Milosevic Transcript 2002-10-18

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Friday, 18 October 2002

[Closed session]

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--- Recess taken at 12.08 p.m.

--- On resuming at 12.33 p.m.

[Open session]

[The witness entered court]

JUDGE MAY: Yes. Let the witness take the declaration.

WITNESS: WITNESS C-1141

[Witness answered through interpreter]

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I solemnly declare that I will speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

JUDGE MAY: If you'd like to take a seat. Yes, Mr. Groome.

MR. GROOME: Your Honour, before we begin, some of the witnesses -- or a portion of the witness's testimony which is most directly relevant to the indictment begins on paragraph 8. I believe it would be appropriate to take the rest of it in more summary fashion, and with the ¹¹⁹¹⁴ ^{BLANK PAGE} ¹¹⁹¹⁵ Court's permission, would propose to lead him through the first few paragraphs of his proposed testimony.

JUDGE MAY: Yes. When you get to anything likely to be controversial, do it in the normal way, but of course lead him through the non-controversial matters.

MR. GROOME: As we start, I would ask to go into private session to ask him his name and a couple of biographical details that may come up in the course of his testimony.

JUDGE MAY: For the record, his name for these purposes should be given too.

MR. GROOME: That's C-1141, Your Honour.

JUDGE MAY: Thank you.

[Private session]

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[Open session]

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

MR. GROOME:

Q. Witness C-1141, I want to ask you to tell us how many different villages make up the municipality of Hrvatska Dubica.

A. The former municipality of Hrvatska Dubica. Why "former"? Because when I came to Hrvatska Dubica, the municipality was dissolved and it fell under Hrvatska Kostajnica. However, within the former municipality, there were four villages.

Q. And can you tell us the names of those villages.

A. Zivaja, Cerovljani, Bacin, Slabinja.

Q. And which of those villages were predominantly occupied by Croat people?

A. Bacin and Cerovljani.

Q. And which ones were primarily occupied by Serb people?

A. Zivaja and Slabinja.

Q. And was there one place in Hrvatska Dubica that was approximately 50/50 between Serbs and Croats, approximately half Croat, half Serb?

A. Yes. Yes.

Q. And was that the village of Hrvatska Dubica itself?

A. Yes. Yes.

Q. Now, prior to 1990, how would you characterise the relationship between Serbs and Croats?

A. In brief, or do you want me to describe it? ¹¹⁹¹⁸

Q. Briefly, please.

A. Well, in brief, quite normal. Everybody lived together in harmony. There was no hatred.

Q. Can you tell us approximately when you noticed a change in this in Hrvatska Dubica?

A. In 1990, after the multiparty elections had been held. It was then that more than one party appeared in Dubica.

Q. Would it be fair to say that as the relationship between the two ethnic communities deteriorated, that both sides began to arm themselves and mobilise for a possible conflict?

A. Yes.

Q. Did there come a time when paramilitaries from the Republic of Serbia arrived in Hrvatska Dubica?

A. I don't know that.

Q. Did there come a time when you left Hrvatska Dubica?

A. Yes. Yes. I left it.

Q. And when did you leave it? Just a date at this point in time.

A. On the 13th of September, the bridge in Hrvatska Dubica was blown up. I think on the 14th of September, which was a Thursday, I learned about what had happened. I took my wife to Zagreb, and then I stayed at home.

JUDGE MAY: Which year? Can we determine that?

MR. GROOME:

Q. Are we speaking about --

A. 1990 -- no. 1991. ¹¹⁹¹⁹

Q. After bringing your wife to Zagreb, did you return to Hrvatska Dubica?

A. No, no. I didn't take her to Zagreb. I sent her there and I stayed on at home. And on that Thursday, Friday, and Saturday evening, I was there. Then I went about two kilometres further away, to a hamlet near Dubica, where a friend of mine lived, someone who had been a colleague of mine at the school. I went there on a motorcycle. When I arrived at his house, I found him there, and his father, and an elderly woman whom I didn't know. They were getting ready to go and loading something onto a tractor. I asked them what was going on, and they said they had to leave. I left my motorcycle in the basement of his house, and together with him, his father, and that elderly woman, I got on the tractor and we went off in the direction of Kutina, under cover of night.

