Page 10694
1 Wednesday, 15 October 2008
2 [Open session]
3 --- Upon commencing at 2.16 p.m.
4 [The accused entered court]
5 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [No interpretation]
6 THE REGISTRAR: Thank you and good afternoon, Your Honours. This
7 is case number IT-03-67-T, the Prosecutor versus Vojislav Seselj.
8 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [No interpretation] ... [Interpretation]
9 Mr. Mussemeyer, as well as and all the people assisting the OTP. I would
10 also like to greet Mr. Seselj and all the people present in helping us.
11 [Technical difficulties]
12 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] The Trial Chamber will check.
13 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] There is a problem with the
14 headphones. Sometimes I hear the interpretation into Serbian, sometimes
15 into English. There's seems to be a mix-up with the channels.
16 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] So we'll check.
17 Mr. Seselj, can you hear the translation properly?
18 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Yes, I do now. Yes, I do. Well,
19 actually, I heard it a little while ago too, but then the Serbian would
20 stop and then I would hear English, as if somebody was switching
21 channels.
22 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] It should be working now. We
23 shall resume cross-examination. I was saying that Mr. Seselj should
24 still have an hour and a half. We shall bring the witness in the
25 courtroom. I shall ask the usher to go and fetch him.
Page 10695
1 [The witness entered court]
2 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Good afternoon, sir. I hope
3 you had a nice evening. As you know, your cross-examination is going to
4 resume now. Questions will be put to you by Mr. Seselj.
5 Mr. Seselj, you have the floor.
6 WITNESS: FRANJA BARICEVIC [Resumed]
7 [Witness answered through interpreter]
8 Cross-examination by Mr. Seselj: [Continued]
9 Q. [Interpretation] Mr. Baricevic, yesterday you spoke about a bus
10 full of White Eagles who allegedly arrived before the rally in Hrtkovci
11 from Sabac. And then you said that they had rifles, is that so? Which
12 means automatic rifles, that's what it usually means. Is that what you
13 meant? And you said that they wore all kinds of clothes and footwear, is
14 that so? That means that nobody had a full uniform, a part of this
15 uniform or part of that uniform, did I understand you correctly?
16 A. I said that a bus full of people, armed people had arrived, and
17 parked in Savska Street, and that they had gone to the place where the
18 rally was to be held, and that they were not dressed like military
19 personnel, but in all kinds of clothes. And that they had automatic
20 rifles.
21 Q. Well, this is what I'm interested in, this diversity of their
22 clothes. Did they wear different kinds of military clothing or civilian
23 clothes? Did they wear different kinds of military uniforms?
24 A. Well, the only difference was, in fact, in the boots they wore.
25 Q. Did they all have the same uniforms but different boots?
Page 10696
1 A. Yes, some had boots, some had shoes.
2 Q. Was that the only difference?
3 A. The only difference.
4 Q. Well, you can see that in any barracks; some soldiers wear boots,
5 some wear shoes. What is so strange about it then? What was the
6 diversity in uniforms?
7 A. Well, I answered you. I said that some had boots, others had
8 shoes, but I just compared them with the regular army. I said that
9 everybody has the same kinds of clothes and footwear.
10 Q. Fine. Let's leave the boots and shoes aside. You said that they
11 had different kinds of uniforms, let's now focus on that. Were those
12 camouflage uniforms?
13 A. No.
14 Q. What kinds of uniforms there?
15 A. Black uniforms. That's what I said.
16 Q. All of them wore black uniforms?
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. And when was there ever a formation in Serbia wearing black
19 uniforms? How come that nobody ever noticed that, ever?
20 A. On that day, they came there dressed in the kind of clothes that
21 I just described.
22 Q. And what party in Serbia set up the White Eagles?
23 A. Well, I don't know what party founded the White Eagles, but
24 that's how those people were dressed.
25 Q. And they said that they were White Eagles and Seselj's security;
Page 10697
1 is that so?
2 A. That's what I said.
3 Q. And did they attend the rally carrying those automatic rifles?
4 A. Yes. They were mingling with the people.
5 Q. Well, is there a single rally in Serbia that was attended by 50
6 people with automatic rifles? Did this happen at all anywhere, ever?
7 A. Well, I don't know if there were any other rallies elsewhere, but
8 I didn't say there were 50 of them. I just said that there was this bus
9 that came.
10 Q. Well, usually you can fit about 50 people on the bus. Maybe the
11 bus was half full, maybe there were just 30 people there, but you would
12 not use a bus to bring just five or six people there, would you? Why
13 would there be a bus if there wasn't a larger number of them? Those
14 people who suggested to you that you should make this kind of statement
15 did not really proof you all that well, they did not really teach you
16 what to say, Mr. Baricevic, did they?
17 A. I cannot tell you the number but --
18 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] One moment, witness. The
19 Prosecutor is on his feet, but I know what he is going to -- I know what
20 he's about to say.
21 What do you want to say, Mr. Mussemeyer?
22 MR. MUSSEMEYER: I want to say that Mr. Seselj should refrain
23 from these allegations that we are putting something in the witness
24 mouth. He knows exactly that we proofed the witness, that we go through
25 his former statement, that we constantly tell him that he has to tell the
Page 10698
1 truth, and it is nothing from the side of the Prosecution to influence
2 the witness, and Mr. Seselj knows this and he should refrain from this.
3 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Witness, you heard Mr. Seselj
4 hint at the fact that somebody implied that you should say that. Did you
5 say it or did somebody imply that you should say that? You understand my
6 question? Let me repeat. A few moments ago you talked about those men
7 who were armed, who were dressed in black, who were wearing shoes or
8 boots and who attended Mr. Seselj's speech, which Mr. Seselj challenges.
9 At one point he says that it was hinted that you should say that, and the
10 Prosecutor has just got on his feet to say that they never hinted at
11 anything. So my question is, did you say that or did somebody suggest
12 that you should say that?
13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I'm not receiving any
14 interpretation.
15 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Let's check. Let me repeat.
16 Can you hear the translation? I'll start from the beginning. You said
17 that there were 30 or 50 people that were armed, dressed in black,
18 wearing boots or shoes. Those people were present when Mr. Seselj
19 delivered his speech, which Mr. Seselj challenges. And he said so. At
20 one point, Mr. Seselj says that what you are saying is something that has
21 been suggested to you. The Prosecutor got on his feet to say that they
22 have never suggested anything whatsoever.
23 This is my question: When you say this, does this come from you
24 or did somebody ask you to say this?
25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I said yesterday that
Page 10699
1 the bus had been parked in the Savska Street somewhere around number 7
2 and my house is at number 19, so that was in my street. I saw this bus
3 there. Nobody told me to provide this answer.
4 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj.
5 MR. SESELJ:
6 Q. [Interpretation] And this time I did not accuse the Prosecution
7 at all, and Mr. Mussemeyer, I think, responds because of his bad
8 conscience, not because I levelled any accusations. But I would like to
9 stress that we had some witnesses, Croats, in this trial and in some
10 other trials, and it turned out that the Croatian intelligence service
11 had prepped them before they came here to testify. There is documentary
12 evidence to that effect. I brought some documents here to show that. So
13 my question is completely regular.
14 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Witness, yesterday Mr. Seselj
15 put the question to you, but I shall put the question to you now. Did
16 the Croatian intelligence services try to contact you with a view to
17 making statements before this Tribunal, or did you never meet the
18 Croatian intelligence services?
19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I said yesterday that
20 I received a visit and they only asked me about these events that I was
21 involved in. No record was made and nobody tried to talk me into
22 anything when I gave the statement.
23 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] I remember you saying that
24 yesterday. But these two people who came, I believe there were two, why
25 did they come? Was it to say hello to you and everything is all fine and
Page 10700
1 well? Why did they come and see you?
2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] They asked me if I was able to find
3 my way around there and they asked me how I was able to get from Hrtkovci
4 to Jaksic. It was just a very brief conversation with them. They asked
5 me more questions about my private life and how I intend to go on to fix
6 the house, to do some farm work, what I should do to improve my situation
7 as soon as possible.
8 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] These two people who came, did
9 they say that they worked for the Croatian Ministry of the Interior, did
10 they show you an ID card? What did they actually tell you?
11 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] They told me that they were from
12 the military prosecutor's office in Osijek.
13 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] From the military prosecutor's
14 office in Osijek, that's what they told you. And the military Prosecutor
15 from Osijek is in charge of rebuilding your house?
16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, no. They asked me about the
17 situation, and then we moved on and we had a private conversation.
18 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well. Mr. Seselj, please
19 proceed.
20 MR. SESELJ:
21 Q. [Interpretation] How far is it from Slavonska Pozega to Osijek in
22 kilometres?
23 A. 90.
24 Q. Not more than that?
25 A. No.
Page 10701
1 Q. And they went all the way from Osijek to Slavonska Pozega to talk
2 to you about your trip from Hrtkovci to Slavonska Pozega and what is the
3 situation with the farm work?
4 A. Well, we talked about farm work later, subsequently.
5 Q. At any rate, you travelled to Croatia via Hungary because that
6 was the only way to do it. You went from Hrtkovci to Novi Sad to
7 Subotica and then to Hungary; is that so?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. And what did they ask you about, what could be of any interest to
10 any military organs or military intelligence organs? Nothing.
11 A. I told you what they asked me.
12 Q. You know Slavko Kulundzic, do you?
13 A. From Ruma?
14 Q. From Ruma. He was in the state security?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. You've known him for years?
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. How long? Since when?
19 A. In 1992 or rather, well, maybe some five years.
20 Q. Have you known him from before?
21 A. No.
22 Q. And you were his informant in Hrtkovci, were you not?
23 A. Me?
24 Q. Yes.
25 A. I was nobody's informant.
Page 10702
1 Q. Well, he says that you were. Slavko Kulundzic said that when he
2 spoke to my expert team there, to assist my Defence, Nebojsa Sarevic and
3 Jelena Bozetalijin [phoen]. And let me read what he had to say about
4 you, and for the Prosecution that's at page 384 of my book. I've
5 provided the book quite some time ago. He talked about some specific
6 things that we will go back to but my associates say this: So you
7 cooperated, the intelligence state security service cooperated with
8 them --
9 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] One moment. The Prosecutor is
10 raising an objection.
11 MR. MUSSEMEYER: [Previous translation continues] ... Mr. Seselj
12 is quoting from statements which we don't know, he should get used to
13 deliver these statements to the Prosecution in advance and not surprise
14 everybody in the courtroom.
15 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj, from what I
16 understood, but I stand to be corrected, I believe that the statement by
17 this person named Slavko Kulundzic is part of a book which you published.
18 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. President, the Prosecution
19 knows about this book. It's on the basis of this book that they
20 announced a criminal complaint against me and against my associates and
21 they are going to charge us with contempt of court, and now they don't
22 know about it. 15 or 20 days ago through the members of the registry, I
23 handed it over to the OTP myself.
24 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Give us the title of the book.
25 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I'm afraid that if I give you the
Page 10703
1 title, you are going to delete it or you are going to move into closed
2 session. You know what heading it is, (redacted), and you know
3 what follows.
4 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well.
5 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] [Previous translation continues]
6 ... with pleasure utter the entire title, but I don't want us to move
7 into closed session.
8 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] This Slavko Kulundzic, what
9 did he tell you that is contained in the book? Since the Prosecutor has
10 a book, he can check straightaway.
11 Mr. Mussemeyer, do you have this book and it's contained in the
12 book?
13 MR. MUSSEMEYER: Ms. Dahl informed me that we have this book.
14 It's 1200 pages long. It's all in B/C/S and nobody in the Prosecution is
15 able to translate this within 14 days.
16 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] The book hasn't been
17 translated. Mr. Seselj, do not read out the entire book, just tell us
18 what this man Slavko Kulundzic has said.
19 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. President, if the book has not
20 been translated, how could they charge me with contempt of court? That
21 is to say, that that someone told them about the book, and on the basis
22 of that, they filed their complaint. This book was published more than a
23 year ago, and since they prepared the complaint, after that they must
24 have read the book.
25 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mrs. Dahl.
Page 10704
1 MS. DAHL: Your Honour, there have been select translations of
2 particular witness statements, but I don't believe that it is fair play
3 to a surprise the Prosecution with a selection from the 1200-page book.
4 That is out of order.
5 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] One moment, Mrs. Dahl. If I
6 understand correctly, Mr. Seselj, based on this book, you have filed a
7 motion, so you must have selected those pages you were interested in. It
8 might have been a better idea to read the entire book since this book is
9 not part of the trial and Mr. Seselj can say that someone has said such
10 and such and the witness will answer by saying, I challenge this or I
11 don't. Mrs. Dahl.
12 MS. DAHL: Your Honour, I think we need to discuss the book in
13 private session to give me a fair chance to respond to what Mr. Seselj is
14 saying and the observations that you have made.
15 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] In that case, we shall move
16 into private session.
17 THE REGISTRAR: Your Honours, we are now in private session.
18 [Private session]
19 (redacted)
20 (redacted)
21 (redacted)
22 (redacted)
23 (redacted)
24 (redacted)
25 (redacted)
Page 10705
1 (redacted)
2 (redacted)
3 (redacted)
4 (redacted)
5 (redacted)
6 (redacted)
7 (redacted)
8 (redacted)
9 (redacted)
10 (redacted)
11 (redacted)
12 (redacted)
13 (redacted)
14 (redacted)
15 (redacted)
16 [Open session]
17 MR. SESELJ:
18 Q. [Interpretation] So, Mr. Baricevic, Slavko Kulundzic is very
19 explicit and he claims that for several years you collaborated with the
20 state security service and that he was your contact, and that you
21 regularly informed him about the situation in the village, what was going
22 on, what people were saying and everything else. That is a claim made by
23 Slavko Kulundzic.
24 A. Your Honour, yesterday I stated that I and Dobrosav Markovic went
25 to Ruma to the MUP to ask for help for the village, to have
Page 10706
1 Slavko Kulundzic help us. Had I been his informant, he would have saved
2 me and Dobrosav at least. Dobrosav and I both had to move out of the
3 village. That is not true.
4 Q. In relation to your trip to Ruma, he does confirm that you came,
5 but that you came on private business to the SUP and then you dropped in
6 to see him, as you did before. You chatted with him, had a cup of coffee
7 and you did not complain about anything specific. You didn't say that
8 you had any problems and you didn't ask him for any help. You came to
9 take care of some business at the SUP, perhaps you were getting a
10 passport or something like that, as people do at the SUP, and then you
11 stopped to see him, as if he was an old friend basically. That is his
12 version. I don't know him and I saw you for the first time yesterday, so
13 I'm comparing your assertions to Slavko Kulundzic's assertions.
14 Judges, in relation to this, I would have a separate statement
15 signed and verified by Slavko Kulundzic had all my contacts not been
16 severed with my associates; that is why I'm compelled to use the book. I
17 have some other documents from the book that, otherwise, my associates
18 would have sent me as original documents. Since I have no communications
19 with them, I can only use the book.
20 Isn't that right, Mr. Baricevic?
21 A. That is not right.
22 Q. Well, that is the assertion he makes.
23 A. I made my statement in 1992, before your book was written, and I
24 did not know that Slavko would make that kind of statement. I gave the
25 kind of statement as I did.
Page 10707
1 Q. And who did you give this statement to in 1992?
2 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Mussemeyer.
