Tribunal Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

Page 20577

 1                           Thursday, 23 July 2009

 2                           [Open session]

 3                           [The accused entered court]

 4                           --- Upon commencing at 2.17 p.m.

 5             JUDGE ORIE:  Good afternoon to everyone.

 6             Mr. Registrar, would you please call the case.

 7             THE REGISTRAR:  Good afternoon, Your Honours.  Good afternoon to

 8     everyone in the courtroom.  This is case number IT-06-90-T, the

 9     Prosecutor versus Ante Gotovina, et al.

10             JUDGE ORIE:  Thank you, Mr. Registrar.

11             Before we start with the next witness, very briefly, a few

12     procedural matters.

13             I was informed that there was something with D15777, a new page

14     uploaded.

15             MR. KEHOE:  That's correct, Mr. President.  I believe there's no

16     objection, and the new page 3 is 1D70 -- excuse me, 1D70-8586 which is

17     the new page 3 for D1577.

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes and new page is -- you had a better one or it

19     was a translation [Overlapping speakers] ...

20             MR. KEHOE:  It's a completed translation.

21             JUDGE ORIE:  It's a translation.

22             MR. KEHOE:  This is a complete translation of the document, the

23     English translation.  That's what we're ...

24             JUDGE ORIE:  That's all.

25             In the --

Page 20578

 1             MR. HEDARALY:  We just received this an hour or so ago.  We'll

 2     just check it and make sure that that was the issue.  I think there was a

 3     translation issue with one of the pages.  We'll just check it and get

 4     back.

 5             MR. KEHOE:  If I can correct counsel.  I don't think there was a

 6     full translation and the whole thing is translated now, but can you

 7     check.

 8             MR. HEDARALY:  Thank you.

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  Mr. Hedaraly, if we do not hear from you later

10     today, could we assume that there is no objection.

11             MR. HEDARALY:  Yes, Mr. President.

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Then, because, I think D1577 was already admitted.

13             MR. KEHOE:  It was, Mr. President.

14             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  So, therefore, it remains admitted evidence

15     and if there's any problem with it, we'd like to hear from you not later

16     than today.

17             Second issue.  After the recess, the Chamber intends to return to

18     five days of sitting a week.  We'll closely monitor how this works out.

19     The problem is not primarily in this case, but it'S the combination with

20     another case on which two of the Judges of this Bench are sitting.

21             Then the Chamber recently received a 92 bis application for 11

22     statements.  Now, if only for scheduling purposes, the Chamber would very

23     much appreciate if it could receive already a provisional point of view

24     from the Prosecution before the recess starts, because, if there would be

25     a strong opposition against these witnesses to be called without

Page 20579

 1     cross-examination, then the Chamber would decide on the basis of that

 2     decide that all witnesses would be called to be cross-examined and make

 3     them all 92 ter witnesses, that, of course, would have quite some impact

 4     on scheduling.  So, therefore, the Chamber would appreciate if a

 5     provisional response, I'm not asking you to -- to give it in detail but

 6     just to say, Well, majority or almost all of them we would agree with

 7     admission under 92 bis or for a majority we would still seek the witness

 8     to be called for cross-examination, so something of the kind so that we

 9     are not taken by surprise after the recess.

10             Those were the procedural matters I would like to raise.

11             Mr. Misetic.

12             MR. MISETIC:  Mr. President, may we move into private session

13     briefly, please.

14             JUDGE ORIE:  We move into private session.

15                           [Private session]

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Page 20581

 1   (redacted)

 2                           [Open session]

 3             THE REGISTRAR:  Your Honours, we're back in open session.

 4             JUDGE ORIE:  Thank you, Madam Registrar.

 5             Mr. Kehoe, is the Prosecution [sic] ready to call its next

 6     witness, which is -- there are no protective measures sought, which is

 7     Mr. Cross.

 8             MR. KEHOE:  I think the Defence is ready, judge.

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  I'm sorry.  You see, it's really --

10             MR. KEHOE:  It's vacation time, Judge.  Yes, Mr. President.

11             JUDGE ORIE:  Madam Usher is doing her duties appropriately and is

12     escorting the witness into the courtroom.

13             MR. KEHOE:  Your Honour, this would be General Cross.

14             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.

15                           [The witness takes the stand]

16             JUDGE ORIE:  Good afternoon, Mr. Cross.

17             THE WITNESS:  Good afternoon Your Honour.

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Before you give evidence in this Court, the rules

19     require to you make a solemn declaration.  You have the text already in

20     your hands, could you please make that solemn declaration.

21             THE WITNESS:  Of course.  I solemnly declare that I will speak

22     the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.  So help me God.

23             JUDGE ORIE:  Thank you.  Please be seated, Mr. Cross.

24             Mr. Cross, when I address you by "mister" rather than by title,

25     it is not in any way out of disrespect.  That's the way the Chamber

Page 20582

 1     addresses all witnesses appearing before it, whatever their function or

 2     title is.

 3             Mr. Kehoe, are you ready to --

 4             MR. KEHOE:  Yes, Mr. President.

 5             JUDGE ORIE:  -- examine Mr. Cross.  Mr. Cross, Mr. Kehoe is

 6     counsel for Mr. General Gotovina, and he will be the first one to examine

 7     you.

 8             Please proceed.

 9                           WITNESS:  TIMOTHY CROSS

10                           Examination by Mr. Kehoe:

11        Q.   General, can you state your name for the record and spell your

12     last name?

13        A.   My name is Timothy Cross, C-r-o-s-s, as in "sugar."

14        Q.   And now, General Cross, can you just give us your years of

15     service in the British army and the date you retired and the rank you

16     held upon retirement?

17        A.   Sure.  I joined the army cadets, actually, 1964.  Went to an army

18     college in 1967.  I went to the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst and

19     was commissioned into the British army in 1971, and I retired in

20     January 2007 in the rank of Major-General.

21        Q.   General Cross, I'd like to show you the report that you have

22     submitted in this cause.

23             MR. KEHOE:  And, Mr. President, if I could bring up 65 ter 1D2741

24     and if I could ask the assistance of the usher if the witness can have a

25     hard copy.  Thank you.

Page 20583

 1             THE WITNESS:  Thank you very much.

 2             MR. KEHOE:  1717.

 3        Q.   General, looking at this document, do you recognise this as the

 4     report that you filed in this cause?

 5        A.   Yes, sir.

 6        Q.   And turning to the -- it should be page 24 in e-court.  And that

 7     would be your curriculum vitae?

 8        A.   Yes.

 9        Q.   And do you recognise that as your curriculum vitae?

10        A.   Yes, indeed.

11        Q.   Now, we are not going go into that curriculum vitae and all items

12     of your background, General, but I would like to just discuss a few items

13     in your career that are pertinent to the hearing that we have hear today,

14     if I may.

15             Now, just going chronologically on some of your deployments - and

16     I start with your deployment in Northern Ireland - and when was that,

17     sir, and what type of operation was it, and what role did you have in

18     that operation?

19        A.   In 1978 I deployed to Northern Ireland as a captain.  I was a

20     part of a small unit that was looking after all of the ammunition aspects

21     of Northern Ireland, including the bomb disposal work in

22     Northern Ireland, and I ran the -- what's called the ammunition

23     inspectorate, and that took me around the province looking at all aspects

24     of the ammunition, including ammunition that was handed in by the public

25     which had to be disposed of, dealing with terrorists, and improvised

Page 20584

 1     explosive devices, and examining and producing reports on the ammunition

 2     that was stored by the British Army throughout the province.

 3             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes, Mr. Cross.  It is only now that the French

 4     translation was able to finish its translation, because it's --

 5             THE WITNESS:  I'm sorry.  I will speak a little --

 6             JUDGE ORIE:  -- slow down a bit.  Yes, please proceed.

 7             MR. KEHOE:  Thank you, Mr. President.

 8        Q.   General, specifically that's your role, but what exactly was

 9     going on with the British army in Northern Ireland during this period of

10     time?

11        A.   In 1969 there were what became known as the troubles in

12     Northern Ireland.  This was largely the Catholic minority who were

13     protesting in various ways, and that became so serious that the

14     government decided to deploy the British Army to Northern Ireland in

15     support of civil authority.  It's an operation which is called "Military

16     Assistance to the Civil Power."  And we deployed a number of troops early

17     in 1969/1970 whilst I was still at Sandhurst at the time being

18     commissioned, and those troops were there to help restore security to

19     Northern Ireland which would give the space and the time to the

20     politicians to try to resolve the problems within the Catholic community.

21        Q.   If we go chronologically General to your next deployment, I

22     believe your CV reflects that you were in Cyprus thereafter.  Can you

23     tell us a little bit background in that regard what the British Army was

24     doing, what type of operation it was, and what specifically you were

25     doing?

Page 20585

 1        A.   Yes, Cyprus was at the time -- well, Cyprus, of course, at one

 2     stage had been a British -- part of the British colonial rule, and we

 3     retrain two sovereign republic bases in Cyprus.  There had been trouble

 4     between the Greeks and Turks over Cyprus for some time, and in 1974

 5     Turkey had invaded the northern part of the island.  There was an UN

 6     observer force in Cyprus at that time, it became what was known as the UN

 7     force in Cyprus, UNFICYP, and it was a UN peace-keeping force that was

 8     deployed.  It consisted of a number of different nations.  The British

 9     provided a battalion to help monitor the line between the Greek and

10     Turkish half of the island, and we also provided a number of officers or

11     soldiers to the headquarters of UNFICYP based in Nicosia.  I was a

12     captain and deployed to take command of the ordnance detachment within

13     the support regiment of the UNFICYP headquarters.

14        Q.   The next item I'd just like to chat with you briefly about was

15     the Gulf war in the early 1990s.  Again, could you replicate your

16     explanation with regard to what the British army was doing, what type of

17     operation it was, and what you were doing?

18        A.   I was serving in Germany.  I had just taken over command of a

19     battalion, so I was now a lieutenant-colonel.  I had deployed to Germany

20     in September of 1990, which coincided with the invasion of Kuwait by

21     Iraq.  The British government along with others, of course, decided to

22     deploy some assets to Iraq.  We initially deployed a brigade in

23     September, October, November, and then in December it was decided to

24     reinforce that commitment with a divisional headquarters, a second

25     brigade, and a large number of supporting combat power.

Page 20586

 1             I deployed as part of the divisional headquarters.  I was the

 2     commander of the supply support for the division, and I deployed to

 3     Al Jubail [phoen] in December of 1995 and stayed through until we left

 4     in -- I think it was April 1996, once Iraq had left Kuwait.

 5        Q.   Now turning to the Balkans.  General, I believe you had several

 6     deployments at various levels in the Balkans.  Can we just go through

 7     those briefly?

 8        A.   Yes.  In 1995, the Dalton -- not the Dalton, the Dayton, Dayton

 9     Peace Accord had been signed.  We, the UK, had already deployed some

10     troops as part the UN protection force in the Balkans in the early 1990s,

11     what was known as UNPROFOR, and after Dayton we agreed to deploy a

12     divisional headquarters and other assets to help implement Dayton under

13     what was known as the implementation force or IFOR.  At this stage, I was

14     a full colonel, and I deployed as the commander of a logistic support,

15     force support, for that UK deployment.  That took me in through Split and

16     the division deployed up to Kupres, and Sipovo and other places in the

17     middle of Bosnia.

18             I left there after some months and came back.  I took over

19     command of a brigade in 1997 in the Balkans.  I went back to the Balkans

20     to take over command of my brigade.  My brigade headquarters was deployed

21     at this stage in various places throughout Croatia and Bosnia.  And I

22     stayed there for a tour with what was then called the sustainment fours

23     for the Balkans or SFOR.  I then came background there from after six

24     months or so, continued to command the brigade in the United Kingdom, and

25     then deployed to the Balkans, this time for the Kosovo deployment known

Page 20587

 1     as KFOR.  At which stage, again I was a brigade commander.  We deployed

 2     through Thessaloniki in Greece and moved both my brigade and another

 3     brigade into Macedonia.  This was on the assumption that the peace talks

 4     that were happening in Rambouillet at the time would produce probably, we

 5     thought, the equivalent of a Dayton Accord.  And the UK government, and

 6     indeed ourselves, believed that we would see that accord signed and we

 7     would then move up into Kosovo to conduct a similar operation to IFOR.

 8             As the Court will know that Rambouillet did not succeed, the

 9     talks did not succeed, and so NATO began a different campaign, and I

10     stayed with that deployment through until eventually I left the following

11     August, and we had been involved in various aspects of that deployment

12     which you may or may not wish to ask about.

13        Q.   Well, we can go into that a bit when we start discussing some of

14     the substance of your testimony.

15        A.   Sure.

16        Q.   If I can just cover one last item.  And that is your deployment

17     in Baghdad with the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Affairs,

18     ORHA?

19        A.   Yeah.

20        Q.   Which ultimately became as we know the Coalition Provisional

21     Authority or CPA.

22             Could you just talk to us just a bit about that and your role in

23     that?

24        A.   This began in 2002 for me, I won't go through the politics of the

25     run up to this, but around October 2002 I was told by the chief of the

Page 20588

 1     General Staff, the British chief of the General Staff, that he wanted me

 2     to establish a headquarters known as a joint force logistic component

 3     headquarters.  This would be a two star headquarters, a headquarters

 4     commanded by a Major-General, which is what at this stage my rank was,

 5     and that involved me establishing the headquarters within the United

 6     Kingdom but also travelling to the American headquarters in Tampa in

 7     Florida called CENTCOM where General Franks and his headquarters were

 8     planning for possible operations in Iraq.

 9             This, of course, had followed on September the 11th and American

10     forces had been in Afghanistan, initial deployment, and they were now

11     planning for possible operations in Iraq.

12             As the logistic component commander I travelled to Tampa on

13     several occasions, and with my other component commanders were looking at

14     the British contribution and possible involvement in that deployment.

15     Around Christmas time, the UK government, as a result of various

16     conversations decided -- came to the conclusion that our engagement in

17     that possible conflict would change.  Until that time we had assumed that

18     wee -- if it had become necessary, we would enter Iraq from the north and

19     we would deploy through the eastern Mediterranean ports along a long line

20     of communication and then enter Iraq through the north with an American

21     division and that our role would be to secure the northern oil fields and

22     the towns around Krukut [phoen] and elsewhere, the north of Iraq, the

23     Kurdish region.

24             The British government having concluded that the Turkish

25     government would not wish us to do that made the decision that we would

Page 20589

 1     indeed go south and work with the American forces in the south.

 2     Logistically that was a much easier operation.  At the time I was

 3     commanding under my command were two logistics brigades and a number of

 4     other assets, and as a result of this change, the UK reduced the logistic

 5     commitment to a single logistic brigade.  I therefore handed over

 6     responsibility for the logistic component command to a one star level

 7     brigadier, what some nations call brigadier general, and I returned to an

 8     appointment that I had held before this began.

 9             Two weeks later I was rung up by the chief of the General Staff,

10     and told that he wished me to go to Washington, to join a small planning

11     team which was led at the time by a man called Jay Garner, who was a

12     retired military -- US military officer, lieutenant-general, and this was

13     at the time called the Office of Post-War Planning.  This office had been

14     established under a presidential directive in January of 2003.  I joined

15     them in early February 2003, and I stayed with that team in the

16     transition to what became known as ORHA, as you have said; eventually

17     became the Coalition Provisional Authority.  I worked with them in

18     Washington, deployed to Kuwait in the spring, and then went into Baghdad

19     at the fall of Baghdad, with that headquarters, and I left Iraq at the

20     end of June 2003.