Q. Now, did there come a time after this point in time that you returned to Hrvatska Dubica through Bosnia?

A. Yes, that's right.

Q. And can you tell us when, please?

A. On the 2nd of October, 1991.

Q. You have previously described for us that the bridge was blown up. Can you describe the condition of the bridge when you returned on this day?

A. One side had been destroyed, but you could cross the bridge because they had put something there, some kind of boulders or broad planks, something of that kind. So you could go up and down these planks and cross that way. ¹¹⁹²⁰

Q. Now, this time when you returned to your village, do you see armed forces in and around the village?

A. Not in the village, but outside the village there were some there, towards the Sava River. About four or five kilometres away there's a forest -- actually, it's Cerovljani and Zivaja, those two places, and from Jesenice onwards. That's where the woods start. So it's a real forest, actually. And then you have the Sava River. And that's where the front line was.

Q. Did you see members of the Yugoslav People's Army as part of these armed forces?

A. I saw reservists, and they were wearing the grey-green type of uniform. They were reservists, and I knew some of them because they were locals.

Q. And they were reservists of the Yugoslav People's Army? You need to --

A. Yes.

Q. Did you see any members of the SAO Krajina police present?

A. Yes, I did.

Q. Did you see any paramilitary forces at that time?

A. Apart from those reservists, and apart from those policemen, I didn't see anybody else.

Q. Do you know where the headquarters of the police -- of the SAO Krajina police were in your area?

A. Yes, I do know that. It was in the old school building. We've got a new school building now, but this was in the old building, in the ¹¹⁹²¹ old school, and that's where an agricultural cooperative was set up as well. Anyway, it's the old school building.

Q. At this point in time, who is the commander of the local police brigade?

A. I don't really know -- actually, there were two of them, two men. One was Veljko Radunovic, and the other was his son, Stevo. I would say that they were the two main people in charge of that. Nobody told me, but I think that they were in command, and I knew both of them, yes.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. May.

JUDGE MAY: Yes.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] First of all, I think we ought to establish whether a local brigade of the police force existed, because a brigade is a very large formation for such a small place.

JUDGE MAY: Well, Mr. Milosevic, you can ask about that when it's your turn.

Yes.

MR. GROOME:

Q. Witness C-1141, can you tell us about how many members made up the local police force in your area?

A. About 30. 31 or 32, I'm not quite sure.

Q. Now, I want to draw your attention to the 20th of October, 1991. Do you recall where you were that morning?

A. I remember, yes. I was at home.

Q. Do you remember the day of the week?

A. It was a Sunday, Sunday morning, about half past 8.00. ¹¹⁹²²

Q. Did there come a time when you went to a neighbour's house to borrow a cup of milk?

A. Yes, that's right.

Q. What occurred while you were in your neighbour's house?

A. While the old woman was pouring some milk for me in her home, her daughter was outside in the yard, and she suddenly rushed into the house --

Q. Did she say anything when she entered the house?

A. And when she came in, she said to me, [redacted]

[redacted]

Q. I'd ask you not to mention any nickname or any other personal identifying information in open session.

Did you go outside your neighbour's house?

A. Yes, I did.

Q. Can you describe for us what you saw.

A. When I came up to the door, the door of my house, the entrance door, on the fence, actually, the iron fence, I saw a young man standing there, waiting for me. It was raining, so he had a sort of rain cloak over him. There was a truck standing behind him. And he asked me if that was my house. I said yes, it was. And he said, "Well, get ready, because we're going off to the fire brigade building for a meeting there."

Q. Witness C-1141, could you tell us: Was there anything written on the side of the truck?

A. Yes, there was. What it said was "Milicija SAO Krajina."

Q. Other than the man who you just described to us spoke to you, were ¹¹⁹²³ ^{BLANK PAGE} ¹¹⁹²⁴ there any other men present at that time?

A. Yes. There was another person, the driver of the truck, who was in the truck. He was a young man, who did the driving. Did either of these men have uniforms on, that you could tell?

A. As it was raining, the one that met me, who wasn't in the truck, was wearing this sort of rain cloak, something of that nature. I didn't see the other one, whether he was in uniform or not, because he was sitting inside the truck.

