Benkovac.
10 Villages inhabited by mostly Serbs surrounded Medvidja before the
11 war. Relationships between the to ethnic groups were good before the war.
12 However, after the referendum for Croatian independence in 1990, the
13 attitude of the local Serbs in the village became more antagonistic
14 towards the Croats.
15 They gathered in a local bar which became a hangout for the Martic
16 militia members and one could see them singing nationalistic songs. There
17 was a sign at the door of the bar which stated "Drinks not allowed for
18 Croats and dogs." The witness recalls that one of the lines of the songs
19 that were sung went along the lines: "Milosevic send us some lettuce.
20 There will be meat because we will be slaughtering Croats."
21 The Croat population was scared but tolerated this kind of
22 behaviour because local Serbs were increasingly armed. The witness noted
23 a heightened presence of Martic's militia in Medvidja in the months
24 preceding the war. Men of Martic's militia wore green camouflage uniforms
25 with a patch on their shoulders that had militia and SAO Krajina written
Page 24971
1 in Cyrillic.
2 Because of barricades erected by local armed Serbs travelling
3 became more and more difficult for the Croat population. At checkpoints
4 harassment of types against Croats increased; some of them were even
5 arrested.
6 On the 2nd of November, 1991, the witness was arrested for no
7 apparent reason by two of Martic's militiamen who were local Serbs. First
8 he was brought to a building full of Martic's militia in Kistanje. From
9 there he was brought to the police station in Obrovac which was also in
10 the hands of the militia. The following day, police interrogated him
11 about the movement of Croats, existence of weapons and the alleged
12 personal possession of a radio transmitter in the village of Medvidja.
13 Despite the witnesses denial of any knowledge or involvement in these
14 events, two members of Martic's militia took him to the old prison -- old
15 hospital in Knin which was used as a prison.
16 There the witness was detained with 120 other prisoners, all
17 non-Serbs from Croat or mixed villages in the Krajina. Most of them were
18 civilians except about 20 members of the Croat military.
19 Martic's militia functioned as guards at the prison. Every day
20 the guards took some of the detainees out of their cells, beat and kicked
21 them and swore at them. The witness considered himself lucky because he
22 only suffered from two broken ribs and one cracked rib.
23 Further, detainees would be taunted by these guards along the
24 lines the Croatian nation has to be destroyed, all Croats have to be
25 killed, Split and Zadar are burning, Sibenik will burn as well.
Page 24972
1 There was a section in the hospital that was being used as a
2 dormitory by Captain Dragan's men and members of the JNA reserve force.
3 Captain Dragan's soldiers differed from the rest. One could tell based on
4 their speech that they were not local Serbs but came from Bosnia or even
5 Serbia. Also, their uniforms differed from that of Martic's militia.
6 Once during his detention, the witness saw Milan Martic in uniform
7 walking around the compound of the prison.
8 Q. Mr. Erstic, did you known Mr. Martic at that time?
9 A. No.
10 Q. How did you find out that it was Mr. Martic you saw?
11 A. They told us that, the guards guarding us.
12 Q. And did you see at any time a senior military officer during your
13 detention in the Knin prison?
14 A. Mr. Mladic.
15 Q. Did you know Mr. Mladic before?
16 A. No.
17 Q. How did you find out who he was?
18 A. They told me, the guards did, while I was washing the corridors
19 down that it was Mladic.
20 Q. What was Mr. Mladic doing?
21 A. He was going round the compound, the prison compound, and with the
22 escorts of Captain Dragan, the army.
23 Q. Did you see him again on another occasion?
24 A. Yes, when there was the exchange, when we were exchanged, between
25 Zitnic and Pakovo Selo.
Page 24973
1 Q. And were you exchanged?
2 A. Zitnic, Pakovo Selo, it's in between. I don't know how to explain
3 it better to you.