21        Q.   Just to clarify one acronym that you used, General.  You noted

22     CENTCOM in Tampa, that's central command, is it not?

23        A.   Indeed.

24        Q.   I'd like to talk a little bit initially about these two roles

25     that you had in the Iraq situation starting first with your role as a

Page 20590

 1     component commander, and then in your role working with General Garner in

 2     the Office of Post-War Planning or the office of ORHA, the Office of

 3     Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance.

 4             Now in page -- I best -- I believe it's page 9 of your statement,

 5     you talk a bit about this role as a component commander basically in

 6     paragraph 35, but I think it's the third line down or second line down in

 7     paragraph 35.

 8             Can you tell us a little bit, General, about what this means when

 9     you refer to a component commander?

10        A.   When the United Kingdom deploy military operations, they plan the

11     deployment within the United Kingdom in a permanent headquarters based

12     near London and with the Ministry of Defence they appointed a commander

13     for that deployment.  He is normally a three-star lieutenant-general

14     equivalent -- or equivalent rank, so it could be an airman or a maritime

15     officer, a royal naval office, or an army lieutenant-general.

16             That three-star appointment who commands the deployment is known

17     as the joint task Force Commander, and he is in overall command of that

18     deployment.

19             We then appoint five component commanders, an air component

20     commander, an air officer of two-star rank, a maritime component

21     commander, a royal naval officer of two-star rank, a land component

22     commander, a Major-General, normally one of our divisional commanders.  A

23     logistic component commander, depending on the size of the operation that

24     might be a one star or a brigadier general or two star major-general

25     rank, in my case for this deployment to Iraq it was a two-star rank, and

Page 20591

 1     finally a commander of our special forces.

 2             So there are five component commanders working to the Joint Task

 3     Force Commander.

 4             We deployed them in different way.  Normally on these operations

 5     when we're working with, particularly the US forces, we will often put

 6     our component commanders in the same headquarters as their equivalents

 7     for the US, but not always.

 8             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Kehoe, I consulted with my colleagues to know

 9     the details of how planning was made in military areas does not in any

10     way assist the Chamber in the determinations it will have to make.

11             MR. KEHOE:  I will get to the point of this.  I will

12     short-circuit this if I can.

13        Q.   General, you have in the workup an operational commander, an

14     overall operation commander; for instance, in Iraq, is there not?

15        A.   Yes.

16        Q.   And I believe in this case it was General Franks?

17        A.   Yes.

18        Q.   And you mentioned for us that you had a retired general, General

19     Garner, that was responsible for the post conflict work in Iraq; is that

20     right?

21        A.   Correct.

22        Q.   Now, when you have an operational commander who is, like General

23     Franks, getting ready to conduct this war, is he part of this planning

24     going on for the post conflict situation that General Garner was taking

25     care of and that ultimately you were taking care of, or is there a

Page 20592

 1     division of responsibilities?

 2        A.   In the example you're quoting, General Franks was the operational

 3     commander for the military deployment to Iraq.  General Garner is

 4     appointed to a separate office of post war planning.  His headquarters

 5     was based inside the Pentagon in Washington.  General Franks'

 6     headquarters was in Tampa, Florida, as we said earlier.

 7             Now, there is a linkage between them in that, obviously, there is

 8     a transition from purely military operations to the reconstruction of any

 9     nation or area of operations post-conflict.  But essentially, it is

10     Garner's headquarters who is trying to pull together the plan for

11     post-conflict reconstruction.

12        Q.   So would it be General Franks who is getting ready to plan and

13     conduct the war, and General Garner who is getting ready for the

14     post-conflict activity in Iraq?

15        A.   Correct.

16        Q.   Now, you talk in your report - and I'm referring to some of your

17     discussions in -- from paragraph 47 to 54, and we are not going to go

18     through all of that - but we would -- you talk about the what the end

19     state is and you explain what the general end state is, what you're

20     trying to accomplish.  And I believe you say that the offensive

21     campaign - would the offensive campaign and the peace support operations

22     be two components of that, whatever the end state happens to be, working

23     towards that end state?

24        A.   I should stress that the expression "end state" is relatively new

25     in doctrinal terms, but it attempts to encapsulate what it is that this

Page 20593

 1     operation is intended to bring about, the changes, what we want this

 2     place to look like once this operation is over.  And in most cases,

 3     indeed one would could argue in all cases, that is not a military end

 4     state.  It is it much broader and bigger than that.  So, for example in

 5     Iraq and indeed in Afghanistan, the end state is something about

 6     establishing a free nation that is at peace with itself and its

 7     neighbour, establishing democracy, a number of expresses that people will

 8     bring together to say this is what we would like this nation to look like

 9     once this is over.

10             Within that end state there are a lot of different organisations,

11     a lot of different players who will be a key part of bringing that about.

12     And the military's role is obviously to engage in military operations

13     should they be necessary, either in offensive operations and war

14     fighting, or, as I referred to earlier, to conduct peace support

15     operations if there had been an agreement prior to the move-in.  And

16     having conducted those operations, to then establish the secure

17     environment within which the non-military players will then bring about

18     this complete end state.

19             So, for example, the military would be responsible for securing

20     the environment that would then enable the judicial system to be

21     established.  And I could give some examples of that if you would wish me

22     to go into it.

23             THE INTERPRETER:  Please turn off all unnecessary microphones.

24     Thank you.

25             MR. KEHOE:  I'm sorry.

Page 20594

 1             THE WITNESS:  Yes, okay.  Not guilty, Your Honour.

 2             So they would be responsible for establishing a judicial system,

 3     and there would be people responsible for establishing an education

 4     system or a trade system.  Those people would come perhaps from a variety

 5     of different organisations, so in the Balkans, there were various

 6     players, non-military players, involved in that work the EU, the OSCE,

 7     the United Nations, a lot of non-governmental organisations who would all

 8     be responsible for delivering parts of that requirement to deliver that

 9     end state.

10             So being clear what it is you're trying to achieve is quite

11     important, if not very important, because then you understand what needs

12     to be done, and indeed you understand that when that has been achieved

13     this operation has been overall successful.

14        Q.   Well, just, if I may, referring to your statement, and I think

15     you alluded to this to some degree in paragraph 48 in the second-to-last

16     line -- or third-to-last line, "It is important to note that the military

17     and all its resources are only one component of the total resources of

18     the state that will be required to achieve an end state."

19        A.   That is correct.  And those other components can be made up of

20     other --

21             THE INTERPRETER:  Please turn off the unnecessary microphones

22     thank you.

23             THE WITNESS:  Can be made up of other state actors, but also as

24     I've noted, non-governmental state actors as well, so NGOs who help with

25     the humanitarian issues and international organisations under the

Page 20595

 1     umbrella of United Nations, perhaps, who will be helping to be deliver

 2     some aspects of that end state.

 3        Q.   Now, you mentioned to us the set up of a court system.  I trust

 4     that's one of the component elements that you are referring to; is that

 5     right?

 6        A.   Yes.  If I may just refer --

 7             THE INTERPRETER:  Microphone off, please.

 8             THE WITNESS:  If I may just refer to the attachment 3 that I

 9     included with my statement, which --

10             MR. KEHOE:

11        Q.   And that's -- if I may, General, that's on the last page of the

12     document.

13        A.   Yeah.  Essentially, what that attachment is trying to show is

14     that the constituent parts of any nation, nation building, post-conflict

15     nation building, has to encompass all of these, in this example, cords of

16     a rope, and the military is shown as a single cord here, but the rule of

17     law is a separate cord of this rope.  And that rule of law of course is

18     not necessarily unique but certainly will apply to that nation.  So the

19     rule of law in the Balkans might be different in the way that the

20     constitution is constructed to other operations around the world.  It may

21     be that some military assets are used to assist in that process, but it

22     is not the military whose role is to establish that rule of law,

23     policing, judiciary, prison service, and so on.

24        Q.   If we could go to the last page of this report to just view this

25     for on moment, the cord that you were talking about.

Page 20596

 1             MR. KEHOE:  If we can spin that.

 2        Q.   Now, General, in there you talk about the constituent's military

 3     being one of them, and you not the array of other components.  Now,

 4     discussing resources and those components, and I ask this question on the

 5     strategic as opposed to the operational level, when a decision is made on

 6     resources to be provided to all these constituent components, is that

 7     done on a strategic or an operational level?

 8        A.   It would be done --

 9             THE INTERPRETER:  Microphone off, please.

10             THE WITNESS:  It would be done primarily at the strategic level.

11     So, for example, when we were preparing to move into Baghdad, both for

12     the for the United Kingdom and indeed for United States and other nations

13     who were engaged at that time, there were people being nominated from

14     other departments, other governmental departments, to deploy alongside

15     the military to take the lead in standing up the ministries, standing up

16     the education system, and so on.  For the United Kingdom we deployed

17     people from our Foreign Office, people from our Department of

18     International development, and indeed capabilities from the police, the

19     Home Office, and others.  The United States and indeed other nations

20     deployed individuals from within their treasury departments, from within

21     their health departments, from within their education departments, an

22     array of individual who would be responsible for various aspects and

23     indeed the many subconstituent parts within each one of these cords.

24        Q.   General, I'd like to go into the central focus of your report

25     which is post-conflict matters, and peace support planning.

Page 20597

 1             MR. KEHOE:  And for the Chamber and all those in courtroom, we'll

 2     be referring for the most part between paragraph 55 to 79, and if we can

 3     start at the outset, General, with a comment that you make in

 4     paragraph 56, and it's four lines down:

 5             "That said, the lessons of history reveal that certain problems

 6     and challenges can invariably be expected in post-conflict areas."

 7             General, can you just elaborate briefly on that -- what you are

 8     trying to say in that -- what you were -- just explain what you were

 9     trying to say.

10        A.   Every -- this is obviously my personal story in the sense of the

11     different deployments that have I been involved with over the years.

12     Every one of those deployments is unique.  It's not possible to produce a

13     template, a solution that can be applied in every deployment.  What is

14     suitable for the Balkans, for example, might not be suitable for Iraq or

15     indeed a deployment to Africa or somewhere else in the world, and indeed

16     what is suitable for a particular part of the world at one period of time

17     may not be suitable subsequently as events unfurl and things change.

18             The reality, that said, is that there are certainly problems and

19     events that reoccur on these deployments.  When there have been -- when

20     there's been a war, when people have been at each other's throats for a

21     long period of time, in many cases many years, over many years, indeed in

22     some cases over many generations, then retribution, criminality, chaos,

23     you know, is an inevitable consequence in my experience.

24             So what we saw happening in Kosovo, once the KFOR had deployed

25     into Kosovo, what we saw happening in Baghdad is not unusual, not

Page 20598

 1     unexpected.

 2        Q.   Let us stay with that.  Those two items as we hear, and talk to

 3     us a little bit about what you saw happening in Kosovo on your KFOR

 4     deployment?

 5        A.   I think it might be helpful to just --

 6             THE INTERPRETER:  Microphone, please.  Thank you.

 7             THE WITNESS:  It might be helpful to just lay out from my

 8     personal point of view the run-up to the move into Kosovo.

 9     Notwithstanding what I was explaining earlier, as a result of the NATO

10     bombing of Serbia, the numbers of the internally displaced persons within

11     Kosovo who then subsequently crossed over the borders into Macedonia and

12     Albania and therefore became refugees, those numbers incrossed

13     dramatically over this period.

14             For various reasons which I'm very happy to explain, my brigade

15     ended up by building and running refugee camps because there were not

16     sufficient non-governmental aid agencies, or indeed UN agencies, in the

17     region to do that.

18             So I saw and worked alongside and operated the refugee camps in

19     northern Macedonia, in southern Albania, for some time before we moved

20     into Kosovo.

21             Once agreement had been reached for KFOR to move into Kosovo, the

22     original thinking was that there would be a sort of orderly return of all

23     of these refugee who had crossed over the international borders and that

24     KFOR would try and organise various aspects of -- of the infrastructure

25     and so on within Kosovo before these people came back.  What happened was

Page 20599

 1     the minute the border was opened, the refugee camps that I had built and

 2     operated, which contained several tens of thousands of refugees,

 3     virtually emptied over night.  Over two or three days, everybody just

 4     started returning.

 5             So the first thing that happens is that people want to go back to

 6     their homes, to their villages, to their towns, or indeed the cities,

 7     like Pristina, and trying to do that in an orderly way, it's always -- I

 8     wouldn't wanted to be too specific, but my personal view is always

 9     virtually impossible.  People, not surprisingly, want to get back to

10     their home villages and so on.  In many cases, of course, they had been

11     separated from members of their families.  Most of the refugees in

12     Macedonia were elderly or were women and children.

13             A lot of men had either been killed within Kosovo in the previous

14     years or they had gone into the hills and joined the Kosovo Liberation

15     Army, the KLA, or indeed had disappeared.  So families wanted to be

16     reunited with their fathers, their uncles, their brothers, or, indeed,

17     their children, and we did have quite a few families in the camps who had

18     just children on the way as they had been forced over out of their homes

19     and forced over the border.

20             So --

21             MR. KEHOE:

22        Q.   General, let me stop you right there just so I can ask one

23     question.  On this orderly return, why didn't you just set up

24     check-points and control this return of these refugees going back to

25     their homes?  Was that a viable solution.

Page 20600

 1        A.   From our point of view - and I say from our point of view, from a

 2     military point of view - we, of course, wished to ensure that the main

 3     roads, the main lines of communication, were kept open for the movement

 4     of the military and, of course, all of the supply chain requirements.

 5     And monitoring the flow of traffic up those main routes, in this case in

 6     Kosovo is there is only one main road from -- from Skopje to Pristina,

 7     alongside it there is a railway line, which we also established got up

 8     and running and used for these purposes, but essentially one wants to

 9     ensure that the military line of communication is kept relatively free,

10     and so establishing check-points to try and control the flow of traffic

11     using military police to do that is certainly something that we wanted to

12     do and in some cases established.

13             But, of course, these people came from their homes.  They had --

14     there were lots of minor roads, lots of tracks, lots of routes through

15     hills and the forests that got them back to their homes without using

16     main roads, and any attempt to secure, if you like, the border area, and

17     force people simply to use the main lines of communication, well, again,

18     would be very difficult if not impossible and would certainly mean the

19     use of a large amount of man power.

20             In Northern Ireland, for example, and I say this in my statement,

21     securing the border between the north of Ireland and the south of Ireland

22     was something we worked hard to do, to stop the infiltration of weapons

23     and other people and so forth.  We established many vehicle check-points,

24     many patrols and so on, but it is just impossible to seal a border in

25     that way.

Page 20601

 1        Q.   Continuing on with your observations and what you saw in KFOR as

 2     people began to move back into Kosovo.  Can you explain that a bit?

 3        A.   Yeah.  I think the -- there are a number of things that were

 4     going on.  One of the things that is most noticeable is that very quickly

 5     small businesses spring up all over the place so that people are selling

 6     literally jugs of petrol, bottles of petrol, by the side of the road,

 7     packets of cigarettes, and so on.  Where they get that from is debatable,

 8     but certainly essentially, to use the expression free enterprise, if you

 9     like, capitalism is trying to break out, people are trying to establish

10     businesses and they are trying to secure a living.

11             In going back to their homes and to their villages, one of the

12     sadnesses for me, in Northern Ireland, in Cyprus, in the Balkans, Iraq,

13     is that people turn to criminality and they turn to retribution.  They

14     try and find out who it was that threw them out of their homes in the

15     first place.  Maybe somebody who had killed members of their family, mass

16     graves, of course, are found this these places, people try to find out

17     who is accountable for that.  And there is a very difficult line for the

18     authorities to hold between doing that in a to formal coordinated

19     controlled way and just banditry and criminality breaking out.