Q. Now, after the man said, "Well, get ready, because we're going off to the fire brigade building for a meeting," what did you do?

A. I went inside the house to put something on. I took a jacket, my cap, and went outside. I locked the door to the house and the gate and went into the truck. I said that I could come on foot, because I knew the way, and he said, "Never mind. It's raining. It's best that you come in the truck with us, so that's what I did. I got up into the truck. There were four old women there, and they were sitting on a sort of wooden bench or something like that. The truck had a canvas awning over it because it was raining. And right after that, my neighbour turned up, the one that had given me the milk, and she was accompanied by her daughter. Some other neighbours turned up too: A woman and her husband, both of them were pensioners.

Q. Now, sir, when you say they turned up, did they also enter the rear of the truck, where you were?

A. No, they didn't get up on their own. They were assisted up. The soldier helped them get up onto the truck, helped these old women to get ¹¹⁹²⁵ up onto the truck.

Q. Now, did there come a time when the truck left the area by your house and travelled somewhere else?

A. No. When we got into the truck, the truck started off, and on the way to the fire brigade station, it stopped at several points, and every time it stopped, people would get onto the truck; old men and women.

Q. Now, before you arrived at the fire station, approximately how many people were in the rear of the truck with you?

A. I counted about 23 of us who had been boarded up onto the truck and who got out at the fire station.

Q. And all of the other people that were in the truck, did you recognise them as being other people who lived in the same area as yourself?

A. Yes, that's right. They were all from Dubica. Of course I knew them. I taught their children and grandchildren.

Q. When you arrived at the fire station, what happened?

A. We got off the truck. It was still raining. And we stood outside in front of the fire station, under the edge of the roof. And after five or perhaps ten minutes - I can't say exactly, but very soon afterwards - a bus turned up. It had also come from Dubica. And the bus brought some old women and men, also from Dubica. There were fewer of them, perhaps about - well, I can't say exactly - 15 or 16 of them.

Q. Can you tell us what time it was that you arrived at the fire station?

A. It was 8.30, thereabouts, or maybe closer to 9.00. Between 8.30 ¹¹⁹²⁶ and 9.00.

Q. Did there come a time when you entered the fire station?

A. When the other lot got off, the old men and women from the bus, we stayed outside for a while, and sometime after 9.00 a woman came, and a man. They were armed. And they told us to go inside the fire station. We all went inside and we never went out again.

Q. Aside from the two people you've just described as being armed, were there any other people at that time by the fire station that had weapons?

A. No. They were guards. There were three guards in two places, and they would take turns and have shifts. They were all armed. Three times two.

Q. The guards that you're describing now, were you able to identify their uniform, or uniforms?

A. Olive-green, yes, grey-green.

Q. And did that identify them as belonging to a particular unit?

A. Yes, it did.

Q. And what unit did they belong to?

A. I don't know the name, but the headquarters of that unit was in Zivaja. The commander of that headquarters or that unit, or whatever it was, a battalion or whatever, but the commander was -- I don't know him personally. He was a middle-aged man.

Q. Were these guards, were they military personnel or police personnel?

A. Military personnel, because they wore the olive-green uniforms. ¹¹⁹²⁷

Q. Now, can you approximate for us how many people altogether were in the fire station after having been collected from throughout the area?

A. Fifty-three.

Q. Can you give us some idea of what their ages were?

A. All of them over 60 years of age, except one person, a young boy. I think he was a boy. He was -- he had a broken leg. I don't know how he came to break it. So he couldn't walk very well. He limped a little, and his leg was in a plaster cast. He was younger. Otherwise, all the others were old people.

Q. Aside from the young boy, who was the youngest -- next youngest person in that group of people?

A. Well, I couldn't really say. I don't know. I was younger than those old people there, at the time. I was then, at least.

Q. Can you describe approximately how many were men, how many were women?

A. Well, I would say half/half. Perhaps there were more women than men.

Q. And can you describe for us the ethnic make-up of that group of 53?

A. There were Serbs and there were Croats and there were Muslims too. Mostly they were Croats.

Q. What is your ethnicity?

A. I'm a Serb.

Q. Now, were the people that were gathered in the fire station, were they free to leave? ¹¹⁹²⁸

A. No. No.

Q. You described for us being told about the necessity of you going to the fire station for a meeting. Was a meeting ever held?