4 Q. No. I asked you when that was, the timing, not where.
5 A. On the 2nd of November, 1991.
6 Q. Who brought you to this exchange point?
7 A. We were brought there by the special police from the JNA.
8 Q. How did you know that it was the special police from the JNA?
9 A. The guards told us. They said you'd be going -- we'd be going for
10 an exchange and the special police will provide an escort for you, and we
11 saw by looking at them that they were the JNA soldiers.
12 Q. When you say by looking at them, what exactly do you refer to?
13 A. Well, they had the green army uniforms, the kind that the JNA had,
14 and they had bulletproof vests on too.
15 Q. And how many detainees from the Knin prison were exchanged that
16 day?
17 A. About a hundred.
18 Q. And against how many Serbian prisoners?
19 A. Well, approximately 60.
20 Q. And what was Mladic doing when you saw him at that exchange?
21 A. He was sitting there. There was the International Red Cross there
22 too, and the people from Split, and they were having this discussion, and
23 they looked at the list to see if everything was -- everyone was present
24 and correct on both sides.
25 Q. Did you see Mr. Mladic anywhere or in any form again after this
Page 24974
1 exchange?
2 A. Well, just on television.
3 MS. BAUER: I'll continue with the summary.
4 The witness did not go back to his family home in Medvidja until
5 after the Operation Storm in 1995. Once he arrived in his village he
6 found his family house and another about ten family houses had been burnt
7 down and levelled to the ground. Also the two village churches were
8 damaged from explosives.
9 In relation to exhibits, the witness reviewed some patches to --
10 which are attached to his 92 bis package, during his stay. He reviewed it
11 during his stay in the Knin hospital.
12 Excuse me. That's a mistake. He reviewed it during the 92 bis
13 procedure but saw these patches during his stay in the Knin hospital.
14 Three of the patches were previously tendered into evidence as the
15 numbers Exhibit 349, tab 11, tab 12, and tab 13, and are only attached for
16 reference purposes to this summary. The remaining three patches, which
17 are not yet part of the evidence, are found under tab 2 of the exhibit
18 510, tab 3 and tab 4. We have singled them out to make it clearer.
19 That would conclude the examination.
20 JUDGE MAY: Ms. Bauer, there's one matter which needs
21 clarification. The dates appear -- both of the exchange and of the arrest
22 appear to have been the 2nd of November, 1991, according to the evidence.
23 So perhaps you could just clarify that for us.
24 MS. BAUER:
25 Q. Mr. Erstic, when were you arrested by Martic's militia from your
Page 24975
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Page 24976
1 village?
2 A. In 1991, on the 2nd of October.
3 Q. And you were exchanged when?
4 A. On the 2nd of November, 1991, that is to say a month later.
5 Q. Thank you.
6 MS. BAUER: That should clarify it.
7 JUDGE MAY: Yes. There's one matter the registrar wants to raise.
8 [Trial Chamber and registrar confer]
9 JUDGE MAY: Ms. Bauer, the matter which is raised by the registrar
10 is the question of the patches. We've got a binder with patches in at the
11 moment. I forget the number. 349. And if we can have them all together,
12 it would obviously be better.
13 I suggest what you do during the -- overnight, if you would, if
14 you would liaise with the registrar and we'll try and get some common
15 numbers for all of them together.
16 MS. BAUER: I will certainly do that.
17 JUDGE MAY: Thank you very much. Well, that's a convenient moment
18 to adjourn.
19 Mr. Erstic, we must ask you to come back to conclude your evidence
20 tomorrow morning. Could you remember during the adjournment not to speak
21 to anybody about it until it's over, and that does include the members of
22 the Prosecution team. And could you be back, please, at 9.00 tomorrow
23 morning.
24 THE WITNESS: Okay.
25 JUDGE MAY: Thank you. The Court will adjourn.
Page 24977
1 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 1.49 p.m.,
2 to be reconvened on Friday, the 25th day of July,
3 2003, at 9.00 a.m.
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