20             In Kosovo, there was no doubt that there was a retribution going

21     on, the Serb families that had stayed behind were intimidated and KFOR

22     worked hard to stop that intimidation and to secure the areas and to try

23     and establish the rule of law in and around, but that is extremely

24     difficult to do and there is no doubt that there were murders and other

25     things going on whilst KFOR initially moved into and then established

Page 20602

 1     itself.  It is -- we're saying, of course, that in moving into these

 2     places there is a period of time when the military are establishing

 3     themselves as much as anything else.  They are getting their bases sorted

 4     and so on, but very quickly you would be want to be seeing patrols out

 5     and about and gathering as much information as possible, and then

 6     attempting to bring, establish the secure environment that I spoke of

 7     earlier on, that would then enable the non-military players to bring

 8     proper reconstruction and reconciliation and so forth.

 9        Q.   General, in paragraph 34, you note in paragraph 32 about the

10     chaos inherent in these situations and the types of crime were not

11     unexpected, but you note in paragraph 34 that there were 50.000 KFOR

12     troops, and it took between the 12th of July until -- in August of 19 --

13     excuse me, 12th of June and August, and I believe in paragraph 82 you say

14     it took six to eight weeks.

15             General, with that type of force of 55.000 -- 50.000 troops, why

16     did it take this period of time to get this situation under control?

17        A.   I think it is worth stressing that the total force of the KFOR --

18             THE INTERPRETER:  Microphone, please.  Sorry.

19             THE WITNESS:  I think it's worth stressing that the 50.000 figure

20     is roughly the size of KFOR and that includes, of course, headquarters

21     and support structures and support units, but nonetheless we're talking

22     probably effectively 30.000 to 40.000 troops who very quickly you wish to

23     get out and about driving in their vehicles, finding out what's going on,

24     trying to establish a secure environment.

25             The reality is that you can't be everywhere all the time, and

Page 20603

 1     certainly you can't be guarding every building, and protecting every

 2     village.  You try and establish a presence.  You make it absolutely clear

 3     to people that force will be used, if necessary, to stop looting and

 4     violence and so on.  In a situation like Dayton and IFOR this was

 5     relatively unnecessary, and very quickly the other agencies that we spoke

 6     of were able to impose and bring about the environment, the court system,

 7     the prison system, the economic development and so forth, but, as we

 8     know, sadly, in Baghdad that was not the case, and in Kosovo - although

 9     people worked very hard to establish that quickly - it did take a certain

10     period of time to do so.

11             I don't know, and I need to be careful in terms of these

12     time-lines and what was going on in terms of the amount of criminality

13     and the individual events that happened, my statement is intended to show

14     that it did take a period of time for KFOR to establish that secure

15     environment, and in my experience that is always the case.  I think it is

16     worth saying, too, that, of course, in any environment, in any city in

17     the world, there is always criminality.  That's why we have a police

18     force, so one never gets rid of criminality.  The important issue is that

19     people understand that criminality will be discovered, investigated,

20     people will be brought to justice, and there is an establishment of the

21     rule of law, and although KFOR made that very clear from the beginning,

22     it took a period of time before we were able to impose that and make it

23     absolutely clear to people that criminality would not be accepted.

24        Q.   Staying with KFOR, General, at paragraph 73 at the top with the

25     50.000 troops, from 30.00 to 40.000 on the ground, you note that:

Page 20604

 1     "Operation Banner and KFOR had, in my opinion, sufficient 'boots on the

 2     ground' to succeed - over time - in stabilising their areas of

 3     responsibility."

 4             So looking back, General, with that type of reference, the six to

 5     eight weeks, do you consider that KFOR was successful after this period

 6     of time and with a sufficient amount of troops to stabilise the area?

 7        A.   Inevitably that is a matter of judgement.  I would argue that

 8     Kosovo was ultimately successful and Northern Ireland was successful, but

 9     it doesn't mean to say - and I think again it is important to

10     acknowledge - notwithstanding -- notwithstanding the fact that I don't

11     take pleasure in acknowledging it, but in Northern Ireland for decades

12     people were killed, there were riots on the streets at occasional

13     seasons, known as the marching season in Northern Ireland, and indeed in

14     Kosovo for some considerable period after this time, there were incidents

15     that occurred which is why the military capability continued to be

16     deployed in Kosovo, and indeed continued to deploy throughout the Balkans

17     for a number of years and some aspects of it remains today.

18             The -- the balance here is how much of a presence do you need to

19     retain and sustain over time in order to sustain and maintain the secure

20     environment, and I won't go into great detail, but there is one problem

21     which in some places, if you keep military there too long they can become

22     a part of the problem, and so you're constantly trying to keep the

23     military reducing, in a way, and allow the civil establishments, civilian

24     policing and so forth to be established, and that is a difficult balance.

25     But I would argue, yes, Northern Ireland over time, but it was a long

Page 20605

 1     time.  One has to acknowledge that Operation Banner was in place for 37

 2     years in Northern Ireland.  It started the year I was at Sandhurst, it

 3     finished the year I left the British Army, and Kosovo continued to be a

 4     difficult place for some considerable time after my deployment.

 5             But over all, the rule of law was pretty well in place for -- for

 6     that time.

 7        Q.   Staying with one last question on Kosovo.  In -- you talk about

 8     some of the criminality that you observed in paragraphs 30 to 31, 32 of

 9     your report, and I would like to just focus you on the paragraph 32.  The

10     third -- fourth to last line:

11             "The perpetrators ranged from desperate refugees to organised

12     criminal elements including, I suspect, low level members of the KLA ..."

13             General with regard to these KLA member, I mean, United Nations

14     Mission in Kosovo, UNMIK, was essentially responsible for this area --

15     was responsible for the area, why didn't UNMIK or, in conjunction with

16     NATO, just go in and remove these KLA leaders whose soldiers might have

17     been committing some type of crime?  Why didn't they do that?

18        A.   I should say, I think, in response to that question, that that

19     sort of decision was -- would have been taken certainly above my

20     position.  So General Mike Jackson who was a lieutenant-general in

21     command of KFOR and the other national components and their governments

22     would have certainly been involved in such a discussion.

23             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Cross, sorry to interrupt you.  The question was

24     why they didn't do that.  Do you know why they didn't do that, because

25     you start now describing at what level such decisions would be taken.  Do

Page 20606

 1     you know why they did not do that?  If so, please tell.  If you don't

 2     know, tell us as well.

 3             THE WITNESS:  Certainly Your Honour.

 4             I think to be fair the answer to the question is I don't know

 5     specifically, but having lived through the experience, my understanding

 6     was that removing the senior command cohort would not have made a

 7     different to what we are talking about here.  So the --

 8             JUDGE ORIE:  That's your assessment.

 9             THE WITNESS:  That is my assessment, but I was not involved in

10     the decision-making process.  I'm not even sure, to be honest, whether

11     there was a discussion about the necessity to do this.

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Kehoe, please proceed.

13             MR. KEHOE:  Yes.

14        Q.   Staying with your assessment, sir, based on the situation, why do

15     you think it wouldn't have made a difference?

16        A.   The evidence that I saw, the evidence that I saw as I travelled

17     around Kosovo, was that much of what was happening was not done as a

18     result of specific orders being passed through a chain of command.  There

19     was no effective chain of command in many respects.  Now, again I have

20     not seen any evidence or construct within the KLA command chain, but many

21     of the people who were returning to their villages and towns, as I said

22     earlier, came from the refugee camps.  Many of the people who'd headed

23     for the hills inside Kosovo were ordinary people from these villages and

24     towns, and they were returning back to them.

25             I'm not aware that they were under any specific orders to do

Page 20607

 1     anything.  They just went home, and in going home and got back to their

 2     villages, they then established their homes and their livelihoods.

 3        Q.   And based on that, sir, these people that went up to the hills,

 4     did they, based on your knowledge, join up with the KLA while they were

 5     up in the hills?

 6        A.   Certainly some did, but I about not suggest by any means that all

 7     did.

 8        Q.   General, I'd like to just shift gears, if I may, and turn to some

 9     of the assumed facts that you were looking at in paragraph, and that

10     would begin on page 18, and I'm most interested with regard to the

11     paragraph (w) and (y) which discusses the amount of military police and

12     civilian police.  And while we -- in paragraph (z), which is the civilian

13     police and in the operative area --

14             MR. KEHOE:  Mr. President, and we did inform the Prosecution of

15     this, with regard to paragraph (z) we have sent to the witness a --

16     updated figures and, of course, these are approximations because they

17     don't squarely follow between the indictment and Sector South, but we

18     provided a information in D1577 and approximated the level of civilian

19     police to somewhere in the area of 700 to 800 as opposed to the 400 to

20     500 figure, and we did that based on the testimony of a recent witness

21     that came after the General had -- or we filed a report on the General's

22     behalf.  So I just wanted to advise the court of that as we move through

23     this, that we have actually upgraded that number.  Once again, it doesn't

24     squarely fall between Sector South and the indictment time-frame.

25        Q.   Now --

Page 20608

 1             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Hedaraly.

 2             MR. HEDARALY:  I just want to correct that the information we

 3     received was that that number was up to 700, not 800, and it was I

 4     believe not confirmed by the witness, it was an exhibit D1577.  So just

 5     so that the record is clear, that's the information we received from the

 6     Gotovina Defence.

 7             MR. KEHOE:  And the purpose, of course, is to put it in that

 8     time-frame.

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  [Overlapping speakers] ...  is that challenged?

10     Mr. Hedaraly give as small correction to what you said.  Any challenge to

11     that?

12             MR. KEHOE:  Mr. President, we were just trying to use the highest

13     number possible which was 700 to 800, so I mean if we can go with --

14             JUDGE ORIE:  Please proceed.  Let's try to come to what perhaps

15     should be the core of the evidence of this witness.

16             Please proceed.

17             MR. KEHOE:

18        Q.   Now, General, just looking at these particular figures in (w) and

19     (z), and as a preliminary question, this Chamber has received evidence,

20     and this is at D1361, at page 21, paragraph 147, that approximately

21     42.000 ethnic Croats who were internally displaced people from Sector

22     South alone, that was the number, and likewise have received information

23     that people were attempting to come back.

24             Without repeating what you said before, in detail, would such a

25     coming back of the civilian population into Sector South after Operation

Page 20609

 1     Storm present security concerns as you've addressed?

 2        A.   Yes.  I think 42.000 is significantly large figure and trying to

 3     control that flow would not be easy.

 4        Q.   And as you were preparing your report, were you aware of some of

 5     the events that had taken place that would lead to degrees of

 6     recrimination and revenge from the civilian population?

 7        A.   In what context?

 8        Q.   Of the people who had been expelled and were now returning?

 9        A.   And we're talking here of Kosovo.

10        Q.   In Kosovo as the -- and is the parallel with Croatia, coming into

11     the Krajina?

12        A.   Again, I must stress this is a personal judgement, but from my

13     experiences of all the interethnic and various other deployments I have

14     been involved with, the sad reality is that as people return bark, yes,

15     they -- they are involved in various aspects of criminality, and I

16     remember saying to, when we were building refugee camps in northern

17     Macedonia, having to explain to people, particularly the media, that

18     within these camps there were people who were angry and had had relatives

19     killed, and they were not innocent in the sense that they were -- this

20     was a sample of humanity here who had gone through very difficult times,

21     and it was quite clear that however hard we tried it was going to be

22     difficult, if not extremely difficult, to stop the sort of things that

23     you're alluding to.

24             MR. HEDARALY:  I am --

25             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Hedaraly.

Page 20610

 1             MR. HEDARALY:  Could we just have a clarification on whether --

 2     the question was whether the witness was aware of that criminality, and I

 3     think the witness is referring to his awareness of what happened in

 4     Kosovo.  If we can just clarify, because the question has the "to" and

 5     the answer is combines.  If we could just clarify that answer.

 6             THE WITNESS:  That is correct.  I can only comment on what I have

 7     experienced and seen in Kosovo.  I was not aware of what was happening

 8     in -- in this part of the Balkans in 1995.

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  Although usually the Chamber decides on what

10     to do with objections, and requests for further clarification, Mr. Cross.

11     You have directly responded.  I would invite you not to do that.

12             THE WITNESS:  I'm sorry, Your Honour.  I will wait.

13             JUDGE ORIE:  But I think it certainly is not dramatic, at this

14     moment, Mr. Kehoe, was it.

15             MR. KEHOE:  No, Mr. President.

16             JUDGE ORIE:  Then please proceed.

17             MR. KEHOE:  Yes.

18        Q.   General, before we move off this point, from your experience in

19     the Balkans were you aware what happened to the Croats in the Krajina

20     from 1991 to 1995?

21        A.   Yes, I was.  But not in -- in great detail.  I had not been

22     involved in the UN deployment to the Balkans.  I had been through the

23     Gulf campaign that I spoke of, and I continued to command my regiment in

24     Germany.  When we deployed as part of the NATO implementation force in

25     1995, we deployed the British forces through Split, through the port of

Page 20611

 1     Split, the airhead was in Split, and the shipping that we deployed in the

 2     theatre came through Split north port, and we took the equipment by road

 3     from Split across into Bosnia through the Kamensko crossing by road,

 4     so -- moving through that area listening to people talking to people, I

 5     was aware of the fact that there had been this trouble in the years that

 6     you mentioned.

 7             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Kehoe, I consulted with my colleagues.

 8             MR. KEHOE:  Yes.

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  If I look at your last question, that is the

10     question of a kind of -- from your experience as being a European, were

11     you aware of what happened between 1940 and 1945 in Europe.  These are

12     unfocussed questions which do not assist the Chamber.  The Chamber

13     invites you to come to the core of what, apparently, is -- was on the

14     mind of the Gotovina Defence when it selected this witness.  Until now,

15     if five per cent or seven per cent has even come close to that, that

16     might be a relatively high estimate.

17             Would you please not provide the Chamber -- of course, we do

18     understand that the experience of the witness in Iraq and Kosovo, et

19     cetera, is relevant for the experience on which he bases his expert

20     opinion.  But to ask the witness to tell a lot about what happened in

21     Kosovo and what happened in Iraq and then say, Well, could you please

22     compare that with Croatia, well, apparently the witness has relatively

23     little knowledge about that, doesn't assist at this moment, the Chamber.

24             Would you please keep this in mind, and could I ask you how much

25     time had you in mind to continue the examination of this witness.  By the

Page 20612

 1     way, the report is quite clear.  That's another perhaps small problem,

 2     that quite a lot of your questions are dealt with in the report in such a

 3     way that it's clear to the Chamber what the witness wants to convey to us

 4     and what you ask him does not always add much to that.

 5             Could you tell us on how much time you would still need so that I

 6     can consider that, together with my colleagues.

 7             MR. KEHOE:  Well, Mr. President, there are -- I do look forward

 8     to the opportunity to tying this all together to you and alleviating the

 9     Court's impatience.  With regard to the -- excuse me.

10             JUDGE ORIE:  There is no impatience by this Court, Mr. Kehoe.

11             MR. KEHOE:  Mr. -- I --

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes, would you please -- do you accept that?

13             MR. KEHOE:  Well, Mr. President, I would --

14             JUDGE ORIE:  If you don't accept that, please tell me.

15             MR. KEHOE:  I don't accept that.

16             JUDGE ORIE:  Okay.  That's clear.  That's on the record now.

17             MR. KEHOE:  I don't accept that.

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Please proceed.