3 MR. MUSSEMEYER: Just shortly for the record, Mr. Seselj has the
4 possibility to contact his associates. He is only not using it. He has
5 repeated this several times and it should be corrected for the record.
6 Thank you.
7 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well. Now, please, sir,
8 answer the question. Mr. Seselj put to you a question and your answer,
9 again was I was not an informant for this person.
10 So now proceed, Mr. Seselj.
11 MR. SESELJ:
12 Q. [Interpretation] Slavko Kulundzic claims here, because he,
13 himself, attended the rally, and he says that there were lots of
14 policemen at the rally. He claims that no bus had come from Sabac with
15 the White Eagles and he says that there were no White Eagles in black
16 uniforms there at all. He also claims that no one attended the rally
17 with weapons. Now, what do you say to that?
18 A. What I say is that that is not true. It is not true. It's not
19 true that I was an informant and this is not true either. I can say
20 exactly where the bus had been parked and everything else.
21 Q. We are not interested in where the bus was parked, we are
22 interested in whether a group of White Eagles arrived in black uniforms
23 to provide security for me or not. That's what I'm interested in. Who
24 knows who had parked some bus there even a week before? I'm not
25 interested in that. However, as for a bus from Sabac with a group of
Page 10708
1 White Eagles in black uniforms, Slavko Kulundzic said that no one like
2 that arrived, and he says if that had been the case, the police would
3 have taken appropriate measures. It is impossible for that kind of thing
4 to happen unobserved.
5 A. The bus was in Savska Street, in front of number 7. These people
6 got out of the bus, the ones that I've been talking about all of the
7 time.
8 Q. Slavko Kulundzic says further on that I did not read out any list
9 at that rally. What do you say that to?
10 A. Slavko Kulundzic can claim whatever he wants.
11 Q. Slavko Kulundzic informed his superiors ex officio about
12 developments at the rally, not then and not now did he hear me reading
13 out any list. Do you think that Slavko Kulundzic is lying for some
14 reason?
15 A. Well, why then did he say to me to Ruma [as interpreted], whoever
16 has to go should go.
17 Q. Slavko Kulundzic never said that to you.
18 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Let's move to private session
19 for a few moments, Mr. Registrar, please.
20 THE REGISTRAR: We are in private session now, Your Honour
21 [Private session]
22 (redacted)
23 (redacted)
24 (redacted)
25 (redacted)
Page 10709
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Page 10710
1 (redacted)
2 (redacted)
3 (redacted)
4 (redacted)
5 (redacted)
6 (redacted)
7 (redacted)
8 (redacted)
9 (redacted)
10 (redacted)
11 (redacted)
12 (redacted)
13 (redacted)
14 (redacted)
15 (redacted)
16 [Open session]
17 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Please proceed, Mr. Seselj.
18 MR. SESELJ:
19 Q. [Interpretation] Slavko Kulundzic claims that you did not
20 complain to him at all. He also says that you did not announce that you
21 would be leaving Hrtkovci. He believes that there was no reason for
22 that, you never mentioned any pressures exerted against you or your
23 family to him. He says that you never said that you had been mistreated.
24 He also says that after so many years of collaboration, you had built a
25 personal, friendly relationship and that once you even fixed the water
Page 10711
1 pipes in his house. Is that true?
2 A. Your Honour, what Slavko says, that I did not ask for help, that
3 is not true. And that I went to fix one water pipe for him, well, that
4 is true.
5 Q. He says that he was very satisfied with your cooperation, and
6 that on the basis of that, sometimes he would help you when something was
7 needed. He did not specify what that something was, truth to tell. Is
8 that true?
9 A. He did not give me any help.
10 Q. All right. That's what he says. All right.
11 Let us not dwell on this any longer, what it is that
12 Slavko Kulundzic says, because his statement is very, very interesting
13 and I hope that he will show up here as a Defence witness, if there is a
14 Defence case at all.
15 You claimed that at the rally I read out a list. Is there a
16 single person in Serbia who saw me reading anything at a public rally?
17 Am I not well known throughout Serbia as a politician who speaks
18 directly, who speaks off the cuff, except in the assembly when I'm
19 criticizing a particular bill and when I have to read something out. Did
20 you see that on television?
21 A. People heard who it was that had to move out, and now whether
22 that was read out or whether it was just uttered, it came from your
23 mouth.
24 Q. People heard that others had already left Hrtkovci and registered
25 with the ZNG, Tudjman's paramilitary units. This is what Zilic said.
Page 10712
1 After that no names were read out. In my speech, there were no names of
2 local persons. Isn't that right?
3 A. No, that's not right.
4 Q. And did Aleksa Ejic found the Serb Radical Party in Hrtkovci?
5 A. We said he did not, did we not?
6 Q. Well, you said that he did but I'm trying now to check, to see
7 whether you changed your mind over night because you said he had. That's
8 what is contained in your statement and that's what you confirmed
9 yesterday, but I can see now that you managed to memorize the fact that
10 he had not, so I just wanted to do a quick spot-check here.
11 MR. MUSSEMEYER: We have again this story about the party
12 membership where I yesterday was quoting our proofing notes and where the
13 witness has corrected this. Mr. Seselj is coming back again to this
14 issue which has already been discussed yesterday. I just wanted to let
15 this know.
16 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Yes, we did know that.
17 Continue, Mr. Seselj.
18 MR. SESELJ:
19 Q. [Interpretation] You said that the list of people to be expelled
20 was given to me by Ostoja Sibincic and other members of the Serbian
21 Radical Party, and that you know that for a fact. Now I want to know,
22 how is it that you know that for a fact?
23 MR. MUSSEMEYER: Sorry, I don't want to object all the time, but
24 Mr. Seselj should be correct. The witness did not -- I lost it now. The
25 witness did not say that Ostoja Sibincic was giving the list. He said he
Page 10713
1 assumes that Ostoja Sibincic contacted Mr. Seselj and gave him a list.
2 It was not that clear like Mr. Seselj did this in his last question.
3 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Yes. Mr. Seselj, the witness
4 did not say that Mr. Sibincic had given you a list. He said that he
5 believed that. It's an assumption, he is not sure.
6 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] That is not correct. I jotted down
7 here that the witness said he knew that for a fact, that the list had
8 been provided to me by Ostoja Sibincic and other members. That's what
9 the witness said here. Not that he thinks. He said he knew that for
10 fact. Please refer to the transcript. He said that before he stated
11 that he did not see me take a list from the pocket.
12 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj, let's shed some
13 light on this immediately. Witness, did you think so, were you sure, did
14 you see him give something? Tell us exactly what you said earlier.
15 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I said that I think that the
16 leaders, headed by Ostoja Sibincic, had provided a list of people who
17 were to move out of Hrtkovci.
18 MR. MUSSEMEYER: Just to assist all of us, I think I found the
19 quote from the transcript of yesterday. The Presiding Judge was -- and
20 it's on page 10623, line 1. Presiding Judge is asking: "So you are
21 telling the truth. This mean that before delivering his speech,
22 Mr. Seselj spoke with the leaders and the leaders gave him the list."
23 Then there is additional text here but I think is, at the moment, not
24 important but the witness's direct answer to this is: "I'd like to say
25 something to you. Ostoja Sibincic was Seselj's right-hand man. Most
Page 10714
1 probably he contacted him every day, that is, in terms of what the
2 situation in the village was like."
3 So the witness made it very clear. He said "most probably," that
4 means he did not know for sure.
5 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Very well. Mr. Mussemeyer had to
6 read the parts that he claims are irrelevant because this is where we can
7 see the first answer of the witness to your question, Mr. President, and
8 the rest follows after that.
9 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Mussemeyer, what was not
10 essential for you, I don't have the transcript here, but I trust you,
11 tell me what is after?
12 MR. MUSSEMEYER: I cannot summarize it because I now see it for
13 the first time, I was using the word search or the WordWheel search. I
14 read the sentence where you finished: "... and leaders gave him the
15 list." Now I can read the following text: "Then he, who knows
16 absolutely no one from this village, this is the first time that he set
17 foot in this village just out of -- from memory. He was able to give
18 five or ten -- between five or ten names which means that he learned five
19 or ten names by" --
20 THE INTERPRETER: Counsel is kindly asked to slow down when
21 reading.
22 MR. MUSSEMEYER: I apologise. "By," and here is written "rote,"
23 so that he could actually speak them out in his speech, because in the
24 speech that I have, he mentioned a great number of people, but people who
25 had nothing to do with the village. For example, he mentioned members of
Page 10715
1 the Communist League, Vuk Draskovic, Milan Komenic, Dragoljub Misiljevic
2 [phoen], Zoran Djindjic, Kosta Cavoski, Nikola Milosevic. So he
3 mentioned a great number of names, so he is very good at quoting names of
4 people that he knows for political reasons, of course, but he didn't know
5 the names of the villagers in the first place. That means that if you
6 are telling the truth, he learned by rote five to ten names and then
7 delivered them in a speech. Is this what happened?"
8 This was the question of the Presiding Judge and the answer of
9 the witness I already read. If you want to, I can repeat it.
10 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] [Previous translation
11 continues] ... repeat it, thank you. Mr. Seselj, please proceed.
12 MR. SESELJ:
13 Q. [Interpretation] Fair enough. So how do you know that
14 Ostoja Sibincic was my right-hand man, and that he was in daily contact
15 with me?
16 A. Ostoja Sibincic acted in such a manner in the village. He acted
17 like he was the boss. He was giving out the addresses of people who
18 should --
19 Q. That's not what I'm asking you. I'm asking you how do you know
20 that he was my right-hand man, and that he was in daily contact with me?
21 That's what I'm interested in. I don't want to know what he was doing.
22 A. That's the assumption. That's an assumption that one makes about
23 a man of this kind. Nobody would be surprised to hear anything about
24 him.
25 Q. Do you know who Zvonko Paulic is?
Page 10716
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. So who is?
3 A. He is my nephew.
4 Q. He works in the Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of
5 Croatia in Zagreb; is that right?
6 A. No.
7 Q. Where does he work then?
8 A. He works in Koncar.
9 Q. But did he work in the Ministry of the Interior at one point?
10 A. In Kamenica.
11 Q. No. He completed the high school of the interior affairs in
12 Kamenica and then he went to Croatia and worked in the Croatian MUP.
13 A. No, he did not work there. He found a job in the Koncar
14 factory.
15 Q. So he never worked in MUP?
16 A. No.
17 Q. Are you sure?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. Well, ha, ha, fine. You said that when you came to Jaksic that
20 that is where you got this house that you swapped?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. You said that this house had been torched, the house that you
23 received in the swap, is that so?
24 A. The house was torched and so was the barn.
25 Q. How was it torched, this house?
Page 10717
1 A. A part of the roof was burned down on the house, from the front,
2 and there were no windows on the front because a Sagger missile had
3 impacted there and the roof on the barn was also burned down.
4 Q. So the house was not burned down, it was just damaged?
5 A. Well, the house was inhabitable.
6 Q. The house was inhabitable because Serbs were living there and
7 they were exposed to constant abuse and were forced to move to Serbia; is
8 that not so?
9 A. I don't know who forced them to move out, but what I do know is
10 what the house was like.
11 Q. Well, you will find out who made them leave soon enough. That
12 was the house that belonged to Desanka Milosavljevic, is that right, and
13 her husband Stjepanovic?
14 A. Her husband Branko.
15 Q. Her husband Branko Stjepanovic and Desanka Milosavljevic. They
16 were married but they had different surnames; is that right? Is that
17 right?
18 A. Branko Milosavljevic, yes, that's right.
19 Q. And since they were Serbs -- was there any fighting ever in
20 Slavonska Pozega?
21 A. Well, since I arrived there or before my time?
22 Q. Well, before your time, from 1990 onwards, was there any fighting
23 there, any combat activities?
24 A. Well, I don't know that, but what I do know is that a couple of
25 shells landed since I came.
Page 10718
1 Q. Well, the shells or bombs landed in Serb yards and Serb houses to
2 make them move out as soon as possible. Do you know that 28 Serb
3 villages around Slavonska Pozega were forcibly evicted by the Croatian
4 military?
5 A. I do know that people moved out and I do know that my house, the
6 house that I received in the swap was uninhabitable.
7 Q. First of all, your house was habitable, and as soon as you did
8 the swap, the Croatian authorities fixed the house free of charge.
9 A. No, that's not so.
10 Q. Yes, it is.
11 A. I said yesterday that they gave me a small loan. I had to
12 provide two guarantors to put the roof on the house. You can check that.
13 Q. And the methodology was as follows: Since nobody harassed you in
14 Hrtkovci, you had your friends in Slavonska Pozega, you went there, and
15 there was this large scale campaign of harassment against Serbs there,
16 you picked a house that you liked and then an action was launched against
17 this house. And as Desanka Milosavljevic stated to my associates, I
18 think that her husband died in the meantime, she says that their house
19 was targeted seven or eight times, that the barn was set on fire. They
20 set a fire in several places and then one is supposed to put the fire out
21 and the phone lines were cut off. This was an organised campaign to
22 force the Serbs to move out as soon as possible. And after that
23 happened, two or three days later, you came to their house, and you spoke
24 to them about the swap. Desanka Milosavljevic asked you, Well, why are
25 you leaving Hrtkovci, and you said that you were being harassed over the
Page 10719
1 phone; is that right? Do you recall that?
2 A. Well, I don't know how I could fancy a house that was burned down
3 and to get that kind of house in exchange for two houses, one a new house
4 and the other one slightly older. What kind of a person would I have to
5 be if I were to accept that?
6 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] [Previous translation
7 continues] ... Mr. Seselj made an investigation.
8 THE INTERPRETER: -- note we could not finish the interpretation
9 because of overlapping speakers.
10 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] [Previous translation
11 continues] ... say that you came see them. This is important, are they
12 lying or are you lying? This is an essential element. If they are
13 saying that you came and if you say, I never came, it means that either
14 they are lying or you are lying. One has to be lying.
15 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I said yesterday that
16 Mr. Spasojevic came to see me and that he picked a house for Branko. And
17 then two days later, Branko's daughter came into my house in a Lada car.
18 She brought her son with her. There were Banja Luka plates on the Lada
19 car and two armed civilians accompanying her. I was then given an
20 address and I went to Pozega. And when I saw that, I realised that I had
21 to take what was an offer because if I refused to take it, I would be
22 destitute. I would have nothing. And that's when I signed this
23 contract.
24 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] So you recognise that did you
25 go there, you saw and you had to take up the offer because that was all
Page 10720
1 that was on offer for you.
2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] She came to see me first. She
3 moved into my house first, so I didn't have a house here and I didn't
4 have a house there. If I refused to take the house there, then I would
5 have nothing.
6 MR. SESELJ:
7 Q. [Interpretation] You fabricated all this. The
8 Stjepanovic-Milosavljevic family did not see the house in Hrtkovci when
9 they signed the contract in Slavonska Pozega. They didn't know where
10 they were going.
11 A. No, that's not so.
12 Q. Do you know who Ilija Sutalo is?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. Ilija Sutalo was the key person behind the campaign to persecute
15 Serbs in Pozega; is that so?
16 A. I don't know that.
17 Q. You don't know that. Well, Mrs. Desanka Milosavljevic does know
18 that. She knows that Ilija Sutalo, as a member of Paraga's formation,
19 the Croatian armed forces of the Croatian party of rights, would that be
20 Paraga's formations?
21 A. I don't know that. I was not into politics there; I'm not into
22 politics here either.
