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Ambassador Herbert Okun was Deputy Co-Chairman of the International Conference on the Former Yugoslavia from 1992 to 1993. |
Ambassador Herbert Okun describes a meeting that he had with Slobodan Milošević on 18 November 1991, in relation to a plan to bring a peacekeeping force into Croatia. Milošević demonstrates his authority over Croatian Serb leaders Milan Babić and Goran Hadžić by committing their agreement to the plan:
"A. He said that [Milan] Babić and Goran Hadžić were both the political and military leaders in the Croatian Krajina. They were the local Serb political and military leaders.
Q. Did he say anything else with respect to those two men?
A. Yes. He discussed their attitude towards the peacekeeping operation.
Q. Can you please be more specific.
A. He said they would represent no problem. He was quite confident on that point, and said, “You can believe me, they will not represent a problem vis-a-vis a proposed peacekeeping operation.”
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"A. We believed at the time, and I still believe correctly, that the President had committed himself, the Yugoslav government, the JNA, and the paramilitaries and the irregulars, as well as the local Serb leadership, Goran Hadžić and Milan Babić, to the peacekeeping operation.
Q. You've told us that this was a long meeting. Was there any time during the meeting during which there was a break during which Mr. Milošević would have been able to, perhaps outside of your presence, use a telephone and contact some of these different people or parties?
A. No. I don't think he ever broke up a meeting to telephone somebody or seek advice or anything like that.
Q. Did he at any time express to you the necessity of having to discuss this matter with some of these parties and the need to perhaps get back to you regarding a future course of action?
A. No.
Q. And did he qualify the assurances he gave you with any statement to the effect that it would depend on further negotiations or discussions with these parties?
A. No. I would say to the contrary; he was quite confident in what he said."
Ambassador Okun describes a meeting he held with Slobodan Milošević on 1 December 1991 in relation to the Geneva Accord to end hostilities in Croatia, which Milošević had signed on 23 November 1991.
"A…. [Slobodan Milošević] said that the day after the signing of the Geneva Accord that he had been in touch with [Goran] Hadžić and [Milan] Babić, and he went on to say that they would respect the accord and that he had secured their consent. His words were, “I promised and I did”, meaning, “I promised you, Mr. Vance, that I would secure their consent and I have done so.”
Ambassador Herbert Okun’s testimony was compelling. As Deputy Co-Chairman of the International Conference on the former Yugoslavia (ICFY), which was mandated with mediating a resolution to the conflicts on the territory, Ambassador Okun and ICFY Co-Chairman Cyrus Vance met on numerous occasions with Slobodan Milošević, and several of his co-perpetrators. Ambassador Okun recorded what transpired at all of these meetings in his diaries, which the Prosecution submitted into evidence in the case. Slobodan Milošević did not contest the accuracy of Okun’s diaries.
Ambassador Okun provided essential evidence of Slobodan Milošević’s control over Croatian Serb leaders. The Prosecution contended that evidence of Slobodan Milošević’s power and influence over Croatian Serb and Bosnian Serb leaders could be seen in the fact that he represented them at meetings with international representatives.
Ambassador Okun’s testimony also provided evidence that indicated that Slobodan Milošević had a plan to seize part of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Ambassador Okun described a conversation that he had with Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Prime Minister Ante Marković on 6 November 1991, some five months before hostilities broke out in Bosnia. In it, Marković tells Okun that Slobodan Milošević and Croatian President Franjo Tudjman planned on dividing Bosnia and Herzegovina between Serbia and Croatia. The Tribunal would later issue an indictment against six of the highest-level Bosnian Croat and Croatian officials (Prlić et al. case) for crimes in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in which Tudjman is named as a co-perpetrator.
Ambassador Okun’s testimony showed that one of Slobodan Milošević’s co-perpetrators, Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadžić, appeared to be following this plan. In a meeting with Ambassador Okun on 17 September 1992, Karadžić said that international representatives could end the war if they brought around one table on the one side Slobodan Milošević, Croatian Serb leader Goran Hadžić and himself, and on the other side, Croatian President Franjo Tudjman and Bosnian Croat leader Mate Boban (who would also be named as a co-perpetrator of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia). When the Prosecution asked Okun whether Karadžić had omitted any significant participants in such a meeting, Ambassador Okun responded, “There were no Muslims.”
Ambassador Okun’s testimony was among the most important that showed Milošević’s knowledge of crimes being committed on the ground in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. In their meetings with Milošević, ICFY Co-chairman Cyrus Vance and Ambassador Okun put him on notice of crimes being committed in both countries. In one of those meetings, on 15 April 1992, Vance raised with Milošević crimes that were being committed by the paramilitary group of Željko Ražnatović, aka “Arkan”, in Bijeljina, on Bosnia and Herzegovina’s eastern border. Milošević at first responded that Arkan was there privately. When Vance challenged him, Milošević then said, “Only at the beginning [of the fighting], the rest of the time he was in Belgrade.” When Vance pressed again and said, “Everyone knows that Arkan was there,” Milošević finally admitted, “Yes. But others are in Bosnia as well.”
Ambassador Herbert Okun, a career diplomat, served with the United States Foreign Service from 1955 to 1991. In October 1962, while serving at the US embassy in Moscow, Okun translated letters from Soviet Chairman Nikita Khruschev to US President John F. Kennedy during the Cuban missile crisis. In the late 1970s, Okun was Deputy Chairman of the US delegation to the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks with the Soviet Union, known as SALT II. From 1980 to 1983 he served as US Ambassador to the German Democratic Republic, and from 1985 to 1989 he was Deputy Permanent Representative and Ambassador of the US to the United Nations. In 1991, he was appointed Special Advisor and deputy to the personal envoy of the UN Secretary General, working on issues related to Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina until 1993, and from 1993 to 1997 on the dispute between Greece and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. From September 1992 until May 1993, he was Deputy Co-Chairman of the International Conference on the Former Yugoslavia. From 1996 to 1997, he was Special Advisor to the International Commission on Missing Persons in the former Yugoslavia.
Ambassador Herbert Okun testified from 26 to 28 February 2003. The relevant transcripts can be accessed through the Cases page on this site.