19             MR. KEHOE:  Mr. President, with regard to the focus of this, of

20     course, we never got a 94 -- a Rule 94 bis focus as to what the

21     Prosecution was disagreeing with in this score, so -- I mean, I've

22     attempted to outline the general parameters of what the witness is saying

23     for the purposes of the Trial Chamber, given the fact that the

24     Prosecution has simply said orally last week that they wanted to

25     cross-examine the witness.

Page 20613

 1             So, I will attempt to focus this as quickly as possible under

 2     these circumstances, Mr. President.  I do not believe that I have taken

 3     an inadequate period of time.  We started approximately one hour ago with

 4     this witness.  I had listed it for three hours, and I will be done

 5     relatively briefly, and there is the basis of my conclusions in that

 6     regard, and once again, it's -- it's simply a matter of receiving from

 7     the Trial Chamber what was given to the Prosecution.  And simply we will

 8     get through this very quickly with these matters, but the Gotovina

 9     Defence concluded that it was essential to bring certain elements of this

10     to the Court now.

11        Q.   Going back, General, to paragraph 80, and with the assumed facts

12     that had been set forth, we have 1.000 military police and 3.500 civilian

13     police for the entire Krajina.  Based on your experience, General, in

14     Northern Ireland, in Cyprus, in Kosovo, and in Baghdad, with those

15     resources would you have expected a high degree of control in that area

16     given the facts that we've talked about, such as 32.000 civilians coming

17     back, and there being a transition with the HV taking this area back from

18     the Republic of Serb Krajina?

19        A.   If I may, I think I would respond but saying I think it's

20     important to say that the -- it's not just the numbers we're talking

21     about here.  It's the quality and the professionalism of the people.  The

22     numbers to me, from what I have seen in the other places, are certainly

23     low in -- in assuming that they could bring order out of a very chaotic

24     situation.  If -- if they were moving into an area that was calm and all

25     that was required from normal policing, and if these were professional

Page 20614

 1     policemen who were well led and had a strong ethic and ethos of

 2     establishing justice and fairness and so forth in the way that we would

 3     all expect and desire of our police forces, then that be would one issue.

 4             I do think it's important to recognise that the ability to

 5     command, control, and give a construct to these people, I have no way of

 6     knowing what that was like.  I have no way of knowing what, to use a

 7     military term, the morale component of these people was like, what was

 8     their leadership like, what was the command and control structure like,

 9     what was their ethics, what was their ethos, did they understand and

10     apply, for the military, the laws of armed conflict, the Geneva

11     Convention, and so on.  So I think the numbers to me are certainly not

12     excessive, and if I compare them to somewhere like Northern Ireland,

13     whereas I said earlier the military were deployed in support of the civil

14     power, and recognising in that province the size and shape of the Ulster

15     Constabulary, the Royal Ulster Constabulary, then, I think it is

16     difficult to compare the two and say, that it would be an equivalence.

17        Q.   Now, we are talking about an area as -- in the assumed facts that

18     you were given in 80(c) of approximately 10.000 square metres for the

19     Krajina -- excuse me, square kilometres, I'm sorry.

20        A.   Square kilometres.

21        Q.   Well, I know that it's very difficult to be exact under these

22     circumstances, but given with -- a degree of internally displaced people

23     coming back, and the area just peaking -- taking over for a conflict, can

24     you give us a rough idea of how many people might have been necessary in

25     the law enforcement, bit it military police or civilian police, to bring

Page 20615

 1     a degree of security to the area.

 2        A.   I don't want to avoid the question but I don't want to give you a

 3     specific answer.  I can only say that this province -- this size of

 4     terrain, territory we're talking about, is of equivalence to Northern

 5     Ireland, and indeed of Kosovo, which is why in my statement I've given

 6     roughly the size and shape of those equivalent territories, and each of

 7     these locations -- each of these places is, of course, unique, the

 8     territory, the size and shape of the villages, the towns, the roads

 9     systems.  I don't know this part of the Balkans and it is important that

10     I stress that.  Therefore, to give you a number, I cannot give you a

11     number.  But I do know that in the size -- if one compares the size and

12     shape of Kosovo, Northern Ireland with the sort of numbers that we had in

13     those place, then the -- it is it not an equal comparison.

14        Q.   Let me talk to you a little bit about the actual planning of

15     these peace support operations that I trust you were involved in with

16     General Garner, and if I can turn your focus to paragraph 55 where you

17     note that:

18             "The planning for a peace support operation as with other

19     operational planning should therefore be guided by a clearly defined

20     strategic end state.  And those involved in the planning should include

21     all of the necessary and responsible authorities, ministries,

22     departments, departments of state."

23             Now, explain to us, if you can, that in the area of peace support

24     operations, why people who should -- those people who are responsible

25     should be part of the planning of those peace support operations?

Page 20616

 1        A.   Certainly from my own experiences and a military perspective, we

 2     have an expression that says those who plan, implement.  Now, this works

 3     both ways.  It's very easy to come back with a plan in a headquarters

 4     back in the United Kingdom, for example, and to be clear about what the

 5     intention is, but to actually implement that on the ground in a theatre

 6     of operations is much more difficult.

 7             On the other hand, to simply be the implementor without

 8     understanding what it was and what is the ethos and the ethic that goes

 9     behind the planning process puts you in a very difficult situation.

10             So in an ideal situation, if I'm going to be accountable for

11     delivering some sort of success in an operation, it should be me and my

12     staff who plan and implement that operation.  And in the context of

13     post-war planning, I would wish to have in my staff, on my staff,

14     representatives of the other non-military players that I alluded.

15             So, for example, in deploying to Washington to begin the post-war

16     plan with Garner, I requested from the United Kingdom and received

17     representatives from the Department of International Development and the

18     Foreign Office, linkages to those departments for the Department for

19     International Development, the man who was given to me was based in New

20     York, and he acted as a link for me whilst I was in Washington, and on my

21     team living with me permanently were members -- two members initially

22     from the Foreign Commonwealth Office.

23             When we deploy to the theatre of operations, the component

24     commanders, the land component commander in particular, was, again

25     attached to his staff, were members of the department for international

Page 20617

 1     development, and in the joint headquarters at the three-star level as

 2     necessary, other people could be attached to that headquarters, who would

 3     be responsible for delivering the non-military parts of that plan.

 4             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Cross, may I ask you a question?

 5             THE WITNESS:  Your Honour.

 6             JUDGE ORIE:  Would your answer be very short, don't plan a job

 7     without involving those who have to do the job?

 8             THE WITNESS:  Correct, sir.

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  Isn't that true for everything in life?

10     Operations, whether you build a hospital, whether you create a business,

11     whether -- I'm just trying to find out what we have now specifically

12     learned from you and that could I say that this is general wisdom.  Don't

13     plan a job and ignore those or don't involve those who have to do the

14     job.  That's simply what you're telling us; is that correct?

15             THE WITNESS:  Your Honour, that is true.  All I would say that in

16     the environment in which I have operated over the last 30, 40 years, a

17     failure to do that has consequences.

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  Isn't that true for building a hospital, if

19     you don't involve them that it gets -- it goes wrong?  I'm just trying to

20     find out what are just the -- I would say the general lessons we learn in

21     life, and what you're actually saying is that they apply in this field as

22     well.

23             Is that --

24             THE WITNESS:  That is true.

25             JUDGE ORIE:  Please proceed, Mr. Kehoe.

Page 20618

 1             MR. KEHOE:  If that's a fact that's taken off the table and then

 2     not part of the Prosecution's case, we will, of course, accept that

 3     stipulation from the Prosecution and move on.

 4             JUDGE ORIE:  You may proceed, Mr. Kehoe.

 5             MR. KEHOE:  That's, of course, why we covered the topic,

 6     Mr. President.

 7        Q.   Now, moving from the planning to the actual execution, if, for

 8     instance, the person responsible for this post-war planning was involved

 9     with military police and civilian police, would you likewise expect

10     information to be passed to that person who was responsible from the

11     military police or the civilian police, on a regular basis?

12        A.   Yes.  I think the issue here is a clear coherent command and

13     control.  Who is -- if I am the commander, when I was involved in these

14     operation, understanding who worked for me, which individuals and which

15     organisations were under my command, and therefore, what would I be held

16     accountable for was clearly important.  And those people who worked for

17     me would report back to me on a regular basis as to what was going on,

18     how they intended to executed their part of the plan.

19             For us, the British military, we do that on a daily base sitting

20     around an operational table, going through what is happening, thinking

21     through how we're going to reacts to whatever events are unfurling, and

22     indeed preparing to be proactive in achieving our intent.

23             So I would wanted a regular feedback to me as the commander by

24     the people who I command and who are clearly under my command on a

25     regular basis.

Page 20619

 1        Q.   Lastly, General, I just want to cover briefly the issue of

 2     pre-planning, and then resources and time available for the pre-planning

 3     and implementation.

 4             You note in paragraph 38, and in -- you are talking about the

 5     Iraq situation.  You said.

 6             "In my estimation the coherent planning for a post-conflict peace

 7     support operation of this magnitude was both late in starting and

 8     understaffed."

 9             Going to paragraph 80 in the stipulated facts, we noted in

10     paragraph --

11             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Hedaraly.

12             MR. HEDARALY:  I don't think they're stipulated.

13             MR. KEHOE:  Excuse me, I apologise.  The --

14             JUDGE ORIE:  The facts presented to the witness.

15             MR. KEHOE:  -- provided, provided.

16             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.

17             MR. KEHOE:  Thank you, counsellor.

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Please proceed.

19             MR. KEHOE:

20        Q.   80(e), we're talking about the planning for the peaceful

21     integration going on since 1993, and paragraph (f), the planning for

22     peace support operations following the military liberation of the

23     so-called Krajina region of Croatia begins less than one week prior to

24     Operation Storm.

25             Now, you note in paragraph 30 83 [sic] that that time was

Page 20620

 1     insufficient.  That's in the last sentence.  Can you elaborate on that

 2     just a bit.  Tell us why you think it's insufficient, and under the

 3     circumstances that you have been given in the given facts, how long do

 4     you think was necessary for the pre-planning of such an operation as the

 5     re-takeover of the Krajina?

 6        A.   Again, maybe unhelpfully, it's difficult for me to give you a

 7     time line for an operation that I was not involved with, although I'm

 8     aware of it, was not part of the planning process.

 9             I said in that part of the -- of my statement that you referred

10     to that for postwar reconstruction of a major world conflict, there had

11     been months, indeed years of the planning, for the post-war

12     reconstruction of Europe.  That is a given.  And that is at one end of

13     the spectrum, if you like.

14        Q.   You're talking about after World War II?

15        A.   I am indeed.  The other end of the spectrum, my experience of

16     post-war planning for Iraq, is that Garner is established to take over an

17     office of post-war planning in January 2003.  The military campaign to

18     secure Iraq begins in the spring of 2003, that in my estimation, was not

19     sufficient time to enable him to get a coherent plan together and to be

20     able to execute that plan.  Rebuilding a nation the size and shape of

21     Iraq, post-military operations, in my estimation should have required a

22     lot longer than that.

23             Now to be fair, in the context of -- or in the context of this

24     court, other departments of state had indeed been doing work for the

25     planning of the reconstruction of Iraq, but Garner, who is in command of

Page 20621

 1     this post-war plan, had not been involved in any of those other pieces of

 2     work.  And, indeed, one of the first things he had to do was to find out

 3     what work had been done, meet with those people, and try to discover what

 4     planning had been achieved.

 5             So I think Garner is at the other end of the spectrum, he is

 6     given nowhere near sufficient time to prepare and plan for post-war Iraq.

 7     Where does this case fit within there?  I would say it is at Garner end

 8     of the spectrum, not at the World War II end of the spectrum.  I could

 9     not tell you whether they needed five weeks or fifteen weeks or twenty

10     weeks, my instinct having understood the facts that you've given to me is

11     that one week is nowhere near sufficient.

12        Q.   If I may have one moment, Mr. President.

13             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes, please.

14             Meanwhile, for the record, I already clarify that when Mr. Kehoe

15     and I were competing to be heard, that I said that these were facts

16     presented to the witness on page 40, line 15.

17                           [Defence counsel confer]

18             MR. KEHOE:  Mr. President, I have no further questions.

19        Q.   Thank you, General.

20        A.   Thank you, sir.

21             JUDGE ORIE:  Thank you, Mr. Kehoe.

22             We have received from both Markac Defence and the Cermak Defence

23     that they are considering to examine or cross-examine the witness.

24             Mr. Cayley.

25             MR. CAYLEY:  Yes, Your Honour, we don't have any questions for

Page 20622

 1     the witness.  Thank you.

 2             JUDGE ORIE:  You don't have any questions.

 3             Mr. Kuzmanovic.

 4             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  Your Honour, I just may have one or two

 5     clarification questions and then that's it.

 6             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  I suggest that we'll do that after the break,

 7     and --

 8             MR. KEHOE:  Mr. President, if I can just clarify one matter.  The

 9     report is 65 ter 1D2741, and we will move for admission into evidence at

10     this time.

11             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes, Mr. Hedaraly.

12             MR. HEDARALY:  Your Honour, if we could, reserve or position

13     until the end of the examination of the witness.  We may want to make

14     some of written submissions regarding the report later on, based on what

15     happens during the testimony.  If we can just -- I think that was done

16     for a few of the witnesses, the expert witnesses of the Prosecution, so

17     if we can just have it MFI'd for now and --

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Hedaraly, at the same time, you would be aware

19     that where Mr. Kehoe apparently did not go through parts of the report

20     additionally to the questions he had done, of course, Mr. Kehoe should

21     know whether or not finally this report will be evidence or not, because,

22     I take it that, otherwise ...

23                           [Prosecution counsel confer]

24             JUDGE ORIE:  He might want to adapt his position.

25             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  Your Honour, I might add that, for example, with

Page 20623

 1     Mr. Konings, and I think there was at least one other expert, we filed

 2     a -- specific motions asking to preclude certain portions of those

 3     reports and testimony well in advance of testimony, so I think it's

 4     inherently unfair to us to state here now that there are some questions

 5     we might have, that we don't know if we want to admit the report.  I

 6     think that's completely inappropriate at this point.

 7             And 94 bis is very clear about what's required.

 8                           [Trial Chamber confers]

 9             MR. KEHOE:  If I --

10             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Hedaraly, we'll, first of all, carefully

11     consider the positions taken under Rule 94(B) by the Prosecution.

12             MR. HEDARALY:  I believe what the position orally was that the

13     report was not accepted and that we wished to cross-examine the witness.

14             JUDGE ORIE:  But is there any challenge to the witness being an

15     expert?

16             MR. HEDARALY:  There is no objection to the witness being an

17     expert.

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Now, what then we have an expert report and you want

19     to challenge the report, which is fine.  But if the report disappears

20     what would remain?  I mean, you would elicit answers from the witness

21     which may undermine, turn out to undermine or to confirm the expert

22     opinion he has given in his report, but we then have to do without this

23     report?  Especially -- especially where there is no challenge to the

24     witness being an expert.  Because that would change matters, because if

25     you say, You shouldn't admit into evidence an expert report from someone

Page 20624

 1     who is not an expert.  That's -- that would be clear.  That would ...

 2             MR. HEDARALY:  I -- I think -- I think the objection is more into

 3     the relevance of some portions of the report, and I think that is what

 4     the objection would be.  As I said, at this stage, we would like to carry

 5     on with the examination of the witness.  It may be that at the end of

 6     that we will not object, but at this stage after the examination of

 7     the -- the direct examination and some of the answers given by the

 8     witness, all I'm asking right now is to reserve or position until the end

 9     of the examination so that we can formerly then object or not object to

10     the admission of the report in evidence.