23 Q. And at the head of Paraga's formations, Ilija Sutalo organised
24 the tax on Serb houses in order to force the Serbs to leave
25 Slavonska Pozega and the villages around it; is that right? That's what
Page 10721
1 Desanka Milosavljevic says; is that true? You don't know.
2 A. I don't know.
3 Q. And when you came to Jaksic, and after you got three times as
4 much property as you left in Hrtkovci --
5 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: We couldn't hear the rest
6 of the answer -- the rest of the question.
7 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Speak slowly, please, because
8 the interpreters are having a difficult time. Please proceed,
9 Mr. Witness.
10 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] When I came to Pozega, I found a
11 job in the mill, in the silo as a seasonal worker from the time when the
12 wheat came in, the wheat harvest, to the time when the corn harvest
13 ended. And when my contract expired, I was jobless. Ilija Sutalo had a
14 small factory producing coils for immersion heaters and that's where I
15 found a job. I worked there every day, eight hours a day. That was the
16 morning shift, and that's the sum total of what I know about Ilija.
17 He is my best man. He stood by me in church when I got married,
18 and I'm really thankful to him for that because he made it possible for
19 my children to receive the sacraments in Croatia.
20 Q. Okay. So now you have provided me with important information,
21 Mr. Baricevic. You got married in church quite late in life and that's
22 where you had your children baptized; is that so? Well, relatively late
23 in life.
24 A. I had my children baptized in their proper time, that was done
25 with the help of my wife's parents. And I told you yesterday that I had
Page 10722
1 to be a member of the League of Communists in order to keep my job and
2 those who went to church couldn't get a job, couldn't keep a job.
3 Q. Well, I agree with you there. But you said that in 1980, when
4 Tito died, you returned your membership card and it took you 20 years to
5 get married in church once you stopped being a member of the League of
6 Communists, well, you could go to church as much as you like.
7 A. That's not how it is.
8 Q. Why isn't it the way it is?
9 A. Well, because it was the same system still and people would get
10 fired for minor transgressions.
11 Q. First of all, nobody was fired because they went to church, and
12 it was particularly impossible after Tito's death. There was not a
13 single case in Serbia that somebody was fired, especially in the local
14 commune, because they went to church.
15 A. There were cases like that. There sure were.
16 Q. You invented all of that. And when you got there, and when you
17 married your wife in church, then you said that, earlier on, you did not
18 have the possibility of getting married because you had been prohibited
19 from doing that; right?
20 A. Well, that's what I said just now.
21 Q. It took you 12 years. I'm trying to say that up until 1990, you
22 were a member of the League of Communists and an informant of the state
23 security service, and as such, you didn't want to go to church because
24 you were a man of the regime in your village.
25 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Mussemeyer.
Page 10723
1 MR. MUSSEMEYER: I ask for relevance. What has that to do with
2 the expulsion of Croats from Hrtkovci with the witness personal things
3 like marriage and baptism of his children?
4 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Witness, a small detail. You
5 were a Catholic. From what I understand, under the communist regime,
6 Catholics ran up against difficulties because they didn't have a job but
7 this prevailed after Tito's death, which was a real problem. This is
8 what I understood. Did you hear what I said? Sir, what do you have to
9 say this, which would explain why you got married a few years later.
10 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I said clearly that I
11 was a member of the League of Communists only for the sake of work
12 because it was hard to get a job. I did baptise my children 150
13 kilometres away so the people wouldn't know about it, and I didn't dare
14 marry in church because of my work. When I left the village, I got
15 married. Is it a shameful thing to be a Catholic today?
16 MR. SESELJ:
17 Q. [Interpretation] It was not a shameful thing to be a Catholic in
18 the times of communism either, and nobody was persecuted for their
19 religious beliefs. But nobody could be a member of the League of
20 Communists if they professed a religion, and also, they could not go to
21 top leadership positions.
22 A. They would be punished.
23 Q. However, in order to have someone work as a plumber or as a
24 member of the council of the local commune, one did not really have to be
25 a member of the League of Communists; isn't that right, Mr. Baricevic?
Page 10724
1 A. That's what you think.
2 Q. It's not what I think, I know, I experienced that. I was
3 persecuted under that regime, but I do not allow you to present this
4 regime a lot worse than it actually was, as if they ate little children
5 alive. That is what you are trying to say.
6 Now, there was a total number of 2 million members of the League
7 of Communists of Yugoslavia at the time. Do you remember that,
8 Mr. Baricevic?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. Around 2 million. And the population of Yugoslavia was 21
11 million; right? So, 10 percent in relation to the total population were
12 members of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia. If one-third were
13 roughly minors, then out of 14 million inhabitants of age, 2 million were
14 members of the League of Communists. Not everybody else was unemployed
15 and persecuted; right?
16 A. Well, I don't know if that's the way it was, but at any rate, in
17 my situation I did not dare do that.
18 Q. There is something else that makes your situation more difficult,
19 your father's name was Ivan; right?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. He was an Ustasha during the Second World War?
22 A. No.
23 Q. He was an Ustasha. I have a document of the state security
24 service stating that he was an Ustasha. You want to see the document?
25 A. I don't want to look at it.
Page 10725
1 Q. Oh, you don't want to look at it?
2 A. And it wouldn't be right to bring up my dead father's name.
3 Q. It is right to mention your dead father's name if he was an
4 Ustasha and if that charted your destiny and you had to prove yourself to
5 be a communist that was a lot more of a communist than everybody else.
6 A. That's not true. There is not a grain of truth in what you are
7 saying. Not a grain of truth.
8 MR. MUSSEMEYER: The Prosecution would be grateful if Mr. Seselj
9 could provide us with a copy of what he has there. Thank you.
10 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj, you are saying you
11 have a document. We don't have this document. You can say anything you
12 like. We don't have this document, what is it?
13 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Your service, if they want to, can
14 quickly -- well, look actually, I was supposed to receive this document
15 with an accompanying letter. This was provided to me by the state
16 security service of Serbia through the counsel for cooperation with
17 The Hague Tribunal at the request made by my legal advisors. However, my
18 legal advisors provided me with a single copy. I did not prepare this as
19 I usually do prepare everything else, because I do not have communication
20 with my associates. However, somebody from the registry can make a copy,
21 I don't mind.
22 JUDGE LATTANZI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj, is it in B/C/S?
23 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Yes, yes.
24 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: Only one speaker at a time
25 can be interpreted. Thank you.
Page 10726
1 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] This is not a document in B/C/S;
2 this is a document in the Serbian language. I did not express any wish
3 for you to read this. The Prosecutor asked for it and I am willing to
4 make it possible to have a photocopy made. I would have prepared this on
5 time, as I always did, if I had communication with my associates. Since
6 I don't, I try to make do, I find this paper, that paper, but the
7 Prosecution does have this document. It was published in that book of
8 mine.
9 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Witness, Mr. Seselj is talking
10 about your family's past, which we know nothing about. Do you agree, do
11 you disagree with him. If you disagree, say so, and then he will move on
12 to something else.
13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, I do not agree. Absolutely
14 not. Can I clarify something?
15 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Yes, please clarify.
16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Those who were in the enemy army
17 were in prison. My father never even saw a prison, let alone do time in
18 prison.
19 MR. SESELJ:
20 Q. [Interpretation] You know full well that that is not true. Some
21 of them who were captured straightaway were summarily executed, some were
22 tried before a court and others were amnestied, pardoned, because there
23 were several cases of pardon. Probably no one carried out an
24 investigation or the investigation did not come to the conclusion that
25 your father had personally committed crimes. He was not tried, but he
Page 10727
1 had been a member of the Ustasha formations and this was a nightmare for
2 you and that made you be much more of a communist than people usually
3 were. You wanted to prove that you were a greater Catholic than the pope
4 as it were. That is the core of the matter. That is why I believe that
5 you were so firm in your communist beliefs and why you were an informant
6 of the state security service.
7 A. I've already told you, there is not a grain of truth in any of
8 this.
9 Q. All right, then. Let's move on.
10 A. All of this is a pure fabrication.
11 Q. Perhaps the state security service is fabricating things. We'll
12 see.
13 A. That's for sure.
14 Q. Now, let us deal with the agreement on the exchange of moveable
15 and immovable property. You concluded this contract with
16 Ranko Milosavljevic?
17 A. Branko.
18 Q. Branko Milosavljevic and Stanka Stjepanovic; right? On the one
19 hand is Branko Milosavljevic, Stanka Stjepanovic and their daughter
20 Branka; right? And the other side is you and your wife,
21 Elizabeta Baricevic. Your signature is on the contract; am I right?
22 A. No.
23 Q. What is the case?
24 A. On one side it is me and my mother.
25 Q. Thank you for this correction. Elizabeta is your mother; right?
Page 10728
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. Now, this is the property that you are exchanging or swapping
3 from Branko Milosavljevic and his family you are receiving land, 1
4 hectare, 38 acres, and 89 square metres of land. Please follow me
5 carefully and correct me if I'm not wrong.
6 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] The Prosecution has this contract.
7 They could have presented it to you here, Judges. Why they didn't, I
8 don't know.
9 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: We do not have the
10 document.
11 MR. SESELJ:
12 Q. [Interpretation] Then also 22 acres and 98 square metres of
13 arable lands.
14 MR. MUSSEMEYER: We don't have the document --
15 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Prosecutor.
16 MR. MUSSEMEYER: -- just for the information of everybody here.
17 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Don't have the document, very
18 well. Please proceed. Mr. Seselj.
19 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, you see Mr. President, this
20 lack of seriousness. They proof a witness, they prepare him for six
21 years to testify in my trial, to accuse me of persecuting Croats in
22 Hrtkovci. This is a witness who exchanged his property and went to
23 Slavonska Pozega, and it didn't cross their mind to get the contract on
24 the exchange of property and immovable property which would be the key
25 evidence here. Should I continue with this? Should I just provide this
Page 10729
1 information, what it was that they provided, that is to say, this family
2 of Branko Milosavljevic and --
3 JUDGE LATTANZI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj, I'm sorry, but I
4 was still listening to the translation. I believe you are the person who
5 needs this for your cross-examination. You have conducted an in-depth
6 investigation as regards this witness. Maybe you could have -- have this
7 document admitted. I would have been quite happy with that.
8 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Madam Judge, the contract was
9 published in that book of mine. Since my communication with my legal
10 associates has been severed, I don't have the original of the contract.
11 They have it, though. And I am now using the contract that was published
12 in the book. I have it here. I have a copy.
13 JUDGE LATTANZI: [Interpretation] Not abridged.
14 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] [Previous translation continues]
15 ... an interpretation of your last words.
16 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: Only one speaker can be
17 interpreted at a time. Thank you.
18 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] My fellow Judge said that the
19 communications were not cut, but that you were the person that
20 interrupted all form of communication. In any case, there is a pending
21 motion regarding this particular issue. Please proceed.
22 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thirdly, [B/C/S spoken] arable
23 land, 1 hectare and 10 square metres. Follow me carefully. [B/C/S
24 spoken] meadow, 28 acres. [B/C/S spoken] meadow, 28 acres, 31 square
25 metres. [B/C/S spoken] meadow, 9 square metres and 2 hectares, a house
Page 10730
1 and the land surrounding it, 23 acres and 98 square metres. Then [B/C/S
2 spoken] land of 59 acres and 34 square metres. Is that the property that
3 was given to you by Branko Milosavljevic's family in exchange for your
4 property? Did I read it out right?
5 A. No, no. There are things missing.
6 Q. What is missing?
7 A. Gromulja.
8 Q. Gromulja is missing?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. Where is this Gromulja?
11 A. In Jaksic.
12 Q. That was not in your contract, you managed to extort that with
13 the assistance of the Croatian authorities after you moved there. I have
14 that judgement here as well because you claimed, or, rather, when they
15 were no longer in Croatia, when they were not even informed of the fact
16 that these proceedings were ongoing, you said that you were not given
17 this land of Gromulja, and then the court granted it to you with the
18 explanation that this was omitted from the contract by mistake. Is that
19 right?
20 A. I've already said that Stanka came to my house. She was the
21 daughter of Branko and Desanka. I went to Pozega to see what was there
22 and what did I see. We went to see the lawyer Primorac, and she drew up
23 a contract. Mistakenly she omitted -- well, was it intentional or not, I
24 don't know, but she was Stanka's friend. Let me tell you that Stanka was
25 a judge in Pozega, and this woman was a lawyer. Now, I don't want to
Page 10731
1 make any assertions as to whether this was done intentionally or
2 unwittingly, but there is one thing that is important and that is that
3 Desanka, Stanka's mother, made me the owner of every one of the fields
4 there.
5 I did not even see that this little part was missing. Only a
6 month later, she sent me new contract from Pozega. She gave it to Cacic,
7 and this had to do with this small field, and he asked for 5.000
8 Deutschemark, and they took me to court. I objected to the court and I
9 brought in witnesses who went along with me when the woman was making me
10 the owner of all of this. So that is the whole story.
11 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj, we have heard the
12 witness at great lengths. Contrary to what you are saying, he is not the
13 person who instituted the legal proceedings but the other party, this is
14 what he is saying.
15 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] That's not what he said,
16 Mr. President. I don't know what kind of interpretation you are
17 receiving. Listen, a contract was concluded here. It's a very specific
18 one and it gives the exact numbers of the land that is being exchanged.
19 What one party is providing, what the other party is providing. When all
20 of that was completed, when this Serb family left Slavonska Pozega and
21 went to Hrtkovci, when Mr. Baricevic became the owner of this property,
22 then he appeared as a plaintiff before the Croatian court, and he asked
23 for yet another field of 1 hectare and 70 acres. It was owned by Stanka
24 Milosavljevic-Stjepanovic. That field had not been the object of this
25 exchange. Stanka had not been informed at all of these court
Page 10732
1 proceedings. It was only 12 years later that she found out that that had
2 happened and she asked for a retrial.
3 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Witness, Mr. Seselj is saying
4 that you are the person who instituted these legal proceedings before the
5 Croatian court. Was it you or was it the other people?
6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I gave you my answer.
7 Mr. Cacic from Pozega came to see me, he had a contract and he asked me
8 to give him 5.000 Deutschemarks, and he filed a legal suit against me in
9 court for compensation of damage. And because I had witnesses for the
10 handover of the property, I brought those witnesses, I called those
11 witnesses to indicate that that is what she did and that's what she
12 originally wanted to do.
13 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj.
14 MR. SESELJ:
15 Q. [Interpretation] Who were those witnesses, Mr. Baricevic? Were
16 they Nikola Lulic, Ante Grizelj and Marko Kalic?
17 A. Ante Grizelj. Ante Stipic.
18 Q. And who else?
19 A. And it seems to me that it was also Ilija Sutalo.
20 Q. Ilija Sutalo, Ante Grizelj, Nikola Lulic, and Marko Kalic.
21 Marko Kalic came from Hrtkovci together with you. And you, together with
22 them, joined this Paraga's party formation that continued to persecute
23 Serbs in Pozega; is that so?
24 A. No.
25 Q. Yes it is. Yes it is. Now let us see, what is it that you gave
Page 10733
1 in return?
2 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] One moment, witness.
3 Mr. Seselj is stating something which can be important. He is saying
4 that you joined the Paraga formations. Is this true, not true?
5 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That's not true. I was not in any
6 kind of army.