A. Well, while they were rounding up the people, and when they came to my house - I'm going back a bit now - they said that we would go for a meeting and then go back, but no meeting was ever held, no.

Q. Now, you've told us that the 53 people weren't free to leave. Can you describe what specific observations you made that led you to the conclusion that you were not free to leave the fire station?

A. Well, the guard. As the guards took turns, the first lot of guards, the first two guards on duty, when they came inside, read out a list of names. Somebody had provided them with a list and they read out the names, and I counted about 53 persons on that list. I was number 53 called out. Then they went out, they locked the door, and one of the guards went one way behind the fire station and the other one stood guard in front of the station.

Q. Was there a toilet in the fire station?

A. No, there wasn't. There was, but you couldn't reach it from the building. You had to go round about. You would have to have gone outside the building, round the corner, into the toilet, that way.

Q. Were the people inside the building permitted to walk freely out to the toilet and use it when they needed it?

A. I saw some people who needed to go to the toilet knock on the door, the guard would open the door, ask them what they wanted, they asked to be excused, and then he would take the person out, lock the door again. ¹¹⁹²⁹ He probably took them to the lavatory around the building. And then after that, they would return. He would unlock the door, the person would come back into the room, the guard would lock the door again and leave. So if somebody asked to be excused, they would allow them to, escort them out.

Q. Did there come a time during the course of that day that you had an argument with one of the guards?

A. Well, I didn't have an argument with the guard. What happened was that I went out perhaps 5.00, half past 5.00. I knocked -- or rather, I recognised one of the guards who was on duty. He was [redacted]

[redacted]

[redacted] something, but he took me out, locked the door, and we stood outside. It was raining all the time. We were standing by the staircase, under the roof. And he asked me what I wanted, and he [as interpreted] said, "Well, let me go home. I don't think there's going to be a meeting of any kind here. So it's getting dark, and can I go home? And I haven't got enough clothes on me. I'm going to be very cold if I stay around like this." He kept me there and tried to convince me not to leave, that somebody would turn up and that we would have a meeting and that we could all go home after the meeting. However, during this conversation --

Q. Sir, before you go further, I want to just establish: You said that this discussion with the guard began somewhere between 5.00 and 5.30; is that correct?

A. Yes. ¹¹⁹³⁰

Q. And that you first entered the fire station at 9.00 in the morning; is that correct?

A. Yes.

Q. The 53 people that you've told us about -- I'm sorry.

A. At 1730 hours, not 5.30 a.m., I mean 1730, that is to say, in the afternoon, towards evening. That was the time.

Q. Yes. Now, during the period of time between when you first went into the fire station and when you had this discussion with the guard between 5.00 and 5.30, was the entire group of 53 people kept together in the fire station?

A. No.

Q. Did there come a time when some of the people were allowed to leave?

A. Yes.

Q. Please describe how many people were allowed to leave.

A. Six of them. Six.

Q. And can you tell us the circumstances under which they were permitted to leave.

A. Somebody came and asked to be taken out. I saw one person. I saw one person coming. I could see this through the window. They were standing outside the station. The guard came back to look for that person, and that person was allowed to leave, and they are alive. All those six people are alive to this day.

Q. Now, I want to draw your attention back to the time of your having this argument with the guard. Did something happen during the course of ¹¹⁹³¹ that discussion?

A. Yes, it did. I said to the guard, "Listen here. I'm cold. If you don't let me go home, I'm going to go home of my own free will, and you can shoot after me." He began to cry, and he said, [redacted]

[redacted] [redacted]. And he said, "Please don't leave while I'm on duty." That meant that he was afraid and that if I left and the other shift turned up, there would be a roll-call. However, in the meantime, a car drew up. I saw the lights. And they parked about 50 metres before the fire station. They stopped in front of a building. Opposite that building was a post office, the old post office. A person got out of the car. They didn't have a cap on their head, just a sort of raincoat or cloak. I didn't know who that was. But that person made a sign. They didn't say anything, but they made a sign to the guard to call him to come up. I waited by the staircase while the guard went to see this man. He went up to the car. They had a discussion of some kind. I don't know what they were saying. The guard returned, and this is what he said: "Go up to the car. The man wants to see you." I did that. I went up to the car and I recognised -- do I have to say the name? Janjeta?