11             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  Your Honour --

12             JUDGE ORIE:  You would say -- one second, please, Mr. Kuzmanovic.

13     You would say from questions and answers to the witness, the relevance

14     would emerge.

15             MR. HEDARALY:  It could, Your Honour.

16             JUDGE ORIE:  It could.

17             MR. KEHOE:  Mr. President, frankly, they -- the Prosecution under

18     94 bis (B)(iii) has waived any objection to this report.  They were

19     required to file a notice.  They filed no notice.  They did nothing.  So

20     any issues concerning relevance are gone, that's been waived.  There's no

21     longer any --

22             JUDGE ORIE:  That's exactly why I wanted to check during the

23     break exactly what submissions were filed or put on the record and any --

24             MR. KEHOE:  I could tell --

25             JUDGE ORIE:  I think, as a matter of fact, you'll find on page

Page 20625

 1     43, line 22, that the first thing I said, "Mr. Hedaraly, we'll first of

 2     all, carefully consider the positions taken under Rule 94(B) by the

 3     Prosecution."

 4             So that would be our job for the next 25 minutes.  If -- if

 5     there's anything to be added at this moment, that's exactly, of course,

 6     the kind of challenge --

 7             MR. KEHOE:  Yes.

 8             JUDGE ORIE:  -- and how the challenge was made and how it was

 9     reasoned and that's what we had on our mind.

10             MR. KEHOE:  My only addition to that is if we can give it to the

11     courtroom deputy, the court officer.  There was one reference on the

12     record by Mr. Waespi simply saying that they wished to examine

13     General Cross.  That was the sole disclosure.  And if I can have a moment

14     with Mr. Misetic -- oh, here it is.

15             The reference was last Friday, at 20471, at line 24, by

16     Mr. Waespi.

17             JUDGE ORIE:  And, again, when was the report filed?

18             MR. KEHOE:  It was filed on Monday, the 22nd if Monday is the --

19     Monday the 22nd of June.  Was it 20?  If I can check that -- that

20     particular day.

21             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.

22             MR. KEHOE:  Until -- my calendar is off, I think it is the 20th.

23             I was right the first time, it was the 22nd.

24             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  Mr. Hedaraly.  The challenge to the relevance

25     is expected within 30 days from filing of an expert's report.  Disclosure

Page 20626

 1     of a statement and/or report of an expert under Rule 94 bis under

 2     (B)(iii).  Yesterday it was the 30 days, I think, finished either

 3     yesterday or the day before yesterday.

 4             Would you please consider the position of the Prosecution in this

 5     respect.  We'll meanwhile take a take a break, and we will resume,

 6     Mr. Cross, at 20 minutes past 4.00.

 7                           --- Recess taken at 3.52 p.m.

 8                           --- On resuming at 4.21 p.m.

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  The Chamber was informed, Mr. Kehoe, that -- that

10     the Prosecution withdraws its objection to admission.  Is that ...

11             MR. HEDARALY:  That is correct, Your Honour.

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  And that at least creates clarity in this

13     respect.

14             Could we first -- Mr. Registrar, have a number assigned to the

15     report.

16             THE REGISTRAR:  Yes, Your Honours.  That becomes Exhibit D1624.

17             JUDGE ORIE:  And is admitted into evidence.

18             Mr. Kehoe.

19             MR. KEHOE:  Yes, Mr. President.  I think that just a couple of

20     typos in the record, and this would be at page 30, line 16.  It reflects

21     4.000.727, and if we go back to the particular exhibit it should be

22     42.000 as opposed to -- and I was quoting.  Get the exact exhibit number,

23     it is D1361.

24             JUDGE ORIE:  In the answer of the witness, I think the 42.000

25     appears, so that's --

Page 20627

 1             MR. KEHOE:  Yes.

 2             JUDGE ORIE:  So that's clear and is now on the record.

 3             MR. KEHOE:  And there is just one last correction.  It's on page

 4     35, line 5.  Again, the exhibit says 42.000 and not 32.000.

 5             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes, that's on the record as well.

 6             MR. KEHOE:  And in Defence of the court reporter, I'm not sure if

 7     I said 32.000 or a mistake, I just want to accurately reflect what the

 8     exhibit says, which is 42 -- or approximately 42.

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes, that's clear.

10             Mr. Kuzmanovic, you had questions for Mr. Cross.

11             Mr. Cross, Mr. Kuzmanovic is counsel for Mr. Markac.

12             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  Thank you, Your Honour.  I will be very brief,

13     general.

14                           Cross-examination by Mr. Kuzmanovic

15        Q.   General, if you could refer your report which we now know is

16     D1624, if you have that front of you?

17        A.   Yeah.

18        Q.   Paragraph 80, with various subparagraphs, asked you to consider

19     the following facts in your analysis and conclusions, and two of your

20     conclusions are contained in paragraphs 83 and 84.  For my benefit, your

21     conclusions in paragraph 83 and 84 are based in part on your experiences

22     in Kosovo, Cyprus, and Northern Ireland; correct?

23        A.   That is correct.  I mean, they are based in entirety on those

24     three and post-war Iraq.

25        Q.   And the assumed facts that you were given in paragraph 80?

Page 20628

 1        A.   Correct.

 2        Q.   I would like to you consider as additional assumed facts that

 3     after Operation Storm was concluded there was still a war going on in

 4     neighbouring Bosnia and Herzegovina, and also to assume that after

 5     Operation Storm was concluded there were various pockets of ARSK soldiers

 6     still in Sector South to some extent putting some resistance or to some

 7     extent hiding.

 8             What I'd like to ask you is based upon those assumed the facts,

 9     would you agree with me that those additional assumed facts would even

10     further complicate matters that you concluded in paragraphs 83 and 84, in

11     terms of manpower and planning?

12        A.   Certainly if there are, as I am aware, continuing operations,

13     further operations, that are now being engaged with inside Bosnia, as

14     opposed to the sovereign territory of Croatia, then there is, if you

15     like, the main effort of the military campaign is now moving on to the

16     next phase of this operation.  The reality of the fighting that you're

17     referring to means that the -- the rear areas of this operation are still

18     vulnerable in terms of lines of communication and supply and so forth,

19     and securing those lines of communication becomes an important issue, and

20     it isn't easy if people are disrupting your lines of communication.

21        Q.   The other question, and it will be my last question, General, is

22     your experience in SFOR and KFOR were after essentially hostilities were

23     over; correct?

24        A.   That is the case in SFOR and indeed in IFOR; although, for IFOR

25     the previous experiences in Balkans meant that there was no peace to

Page 20629

 1     keep.  The terminology that was used for IFOR and SFOR, that these were

 2     peace enforcement operations; therefore, force would have been used had

 3     it been necessary.  Of course, during KFOR force was used in terms of the

 4     NATO bombing campaign, et cetera.  When we actually moved into Kosovo

 5     itself, as opposed to the preparations for that and the pre-events that

 6     occurred, then there was -- essentially the war was finished, yes.  There

 7     was no fighting between the warring parties other than the criminality

 8     that I referred to.

 9        Q.   Okay.  So essentially, assuming -- assuming that there were still

10     some pockets of resistance in Sector South in Croatia and that there were

11     active combat operations being conducted in Bosnia during the course

12     after Operation Storm was over, the fact that KFOR and SFOR and IFOR

13     essentially came into play and into their force during a time when combat

14     operations were over is another complicating fact that -- faced

15     implementation and manpower inside Sector South in Croatia; correct?

16        A.   I would agree with that sir, yeah.

17        Q.   Thank you.

18             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  I have no further questions, Your Honour.

19             JUDGE ORIE:  Thank you, Mr. Kuzmanovic.

20             You have just, Mr. Cross, answered a question by Mr. Kuzmanovic,

21     who gave as an additional fact to you that various pockets of the ARSK

22     soldiers still had remained in Sector South.  How did you understand this

23     information?  What -- in what numbers, for example, are you thinking, if

24     you get this information?  And would that have any impact on the answers

25     you gave to Mr. Kuzmanovic?

Page 20630

 1             THE WITNESS:  It would, Your Honour, in the sense that if these

 2     were relatively isolated incidents, then, from a military point of view,

 3     you press on in dealing with what needs to be dealt with, within Bosnia,

 4     in this context.  If these incidents within the southern part of Croatia

 5     were seriously disrupting your ability to conduct operations, then

 6     clearly would you have to move assets and deal with that in a much more

 7     coherent way, if you like.  You would have to put together a much more --

 8     you have a series of contingency operations that you would put into

 9     place.

10             So the size and shape of those -- of those continuing operations,

11     yes, indeed, would have an effect.

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  Now, you're using the term "southern part of

13     Croatia," whereas Mr. Kuzmanovic said "Sector South."  Is that the same

14     for you?

15             THE WITNESS:  No, sir.  I realise that Sector South is not

16     completely in its entirety the southern part of Croatia, although it does

17     encompass more than that.  I realise that.

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Sector South more and or less?

19             THE WITNESS:  As I understand it, Sector South is more than just

20     the -- sorry, is less than the whole of the southern half of Croatia.

21     And it includes other operational parts of -- as I understand it, parts

22     of Bosnia as well.

23             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  As you understand it, if I would ask you to

24     mark on a map --

25             THE WITNESS:  No, sir.  I would not be --

Page 20631

 1             JUDGE ORIE:  -- where Sector South would be, would you be able to

 2     do that?

 3             THE WITNESS:  No, not in an accurate way.  I mean, my

 4     understanding is based on my understanding as I deployed to the Balkans

 5     in 1995, so...

 6             JUDGE ORIE:  It's a rather general knowledge --

 7             THE WITNESS:  Indeed, sir.

 8             JUDGE ORIE:  -- of an area which was called --

 9             THE WITNESS:  Indeed sir.

10             JUDGE ORIE:  -- Sector South.  Thank you for those answers.

11             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  Your Honour --

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.

13             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  -- I just wanted to note for the transcript, and

14     I'm sure it will be corrected, but page 49 lines 8 and 9, there seems to

15     be a -- it might have been probably because I was speaking too fast in

16     the question, and I can't even actually remember that part of the

17     question, but it doesn't make any sense if you look at it on the

18     transcript.

19             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  I should blame myself perhaps for talking too

20     quickly.

21             I think I asked --

22             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  No, Your Honour I was referring to myself not to

23     you.

24             JUDGE ORIE:  [Overlapping speakers] ...  and could you then

25     repeat again the page and line number.

Page 20632

 1             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  Page 48, line 20.

 2             JUDGE ORIE:  Now confusion is total, because I read that you

 3     earlier referred to 49, 8 and 9.

 4             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  Actually, I think it applies to both of us, Your

 5     Honour.

 6             JUDGE ORIE:  I really have problems exactly to see how we can

 7     resolve this matter.

 8             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  Your Honour, just so we're clear, my reference

 9     is page 49 lines 8 and 9.

10             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes, that's --

11             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  And I'm sure it's recorded so I'm sure Madam

12     Reporter will hopefully figure me out.

13             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  And may I invite you to draw specific

14     attention if you receive or if you have a view of the transcript that it

15     reflects what you said and if not, there's always a way of correcting it.

16             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  I will do so Your Honour.  Thank you.

17             JUDGE ORIE:  Thank you, Mr. Kuzmanovic.

18             Mr. Hedaraly, are you ready to cross-examine the witness?

19             MR. HEDARALY:  Yes, Mr. President thank you.

20             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Cross, you'll now be cross-examined by

21     Mr. Hedaraly.  Mr. Hedaraly is counsel for the Prosecution.

22             THE WITNESS:  Thank you, sir.

23             JUDGE ORIE:  Please proceed.

24                           Cross-examination by Mr. Hedaraly

25        Q.   Good afternoon, General.

Page 20633

 1        A.   Good afternoon.

 2        Q.   What were your instructions in preparing this report?  What were

 3     you asked to do?

 4        A.   When I was approached by the counsel to give a -- give a -- my

 5     experiences in such operations, I produced a paper, that I believe I sent

 6     to yourself as well, which laid out my background and my experiences over

 7     the period of my command.  Having done that, I wasn't given any

 8     instructions on producing the paper.  I then met with counsel, talked

 9     through those experiences, and they asked me questions in those areas

10     that inevitably were of more relevance to this particular hearing than

11     others, and from that a draft report was produced.  I then amended that

12     report in using my own -- my own amendments, if you like, and then sent

13     that report to counsel some time ago but -- in time for them to file it.

14        Q.   And who prepared that first draft report?

15        A.   The draft report was prepared as a result of the conversations

16     that I had with counsel back in the United Kingdom.  They took the notes,

17     they produced the draft, sent it to me.  I then went through it in my own

18     time, reflected it, and amended it as I -- as I -- as I tried to ensure

19     that what was being said here was what I believed and using the

20     expressions that I wanted to use.

21             So they had taken extensive notes as a result of initial

22     discussions that I had and used some of the information from the paper

23     that I'd sent them originally.

24        Q.   General, we both tend to speak a little fast --

25        A.   I will slow down, sir.

Page 20634

 1        Q.   So if I make what seems to you to be inordinately long pauses,

 2     it's not an invitation to continue but simply me waiting for the

 3     interpreters to catch up with us.

 4        A.   Sure, I understand.

 5        Q.   And you were provided the facts in paragraph 80 on and around 10

 6     June 2009, less than two weeks before this report was filed; is that

 7     correct?

 8        A.   Yes, that's so.  I don't know the exact date.  I'm very happy to

 9     accept your date.  Having written my initial -- having written the

10     initial paper, had those discussions, amended the report to reflect my

11     experiences of the various deployments that I had been on, the facts were

12     then given to me, the assumed facts were given to me, and I was asked to

13     reflect on them in the context of what I had said already to see whether

14     these either mitigated against or reinforced some of the points that I

15     had said earlier.

16        Q.   And when you provided your opinions in paragraph 83 through 85,

17     those opinions were based on the specific facts that were provided to

18     you; correct?

19        A.   Yes.  The final paragraphs were written as the final draft,

20     really, for summarizing everything that I had done previously and then

21     having been given the facts, the assumed the facts, taking those into

22     consideration, I then wrote the final three, four paragraphs.  Five --

23     five or six paragraphs.  And I wrote those at home on my own and then

24     sent the final copy of the report to the counsel.

25             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Hedaraly, may I seek clarification of one of the

Page 20635

 1     previous answers.

 2             This list of facts in which we find in paragraph 80, now were

 3     they provided to you before you had these conversations which resulted in

 4     a draft report being sent to you; or did you find them listed for the

 5     first time in the draft report that was sent to you?

 6             THE WITNESS:  I would -- in all honesty, Your Honour, I would

 7     have to take advice as to dates here.  But from my -- the way that I put

 8     this together was I was asked to talk through my experiences from the

 9     various operations we have spoken about.  I was then asked to comment on

10     did I think certain things about the Croatian Operation Storm, how -- how

11     relevant was that, in --

12             JUDGE ORIE:  This was still discussion?

13             THE WITNESS:  Yes, sir.

14             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.

15             Please proceed.

16             THE WITNESS:  And in saying that, the assumed facts were then

17     given to me, to say, Well, these are the facts as we understand them.  In

18     relation to what you have already told us, does that change the way you

19     think, does that reinforce any of the points you were trying to make, or,

20     indeed, detract from any of them?

21             So the assumed facts were given to me after I had prepared quite

22     a lot of this report, which was, of course, and is, of course, simply a

23     report of my own experiences hopefully helping to set a context within

24     which you are considering this particular case.

25             JUDGE ORIE:  But, now, you had these conversations, and at a

Page 20636

 1     certain moment you received a draft report, which you then reviewed and

 2     you said you would -- well, check whether you would agree or whether you

 3     would use other language or -- now, as footnote 12 says:  "These facts

 4     are as written by General Gotovina's counsel."