7 MR. SESELJ:
8 Q. [Interpretation] Well, I didn't say that you were in an army.
9 You took part in the activities of this terrorist group that continued to
10 torture the properties, to fire shots at their house, to harass Serbs,
11 and to speed up their departure from Pozega.
12 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj, you are stating
13 this. Do you have any evidence, any proof, any documents.
14 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] [Previous translation continues]
15 ... from the state security service, where it says that Zvonko Paulic
16 also took part in that. He is the son of this witness's sister. He was
17 a member of the Croatian MUP and that he went as far as to bring some
18 Serbs to the new house of this witness and they were mistreated and
19 harassed there in order to be forced to flee Slavonska Pozega. This is
20 what is it says in a document from the state security service, and the
21 Prosecutor can check over the phone in Belgrade whether this is an
22 original document that I have in my hand. He can call the counsel for
23 cooperation with the Tribunal to check whether I did receive a document
24 from the state security service about Franja Baricevic.
25 MR. MUSSEMEYER: I have two issues, the accused is alleging that
Page 10734
1 the witness has allegedly committed crimes. He should, in my system at
2 least, he should be cautioned that he is not obliged to answer these
3 things. And another thing, a little observation, I've been here in court
4 several times, I have only one time got from Mr. Seselj in advance
5 documents he was using in cross-examination and that was at the end of
6 the examination-in-chief, and I got it in B/C/S. I think this approach
7 is completely unfair.
8 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well. Mr. Seselj,
9 normally speaking, since you do not ask any of your documents to be
10 admitted, normally speaking, the Prosecution should have a copy of all
11 the documents you are going to be using during your cross-examination
12 beforehand. But since you did not ask these documents to be admitted, we
13 face a void. Please proceed. You have five minutes before the break.
14 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Let me remind you, Mr. President,
15 that I have always provided the documents in advance, both to the
16 Prosecution and to the Trial Chamber, while I was able to cooperate with
17 my legal advisors. Once a stop was put to that, I have been unable to
18 continue doing so. But 15 to 20 days ago, I handed this book to the
19 Prosecution, this whole book, and then the Prosecution informed me that
20 they are already working on this book and that they intend to charge me
21 with contempt of court because of this book. And after I could no longer
22 cooperate with my legal advisors, I have been unable to provide documents
23 in advance, but that's not my fault. I used to do that always.
24 But as far as translation is concerned, that's not my concern.
25 Translating documents into English and French. That's really not my
Page 10735
1 concern. I don't want to concern myself about it. I am guaranteed right
2 to use my own mother tongue.
3 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Mussemeyer.
4 MR. MUSSEMEYER: Another little observation. In my system, it's
5 completely unlawful to publish statements given to the Prosecution and
6 which I expected to be used in court. It is the reason for these
7 regulations, and I know that it is in several European countries the
8 same, is not to influence the witness. My assumption that Mr. Seselj is
9 publishing these statements already much in advance and slamming the
10 witnesses who are coming here in court. He has a specific reason to do
11 this and as I don't want to speculate. Everybody should conclude what
12 the reason might be for this.
13 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Proceed, Mr. Seselj.
14 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Mr. President, may I say something?
15 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Yes.
16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] It is not difficult for you to
17 check. You can check in the Croatian MUP whether there is a single note
18 about me there in their files. What Seselj is saying about me, this is
19 just lies, pure and simple. I state this here with full responsibility,
20 here as I sit before you.
21 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Fine. Mr. Seselj. It's been
22 recorded on the transcript. Mr. Seselj, proceed.
23 MR. SESELJ:
24 Q. [Interpretation] Now, Mr. Baricevic, please follow closely. I
25 will now list the property that you gave in exchange. The property that
Page 10736
1 you had in Hrtkovci. It's a house, an arable land and yard, the size is
2 6 acres, 42 square metres. Then another stretch of arable land, 17 acres
3 and 90 square metres. Then [B/C/S spoken] arable land, 68 acres, 31
4 square metres. [B/C/S spoken] arable land, 1 hectare, 13 acres, 9 square
5 metres. And your mother gave arable land in Sicara [phoen], the size was
6 75 acres, 66 square metres. And you together, you and your mother gave
7 an orchard; the size is 14 acres, 52 square metres; orchard 7 acres, 37
8 square metres; and orchard, 8 acres, 92 square metres. Is that right?
9 Did I read everything?
10 A. No, that is not so. What is missing here, it says only one house
11 whereas -- well, what does it mean if you give an orchard in exchange for
12 meadow? If you are smart, you can figure this out.
13 Q. Yes. But the question is what state this orchard was in; is that
14 not so, Mr. Baricevic?
15 A. The orchard was in good state while it was in good hands.
16 Q. It was a very bad state, Mr. Baricevic.
17 Now, as you concluded this contract, you determined that the
18 value of both properties was 800.000 Croatian dinars; is that so?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. And there is a provision in that contract that this exchange is
21 entered into voluntarily and there shall be no further payments made by
22 any parties, is that so?
23 A. Well, if that's what it says in the contract, then that is the
24 case.
25 Q. And this is a contract that was entered into before the Croatian
Page 10737
1 authorities, it is registered before a Croatian court?
2 A. Let me just say that only one house is listed here. Where is the
3 other house?
4 Q. Well, the other house was torn down as soon as the Milosavljevic
5 Stjepanovic family came to Hrtkovci because it was completely unusable.
6 It was an old adobe house, nobody could live there.
7 A. Well, this house stands there today.
8 Q. That house is unusable.
9 A. Stanka's mother lives in that house and Stanka lives in the new
10 house that I built, the one with the attic. I know that very well.
11 Nobody can tell me anything about that. I'm sure about what I'm saying.
12 Q. Well, let's see what Stanka has to say about that. She says that
13 they gave you a house in Slavonska Pozega which was a surface of 110
14 square metres; is that right? Does it have 110 square metres?
15 A. No.
16 Q. How much -- what is the surface then?
17 A. The surface is 95 square metres.
18 Q. Stanka Stjepanovic, in her statement, says 110 square metres,
19 fully completed and furnished with parquet floors and tiles and
20 furniture. Did you find any furniture in that house?
21 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Witness, I'll go straight to
22 the point. You have a contract, a contract has been described at length,
23 so now the other part of the contract is talked about. Were you
24 victimized in this exchange or were you the beneficiary? This is a
25 question I put to you. From what I understood, the Defence is saying
Page 10738
1 that you were the beneficiary and not the other people. What do you have
2 to say to that? Were you victimized or were you the beneficiary?
3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Mr. President, let me say this once
4 again, that I left behind a house and Stjepanovic was already in that
5 house. I came to the house where Desanka and her husband were. That
6 house had been torched. I left two houses. One was a new house built in
7 1983, the other one was built in 1953. I signed the contract because I
8 didn't want to lose everything. I didn't want to be left out in the
9 street. And now it is up to you to judge who is losing here, who is the
10 war profiteer here.
11 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Whatever the case may be, it is
12 difficult to establish who the winner and the loser is. For this to
13 happen, the two properties would have had to be assessed. We don't have
14 the contract because the Prosecution in its -- in the presentation of its
15 case did not show us the contract, and Mr. Seselj is not going to admit
16 the document. We are going to have a break and resume in 20 minutes
17 time.
18 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: Please replace not
19 abridged by not interrupted
20 --- Recess taken at 3.48 p.m.
21 --- On resuming at 4.10 p.m.
22 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] The court is back in session.
23 And I take this opportunity to welcome the new arrivals in the OTP.
24 Mrs. Biersay, for example, very happy to see you.
25 Mr. Seselj, you have 50 minutes left and you have the floor. 50
Page 10739
1 not 15. 50.
2 MR. SESELJ: [Microphone not activated]
3 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, please.
4 MR. SESELJ:
5 Q. [Interpretation] I hope that I won't talk all of those 50 minutes
6 that I have to complete my cross-examination. Mr. Baricevic, you see
7 there is an interesting sentence in the statement that Desanka
8 Milosavljevic made. She says that all the rich Croats remained in
9 Hrtkovci, those who owned a lot of land, whereas those Croats who were
10 poorer, less well off, and who had this opportunity to pick and choose
11 much better things than they left behind in Hrtkovci. What do you think
12 about this statement?
13 A. Your Honour, I have already explained to this Chamber what I had
14 owned and what kind of situation I encountered in Jaksic. Now, as to who
15 remained and under what conditions and for what reasons, I would not go
16 into that. I know that some rich people left, some rich people stayed,
17 and all I take care of is myself.
18 Q. And of the rich Croats from Hrtkovci, who left?
19 A. Well, there are quite a few of them.
20 Q. Well, there are those but you don't know their names?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. Tell me this, if we bear in mind that until mid-1992,
23 200.000 Serbs were expelled from Croatia, and when we take into account
24 the 200.000 that were expelled in 1995, that is the figure of 400.000
25 Serbs expelled from Croatia and only a few thousand Croats left Serbia.
Page 10740
1 Now, if we look at this in purely economic terms, if we set aside the
2 horrible ways in which Serbs were persecuted in Croatia and the Tribunal
3 in The Hague refused to prosecute those who are responsible for it, let
4 us look at the economic aspect. We have the law of supply and demand on
5 the market. For -- first 200.000, then 400.000 Serbs are looking for
6 somebody to exchange their property, their shops, their small factories
7 with; and on the other side, you have just a few thousand Croats. Who is
8 in a better position here when it comes to this exchange, because the
9 logic of the law of economics tells us that those who are in demand are
10 in a better position on the market than those who offer what they have to
11 offer in vain; is that not so?
12 A. I told you what my situation was, how I fared in this exchange.
13 I lost a brand new house, and it takes two generations to build it. My
14 father and myself, we worked hard for that and I lost that.
15 Q. So you would not venture into this economic -- logic of
16 economics, the law of supply and demand, you don't know about that?
17 A. Of course I wouldn't.
18 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Witness, let's not get into
19 economic logic. It's true that if we have a market with 400.000 people
20 on the supply side on the one hand, and a few thousand on the other side,
21 on the demand side, then that could be a bit strange. But what I'm
22 interested in your answer is the following: I think I understand now
23 that all Croats from Hrtkovci didn't leave. Some of them stayed in
24 Hrtkovci, which is important. But what I'm interested in is the
25 following: Among the Croats who left, it seems that there were some rich
Page 10741
1 Croats who actually stayed and the lesser well off seemed to have left.
2 But as far as you remember, could you tell us how many Croats stayed in
3 Hrtkovci.
4 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I said yesterday that
5 460 families moved out from Hrtkovci, and 300 families within a month.
6 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] How many stayed?
7 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, roughly speaking, maybe 6 or
8 7 per cent remained.
9 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, Mr. President, we will have a
10 demographer here and we can discuss it with her, because this witness is
11 not an expert.
12 MR. SESELJ:
13 Q. [Interpretation] Mr. Baricevic, after you left for Jaksic, you
14 went back to Hrtkovci how many times did you go back to Hrtkovci after
15 your departure?
16 A. Twice.
17 Q. And how many times did Desanka Milosavljevic and her daughter,
18 Stanka Stjepanovic, go to Jaksic, to Slavonska Pozega?
19 A. I don't know that. I did not get into touch with them, they
20 didn't get in touch with me.
21 Q. And is it the usual situation for Croats who lived in Serbia to
22 be able to go back to Serbia much more often and it is much easier for
23 them as opposed to the Serbs who were expelled who don't dare go to
24 Croatia?
25 A. Well, I don't know that, but I really was quite apprehensive
Page 10742
1 about going to visit my father's grave.
2 Q. But in the end you did there and you didn't have any problems?
3 A. I didn't have any problems.
4 Q. Fair enough. That's very important. Do you know how many
5 thousands of Serb houses were destroyed throughout Croatia, not in combat
6 zones, outside of the combat zones, in Split, in Sibenik, in Zadar, in
7 mainland Croatia. Do you know that?
8 A. As far as I was able to see in Pozega and around it, the houses
9 were destroyed, but now they have been fixed.
10 Q. How many empty Serb houses still remain throughout Croatia?
11 A. I don't know that.
12 Q. And do you know about any Croat houses in Serbia that were torn
13 down, about an instance when somebody came and destroyed somebody's house
14 because that somebody was a Croat?
15 A. I don't know that.
16 Q. Do you know if any Croats were deported from Serbia? Do you know
17 what it means to deport somebody? The authorities or some other armed
18 group captures you and forces you to leave, and you have to leave all
19 your property behind. Was any Croat expelled from Serbia and were forced
20 to leave their property behind?
21 A. Well, there were some cases.
22 Q. Who?
23 A. For instance, Jurcevic.
24 Q. Where was he expelled from?
25 A. From Hrtkovci.
Page 10743
1 Q. Who expelled him?
2 A. I don't know who expelled him, but he left after I did and he
3 came without anything.
4 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: The speakers are kindly
5 asked to make pauses between questions and answers. A few questions and
6 answers are missing, note the interpreters.
7 MR. SESELJ:
8 Q. [Interpretation] How can you say that he was expelled? How can
9 you say that he was expelled and you don't know who expelled him and how?
10 A. Because he entered an apartment and he is building himself a
11 house.
12 Q. Wait a moment. That is not proof of him being evicted from
13 somewhere. Did he have a house in Hrtkovci?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. What happened to that house?
16 A. He left it.
17 Q. What do you mean left it, did he sell the house?
18 A. No.
19 Q. He just left the house and the house just stayed on?
20 A. I guess somebody moved in. I'm saying that this happened after I
21 had left.
22 Q. Oh, I guess. Never mind, I don't want you to say things like "I
23 guess." Is it correct that in addition to this house in Jaksic of 110
24 square metres, did you get a shed that is between 60 and 70 square
25 metres?
Page 10744
1 A. The shed was on four pillars. There wasn't even any concrete
2 there, just four pillars, and there wasn't a proper roof either, that's
3 the exactly the way it was.
4 Q. Perhaps. You also got a big building in the yard with ainfort,
5 and Stanka told me that this is a big door through which one enters the
6 economic part of the yard. Is that correct?
7 A. Well, this is a classical passageway in Slavonia.
8 Q. All right. Let's move on. Also that you found their sheds,
9 pigsties, chicken coops, smoking huts, and buildings for cattle fodder,
10 and things like that; is that true?
11 A. Well, every farmhouse is supposed to have that.
12 Q. This is not every farmhouse. This was the house that belonged to
13 this very prominent farmer, and everything was at the highest
14 technological level, right?
15 A. Sir, I would not go into all of that without checking properly
16 what the state of the house was.
17 THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's note: Speakers are overlapping
18 again.
19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] As for the situation in Hrtkovci,
20 you just --
21 Q. Let's wait for us to get to Hrtkovci.
22 JUDGE HARHOFF: Mr. Seselj and Mr. Witness do not overlap because
23 it is impossible for the interpreters to catch, and then we don't
24 understand what you are saying.
25 MR. SESELJ:
Page 10745
1 Q. [Interpretation] One of these fields was right by the asphalt
2 road, wasn't it?
3 A. Yes. Yes, it is tilling land.
4 Q. And it is very convenient for breaking it up into smaller plots
5 for building houses?
6 A. It is arable land.
7 Q. But Stanka Stjepanovic says that it is 100.000 Euro worth.
8 A. Well, when all the public utilities get there, but that will be
9 in about ten years or so.
10 Q. But it is very valuable and you cannot consider it be -- well,
11 even to this day, you wouldn't just sell it as arable land.
12 A. It is being sold as arable land.
13 Q. By who?
14 A. My neighbours.
15 Q. Nobody is trying to sell it now. Everybody is waiting to sell it
16 for big money. Also you got a tractor that was bought just before the
17 war broke out with all the necessary machinery and accessories; am I
18 right?
19 A. No, you are not right.
20 Q. They left you all the furniture and everything they had in the
21 house; right?
22 A. That's not right.
23 Q. And from -- and you took everything from Hrtkovci from your house
24 and you left an empty house?
25 A. That's not true.
Page 10746
1 Q. So what is true then, they took everything and you left
2 everything behind?
3 A. Your Honour, once again, I would like to repeat this. This
4 departure of ours -- I mean, this going back from Jaksic to Hrtkovci,
5 when I signed this contract with Mira Primorac, I had to go back in order
6 to give Stanka the contract to have it confirmed in Ruma. And then, yet
7 again, I went back, or rather, in Jaksic, Branko and Desanka were still
8 there, and I went back and my daughter -- or, rather, their daughter was
9 in the house as I was going between the two houses. And Ante Grizelj and
10 I, on one occasion, took this little truck and we divided this up in
11 half, this is one half, this is the other half, are you going to load it
12 or will I, and then we loaded on to this little truck the most basic
13 clothing and two couches. The house was full, or, rather, both houses
14 were full, the refrigerators were there, everything else. When I
15 returned to Jaksic through Hungary, then I unloaded these bits and pieces
16 that I brought in. Desanka loaded a full truck, that full truck, and
17 went to Hrtkovci. Now that is the whole truth. That can be confirmed
18 not only by one person, but by 20 persons who know about this. They know
19 that I had no bed to lie in until I brought in my things because they had
20 taken everything.
21 Q. Is it true that you did not leave a single agricultural machine
22 in Hrtkovci that was in operational order?
23 A. That's not true.
24 Q. And you found in Jaksic all the agricultural machinery you needed
25 that was in proper working order? You left an old tractor and you found
Page 10747
1 a perfectly new one?
2 A. That's not true.
3 Q. I'm checking. All right. I have Mrs. Stanka Stjepanovic's
4 statement, and now I'm checking with you what is true and what is not
5 true. Well, the very fact that not at any point in time did you look me
6 in the eye is telling enough.
7 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] This tractor, when you arrived,
8 was there a tractor? Yes or no? Had they left a tractor?
9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] There was a tractor there, but then
10 I had left my tractor behind too. So one tractor for another tractor.
11 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Can you give us the make of
12 this tractor?
13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] IMT. A small one, 35 horsepower.
14 And it was manufactured in 1969.
15 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Did it work? Did it operate
16 properly?
17 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] It worked properly, normally. If
18 you maintain it properly.
19 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] You can imagine, Mr. President, how
20 well a tractor that is 23 years old works.
21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The one I talked about now is the
22 one that I found in Jaksic, what I talked about.
23 MR. SESELJ:
24 Q. [Interpretation] All right. This is what Mrs. Stanka Stjepanovic
25 says, that in Hrtkovci they found an old, dilapidated house of 60 square
Page 10748
1 metres. So you got a house of 110 square metres and you gave a house of
2 60 square metres; right? How big was your house in Hrtkovci?
3 A. I've already said, I said yesterday that my new house, with an
4 attic at that, was of the following dimensions: 11 by 12. Whereas the
5 old house -- just a moment, please. It was 8 by 15.
6 Q. Wow, a palace, sir. A palace. 8 by 15.
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. 120 square metres, the foundation?
9 A. And out buildings too.
10 Q. The house that you called your new house, does yours have a
11 parquet floor at all?
12 A. No, but floor heating.
13 Q. There was no floor heating. There was concrete there, and then
14 you plastered some kind of wall-to-wall carpeting on the concrete. Is
15 that what you call parquet flooring?
16 A. I'm saying it's not parquet flooring but it was heated floors.
17 Q. What do you mean heated floors?
18 A. Well, you know.
19 Q. Using electricity?
20 A. Using water.
21 Q. What do you mean water?
22 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj, maybe you might
23 move on to something else. You should move on to something else. We'll
24 never know unless the Trial Chamber goes on site to check out your old
25 house and the house you obtained through swapping. I don't have any time
Page 10749
1 for this. I'm sitting on two trials every day, I don't have any time to
2 go on site. But if I had had time, I would have invited my fellow Judges
3 to go and check things on site. Maybe the Prosecutor, during the
4 investigation, could also have taken pictures of your old house and the
5 new one, could have been done. If we had had pictures, you know, we
6 could have compared. But we have nothing, so I don't think that we can
7 draw any final conclusion out of all this.
8 Please proceed, Mr. Seselj.
9 MR. SESELJ:
10 Q. [Interpretation] This old house, as you've been calling it,
11 according to Stanka Stjepanovic's testimony, was torn down as soon as
12 they arrived because it could not be used. And also they had to adapt
13 the house that you call the new one to make it liveable.
14 A. That's a pure lie.
15 Q. Fine, fine. It's obvious here who is lying and who is not lying.
16 It's very obvious here. The very fact that you are not able to look me
17 in the eye when answering my questions is very telling, as far as I'm
18 concerned, and I'm a great psychologist.
19 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj, don't intimidate
20 the witness. You have your own version, he's got his own. The Judges
21 will decide.
22 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] All right, all right. If you
23 consider this to be intimidation, then I'm not going to say that to him
24 again. But it's all right if he says lie, whereas I'm not allowed to say
25 lie even when something is the most blatant possible lie. But anyway,
Page 10750
1 who do I have to blame.
2 MR. SESELJ:
3 Q. [Interpretation] You know who Marko Kalic is?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. He arrived in Jaksic too; right?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. He also swapped houses with Jovo Njemcevic; right? Do you know
8 that he swapped houses with him?
9 A. I know that he swapped houses, but I don't know the name of the
10 man.
11 Q. Now, his name is Jovo Njemcevic and he gave a statement to me
12 about his own fate. He was also subjected to attacks there.
13 Ilija Sutalo led this group of Croats, he says that too. They were
14 torching and blowing up Serb houses, harassing people and causing a great
15 deal of unrest, and then Marko Kalic came to him after having gone
16 through all this harassment, and then he made this offer to swap houses.
17 Since Jovo Njemcevic had lived there on his own, his daughter and
18 son-in-law lived in Belgrade, they were concerned about him and they
19 decided to swap houses, or, rather, property with Kalic. Jovo Njemcevic
20 says that he went to the Pozega SUP with Kalic and that that's where he
21 got a proper emigration document allowing him to leave Croatia, but he
22 could no longer go back to Croatia; is that correct?
23 A. I really don't know.
24 Q. Could you enter Croatia without a certificate from the local
25 parish priest that you had been baptized in the local church?
Page 10751
1 A. I could enter, but I could not exercise my rights.
2 Q. What rights?
3 A. Well, for instance, say, get married, then, well, to have my
4 children receive the holy communion and the sacrament.
5 Q. Before leaving Hrtkovci, you obtained a certificate from the
6 local parish priest, Niko Kraljevic, that you had been baptized a Roman
7 Catholic at the church there; right?
8 A. No, later.
9 Q. When later?
10 A. Well, later. Later. A man brought this to me.
11 Q. What was this man who brought this to you?
12 A. Do I have to say?
13 Q. You do have to say.
14 A. Stipo Roland.
15 Q. Where did he bring that from, Hrtkovci to Slavonska Pozega?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. What passport did you use for entering Croatia?
18 A. Well, I mean, the Yugoslav passport.
19 Q. The passport of the SFRY, right?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. It hadn't been changed in Serbia yet, right?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. And the Croatian authorities no longer recognised that passport.
24 With that passport one could leave Croatia but one could not enter
25 Croatia with that passport?
Page 10752
1 A. That's not true. The passport was valid and one could travel
2 with it for as long as it was valid.
3 Q. Well, the Prosecution showed us proof here that one could not
4 enter Croatia without a certificate issued by local parish priests to the
5 effect that a person belonged to the Roman Catholic church?
6 A. Well, I did enter.
7 Q. Oh, you entered. All right. And he complains that in Jaksic he
8 had a big proper house, property, valuable machinery and that in Hrtkovci
9 he found a dilapidated house of 60 square metres. Do you know what kind
10 of a house Marko Kalic had in Hrtkovci? He is your neighbour, you'd have
11 to know.
12 A. I think that the best answer would be for you to ask Marko.
13 Q. Why would I ask him, I'm asking you. You know. You know where
14 Marko lived.
15 A. I saw the house but I never entered the house.
16 Q. You saw this house in Hrtkovci?
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. What kind of a house was it?
19 A. Well, a house is a house. It has a gate, it has a door, it is
20 painted, it has a roof and what kind of material it was made of, that I
21 don't know.
22 Q. Oh, you don't know. Well, then, fine, let me believe you on
23 that. Katica Paulic is your sister, right?
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. Your very own sister?
Page 10753
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. She moved to Zagreb, right, from Hrtkovci?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. Is that true?
5 A. It's true.
6 Q. Do you know when she moved, do you remember?
7 A. I know that she moved after I did.
8 Q. When was that?
9 A. Well, I moved in May, and then she perhaps moved out in late May,
10 early June.
11 Q. What kind of a house did she have in Hrtkovci?
12 A. She had a house, I know that very well, because my father and I
13 helped her build the house.
14 Q. What kind of a house was it?
15 A. It had an attic. It had a cellar. The dimensions were 10 by --
16 I don't know, 9 by -- 9 or 10, never mind. And in front there was a
17 shop.
18 Q. What kind of a house did she get in Zagreb?
19 A. In Zagreb, she got a house at Zitnjak. In Ivanja [phoen] -- no,
20 no, not Ivanja. She got this tiny little house. This year, she had to
21 build a new roof because the old roof almost fell on her head. It was so
22 rotten.
23 Q. How could that be?
24 A. You can check that.
25 Q. Dragutin Spiric, a Serb from Zagreb, is who swapped houses with
Page 10754
1 her.
2 A. I don't know his name.
3 Q. His house is 4 kilometres away from Zagreb, Zitnjak, right?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. That's what Dragutin Spiric says. I don't know. I don't know.
6 I visited Zagreb several times but I don't know it very well, perhaps you
7 know it better; is that true?
8 A. Well, Zagreb, yes, but not 4 kilometres away from the centre.
9 Q. He says it's 4 kilometres away from the centre. Is it closer to
10 the centre?
11 A. It is further away from the centre.
12 Q. Further on he says that this was a big, well-appointed house and
13 that in the house in Hrtkovci he found only concrete and that his wife
14 was in tears when she realized what she had come to. And then soon after
15 that, he died. He had an apoplexy. All of this was very difficult for
16 him. So, feeling so sad and desperate, he died. Do you know about that?
17 A. I don't know that he died, but I knew that the house was well
18 appointed.
19 Q. You knew that it was well appointed. Was Katica Paulic expelled
20 from Hrtkovci?
21 A. I think she was.
22 Q. You think. But do you consider yourself to be a thinker of some
23 sort? And Katica left for Zagreb on her own, she swapped her house, and
24 her husband and her son remained living in Serbia for a time; is that so?
25 A. No, it isn't.
Page 10755
1 Q. How is it not so when her son went to the high school of the
2 interior affairs in Sremska Kamenica and her husband stayed with him
3 there until he could complete his secondary education and then get a job
4 Croatian MUP?
5 A. Well, they moved later, all of them.
6 Q. No, no. They waited for the son to complete his training, so
7 Katica went first and then her son and her husband joined her; is that
8 so?
9 A. No, it isn't.
10 Q. Well, if you say that it isn't, I think it would be pointless for
11 me to continue asking you question this is this vein because I'm sure
12 that everything is quite clear on the basis of your answer so far. I
13 have completed my cross-examination.
14 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Thank you. Is there any
15 redirect the Prosecution?
16 MR. MUSSEMEYER: I have only one short question.
17 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Go ahead.
18 Re-examination by Mr. Mussemeyer:
19 Q. Mr. Baricevic, yesterday you were asked by Mr. Seselj, you were
20 asked by Mr. Seselj about Chetniks. He said, well, and it is on page
21 10666, line 11, and the wording is: "Well, they wore Chetniks caps and
22 they shouted, 'This is Serbia, this is Serbia.'" This is was your
23 answer. Mr. Seselj says: "Why do you bother about Chetnik caps? These
24 are traditional Serbian insignias." And he was also referring to songs
25 which these Chetniks sang. Can you explain us what Chetnik for you meant
Page 10756
1 at that time? Were you informed about history, about the reputation of
2 Chetniks? Can you explain this please, to us?
3 A. Your Honour, when I was in elementary school, we were taught
4 history, and the way we were taught history, Chetniks and Ustashas were
5 the enemies of the Yugoslav people. That's the way I was brought up.
6 And when I saw that, I found it quite horrifying, and I forgot to mention
7 yesterday one thing. When I saw on Franjo Magoc's wall, a song, some
8 lines from a song, well, Croats, there is a deep hole waiting at the end
9 of the line for you. For a peaceful village, this was really a big deal
10 and on the Catholic church, you could see the four C -- four S signs and
11 you could see the letter U painted on the walls of the houses. It was a
12 great shock. Not only for me but for the people as a whole.
13 Q. Have you and the other inhabitants of Hrtkovci been scared about
14 all this, what happened?
15 A. Well, of course, they were scared. You go to bed in fear. You
16 don't know who is going to live to see the morning. While my children
17 were at home, I didn't sleep downstairs. I went to sleep up in the attic
18 to guard my children while they were at home, and that's what forced me
19 to take my kids out of the school before the end of the school year and
20 to move them, to take them to my wife's parents to a safe place. I
21 didn't do that on a whim. I did it because I was afraid. I was
22 concerned for their lives, the life of my wife and, in the final
23 analysis, my own life.
24 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I have an objection, Judges. I
25 didn't want to object before the witness replied, but this is a general
Page 10757
1 objection. I would like to tell you that the national assembly of the
2 Republic of Serbia rehabilitated Chetniks led by General
3 Drazen Mihajlovic, as an anti-fascist formation from the Second World
4 War. So you have the subjective picture of the Chetniks and the picture
5 that was painted of Chetniks by the communists, and there is the whole
6 other thing which is the objective truth, historical truth about
7 Chetniks.
8 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well. It's on the
9 transcript.
10 MR. MUSSEMEYER: This is no answer for the reasons the
11 inhabitants had to be scared [sic]. I have no further questions. Thank
12 you, Mr. Baricevic. And, Your Honours, I have no further questions. I
13 have finished. Thank you.
14 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Witness, I have one small
15 question. I was very interested by your answer. You said that you were
16 in grade school and that you were taught that the enemies of the Yugoslav
17 people were the Chetniks and the Ustashi. This is what you were taught
18 in school, you were told that the enemies of the Yugoslav people were the
19 Chetniks and the Ustasha?
20 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That's right.
21 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] And you were raised in that
22 belief then, is that it?
23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] While Tito was alive, there were no
24 Chetniks, there were no Ustashas. It was prohibited to sing the songs of
25 either side, and that's the way I was taught and that's the way I lived.
Page 10758
1 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] What did you sing, yourself?
2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, there were songs that were
3 not nationalist songs that you could sing, but nationalist songs could
4 not be sung.
5 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Thank you very much.