 5             That means that there must have been a moment in time when you

 6     received these facts - and there are quite a number of them - in writing.

 7     Now, was that before -- was that during your conversations, your

 8     discussions, that you received a written list of facts; or did you

 9     found -- find them written only for the first time in the draft report

10     that was sent for review to you?

11             THE WITNESS:  Again, sir, the counsel may wish to comment.  But

12     my recollection is, having produced a draft of this report, and having

13     read through it and amended it, in an electronic communication, an

14     e-mail, the assumed facts were passed to me, and I then took those

15     assumed facts, looked at them, and considered them in the light of the

16     report that I had written.

17             JUDGE ORIE:  Now, said "having produced a draft of this report,"

18     would that include conclusions about the Croatian situation?  To say,

19     conclusions and summary of opinion, well, let's say part six of the

20     report.  Was that --

21             THE WITNESS:  No, sir.

22             JUDGE ORIE:  -- not in there?

23             THE WITNESS:  No, sir.

24             JUDGE ORIE:  So your first draft was exclusively explaining --

25             THE WITNESS:  Yes, sir.

Page 20637

 1             JUDGE ORIE:  -- your experience.

 2             THE WITNESS:  Yes, sir.

 3             JUDGE ORIE:  Now, then you received this list of facts by e-mail.

 4     So, at that point in time, there was no report yet on conclusions on the

 5     Croatian situation; is that correct?

 6             THE WITNESS:  That is my recollection of events, sir, yes.

 7             JUDGE ORIE:  Well, you are the witness so we have to rely on --

 8     at this moment, on your recollection.

 9             Did you then, on the basis of those facts, draft conclusions as

10     far as Croatia is concerned; or did you receive draft conclusions from

11     the Defence?

12             THE WITNESS:  No, my recollection is that I wrote my own

13     conclusions.

14             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.

15             THE WITNESS:  And the key issues were trying to look at this

16     particular operation in relation to the size of the operations in

17     Northern Ireland, geographically, for example, and indeed Kosovo and

18     Iraq, looking at the numbers of people were involved in this, those sorts

19     of issues that those facts were -- looking at them, enabled me to say

20     yes, this is a comparative.  It is fair to draw a conclusion from my

21     experience in these places to what was happen on this particular

22     operation.

23             JUDGE ORIE:  But, at that time, you then received questions to be

24     dealt with?  I mean, you had given your experience.  You then received a

25     list of facts about Croatia, and then may I take it that some questions

Page 20638

 1     or issues were raised by the Defence at that time?  Could you please, in

 2     your conclusions, pay attention to A, B, C, D, whatever.  Was there a

 3     clear --

 4             THE WITNESS:  Well, I think the -- there was certainly

 5     discussion, but my -- I'm not aware that this paper was amended more than

 6     once as a result of having received these assumed facts.  I wrote

 7     conclusions, there was then discussion both electronically and face to

 8     facial on the finalisation of the paper.  Nobody -- forgive me because I

 9     may be reading something that you're not assessing, but nobody tried to

10     say to me, Can you write this sentence differently, or Could you add

11     something you've not yet put in.  As a result of the discussions, I was

12     quite clear what I wanted to include in my report, and I was quite

13     content that having seen the assumed facts, that I could then write the

14     conclusions that I reached.

15             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  I'm -- I have no second thoughts on the

16     matter.  I just want to have clear on my mind how this report came into

17     being as we find it now.

18             THE WITNESS:  Yeah.

19             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Hedaraly, please proceed.

20             MR. HEDARALY:  Thank you, Mr. President.

21        Q.   Just to follow up briefly on that, after you received the assumed

22     facts, did you make any changes to the first 79 paragraphs of the report,

23     or did you only draft the last five or six paragraphs?

24        A.   I don't believe I made any changes as a result of seeing the

25     assumed facts.  There was nothing that I saw in the assumed facts that

Page 20639

 1     made me change what I had already written, because as we said earlier,

 2     the vast majority of that was simply relating the events that had

 3     occurred in the various deployments and trying to explain the issues of

 4     an end state and the strategic and operational levels and so on.  So the

 5     vast majority of the report written beforehand is simply laying out my

 6     experiences.  The conclusions that I've written are as a result of seeing

 7     the assumed facts, but they did not effect that previous part of the

 8     report.

 9        Q.   And if you could just look at your report and just so that we are

10     all clear, we're talking about all the way up to page 18 before the

11     section "Provided Facts," that's what you refer to when you are talking

12     to everything before the assumed facts?

13             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Hedaraly, I think you wanted refer to -- oh, no,

14     it's page 18, and paragraph 80.  And that's both the same.  That's what's

15     confusing me.

16             Please proceed.

17             THE WITNESS:  That is -- what you have just asked me is correct.

18     I would want to say that, you know, reading the paper, putting it in my

19     own words, amending it to reflect.  I wouldn't want to suggest for one

20     minute that I didn't change some of the wording in the early part of the

21     paper before submitting the final draft, reading through it, as I

22     obviously did, trying to assure that it was coherent.  I may well have

23     changed some of the sentencing and phrasing, which I would have done

24     having received the facts.  My point is that the facts did not change the

25     essence of what I was trying to establish in the first part of the paper.

Page 20640

 1        Q.   I think I understand you, but just allow me to make sure that --

 2     I don't want to mischaracterise what you've said.

 3             You probably would have made some changes throughout these first

 4     portions as general edits, let's say, of your draft, but you did not make

 5     any specific changes to those portions, because of specific facts that

 6     you received; is that correct?

 7        A.   Yeah.  That -- that is my recollection, yes.

 8        Q.   And these facts, and I think you've testified earlier, perhaps a

 9     few minutes ago, so I apologise for asking you the same question again,

10     but opinions in paragraphs 83 through 85 were based on those assumed

11     facts that you received that are listed in paragraph 80; correct?

12        A.   Yes.  I tried to conclude by recognising the reality of what I

13     had been presented with.

14             I should stress that in writing my initial drafts, I can't

15     remember, to be honest, what those conclusions were, but in concluding

16     there were some basic conclusions, the paragraphs drafted in trying to

17     conclude and summarise what I had tried to say in the first part of the

18     paper.

19             So changing those to reflect the assumed facts that I had been

20     given, trying to draw out key issues from where I was coming from, which

21     had to do with resources, manpower, time-lines, and so on.  Trying as

22     I've said both in the introduction to my paper and in my conclusion,

23     particularly at paragraph 85, that I - very clearly -  am not -- was not

24     part of this operation, I was not there on the ground, I make no

25     judgement at all on -- on those sorts of aspect, and that's what I've

Page 20641

 1     tried to summarise in that particular paragraph.

 2        Q.   And if I could just invite you -- I don't want to belabour this

 3     point, but I'm -- I apologise if I'm a little confused.

 4             If you look at paragraphs 81 and 82 at page 21 of your report,

 5     under the section -- under the heading "Conclusions and Summary of

 6     Opinion," paragraphs 81 and 82 are essentially the general conclusions of

 7     what is contained in your report from paragraphs 1 to 79; is that

 8     correct?

 9        A.   That's correct.  And they would have been written in that

10     initial -- when I wrote the initial conclusions, they would have been the

11     way that I had tried to summarise what I had put in the paper.

12        Q.   And then in paragraph 83 you give an opinion, "Given the facts

13     provided to me in paragraph 80," and then you say the same thing in

14     paragraphs 84.  So it's that those two paragraphs are opinions based

15     solely on the assumed facts given to you?

16        A.   That is correct, sir.

17        Q.   Thank you.  Now, if these facts were not accurate or if you were

18     given different facts, it would therefore follow that your conclusions

19     would also be different; is that correct?

20        A.   That is correct, sir.  Well, I should say, if I may, it would

21     depend on what those new facts were.  But in principle I understand what

22     you are saying and I agree.

23        Q.   Thank you for that clarification.  You mention both in your

24     report and earlier today that the criminality that occurred, for example,

25     in Iraq, was not unusual or unexpected.  Do you remember that?

Page 20642

 1        A.   I do.

 2        Q.   Now, would you have expected the troops of General Franks to

 3     commit crimes in Iraq, following the military operation?

 4        A.   No, sir.  If you are distinguishing between the troops under the

 5     command of General Franks as opposed to what the Iraqi people themselves

 6     were doing, I would not have expected them to be involved and engaged in

 7     that criminality themselves.

 8        Q.   And were you aware, sir, that this Chamber has received evidence

 9     that soldiers involved in retaking the territory were involved in a

10     significant amount of crimes committed in the area?

11             MR. KEHOE:  I object to the word "significant."

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Well -- yes.  What makes an amount significant, what

13     not.  Let's say was involved certainly not in a sporadic way.  An amount

14     not of a -- certainly not of a sporadic nature.

15             Would you please answer the question?

16             Well, Mr. Kehoe, of course, this witness has been fed with a long

17     list of facts on which, whether established or not, whether they're

18     complete or not, whether they're -- what's the basis for the selection is

19     still to be seen.  So, therefore, Mr. Hedaraly now puts other facts.  You

20     would say it's -- you have -- you object to putting to him that it is a

21     significant.  I could imagine - I don't know whether that's true or not -

22     that Mr. Hedaraly would object to some of the facts as presented here as

23     well, but they were the facts given to the expert.  I think I have sized

24     it down slightly, and invite witness to answer the question.

25             Mr. Kuzmanovic.

Page 20643

 1             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  I'll let Mr. Kehoe go --

 2             MR. KEHOE:  Mr. President, if counsel wants to say assume X/Y

 3     facts, as he has done before with an expert and as Mr. Kuzmanovic did,

 4     that's the proper cross-examination of a witness, but to postulate that

 5     there has been a significant amount presented to this Chamber, we take

 6     issue with that.

 7             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes, well -- and you may -- yes, Mr. Kuzmanovic.

 8             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  Your Honour, and if Mr. Hedaraly, as Your Honour

 9     put it, would object to some facts as presented, he could have done so in

10     a filing opposing expert's report and we could have all had knowledge of

11     that prior to the cross-examination.

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Well, the structure of the report, you put certain

13     facts to the witnesses, to fully litigate whether that is complete or not

14     would come close to final argument, Mr. Kuzmanovic, which is certainly

15     not something one would seek in preparing this expert report, and

16     cross-examination of this witness.

17             You may have forgotten about the question already.  Let's go back

18     to it.  And ...

19             THE WITNESS:  Your Honour, I think I'm comfortable with the

20     question.

21             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes, then please answer the question.

22             THE WITNESS:  Your Honour, if I may also, I would like to say, as

23     we go into this period, that I absolutely understand that the facts that

24     were presented to me as a result of my initial writing of my views on

25     these deployments were undoubtedly facts that were there to draw out

Page 20644

 1     certain lessons and to reinforce some of the points that I made, and I

 2     absolutely understand that there were maybe other facts that may -- would

 3     led me to say other things or draw other conclusions.

 4             As I said at the beginning of paper, my intent here is to try to

 5     assist the Court as a whole in understanding what it is like to be

 6     involved in these post-conflict operations.  So I have no problem with

 7     the tenant of the question.  That said, I also would like to say, if I

 8     may, having served in the Balkans three times that, and I touched on this

 9     slightly earlier before, when we look at the competency of military

10     organisations we can talk about their equipment, we can talk about their

11     understanding of warfare.

12             For me, the key issue, not just in the Balkans but everywhere

13     else, is what the British military talk about as being the moral

14     component of fighting power.  It's about leadership.  It's about ethic.

15     It's about understanding the Law of Armed Contact, the Geneva Convention.

16     It's about how you conduct operations.  And in first-world armies,

17     American, British Armies and so on, we take that extremely seriously.

18     There are, unfortunately, still occasions when that goes wrong.  We can

19     look at that in terms of Iraq or other operations around the world.  My

20     own experience is the Balkans make it very clear to me that the moral

21     component, constituent moral component of all the forces engaged in

22     operations in the Balkans was nowhere what I would want to have seen in

23     any military organisation that I served with.

24             So the fact that there were -- whether they are considered to be

25     with respect to everybody significant or insignificant, the fact that

Page 20645

 1     there are so-called soldiers within these various armed factions in the

 2     Balkans doing bad things, criminality, ethnic cleansing, killings, and so

 3     on, I am certainly aware of that because I saw the evidence of it, the

 4     results of it.  What actually happened in Operation Storm, I can't

 5     comment on because I wasn't engaged in that operation, but I am certainly

 6     aware that lots of bad things went on on all sides over the whole period

 7     of the operations in the Balkans.

 8             MR. HEDARALY:

 9        Q.   Now, if -- if the crimes that were committed in the aftermath of

10     Operation Storm were committed mainly by the forces that retook the

11     territory, isn't that a fact that would have been relevant for you to

12     know in coming to your conclusions about resources and so on?

13        A.   It would -- it would certainly be -- if the fact that you are

14     presenting, that the majority were, the size and shape and scale of those

15     was made clear, it would be an issue to which, in phrasing my

16     conclusions, I may wish to make an adjustment one way or the other.

17             The -- I think in the context of what was happening, and I think

18     again I shouldn't be leading you where you are trying to take me, but in

19     the context of what was happening if there is an assumption that these

20     things were going on because they were part of the operation, they were

21     ordered to happen and so forth, understanding and knowing that as facts

22     would clearly have -- have affected the way that I tried to draw my

23     conclusions.

24        Q.   And would you agree with me that if this Trial Chamber found that

25     the military operation was conducted in a manner to remove the Serb

Page 20646

 1     civilians from the area, that would also be a fact that would have

 2     affected your conclusions?

 3             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Kehoe.

 4             MR. KEHOE:  Excuse me, Mr. President.  I mean, if the Trial

 5     Chamber found -- I mean, we're still in trial.  I object to the premise

 6     of if -- if the counsel wants to ask --  excuse me, I need to change

 7     microphones here a moment.

 8             If counsel wants to ask hypothetical situations like that for the

 9     witness, that's fine.  But positing something about what the Trial

10     Chamber found or didn't find, that's why we're here and I object to the

11     form.

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Would you please rephrase, Mr. Hedaraly.

13             MR. HEDARALY:

14        Q.   Okay.  General, if a military operation was conducted in a manner

15     to remove the Serb civilian population from the area, would that also

16     have been a fact that would have affected your conclusions?

17        A.   I think it would be -- I'm not sure that it would have affected

18     the conclusions markedly, in that what I was trying to draw in my paper,

19     what I'm trying to assist the Court in understanding as a whole, is the

20     chaotic nature of post-war operations and the inherent nature of that

21     chaos, and the things that flow from it.  However hard and well

22     intentioned the forces apply their military power post-operations.

23             So for example, whilst I am very conscious of what happened in

24     Kosovo and indeed Baghdad and indeed Northern Ireland, in those phases

25     I'm quite clear that there was no intent, within the KFOR chain of

Page 20647

 1     command, within the US/UK chain of command, the coalition chain of

 2     command, or indeed within the UK chain of command in Northern Ireland, to

 3     bring about those things.

 4             Your comment to my mind relates back to the end state, the

 5     strategic end state, what was trying to be achieved here.  And if you

 6     were to present to me a strategic end state that made it quite clear that

 7     the military campaign was about the sort of thing you are alluding to, it

 8     would effect the -- if there was no intention to bring order and

 9     structure to post-war operations, then that clearly would have affected

10     what had I would want to say.