6 JUDGE HARHOFF: Thank you Mr. Witness. I have two small
7 questions for you and I realise that you may already have answered them,
8 and in that case, I just ask for your indulgence.
9 But the first question I had was regarding the bus full of
10 black-uniformed men who came just before Mr. Seselj was about to give his
11 speech on the 6th of May, 1992, in Hrtkovci. We have spoken at length
12 about who these soldiers were, and you told us that you were told by
13 others that they were White Eagles. And so this remains still an open
14 question because we have no further proof of whether or not they were
15 actually members of the White Eagles. This is why I want to ask you if
16 you noticed any insignia on the uniforms or any caps that they were
17 wearing, or any other visible traces that could support your opinion that
18 they were members of the White Eagles. Did you see that?
19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The caps, well, those people did
20 not wear the kind of caps that were worn by the army as it was at the
21 time. They wore caps with the cockades, whereas the army and the police,
22 at that time, bore a five-point stars as their insignia, and they had the
23 cockades.
24 JUDGE HARHOFF: So, if I understand you correctly, the soldiers
25 who came to Hrtkovci on the 6th of May, they were having cockades shown
Page 10759
1 in their hats?
2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That's right.
3 JUDGE HARHOFF: What sort of hats or caps were they wearing?
4 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, it was a military style cap.
5 It was black, but instead of the five pointed star, there was the cockade
6 that was stuck on it.
7 JUDGE HARHOFF: I see. So it was not fur -- fur hats. It was a
8 military --
9 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, no, no, it was not.
10 JUDGE HARHOFF: And did they have any -- did you notice if they
11 had any insignia on their uniforms, other than what they had on their
12 hat?
13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I didn't see that.
14 JUDGE HARHOFF: Thank you. The other question I have for you,
15 and again I apologise if you have already told us so but it may have
16 simply slipped my mind, is whether you had a chance to see the house in
17 Jaksic before you were forced to enter into -- before you signed the
18 contract for exchange. Did you actually have a chance to see and assess
19 the property that you were exchanging for your own two houses in
20 Hrtkovci, or did you do that without having seen the new property?
21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honour, I said at one point
22 that when Stanka Stjepanovic came into my house, I went to Croatia and I
23 found her parents in that house. The windows were boarded up. There
24 were no -- there was no window panes. The barn was burned down and the
25 roof on the house was also burnt. But I signed the contract because at
Page 10760
1 the time people were already living in my house and they were living in
2 this house here, so if I didn't sign the contract, I was -- I stood to
3 lose everything because that was the system in Hrtkovci. If somebody got
4 into your house, it was difficult to evict them. And that's why I agreed
5 to the swap.
6 I knew that I had much more, but what could I do? My children,
7 my wife were already in Croatia. I didn't have a house at all. My
8 children had to go to school. They had to complete that school year. I
9 was forced to sign the contract.
10 The villagers who came to see me told me flabbergasted, Franja,
11 how could you do this swap, but I had to do it, that was my fate, and I
12 fixed this house. I am still fixing it and I will bring it up to the
13 standard that I had where -- in the house that I left, in a couple of
14 years.
15 JUDGE HARHOFF: Was there any possibility of you, once you had
16 moved into the new house in Croatia, to move on to another house
17 somewhere else in Croatia? Had that been possible?
18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I am sorry, I didn't understand
19 you.
20 JUDGE HARHOFF: I am sorry. My question was, if it was possible
21 once you had moved into the house in Jaksic in Croatia, whether you could
22 move on from there to another house in Croatia and perhaps a better
23 house? Was that a possibility or were you simply stuck with the house in
24 Jaksic?
25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] What possibility? When I signed
Page 10761
1 the contract for that house, and I forgot to mention that Stanka, this
2 very same Stanka who is now living in my house, sold a house in Pozega,
3 pocketed the money, and entered my new house and that house was not new,
4 the one that you described as new is not new. That was an old house,
5 built in the 1960s.
6 JUDGE HARHOFF: Thank you very much.
7 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Yes, Mr. Seselj, to finish.
8 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, I have to draw your attention
9 to two things. The five-pointed star was removed from police uniforms in
10 1991. That was official. And the cockade was put on the caps with the
11 Serbian flag, and from military uniforms the five-pointed star was
12 removed in early 1992, as soon as General Veljko Kadijevic resigned as
13 the Defence minister, because he had opposed this. And I would also like
14 to note that Stanka Stjepanovic, as the witness himself admitted, was a
15 judge in Slavonska Pozega. As a judge, she had to leave Slavonska Pozega
16 and to flee to Serbia. I would like to draw your attention to those two
17 important elements.
18 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Mussemeyer.
19 MR. MUSSEMEYER: I think the record is not correct. I was
20 answering to Mr. Seselj at page 62, line 10, and my answer is written
21 down there as: "This is no other reason for all inhabitants to be
22 scared." What I think I said and I wanted to say is, this is no reason
23 not to be scared. This should be corrected.
24 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Yes. We'll make the
25 correction. Thank you. Mr. -- well, witness, you have just finished
Page 10762
1 your testimony. I thank you for having come to answer the questions put
2 to you by the Prosecution, the Defence, and the Bench. I wish you a safe
3 journey home. And I will ask the usher to escort you out of the
4 courtroom.
5 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you.
6 [The witness withdrew]
7 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] I shall also ask the registrar
8 to move into closed session and drop the blinds for the next witness,
9 please.
10 THE REGISTRAR: Your Honours, we are now in private session.
11 [Private session]
12 (redacted)
13 (redacted)
14 (redacted)
15 (redacted)
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Page 10763
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Page 10767
1 (redacted)
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5 [Open session]
6 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Registrar, we need a
7 private session to start with.
8 THE REGISTRAR: We are in private session now, Your Honours
9 [Private session]
10 (redacted)
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Page 10768
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25 [Open session]
Page 10769
1 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Madam Prosecutor, you have the
2 floor.
3 MS. PRASAD: Thank you, Your Honours. I will start by reading
4 the short summary of the witness evidence. The witness is a Croat who
5 lived with his parents in the village of Hrtkovci until they were forced
6 to leave in August 1992. The relations between different ethnic
7 communities in Hrtkovci were harmonious, mixed marriages were perceived
8 as normal. The problems began after 6 May 1992. The witness describes
9 the activities of the members of the SRS before and after 6 May 1992. In
10 particular, the involvement in expulsion of the Croats from Hrtkovci.
11 During the autumn of 1991 and spring of 1992, a large number of Serbian
12 refugees came to Hrtkovci. The arrival of these Serbian refugees was
13 organised by the SRS. The local SRS must have had help from persons in
14 higher positions in Belgrade.
15 Ostoja Sibincic organised the so-called exchange of houses in
16 Hrtkovci. The Serbian refugees who arrived in the village went to
17 Sibincic to get addresses of Croat houses which they would occupy.
18 Sibincic would provide these refugees with the necessary information to
19 locate the house and to evict the Croatian occupants.
20 At the beginning of 1992, the witness saw armed Chetnik groups
21 meeting at a bar in the centre of Hrtkovci. The Chetniks carried
22 automatic guns and knives and they wore peaked caps with Kokardas on the
23 front. The local Croats felt intimidated by the presence of these
24 Chetnik volunteers in their village.
25 Seselj came to Hrtkovci on 6 May 1992. During his speech, Seselj
Page 10770
1 read a list of names in public and stated that the Croats would have to
2 leave with only plastic bags in their hands.
3 The witness was informed by other people that Seselj read a list
4 of names of prominent Croats who were to be expelled. Seselj also said
5 that the children born from mixed marriages were to be killed.
6 From 6 May 1992 onwards, the atmosphere became hostile for the
7 Croats in Hrtkovci. There were threats that Croats would be killed if
8 they did not leave their houses. Some Croats received telephone threats.
9 Groups of men would go harassing the villagers in order to convince the
10 villagers to leave and exchange their house. The witness mentioned
11 groups of 20 Serbians who went and kicked Croats out of their houses.
12 The police would protect the perpetrators instead of the owners
13 of the houses. Bomb threats were also frequent. Serbian refugees would
14 go directly to the houses where Croats lived and tell them to give up
15 their houses.
16 In June 1992, the witness's relative was killed. As a result of
17 the death of his relative and the exchange of houses by his immediate
18 neighbours, the witness decided to leave Hrtkovci. The witness and his
19 parents packed their belongings and left for Croatia. They finally
20 settled in Jaksic where the witness arranged the exchange of his house
21 with a Serbian who still lives in Hrtkovci.
22 Your Honour, that concludes the summary.
23 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Well, now ask the traditional
24 questions, please.
25 MS. PRASAD: Thank you, Your Honour.
Page 10771
1 Examination by Ms. Prasad:
2 Q. Before we discuss the Exhibit 65 number 5044, Mr. Witness, did
3 you give a statement in 2002 to representatives of the Office of the
4 Prosecutor?
5 A. Yes, I did.
6 Q. Thank you. And in 2005, did you certify this statement before
7 representatives of the registrar of this Tribunal?
8 A. Yes, I did.
9 Q. Thank you. Did you have an opportunity to review your written
10 statement in your own language?
11 A. Yes, I did.
12 Q. Thank you.
13 MS. PRASAD: Usher, could you please hand out the hard copy of
14 the statement 65 ter 5044 -- questions to the witness. Thank you.
15 Q. Witness, could you look at the third page with number 0465-6591,
16 which is the first page of the English version with number -- ERN number
17 0189-8834.
18 Witness, do you see your signature?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. And if you could flip through those other pages --
21 A. Yes, yes, I can see that.
22 Q. Do you have your initials at the bottom of the page?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. Witness, could you look at page 7, the number is 0465-6595 --
25 A. Yes.
Page 10772
1 Q. -- which -- page of the English version with ERN number
2 0189-8839. Witness do you see your signatures?
3 A. I do see my signature.
4 Q. And does that statement accurately reflect your recollection of
5 the events described in it?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. Witness, if you were asked the same questions today, will you
8 have -- will it be a reflection of your account?
9 A. Yes.
10 MS. PRASAD: Your Honours, we would move for the admission under
11 seal of this document, 65 ter number 5044.
12 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Trial Chamber will decide after
13 we have put a few questions to the witness. Do you have any questions to
14 put to the witness?
15 MS. PRASAD: No, Your Honour.
16 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well. I have a few
17 questions for you, using your statement as a basis for these questions.
18 Regarding what happened before May 6, 1992, before Mr. Seselj's
19 speech, could you please tell us whether in your village there were
20 political parties that you are aware of or were you totally unaware of
21 the political parties that existed in your village?
22 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, as I said in my statement, I
23 did not really know about this very well, but I do know that it was the
24 SDP there that was the strongest party, that was the Social Democratic
25 Party, then the SPO, and then this other party, just a moment, please,
Page 10773
1 the Croatian party led by Bela Tonkovic and the Serb Radical Party.
2 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Let me discuss the Serbian
3 Radical Party. How did you know that the Serbian Radical Party existed
4 before May 6, 1992?
5 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, you know what, it's a small
6 place. People know all these things. Sibincic was bragging and he and
7 Aco Ejic, as far as I know, established --
8 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] [Previous translation
9 continues] ... I believe that there is a problem with the microphone,
10 witness, because it's very difficult to hear. Mrs. Biersay, is that the
11 problem?
12 MS. BIERSAY: Your Honour, it's interpretation that's missing, at
13 least for me.
14 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Well, let's start over again.
15 Regarding the Serbian Radical Party, according to you, who was member of
16 the Serbian Radical Party?
17 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Members of the SRS? There were new
18 people there who had already exchanged houses. There was Ostoja Sibincic
19 and this group around him. I didn't know exactly who the members were
20 but it was his friends, people who were like minded. You never could
21 tell because it's not that I ever saw a list so that I would know exactly
22 who all the members of the Serb Radical Party were.
23 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Did you know Sibincic? Did you
24 discuss with him?
25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, I never talked to him, but I
Page 10774
1 knew him.
2 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] You knew him but you never
3 spoke to him. Very well. Who told you that Sibincic was a member of the
4 Serbian Radical Party? Was it hearsay? Did you know that it was -- did
5 somebody really tell you about it?
6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, it wasn't only a question of
7 rumours. For example, when he spoke in taverns and public places, he
8 showed it himself. But not directly in some contact with me. You would
9 hear people talking about this, you'd hear him talking. You'd stand at a
10 bit of a distance and you'd hear him talking.
11 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well. So that is what he
12 said. On May 6, 1992, Mr. Seselj came to Hrtkovci to make a speech.
13 Where were you on that day, on May 6, 1992? It seems that you did not
14 attend the speech.
15 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That day I was in the watermelon
16 and melon fields.
17 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Obviously you would rather be
18 in the field with melons and watermelons than listen to Mr. Seselj.
19 Fine. But the speech, had you heard about it beforehand or were you told
20 about it afterwards?
21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I heard about that speech later,
22 after it was actually made.
23 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] What exactly were you told?
24 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, I was told that the names of
25 eminent Croats from the village were read out and it was stated that they
Page 10775
1 had to move out. Also, that it was said at this gathering that mixed
2 marriages should be divorced, that the children should be killed. It is
3 people from mixed marriages who talked about this the most. They were
4 the ones who complained about it the most. They were moaning about what
5 was wrong with their children, why would they have to be killed.
6 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Do you remember if someone from
7 a mixed marriage told you that? As far as you recollect, can you give us
8 a name or not? It did happen a long time ago and I fully understand that
9 you would not really remember who said what to you.
10 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, I cannot remember exactly. I
11 cannot remember the names and I wouldn't like to mention them either.
12 After all, these are people from mixed marriages, and from time to time,
13 they go to Hrtkovci so I'm afraid for their safety.
14 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well. So you did not
15 attend the speech. And you can only tell us what people told you. Now,
16 let's move to the core of your -- the main element of your statement,
17 which is the house exchange.
18 Can you tell us how it happened? To start with, can you describe
19 your own house in Hrtkovci, how many rooms it had, what size it was?
20 Could you describe your house to us.
21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, it was a house that was
22 similar to the one that I swapped it for. It is only natural that we
23 cannot exchange houses for an absolutely identical house. It was a
24 house, say, with three rooms, a kitchen, a pantry, a bathroom, and then
25 the smaller buildings outside. They are as big as they are. You cannot
Page 10776
1 really have an ideal swap. I exchanged my house, tractor, all my
2 agricultural machinery and land.
3 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] It was a three-room house with
4 a kitchen, bathroom, and there was some agricultural land and a tractor.
5 Let's talk about the agricultural land. Could you tell us what was the
6 acreage where you were planting those watermelons.
7 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] It's not that I only planted
8 watermelons and melons. All other crops were there too. It was over 7
9 hectares, my land was, and I got around 6 hectares.
10 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] 7 hectares. Very well, now we
11 have a good idea of the size of this agricultural land. How was the
12 exchange going to take place, what happened, who told you to do what?
13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, first of all, how did this
14 exchange take place. People kept coming to the village and offering
15 exchanges of houses to us. They gave us addresses in Croatia and made
16 offers to us to go there and see for ourselves, and, for example, there
17 was even a little ad by the shop saying that there were 30 or 40 houses
18 in Kula by Pozega in Croatia that were supposed to be swapped. I got
19 into my car, I took some of these addresses and I didn't like those
20 properties that I went to. It so happened that I went to Jaksic and I
21 accidently bumped into this man, and I asked him whether he wanted to
22 swap and he said yes. So we reached some kind of an agreement and
23 then --
24 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Let me stop you. You said that
25 people had arrived, these were Serbian refugees who wanted to swap
Page 10777
1 houses. You said that there were also ads for house swaps, then you told
2 us that on your own volition, you decided to try to look for a house, and
3 you ended up in Jaksic. So before talking about the exchange with the
4 owner in Jaksic, I would like to know why you wanted to leave? What was
5 the motivation behind that?