11             If there was no intention to do that, then my facts are almost

12     irrelevant.  If there was a clear intent to do that, then the numbers of

13     people, the planning processes to bring order post-Operation Storm, my

14     conclusion, having been given the facts that I have been given, was that

15     that planning process, those resources and the other points that I make,

16     were insufficient in order to bring about that order post-war.

17             Does that -- is that clear?  Is that --

18        Q.   I think I was with you just until the end.  Let me just read it,

19     and I will see if it is clear to me.

20        A.   Fine.

21        Q.   Thank you, I understood very well.

22             Let me move to a specific conclusion that you drew based on the

23     facts you were given and that is the one about lack of available

24     resources, and you find that in paragraph 84 at page 22 of your report.

25             And I just want to be clear that the facts that you are referring

Page 20648

 1     to here are the numbers of military and civilian policemen.  The numbers

 2     that were provided to you that are found in paragraphs (w) through (z) of

 3     the assumed facts.  Is that right?

 4        A.   Yes, sir.  The numbers that you referred to were the numbers that

 5     I took into consideration.  And for complete clarity, that is why when,

 6     as a result of additional evidence that was presented that -- the numbers

 7     in paragraph (z) were then -- I was then told that they were more than 4

 8     or 500.  They were the 7 or 800 we referred to earlier.

 9        Q.   Just to be absolutely clear, that change in number did not affect

10     your conclusion; is that correct?

11        A.   That is correct.

12        Q.   Now, when you talk about resources one of the terms that you used

13     that was also mentioned in direct examination is this idea of boots on

14     the ground or more specifically the number of soldiers per square

15     kilometre tasked with providing security.

16             Is that right?

17        A.   Correct, sir.

18        Q.   And you gave some examples, based on your previous experiences.

19     And, of course, I understand that -- your evidence to be that these

20     numbers by themselves are not -- not an automatic scale to apply.  They

21     depend on circumstances.  But the examples that you gave was that

22     1.67 soldier per square kilometre was sufficient in Operation Banner.

23     Whereas 0.34 were not sufficient in Iraq and you also gave 4.5 per

24     kilometre squared for Kosovo.  All of this is at page -- paragraph 70

25     to 72 of your report.

Page 20649

 1             Were you aware that there were UNPROFOR troops on the ground in

 2     the Krajina before and after Operation Storm?

 3        A.   I was aware that UNPROFOR were in that region.  I was not aware

 4     of actual deployment locations in relation to Operation Storm.

 5        Q.   Let me show you 65 ter 7360.  And it will come up on your screen

 6     in front of you.

 7             MR. KEHOE:  Just one minor correction for counsel.  I think we're

 8     talking about --

 9             THE INTERPRETER:  Could counsel switch to the other microphone,

10     please.  Thank you.

11             MR. KEHOE:  Sorry.  I think for the clarity in the -- in the

12     record so -- because there has been talk about UNCRO.  We're talking

13     about UNCRO at that point as opposed to UNPROFOR which is in Bosnia, and

14     so the witness doesn't get confused between UNCRO in Croatia and UNPROFOR

15     in Bosnia.

16             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Hedaraly.

17             MR. HEDARALY:  That's fine.  I will just show the document to the

18     witness, but that's fine.

19        Q.   If that changes your answer at all, General, please --

20        A.   No, I should have corrected it myself.  Counsel is quite right.

21        Q.   You see here, General, this is dated February 1995, and you see

22     at the top there that -- I mean, I'm going to give an approximate figure

23     that 90 per cent of the complete mission are soldiers and policemen.  And

24     then if you go to the Sector South and Sector North, you see that there

25     were 4.614 personnel in Sector South, and based on the top figures that

Page 20650

 1     most of those, we can assume, are soldiers and policemen.  And just so

 2     you know as well, the area of the Split Military District that was under

 3     the control of General Gotovina during Operation Storm, is roughly

 4     4.000 square kilometres.

 5             That can be found at P482.

 6             So now you can see, General, that that is roughly one UN --

 7     that's a soldier or policeman per square kilometre.  And my question to

 8     you is:  If the purpose had been to bring security to the area, wouldn't

 9     you consider it logical to use these UN forces to assist in providing

10     security?

11        A.   The -- one of the points I was making earlier of the utility of

12     military, non-military, international organisations, non-governmental aid

13     organisations, from a personal point of view, in my view, every available

14     asset should be used to bring about stability post-war operations.

15             Now, that is not the case in every deployment that I have been

16     on, but the principle -- in principle my answer to your question is:  If

17     it is possible to do so, use every asset that you have available to you.

18             MR. HEDARALY:  If I can tender 65 ter 7360 into evidence.

19             MR. KEHOE:  Mr. President, in theory I don't have an objection.

20     If we just MFI it, I can take a look at it at the break and then just

21     give the position --

22             MR. HEDARALY:  It's one page.

23             MR. KEHOE:  Excuse me --

24             JUDGE ORIE:  Seems to be the whole of the document, a fact sheet,

25     14th of February, which lists only the -- well, the authorised strength,

Page 20651

 1     and the actual strength being approximately 12 per cent lower.  And

 2     apparently the numbers, Mr. Hedaraly, presents the actual strength,

 3     because adding them up, brings us to the figure of 44.547.

 4             MR. KEHOE:  I guess my question is I thought this was a

 5     multi-page document.  Is it just this sheet?  Well, then I have no

 6     objection.

 7             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes, Mr. Registrar.

 8             THE REGISTRAR:  Your Honour, that will become Exhibit P2601.

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  And is admitted into evidence.

10             Please proceed, Mr. Hedaraly.

11             MR. HEDARALY:  Thank you, Mr. President.

12        Q.   Now, General, you were not -- in the facts provided to you, and

13     correct me if I'm wrong, you were not provided the number of Croatian

14     soldiers who remained in the area after Operation Storm.  Is that right?

15        A.   That is correct.

16             MR. HEDARALY:  Let me now put up on the screen 65 ter 1231, which

17     is a report by General Cervenko of 21 August 1995.

18        Q.   General Cervenko, at the time, was the Chief of Staff of the

19     Croatian army.  And this is his report on Operation Storm that will come

20     up in a few seconds.

21             I just want to draw your attention to a few -- few portions of

22     this.

23             You can see the heading to satisfy yourself that the document is

24     sent to the president of Croatia and is a report on Operation Storm.

25             If we go to the second page of this document, you will see a --

Page 20652

 1     after the list of items it says:  "The total of 127.000 members of HV,

 2     military police, and MUP have taken part of the attack for liberation of

 3     the occupied Croatian territory, Operation Storm."

 4             So just keep that number in mind for now, 127.000.  And I don't

 5     want to confuse you.  This is the entire operation, so it is both Sector

 6     South and Sector North, so th 10.000 square kilometres, not the 4.000.

 7     Just so we are clear.

 8        A.   Okay.  Thank you.

 9        Q.   And if we go to page 10 of this document in the English, item VI.

10     I think it's page 7 in the B/C/S but -- I'm fairly sure.  If we go down

11     you see and it say there:  "At the moment, there was 30.000 demobilised

12     HV members."

13        A.   Yes.

14        Q.   Now let me just ask you, you said just earlier that you would use

15     every possible asset to try to secure the territory.  Would

16     30.000 soldiers be an asset that you would try to use to try to secure

17     the territory?

18        A.   I understand -- the understand the line.  And I would think my

19     response would be yes, recognising -- and I think the issue would be

20     whether these were -- first of all, who was in overall command of this

21     operation, were all of these assets under the command of that person, did

22     he have full command and control of them?

23             Now, Your Honour, we could get into a very difficult discussion

24     about command here, because in -- from a UK point of view, we will have

25     garrisons and administrative districts commanded by various people who

Page 20653

 1     are not under the command of an operational commander who happens to live

 2     and operate in that same territory.

 3             So if I may give an example, I commanded a brigade in the

 4     United Kingdom.  My brigade lived in a part of the country that was under

 5     the command of another brigadier whose responsibilities were to

 6     administer that area of the country.  So in this context, if all of these

 7     people that you have presented are clearly under the command and under a

 8     single coherent command and they are all available to be used in

 9     achieving the post-conflict stability, then in principle my answer is

10     yes.

11             Now, I caveat that slightly, in that in having been given the

12     assumed facts that I was given by counsel, and going back to our earlier

13     conversation, I had discussions with them about what that meant, how did

14     it operate.  In the short time in which you have given to me, I'm

15     responding as honestly and as positively as I can do, but there may be

16     all sorts of other aspects to this that I am not aware.  So I must caveat

17     my response in that way.

18        Q.   I completely understand your answer, General.

19             If you were to assume that -- and I know that was not one of the

20     facts given to you, but if you were to assume that General Gotovina did

21     have control, military control of that territory, then that would change

22     your answer?

23        A.   Again, I must be clear --

24             JUDGE ORIE:  Could I just --

25             Mr. Hedaraly, I think that the witness explained that it depends

Page 20654

 1     on command, availability, a lot of the circumstances.  What do you say,

 2     maybe yes, maybe no.  That's more or less your answer, depends on the

 3     circumstances.  Now to take out one of them, and then ask him, Would,

 4     under those circumstances, that ignores the other caveats, there seems to

 5     be even perhaps more caveats than there is answer.  I'm not blaming you

 6     for that, not in any way, Mr. Cross but it makes no sense to continue

 7     questioning and to some extent ignoring what the witness told us.

 8             Please proceed.

 9             MR. HEDARALY:

10        Q.   So we had 127.000 in the operation.  30.000 at the time of this

11     report were demobilized.  If we go to the second page of the document --

12     the next page, sorry, of this document, you see at the top there, it

13     says:

14             "Sufficient forces were left in the areas of responsibility of

15     Military District to guard the borders and control territory behind the

16     borders?"

17             So now we have 97.000 remaining forces.  Now let's just assume --

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. -- could you explain the number, Mr. Hedaraly.

19             MR. HEDARALY:  I was looking at 127.000 minus 30.000.

20             JUDGE ORIE:  I missed the 30.  And isn't it true that at least

21     this Chamber has had some evidence that --

22             MR. HEDARALY:  That's what I was going --

23             JUDGE ORIE:  -- forces were not necessarily on the territory --

24             MR. HEDARALY:  That was my hypothetical, Your Honour, that I was

25     going into.  I started by saying let's just assume --

Page 20655

 1             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes --

 2             MR. HEDARALY:  -- that a number and I was going --

 3             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  Or double the numbers.  Let's just assume that

 4     they are wrong and that they are the double.  What about that?

 5             MR. HEDARALY:  I was going provide a --

 6             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  But, of course, this witness doesn't know

 7     anything -- one thing is clear:  Feed this witness with the information

 8     or the facts that would encourage him to lead him to the answers you

 9     would most likely want to hear from him.  That's an exercise.  We could

10     go on with that for days and weeks, and finally, you might get

11     25 per cent of the answers you would like to have.

12             Let's -- let's not -- try to avoid that, Mr. Hedaraly.  If you

13     are saying 127.000 minus 30.000 demobilised, then of course one of the

14     assumptions where there may be good reasons to believe that that

15     assumption is not true would be that all these soldiers were still on

16     Croatian territory, or in Sector South.  And -- well, I'm not going to

17     stop you immediately, but I think I explained to you that that might not

18     really assist the Chamber.

19             But perhaps I have misunderstood your line of questioning, so

20     perhaps I should be more patient.

21             Mr. Misetic.

22             MR. MISETIC:  Mr. President, I rise only because there's an

23     interpretation or, I should say, a translation issue in the document

24     itself which may be of some relevance certainly to the witness with

25     respect to the sentence that was quoted.

Page 20656

 1             JUDGE ORIE:  If we have such an issue, then I would seek your

 2     assistance or at least any native speaking person to read the line and

 3     then, of course, we'll see whether the translation would be the same

 4     approximately.

 5             MR. MISETIC:  Yes, Mr. President.

 6             I will begin --

 7             JUDGE ORIE:  You're reading from?

 8             MR. MISETIC:  From the first sentence in the original.

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.

10             MR. MISETIC:  On the page on the screen.  [No interpretation].

11             JUDGE ORIE:  I haven't received translation but could be that the

12     interpreters were waiting to hear the whole of the line.  But if you

13     slowly restart, Mr. Misetic, then -- and let's -- let's wait getting

14     upset for a few seconds now and then.

15             Please proceed.

16             MR. MISETIC:  Thank you.

17             [Interpretation] "In the areas of responsibility of the

18     Military Districts, enough forces were left to guard the border and

19     control the area in depth."

20             [In English] Thank you, Mr. President.

21             JUDGE ORIE:  Please proceed, Mr. Hedaraly.  The translation we

22     received now is the control the territory in depth which from what I

23     understand has a self military meaning.

24             Please proceed, Mr. Hedaraly, the --

25             MR. HEDARALY:  I -- I just --

Page 20657

 1             JUDGE ORIE:  -- the translation we received now is the "control

 2     the territory in depth," which, from what I understand, has a specific

 3     military meaning.

 4             MR. HEDARALY:  I just -- briefly, Mr. President.  I understand

 5     the Chamber's guidance.  This whole report was prepared and provided

 6     based on facts given by the Gotovina Defence to the expert for him to

 7     come to certain conclusions.  I understand and I will not go through the

 8     entire Prosecution case and give that the witness, but I think that it is

 9     only fair for us as well to present some facts.  And if I had finished my

10     question, Your Honour would have seen that I was trying to present a

11     reasonable assumption of the -- in the assumption -- in the hypothetical

12     that I was making.  That's simply what I wanted to do.

13             JUDGE ORIE:  Well, it may not come as a surprise that if, as the

14     witness did, if you give your expert opinion based on certain facts, that

15     relevant changes in those facts will result in different answers.  There

16     is, as such, apart from that perhaps you want to demonstrate it in one or

17     two instances, but there is, as such, I think, no doubt about that.  But

18     I would not prevent you from demonstrating that in relation to one or two

19     examples.  But let's not go through the whole of it, and, further, if you

20     give different facts or other facts, perhaps also try to remain at not

21     too much a distance from the evidence, as the party understood it, the

22     Chamber has received.

23             Please proceed.

24             MR. HEDARALY:  Thank you, Mr. President.

25        Q.   While we're here, can you clarify for us what it would mean to

Page 20658

 1     control the territory in the depth?

 2        A.   And I -- again, I think from my perspective and my experience as

 3     military words like "control" -- words like "control," you know, do have

 4     meanings.  We used words like "destroy," "defeat," "control," whatever,

 5     and they carry certain nuances that after 30 or 40 years in the military

 6     you instinctively understand, but it is quite difficult to define them

 7     really.  And in the context of the sufficient forces controlling in

 8     depth, that would depend for me -- my reaction to that is that would

 9     depend on the circumstances on the ground.  So if things are relatively

10     quiet and there's no huge amounts of disruption, forces can control in

11     the sense of keep a track of people's movements, be able to deal with

12     individual incidents in a relatively coherent way; but if the terrain is

13     -- or the territory has got a lot of incidents going on, there are lots

14     of people moving around, there's a lot of banditry and criminality, then

15     establishing control is a completely different picture.

16             So I -- although, again, I stress I'm here to try and assist the

17     Court in the round and I hear what you are saying again, it's, again,

18     difficult to know who are these 30.000 or 97.000, what is their

19     professionalism, are they professional soldiers who are garrisoning the

20     towns, are they under clear command and control, are they volunteers,

21     have been in the military for a long time, am I able to give them orders,

22     what is happening around me in the context of this territory, all of

23     which you -- the Court may be able to establish with clarity and hold to

24     account the commander on the ground at the time.

25             I cannot comment on whether or not that is established.  You can

Page 20659

 1     establish that or not.  So, I'm trying to be helpful but I think I don't

 2     think I can say anything more unless there is something specific you

 3     would like to tease out.