6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Now, what were the reasons. My
7 uncle had been killed, threats were coming in every day. These groups of
8 five, six or seven men would break into the yard and they were saying
9 that I had to leave. These threats were being issued every day. A man
10 could not go on living in a normal way. You could not work all day and
11 get proper rest at night if there was this kind of pressure every day.
12 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] One small detail. You just
13 said that there were groups of men who came every day to threaten you.
14 Were these groups made up of Serbian refugees who had left Croatia or
15 were they Sibincic's people?
16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, there were Serb refugees
17 there, but there were also armed groups there too. I don't know who they
18 belonged to, but they always had pistols, some of them even had hand
19 grenades and some even wore camouflage military uniforms. So the
20 psychological pressure was even greater that way. They would unbutton
21 their shirts and they would show their belts with hand grenades and
22 pistols.
23 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] So you decided to leave, and
24 you drove to Jaksic. Who did you meet there?
25 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, as we drove through Jaksic,
Page 10778
1 we stopped precisely this man with whom I swapped houses. He was on a
2 tractor, and we asked whether he knew of someone who wanted to swap his
3 house and he said that he did. We went to his house, we had a look at
4 everything, and after that, his two sons-in-law and two daughters came to
5 see our house because they had been living in Belgrade, and that is how
6 the agreement on the swap was made.
7 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] What was his name, this person
8 that you swapped houses with?
9 (redacted)
10 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Microphone not activated]
11 THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, please.
12 MS. PRASAD: Your Honour, can we redact the name of the --
13 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Absolutely right.
14 Mr. Registrar, we need to redact the name that is on line 17 of page 82,
15 because that might help identify our witness. There's a 30-minute lag
16 anyway, so this mistake will be fixed easily.
17 Now, could you please describe his house. How many rooms, did he
18 have a tractor, was there any farmland? Describe his house.
19 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] His house also had three rooms, a
20 kitchen, a bathroom, a toilet, all of that. It was similar to our house
21 except that the building style was a bit different. Also, perhaps some
22 of the smaller buildings were a bit smaller, however, you can never have
23 an exchange that is absolutely equal. However, their tractor was
24 smaller, it had fewer accessories, and therefore, it was agreed that at
25 that time they would pay us 2.000 Deutschemark for the machinery because
Page 10779
1 theirs were less valuable.
2 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] So you agreed and on top of the
3 house exchange, he also gave you 2.000 Deutschemark. Was there a
4 contract for this agreement, and if so, where was it signed?
5 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] We signed a contract, of course,
6 about exchange of real estate and machinery. The contract was signed in
7 the municipal building in Pozega. It was drafted by a lawyer, and so it
8 was signed in Pozega and then again it was signed also in Ruma.
9 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] It was registered with a
10 Tribunal in Ruma. As part of this exchange, were you a loser or a
11 winner?
12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, when you get to the bottom
13 line, the only thing where I was a loser was with land. But if you have
14 to choose between safety, a safe life, it is better to opt for safety,
15 for being alive, then for some land, because if you're dead, you can't
16 really do anything with land anyway.
17 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] There is a theory put forward
18 by the associates of Mr. Seselj, the Defence case, and I shall tell you
19 what this is about and ask you what your feelings are, that is the role
20 of the Bench to confront the theory put forward by the Prosecution and by
21 the Defence.
22 Now, this is what the Defence submits. The Croats expelled the
23 Serbs who lived in Croatia, and after that, there were two waves of Serbs
24 who went to Serbia, who used to live in Croatia. One first wave
25 including 200.000 Serbs around the year 1992, and another wave of 200.000
Page 10780
1 Serbs in 1995. All in all, 400.000 Serbs left Croatia to come and settle
2 in Serbia.
3 The Defence theory runs as follows: All these Serbs who left
4 Croatia were forced to leave, were driven out. Some of them were
5 mistreated and so on. I will not go into the details of all this. On
6 the other hand, Croats, like you, living in your community and other
7 communities, other villages, left for Croatia, and these Croats amounted
8 to 1.000 or so people. We don't have an exact figure for the time being,
9 but supposedly, 1.000 or so Croats went back to Croatia to go live there.
10 So this is my first question: Do you agree upon the figures with
11 me? A lot of Serbs arrived from Croatia and a number of Croats left for
12 Croatia.
13 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, I don't keep statistical data
14 so I don't know the figures for people who moved from one side to the
15 other and vice-versa, but I'm sure that more Serbs came from Croatia into
16 Serbia and Vojvodina than Croats who left the Serbian Vojvodina to go to
17 Croatia, because there were more Serbs living in Croatia than were Croats
18 living in Vojvodina.
19 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Another theory put forward by
20 the Defence during cross-examination a while ago, runs as follows: The
21 Croats who, like you, left Croatia met up with Serbs to exchange their
22 houses, and given that the Serbs were intimidated and victimized, they
23 seized this opportunity since the Serbs had to leave Croatia and exchange
24 their flats with people like you who had come to see them. And you said
25 that you yourself went to Croatia and went to see the person whom you
Page 10781
1 were going to exchange your house with. Is this true or not?
2 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] It is true that I went to Croatia
3 to look at the house that I was to swap, but it is also true that Serbs
4 could come to our village to look at the houses that they would swap. It
5 is not true that we, on both sides, could not see the houses and the
6 property that we would be exchanging.
7 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Another argument put forward by
8 the Defence which we are submitting to scrutiny as follows: Among those
9 Croats that left Hrtkovci, most of them were not wealthy people or people
10 of an average income who left because they had small houses and small
11 plots of land whereas the wealthy Croats who had large houses and a lot
12 of land stayed. In other words, the underprivileged Croats left for
13 Croatia whereas the wealthy Croatians stayed. What do you think of this?
14 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Let me tell you, there are some
15 rich Croats who remained because they were able to pay Sibincic
16 protection money, so that he would leave them alone. And I know that
17 there are rich Croats who went to Croatia, and you can check that if you
18 look at the houses in Hrtkovci that Croats had left behind, and then look
19 at the houses that they got in the exchange in Croatia.
20 It is easy to say I left a bad house and got a better one. It
21 all depends on whether houses are in villages or in towns or in big
22 cities, because the value of a house here in the centre of The Hague is
23 different from the value of a house on the outskirts of The Hague, just
24 to give you an example. But there is a village of Ciglenik or Porec near
25 Pozega, even if houses that were there were better than the ones that the
Page 10782
1 Croats left in Hrtkovci, the problem is location. Those villages are
2 really in the back of beyond, so even if it's a big house it's worth
3 nothing.
4 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] [Previous translation
5 continues] ... among the farmers, since you were a farmer, were you a
6 poor farmer, did you have an average income or were you wealthy, in what
7 category would you have been put at the time?
8 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, I was medium income.
9 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] You'd be an average income
10 earner. You said something which we haven't heard so far; nothing
11 escapes me. As soon as I hear something new, I put the question to the
12 witness directly to ask for more detailed information. You said that
13 wealthy Croats had given money to Sibincic to be able to stay and left
14 alone. Was Sibincic racketeering people and telling them, I shall
15 protect you, but you need to give me some money and then you won't have
16 any problem?
17 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, something like that. That's
18 what I heard some Croats say. I shouldn't really give you their names.
19 But it is not true that only Croats moved out, there were Hungarians who
20 were quite well off who moved to Croatia. They didn't want to pay the
21 protection money to Sibincic and they had to move out.
22 My uncle also moved to Croatia, to give you another example. He
23 was also well off. He had all kinds of farming machinery, a lot of land,
24 so it was not the rule for just middle class and the lower income people
25 moved out into Croatia.
Page 10783
1 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] You quoted your uncle as an
2 example. What was the surface area?
3 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] As far as I know, he had over 15
4 hectares of his own land. He had all the accessories for the tractor and
5 for the harvesting of sugar beets, because our area was well known for
6 sugar beet, so he left all of that and went to Croatia. There was also
7 our village doctor. He had 15 or 20 acres of land and he farmed the
8 land, yet he left it behind and he went to Croatia and he is unemployed.
9 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] In other words, as far as you
10 are concerned, a number of Croats left for Croatia and they weren't the
11 winners in this exchange, they were the losers.
12 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That's right, yes. We were the
13 losers. First of all, land in Srem is much better. It yields much more
14 than the land in this part of Slavonia around Pozega, Nasice, Slatina,
15 Bijelova [phoen], for instance. The land there is much poorer than in
16 Srem, in our parts in Srem. And if Mr. Seselj or somebody else, if you
17 don't believe me when I say that, you can find experts who are going to
18 test the land.
19 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] If the Trial Chamber has enough
20 time, it can go and visit the area to see how much land there is, but for
21 the time being we don't have time to go there. We shall see.
22 Let me now talk about something which is in your statement. You
23 said that your uncle -- well, that something happened to your uncle.
24 Could you tell us what this is, but do not give us his name. Let's move
25 into private session. Registrar, please.
Page 10784
1 THE REGISTRAR: We are in private session now, Your Honour
2 [Private session]
3 (redacted)
4 (redacted)
5 (redacted)
6 (redacted)
7 (redacted)
8 (redacted)
9 (redacted)
10 (redacted)
11 (redacted)
12 (redacted)
13 (redacted)
14 (redacted)
15 (redacted)
16 (redacted)
17 (redacted)
18 (redacted)
19 (redacted)
20 (redacted)
21 (redacted)
22 (redacted)
23 (redacted)
24 (redacted)
25 (redacted)
Page 10785
1 (redacted)
2 (redacted)
3 (redacted)
4 (redacted)
5 (redacted)
6 (redacted)
7 (redacted)
8 (redacted)
9 (redacted)
10 (redacted)
11 (redacted)
12 (redacted)
13 (redacted)
14 (redacted)
15 (redacted)
16 (redacted)
17 (redacted)
18 (redacted)
19 (redacted)
20 (redacted)
21 [Open session]
22 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] In your statement, you said
23 that you saw people looting houses. It seems that you witnessed this
24 with your own eyes. Can you tell us exactly what you saw as far as
25 looting of these houses is concerned?
Page 10786
1 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Three houses down the road from my
2 house, a group of people broke into my neighbour's house, and this
3 neighbour of mine was in Croatia looking for a house for the exchange.
4 His brother-in-law was there looking after the house and this group of
5 maybe 15 or 20 people simply threw him out of the house, and this house
6 was then occupied by a Serb from Croatia. In the meantime, my neighbour
7 was able to exchange his house with a Serb from Rijeka, and when this man
8 came to Hrtkovci, he couldn't get into the house. He had to allow the
9 other man who was already in the house to take everything out, all the
10 things that he wanted.
11 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] One witness told us that the
12 Serbs who had been driven out of Croatia were very discontent and they
13 were blaming the government for not doing anything, and we were told that
14 a lot of them were armed and walking around armed. Did you see this with
15 your own eyes?
16 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, I saw armed people moving
17 around because they came into my yard and they threatened me at gunpoint.
18 They had pistols, some of them even had automatic weapons. But as they
19 went around, they were usually protected by the police.
20 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] You are saying that the police
21 was protecting them.
22 My last question, a great number of Serbs come to your village
23 and they are looking for houses because they need to sleep somewhere. It
24 seems that a lot of them are armed and they burst into houses in the way
25 you described, but what was the state doing? What was the police doing,
Page 10787
1 standing nearby, powerless, because everyone is overtaken by the
2 situation? Why did the JNA not come to establish or re-establish law and
3 order? What kind of explanation can you give us?
4 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I do have an explanation. The
5 police did nothing, as I indicated in my statement, until I spoke with
6 the president of the Ruma municipality after my uncle's murder. She said
7 I have to come to Hrtkovci and deal with the situation but I can't do it
8 with the police in Hrtkovci, I have to come with the special forces.
9 When she came to the village a couple of weeks later with the
10 special forces, then law and order were re-established. Nobody broke
11 into houses, we Croats started moving out in an orderly fashion.
12 Roadblocks were set up at the entry and exit roads in the village so that
13 some control was established over who got in and out and then there was a
14 lull. It was it is my opinion that until that time, the police was
15 commanded by somebody else, and I don't know whether the president of the
16 Ruma municipality was given approval by Milosevic or somebody else at the
17 top to calm the situation in Hrtkovci down a little bit or not, but my
18 opinion is that she was.
19 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] When the Bench put questions,
20 new information surfaces. You have just mentioned something which we
21 have never heard before. You were saying that the president of the
22 municipality in Ruma had been advised of the crime and you said that this
23 person did something about it. Special police forces purportedly came
24 and re-established law and order. Roadblocks were set up along the
25 roads, when did this actually happen, what month?
Page 10788
1 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] It was in July.
2 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] July, that's when peace was
3 restored. So in 1992, before the month of May, after the month of May,
4 June, that's when law and order is re-established, before that it was
5 unruly, is that how things happened?
6 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, something like that. The
7 unrest followed Mr. Seselj's visit to the village, and then once the
8 special police entered the village, then this unrest was lesser. There
9 were still some provocations, but less attacks on the houses. People
10 were not evicted from their houses anymore.
11 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] There's something interesting
12 in what you said. These special forces arrive in July, and law and order
13 is re-established, but after July, Croats decided to leave. They could
14 have just stayed. Croats left after July, did they?
15 (redacted)
16 (redacted)
17 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] We need to redact line 21, page
18 92, I need to do all things at once. Please make sure that this is done.
19 They left after that, but they didn't have to leave since law and
20 order was back again. Why did they leave?
21 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, what kind of a life is it if
22 you have to be under police guard all the time? We were not used to
23 that. We were used to moving around freely. So they were guarding us in
24 the village, but out in the fields, what about that? They were
25 destroying our crops. You go into the field and you see somebody else
Page 10789
1 harvesting your crop, watermelons, potatoes, and somebody can just kill
2 you there in the fields just like that. They had weapons. We didn't
3 have weapons. We didn't have anything to defend ourselves with.
4 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] When exactly did you exchange
5 your house, on what date? I didn't ask you that question. On what date
6 did you exchange your house?
7 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] On the 18th of August, as far as I
8 can remember. That's when I moved to Croatia. That was the date of the
9 final move.
10 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] So on the 18th of August, you
11 left when order was restored; is that right? Last question. Every time
12 I say it's a last question, but I always put a last question after your
13 answers.
14 When you went to Croatia after 1992, 1993, 1994, you worked, then
15 you gave the OTP a statement in 2002. At some point, did the Croatian
16 intelligence services or the Croatian office of the prosecutor or
17 Croatian police officers, did they come and visit you in your house or on
18 your farm to ask you whether you were prepared to testify for this
19 Tribunal? Were you contacted in such a manner or did you not see anyone
20 save for the representatives of the OTP who was represented by
21 Mr. Paolo Pastore-Stocchi, whom we all know. Did you see anybody else
22 apart from him?