 4        Q.   No, that's fine.  I think the -- the only point that I wanted to

 5     make, and I think that that's what you've said, and the subject of the

 6     caveats that you have mentioned earlier for the 30.000 soldiers, if there

 7     were any available soldiers on the territory subject to the command and

 8     control caveat that you have raised before, those would be assets that

 9     would be want to employ in securing the territory.  Is that correct?

10        A.   Yes, with the caveats and -- alongside.

11        Q.   Yes.  No, that's understood.

12             Now, you also provided information about a number of civilian

13     police officers, and I asked you earlier to assume that a number of these

14     crimes were committed by military personnel.  If that were the case, if

15     soldiers successful in retaking an area committed crimes, in your

16     experience, what could civil police officers do in that situation?

17        A.   Again, I can only put this in the context of the UK military

18     procedures.  Soldiers are subject to civil law and military law.  Within

19     the British military, we have military policemen and military lawyers who

20     are part of the command structure.  So if soldiers under my command or a

21     British military command were involved in criminality, the commander of

22     the force has military policemen and a judicial system that can conduct

23     the initial investigation.

24             Depending upon the circumstance, in the United Kingdom, for

25     example, very quickly, that might be handed over to the civil authority

Page 20660

 1     to deal with.  In places like Germany, where we were based under a status

 2     of forces agreement, there would be procedures with the German legal

 3     system and the British legal system, and the niceties of that I don't

 4     understand, but in some cases, the -- the case would be handed over again

 5     to civil -- civil authority, or in other cases the military person who

 6     had committed a crime or was being accused of committing a crime would be

 7     held in British military prison whilst the court case proceeded, may even

 8     be brought back to the United Kingdom for that to be brought to trial.

 9             On operations, similar would apply.  In some cases the military

10     would deal with the issue if it was under military law, but in serious

11     civilian criminality terms, they would be passed over to the civil

12     authority.  And I should stress, if I may, that the military commander

13     does not have authority over the civil police system, and he does not

14     have authority to interfere with the military police and the military

15     legal system in conducting what it needs to happen.  So the commander

16     cannot step in and say, I do not want that man to be charged if he has

17     been found doing something and has been caught and has been brought to

18     court, the commander has to step away from that while justice is

19     conducted.

20        Q.   And that is based all of this on your understanding of the UK

21     military system and civilian system; is that correct?

22        A.   Correct.

23        Q.   Okay.  And --

24        A.   So if I can give, if it's helpful, to give an example --

25             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Hedaraly.

Page 20661

 1             MR. HEDARALY:  No, I --

 2             JUDGE ORIE:  Let me just intervene.  I think we have heard for

 3     hours and hours, evidence what was the competence of the civilian police

 4     and under what circumstances, even if we would have a soldier as a

 5     suspect, whether they -- we could intervene.  Now, in the last answer we

 6     have heard an explanation about the British system, which might be -- one

 7     thing I know that the British system in many respects differs from

 8     continental European systems, whether it's police or whether it's court

 9     systems.  We have now dealt with status of forces agreement, in Germany,

10     most likely NATO status of forces agreements, with additional agreements,

11     let's move on.

12             MR. HEDARALY:  I did not want to interrupt the witness,

13     Mr. President, and that's why -- I simply wanted to clarify which that --

14        Q.   -- you don't have any knowledge of the Croatian military or

15     civilian system?

16        A.   No, I don't.

17        Q.   Thank you.

18             MR. HEDARALY:  Just a moment.

19             THE WITNESS:  Sure.

20                           [Prosecution counsel confer]

21             MR. HEDARALY:  Your Honour --

22             THE INTERPRETER:  Could the witness kindly speak closer to the

23     microphones.  Thank you.

24             MR. HEDARALY:  Your Honour, this concludes my cross-examination.

25             General, thank you very much for your assistance and for

Page 20662

 1     answering the questions.

 2             I'm just reminded, if I could tender 65 ter 1231, the document on

 3     the screen, and then I will formally conclude my cross-examination.

 4             MR. KEHOE:  No objection, Mr. President.

 5             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Registrar.

 6             THE REGISTRAR:  Your Honours, that becomes Exhibit P2602.

 7             JUDGE ORIE:  And is admitted into evidence.

 8             Has the cross-examination triggered any need to put further

 9     questions to the witness?

10             MR. KEHOE:  No, Mr. President.

11             JUDGE ORIE:  Mr. Kuzmanovic.

12             MR. KUZMANOVIC:  No, Your Honour.  Thank you.

13                           [Trial Chamber confers]

14             JUDGE ORIE:  I may have one or more questions for you.  Let me

15     first find the relevant portion of the transcript.

16                            Questioned by the Court:

17             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  I would like to ask you the following.

18     Mr. Kuzmanovic added two facts to the list of facts and asked whether it

19     would further complicate matters.  The first fact would be that after

20     Operation Storm was concluded, that there was still a war going on in

21     neighbouring Bosnia and Herzegovina.

22             Now, looking at the list of facts that were put to you, and I'm

23     referring to page 20, under T and U, that the VRS organises military

24     operations against General Gotovina's forces in Bosnia, and that on or

25     about the 12th of August, General Mladic launches a counteroffensive

Page 20663

 1     against HV forces never the Croatian-Bosnian border, would that first

 2     fact not already, in your view, having been among those facts that you

 3     had considered in drawing your conclusions?

 4        A.   It was, Your Honour, in that in looking at what needed to be done

 5     and the numbers and the resources that were available, recognising that

 6     there were events like that happening.  Now, again, I think it's

 7     important to recognise I'm not aware of how that particular event

 8     unfurls.  I had within it, assumed that this is, if you like, a regular

 9     army counteroffensive.  This is not insurgents, this is not banditry,

10     this is a military counteroffensive, and that in the follow-on facts that

11     were presented, General Gotovina defends the line and then continues with

12     his operational -- his operations -- his operation Southern Sweep and so

13     on.

14             So it is a fact that I was aware of, but in the context of what

15     is going on in post-war operations, the post-conflict, reconstruction,

16     and trying to restore order in the main part of this area of operations,

17     this, to me, is part of the follow-on.  Is that --

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.

19        A.   Is that clear.

20             JUDGE ORIE:  Well, I do understand your answer.  At the same time

21     that was not the fact that was submitted to you by Mr. Kuzmanovic,

22     because what he gave you as a new fact or perhaps not a new fact is that

23     a war was going on in neighbouring Bosnia and Herzegovina.

24              Which I understood, Mr. Kuzmanovic, that this already

25     demonstrates how fragile these kind of assumptions are, that it was the

Page 20664

 1     war in which the same forces that were involved in Operation Storm, at

 2     least some of them were involved, but now across the border the war

 3     continuing there.  And that is something I thought was already

 4     reflected --

 5        A.   I understand.

 6             JUDGE ORIE:  -- under T and U.

 7        A.   I understand.

 8             JUDGE ORIE:  Now the second fact which was new was the pockets of

 9     RSK soldiers of which, I think you later said it very much depends on

10     what it is, is it -- so, therefore, you quickly answered that matters

11     became more complex, whereas, for one of the facts you had already

12     considered, so for that reason it could not have become more complex,

13     because it was already part of the facts; and the other one was so vague

14     to understand what it actually meant, that it would be difficult to draw

15     the conclusion that it would -- makes matters more complex.

16             Would you agree with me --

17        A.   I understand your point, Your Honour, I think my -- in responding

18     to the way the question was phrased, if these are major operations, large

19     casualties are being caused, there is this war that's going on in Bosnia

20     and is beginning to incur across the borders and is now beginning to take

21     my mind -- draw my attention to it, then yes it becomes more complex.

22     But again, I do understand your point, and it is -- it is relevant in

23     terms of the size and shape of what these things are, and if -- if they

24     were significant, they would make the attempt to bring order to this

25     region much more difficult.

Page 20665

 1             My understanding was that these were relatively small

 2     occurrences, but if that were not to be the case it would make it more

 3     complex.

 4             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  My next question, and perhaps also a bit of a

 5     general kind, is your conclusions in your report are based on your

 6     experience, Kosovo, Iraq, Northern Ireland, and the facts that were given

 7     to you in relation to Croatia, facts which were presented to you and were

 8     not verified by you, would you agree with me that whether these

 9     conclusions can be drawn entirely depends on to what extent the

10     comparison between the Croatian situation and the Kosovo situation,

11     Northern Ireland situation, et cetera, would be of a similarity which

12     would allow for drawing conclusions of -- based on the experience in the

13     other areas?

14        A.   I would, sir.

15             JUDGE ORIE:  Just to give you an example.  Would, for example,

16     would it for you make a difference comparing with Iraq that from what I

17     understand after Iraq had been militarily taken, that there was no

18     still-functioning government anymore which had to be fully

19     re-established.  The old governmental system having collapsed; whereas in

20     Croatia one might think of Croatia still having a government but had it

21     retaken certain territory, on which it could well, extend or re-build on

22     the basis of existing governmental institutions to that area.

23             Would, for example, such a difference, would that be relevant for

24     you, and I'm not asking whether it would change your conclusions, but

25     would that have an impact, an important impact, on considering the

Page 20666

 1     situation of the type of operations you are talking about?

 2        A.   Your Honour, yes.  If I may just expand on those.  I think Iraq

 3     is, of course, a military occupation, and under international law certain

 4     things flow from that, and therefore the responsibility of commanders in

 5     Iraq are different than responsibilities within the sovereign territory

 6     where there is a functioning government.

 7             So Iraq is at one end of that spectrum, if you like.

 8     Northern Ireland was part of the sovereign territory of the United

 9     Kingdom.  In the earlier 1970s there was a period of time there were what

10     were termed to be "no go areas" within certain cities of

11     Northern Ireland, and under a military operation called Motor Man we

12     cleared those areas to re-establish the sovereign rule of law in those

13     areas.

14             So as I understand this operation within Croatia, and as you've

15     explained it, this is the sovereign territory of Croatia, and the

16     military commander, having conducted a military operation, it is then the

17     responsibility of the sovereign government, the civil power, and the

18     ministries to re-establish every aspect of post-conflict situation.

19             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  I didn't want specifically focus on the

20     difference between Iraq and Croatia, but I just wanted to highlight one

21     of the circumstances which might have an impact on the conclusions of how

22     much the problems, huge and complex problems, you faced everywhere, to

23     what extent comparing them is -- is be done on a one-to-one basis.

24        A.   Sure.  And I did try to say in the report that you cannot just

25     pick out the circumstances of one operation and implant it into another.

Page 20667

 1     They are always unique.  You always have to assess it on a one-to-one

 2     basis.

 3             So everything that I have explained in my report, which lays out

 4     my experiences, I would be the first to acknowledge may or may not be

 5     applicable in this particular operation, at this particular time, in the

 6     circumstances that the commander on the ground found himself.

 7     Nonetheless, there were some underlying issues in terms of how long did

 8     he have to prepare, how much resource did he have, what was the size of

 9     the operation, what was going on in that operation.  Some of those

10     things, I think, are applicable in every sort of operation that we have

11     been involved with over these last 20 or 30 years.

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Well, the general message seems to be don't

13     underestimate what it takes --

14        A.   Absolutely, sir.

15             JUDGE ORIE:  In such kind of operations.

16        A.   Absolutely.  And if I may just add, if you want to work on the

17     basis that everything will go well, plan A is we will not have a problem

18     here.  A good military commander or a good organisation planning this

19     process has always got to have some sort of reserve.  Okay, if that

20     doesn't happen what then do we do?  And if you don't have a plan B, or

21     indeed a plan C, and if we don't actually recognise in reality whatever

22     contingency plans you've, you always have to adapt them to suit the

23     circumstances, then you can run into trouble very quickly.  So you must

24     not underestimate.  Absolutely.

25             JUDGE ORIE:  As doctors have to do, as companies have to do,

Page 20668

 1     as --

 2        A.   Indeed, sir.

 3             JUDGE ORIE:  Thank you for those answers.

 4             Have the questions by the Bench triggered any need --

 5             MR. KEHOE:  No, Mr. President, thank you.

 6             MR. HEDARALY:  No, Mr. President.

 7             JUDGE ORIE:  Then, Mr. Cross, in the beginning I said it is no

 8     disrespect of positions and titles, perhaps I should have added ranks.

 9     I'd like to thank you very much for coming to The Hague and for answering

10     the questions that were put to you by the parties and by the Bench, and I

11     wish you a safe journey home again.

12             THE WITNESS:  Thank you very much, sir.

13             JUDGE ORIE:  Thank you.

14                           [The witness withdrew]

15                           [Trial Chamber and legal officer confer]

16                           [Trial Chamber confers]

17             JUDGE ORIE:  There are no more witnesses for this week.

18             MR. KEHOE:  Yes, Mr. President, that's right.

19             JUDGE ORIE:  There are a few procedural matters which the Chamber

20     would like to deal with before the recess.  At the same time, the Chamber

21     needs some additional time to discuss a few matters and to prepare for

22     them.  To some extent, they are related also to scheduling issues for

23     after the recess.

24             I suggest to the parties that we will adjourn for the day, and

25     have a hearing tomorrow relatively short, not necessarily starting at

Page 20669

 1     9.00 in the morning which would give additional time for the Chamber to

 2     deliberate on certain matters and to clear our desks before the recess.

 3             Let me first hear whether there's any objection to -- if the

 4     Chamber would decide to do so.

 5             MR. KEHOE:  No, Mr. President.  We, of course, have no objection.

 6     If I can just put one issue on the table, and I haven't talked to our

 7     client yet, but he is shaking his head, if we have procedural matters,

 8     can they be excused or certainly --

 9             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  They, of course, they are -- I mean, a request

10     for a week not sitting is of course a procedural matter but, of course,

11     might have a direct effect.  When we are discussing procedural matters,

12     and if we're not hearing any evidence and not thoroughly discussing on

13     admissibility of evidence, then, of course, the accused always have -- I

14     wouldn't say have a right, but if they waive their right to be present,

15     under those circumstances the Chamber would easily accept it.

16             MR. KEHOE:  I think I'm speaking for my colleagues that they have

17     all agreed that they will --

18             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  Then ...

19                           [Trial Chamber confers]

20             MR. KAY:  Your Honour, sorry, I apologise.  Your Honour, for my

21     part we needed to see Mr. Cermak tomorrow before the recess, and I was at

22     one stage trying to book a DU visit in the morning, but then I was quite

23     satisfied if we were going to be sitting and he was going to be here,

24     because then I could speak to him here and hand to him certain documents

25     before the recess starts, so I -- I don't have a Croatian speaker with me

Page 20670

 1     on the bench, and I'm not sure if I speak to him he will fully

 2     understand, but I know this is being interpreted, whether I need to hand

 3     certain documents to him tomorrow, and it may be better if he comes to

 4     court and then that can serve that process.  It will be easier than

 5     trying to fix things for the DU.

 6             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.  I am not fully familiar with all the practical

 7     difficulties that creates, but you have put it now on the record now.  So

 8     Mr. Cermak would have a good reason to come, if he wants to see the

 9     documents you want to hand out to him.  If he doesn't wanted to see them

10     then ...

11             MR. KAY:  I'm grateful to the translators.

12             JUDGE ORIE:  Yes.

13                           [Trial Chamber and registrar confer]

14             JUDGE ORIE:  We adjourn for the day and we resume tomorrow, 24th

15     of July, most likely for one session only, to start at 11.00, in

16     Courtroom III.

17                            --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 5.54 p.m.,

18                           to be reconvened on Friday, the 24th day of

19                           July, 2009, at 11.00 a.m.

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