23 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. That day when I gave the
24 statement, a representative of the Croatian police in plain clothes came
25 to my house and he asked me if I wanted to give the statement and I said
Page 10790
1 I wanted to, and then I went to actually provide the statement. But that
2 was only on that day that I gave the statement to Mr. Stocchi, that's
3 when this happened.
4 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] And the Croatian police officer
5 didn't tell you that you should say such and such and not such and such?
6 Nobody tried to influence you?
7 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Nobody exerted any influence. I
8 came home from work, I didn't even have lunch. This gentleman came and
9 told me you should come to such and such a place, they are waiting for
10 you there. So I took my own car, I didn't go in his car. I took my own
11 car. I waited there for maybe an hour or two hours until it was my turn
12 to give a statement.
13 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] I'm turning to members of the
14 Bench to see if they have any questions for you.
15 JUDGE LATTANZI: [Interpretation] You were not there when
16 Mr. Seselj delivered his speech, but had you heard about security and did
17 you know who was in charge of these security measure, the local police?
18 THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I don't know that. I really don't
19 recall that too well, about the security at that rally.
20 JUDGE LATTANZI: [Interpretation] Thank you.
21 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] I'll turn to my colleague. No
22 questions. I'm turning to the Prosecution, do you have any redirect?
23 MS. PRASAD: Your Honour, could we go into the private session
24 for a moment.
25 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well, let's move to
Page 10791
1 private session, Mr. Registrar.
2 THE REGISTRAR: We are in private session now, Your Honour.
3 [Private session]
4 (redacted)
5 (redacted)
6 (redacted)
7 (redacted)
8 (redacted)
9 (redacted)
10 (redacted)
11 (redacted)
12 (redacted)
13 (redacted)
14 (redacted)
15 (redacted)
16 [Open session]
17 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] In open session, let me say
18 that the witness's written statement has been tendered and -- under P654
19 [as interpreted] under seal. Mr. Witness, I would like to thank you --
20 First, Mr. Seselj, you do confirm that you not want to ask any
21 questions for cross-examination purposes, right?
22 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I am not going conduct a
23 cross-examination.
24 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well. I would like to
25 thank you on behalf of my colleagues and myself. Thank you, sir, for
Page 10792
1 come coming to testify for the Prosecution. I wish you all the best for
2 your return home. Before you leave this courtroom, we need to drop the
3 blinds.
4 I think you can leave.
5 [The witness withdrew]
6 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] We are in open session.
7 Mr. Seselj, let me discuss the schedule for next week. The Trial Chamber
8 has handed out a decision that was filed today. It might take some time
9 to have it translated into your own language and you might not have it on
10 time. This has to do with Mrs. Ewa Tabeau, expert witness for the
11 Prosecution scheduled for Tuesday and Friday [as interpreted]. The
12 Trial Chamber decided that Mrs. Tabeau, the expert witness, will come on
13 those days. She will be examined in chief by the Prosecution for 30
14 minutes, using her report as a basis for this examination-in-chief.
15 After which, Mr. Seselj, you will be given two hours, I repeat, two hours
16 to cross-examine this expert witness. After this, if need be, the OTP
17 will be entitled to ask additional questions and will be granted one hour
18 to do so. Of course, the Judges are also entitled to ask questions but
19 no time will be set aside for the Judges in all this time.
20 I want to make a correction, I said it was Tuesday and Friday --
21 Tuesday and Wednesday and the transcript reads Tuesday and Friday. So I
22 want to repeat the days for Ewa Tabeau are Tuesday and Wednesday. For
23 Thursday we have another witness. This is what we've scheduled for
24 Mrs. Tabeau. After all this the Trial Chamber -- after having heard both
25 parties on the questions, the Trial Chamber will rule as to whether this
Page 10793
1 expert report will be admitted or not.
2 I wanted to tell you all this because I'm sure that you will not
3 get our decision in your own language in time because it is several pages
4 long and I think you needed to be informed of this. Mr. Seselj, you have
5 the floor.
6 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Perhaps I should wait a minute for
7 the blinds to go up.
8 Mr. President, Mr. President, I'm surprised that you decided in
9 advance to give the Prosecution one hour for re-examination. Of course,
10 I'm not opposed to it at all, but I want my rights to be protected as
11 well. First of all, I come from a legal system in which the Defence
12 always has the last word in relation to the Prosecutor. So whatever the
13 Prosecutor says in court, the Defence is always entitled to respond.
14 Here the Prosecutor gets an entire hour for re-examination
15 whereas their examination-in-chief is two times less, half an hour. In
16 other systems, the Defence usually gets more time to cross-examine an
17 expert witness because there's usually an accompanying expert report.
18 Now, if the Prosecutor is going to re-examine twice as long as the
19 examination-in-chief is supposed to take, then there are various dangers
20 looming there of the Prosecutor raising questions that they did not bring
21 up during the direct examination, or things that I did not bring up in
22 cross-examination, or they have the possibility to analyse even further
23 what I brought up during my cross-examination. Therefore, I ask that if
24 some new questions are raised, you give me time for my additional
25 questions too. I believe that that would be fair. That was the first
Page 10794
1 thing that I wanted to tell you.
2 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Just a minute, let me answer
3 right away. The Trial Chamber could very well have decided to admit the
4 report directly, and only to allow you for cross-examination. Some
5 Trial Chambers proceed in such a manner. However, in order to guarantee
6 your rights, we decided to grant the Prosecution half an hour to ask a
7 few questions on the report. I believe that that is sufficient. After
8 that, you will have two hours, which is a lot of time, for your
9 cross-examination, and as we said in our decision, if need be,
10 Prosecution -- the Prosecution is entitled to redirect, to ask additional
11 questions. That's in the rules.
12 We decided that given the magnitude of which you may explore in
13 your cross-examination, the Prosecution might need an hour for redirect.
14 If you need, of course, to reply on a few things, you know, you will be
15 allowed to do so.
16 Mrs. Tabeau is a demographer. She will be talking about
17 statistics, population breakdown, a lot of tables, and so forth and so
18 on. The Prosecutor might have some additional questions and maybe not,
19 but if they do you will have the floor after them also.
20 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well I have two more things to
21 raise. First of all, as far as Ewa Tabeau is concerned, you've given me
22 two hours. I believe that it may happen, I cannot say in advance, that I
23 may need somewhat more time. I would like to draw your attention to the
24 fact that I've saved up quite a bit of time during cross-examinations of
25 the last few witnesses.
Page 10795
1 Next week, Ewa Tabeau is the only witness that was envisaged.
2 There's going to be another 92 ter witness, that's going to be very
3 short, so we have three days at our disposal. Please bear that in mind,
4 if I need more time, more than two hours, please grant me that time. I
5 usually don't ask for that, but I would ask in the case of an expert, if
6 necessary.
7 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] We'll keep this in mind, no
8 problem.
9 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] The third thing that I wanted to
10 raise, today I got a new witness schedule for October, November, and
11 December from the OTP. This schedule was changed to an enormous degree
12 compared to the one I had earlier on. There are three problems on the
13 basis of that.
14 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] If you are going to mention the
15 name of protected witness, it would be best to move to private session.
16 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] No, no, I'm just going to refer to
17 numbers. First of all, there are eight witnesses there who are Defence
18 witnesses. As the Trial Chamber, you haven't ruled yet with regard to my
19 voluminous request pertaining to the protection of Defence witnesses.
20 Secondly, yet again I --
21 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Just a minute. We handed out a
22 decision, I believe that it is been translated. At the moment I'm
23 looking at my legal officer and she is nodding, so we have handed out a
24 decision regarding this. Unfortunately, there is always, you know, a
25 time lag between the handing down of the decision and the translation of
Page 10796
1 such decision. We work extremely quickly, as you know. We try to work
2 as quickly as possible so you are not left hanging, but the decision has
3 been handed down.
4 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, on the basis of this, I
5 conclude that the OTP informs me that you have rejected my request,
6 otherwise they wouldn't put (redacted)
7 (redacted)
8 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] It is best not to mention the
9 pseudonyms and their numbers because it might be possible to identify the
10 persons with these numbers. We will redact all these numbers. But I can
11 confirm that on the schedule there are people who you claimed as Defence
12 witnesses, but that the Prosecution wants to call as their witnesses, and
13 the procedure to call them is under way at the moment.
14 Now, whether they will come or not, we will see, and if they do
15 not come, the Trial Chamber will take the necessary steps. But as of
16 now, they are on the schedule and we wanted to inform you of this because
17 you need to know who is scheduled until December 12th.
18 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Now, a new name appeared here that
19 was not on the list of Prosecution witnesses. VS-065 is the name. The
20 Prosecutor provided me with this witness's statement but this witness's
21 name was never officially put on the list. I do not have a decision of
22 the Trial Chamber that an expansion of the list was approved.
23 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Just a minute. I don't have
24 this witness on the list. Mrs. Dahl, you are on your feet.
25 MS. DAHL: Yes, Your Honour, it refers to a confidential filing
Page 10797
1 and if we could move into private session briefly.
2 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Very well, private session,
3 please.
4 THE REGISTRAR: Your Honour, we are now in private session.
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20 [Open session]
21 MS. DAHL: Very briefly, the accused filed submission number 403
22 seeking reconsideration of the Trial Chamber's decision to admit the
23 statements of witness Stojanovic. The Prosecution will not be filing a
24 written response, given that the accused has identified no new facts or
25 developments in the jurisprudence of the Tribunal that we think warrant
Page 10801
1 any further discussion. So we consider that in the absence of any
2 demonstration that Mr. Seselj is unfairly prejudiced by the decision,
3 there's nothing more that needs to be said and the motion is ripe for the
4 Chamber's consideration.
5 Finally, with regard to a question raised last week concerning
6 David Tolbert, the Chamber will recall that on 9th October, Mr. Seselj
7 made a statement that Mr. Tolbert had met with Tomislav Nikolic a few
8 days earlier that week. He requested that that information be verified
9 with Mr. Tolbert. The Prosecution got in contact with him and
10 Mr. Tolbert has informed us that Mr. Seselj's claim that he met with
11 Nikolic a few days ago is baseless. He has, to his recollection, never
12 met Mr. Nikolic. And Ms. Biersay, would you like to address the
13 questions about the DVD disclosure?
14 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] First of all, I have to say
15 something. First of all, it's not true that I said that Tomislav Nikolic
16 met up with David Tolbert a few days beforehand. I said, and that must
17 be in the transcript, that they met two years ago, that he met with
18 Tomislav Nikolic two years ago. And I ask that David Tolbert make a
19 statement in writing as to whether he met with Tomislav Nikolic about two
20 years ago. We don't want to have Christine Dahl telling us about it
21 only.
22 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mrs. Dahl, Mr. Seselj confirms
23 that Mr. Tolbert would have met with Mr. Nikolic two years ago. We're
24 now in 2008, so he might have met him in 2006, 2005, I don't know.
25 MS. DAHL: Your Honour, what I understood from the transcript at
Page 10802
1 page 10580 was that it was concerning two days ago, that was the quote
2 from the transcript. Regardless, Mr. Tolbert's answer was unqualified
3 temporally, meaning that he has no recollection of ever having met
4 Mr. Nikolic at any time and --
5 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Let me say one more thing. This
6 shows that there is a problem with the transcript. I said about two
7 years ago and you can check that in the audio recording.
8 JUDGE LATTANZI: [Interpretation] I remember you talked about
9 years and you did not talk about days.
10 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Secondly, Tomislav Nikolic admitted
11 to me personally, in the presence of Dragan Todorovic, that he met with
12 David Tolbert and most probably this meeting took place within an OSCE
13 meeting or a Council of Europe meeting. I seem to remember that it was
14 in Budapest. I have a witness and Tomislav Nikolic admitted to me that
15 he had met up with him. In all fairness, he explained to me that he met
16 up with him so that he could advocate to the respect of my procedural
17 rights, and I know why he met up with him because what business did he
18 have meeting with the deputy Prosecutor.
19 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Now, Mrs. Biersay.
20 MS. BIERSAY: Thank you, Your Honour. Given that Dr. Tabeau will
21 be testifying next week, I wanted to give the Court an update on the
22 disclosure that we -- that I discussed in court last week. I believe it
23 was the 9th. At this point, I believe we've given to Mr. Seselj the
24 reports that he requested, and we've also, at this time, given him all of
25 the transcriptions of Dr. Tabeau's previous testimony before the
Page 10803
1 Tribunal.
2 I understand that an issue came up with respect to some DVDs that
3 were attempted to be disclosed to Mr. Seselj and he rejected those.
4 Because we had not finished the transcription of the Popovic testimony,
5 which he indicated in court he was particularly interested in, we
6 provided him with the audio pending the completion of the transcript. So
7 that is what that was. My understand is that he rejected the DVD
8 containing her live testimony which was in English and we followed up
9 with the transcription in B/C/S.
10 And I have been corrected. We -- the DVD that we ultimately
11 disclosed to him did, in fact, have the B/C/S extraction on it, so that
12 what he did reject was the B/C/S extraction, but we followed up with a
13 hard copy transcription of that extraction.
14 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I don't know how come the
15 Prosecutor speaks in such a confused way or the interpreter is
16 interpreting in such an unprofessional way. I did not understand
17 Ms. Biersay's last sentence at all.
18 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Ms. Biersay is saying that at
19 first, you were disclosed a DVD with Mrs. Tabeau's testimony in the
20 Popovic case, if I'm not mistaken. You did not accept this DVD because
21 it was in English. Then the Prosecutor gave you a hard copy of the B/C/S
22 of this transcription. That's what I understood anyway. Is that what
23 happened, Mrs. Biersay?
24 MS. BIERSAY: Your Honour, I'll try again. Thank you. We
25 provided -- attempted to give Mr. Seselj a DVD. I think based on our
Page 10804
1 previous disclosures he decided it was English and rejected it. It was
2 actually the B/C/S extraction of her Popovic testimony. So not in her
3 own voice but the interpretation. The same day that we attempted this
4 disclosure, we also disclosed to him the hard copy transcription in B/C/S
5 to him. So in our opinion we have now provided to him all of the
6 transcriptions, in hard copy and in his language, of all of the previous
7 testimonies by Dr. Tabeau.
8 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] Mr. Seselj, you have a hard
9 copy of Mrs. Tabeau's statements.
10 THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] First of all, I did not refuse to
11 take receipt of the DVD because it was in English, but because the
12 Prosecution is obliged to provide me with a hard copy of all that. If
13 the Prosecution provided me with a hard copy of the full transcript from
14 the Popovic case, then there's not a problem. I received the transcript.
15 Unfortunately, I have been unable to read it, but I was able to see that
16 it has only about 40 pages. So I'm quite flabbergasted how come that the
17 testimony lasted for such a short time because it with me it will not be
18 such a short time. And I assume that their case is a tiny little bit
19 more complicated than mine. If the 40 papers are the sum total of her
20 evidence, then there's not a problem at all.
21 JUDGE ANTONETTI: [Interpretation] To conclude, Mr. Seselj, I'm
22 fully transparent. I must tell you and I'm probably told you before,
23 Mrs. Tabeau has already testified in the Prlic case. I have already seen
24 this person, she testified in that case. I want this to be very clear.
25 I have already seen this person in another case.
Page 10805
1 It is now 7 o'clock. The court stands adjourned and we shall
2 meet again next Tuesday at half past 8.00.
3 --- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 7.01 p.m.,
4 to be reconvened on Tuesday, the 21st day of
5 October, 2008, at 8.00 a.m.
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