Q. Is there a good reason why -- do you feel you cannot say the name?

A. Well, no. I haven't mentioned any names so far, but there's no reason I shouldn't, no.

Q. So tell us: Who is the person that was at the car.

A. He was also a pupil of mine, but I heard people say later on that ¹¹⁹³² ^{BLANK PAGE} ¹¹⁹³³ he might have been the guard shift leader. I don't know what he was, but that's what other people said.

MR. GROOME: Your Honour, could we go into private session for just a minute?

JUDGE MAY: Yes.

[Private session]

[redacted]

[Open session]

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

MR. GROOME:

Q. Sir, now, this person who was at the car, did he say anything to you regarding your being detained in the fire station?

A. Not really. He didn't say anything about detention. But the person asked me what I had said to the guard. I said I had asked the guard to let me go home and get some warmer clothes, because night was ¹¹⁹³⁴ drawing close and it was cold. And he asked me, "What else did you say to him?" I said, "Well, nothing else." And then he persisted. He said again. "What else did you say to the guard?" Because it seems that the guard told him that I had told the guard that I was going to escape, to go off on my own if he didn't let me go. And I said, "Well, I said to the guard that if he didn't allow me to go home, I would go home anyway." He told me then to get into the car, to get into the car, and that's what I did.

Q. And did he drive you somewhere in the car?

A. I got into the car and he went up to the guard. And when he returned, he got into the car and drove me off along the road leading to Kostajnica.

Q. And did there come a time when you got out of the car?

A. I did not get out of the car. About a kilometre after the fire station, he turned the car around. He went back by the house, and then he went towards my house. He brought me to my house. It was night-time. He stopped the car, and he said the following to me: "Don't you dare stay at home overnight; and secondly, don't you dare ever tell anyone that you were with me if you get caught."

Q. Did you stay at your home that night?

A. No. No.

Q. Where did you go? Without telling us the name of the person who you went to, just give us some general idea about where you went.

A. I went into the hills. That's what we call it: The hills. Because my house is low down by the river. So I went into the hills. I ¹¹⁹³⁵ didn't take the road. I went through the woods. And I reached a house. I reached the house of a person who was on very good terms with me, still is, as a matter of fact, this person is still alive. So since the lights were on in front of his house, I stopped there. And there was a cornfield right by the house, so I got out of the cornfield and I came to the fence.

JUDGE MAY: With respect, we don't need too much detail of this.

MR. GROOME: Yes, Your Honour.

JUDGE MAY: Let's try and get the matter fairly quickly, get to the nub of this matter.

MR. GROOME:

Q. Did there come a time that you tried escape and you were arrested by the local police? Yes or no.

A. Yes.

Q. And were you held at the police station, where you were beaten and interrogated?

A. Yes, but they didn't beat me.

Q. What happened to you?

A. Nothing. They interrogated me. I was there for two days and two nights, in a room. Main accusation was: Why did I escape from the fire station building, that I had some weapons at home, that I was concealing weapons, and there was another major accusation: Why I did not accept the SDS, that party.

Q. And did there come a time when you left the area of Hrvatska Dubica?

A. Yes. ¹¹⁹³⁶

Q. Now, out of the original 53 people, you've described six people as having left while you were present in the fire station; is that correct?

A. Yes.

Q. And did you learn later that three other people were allowed to leave the fire station during the -- after you left the fire station?

A. Yes.

Q. Now --

A. Yes. Yes.

Q. I want to draw your attention to March and April of 1997. Were you present during the exhumation of a number of bodies in Bacin?

A. Yes.

Q. Did that exhumation include some of the people who you were in the fire station with on the 20th of October?

A. Yes.

Q. Sir, did you make a list for the Office of the Prosecutor of the people who were in the fire station who did not leave, were not part of the six or the three people that left, but the remaining -- the people that remained in the fire station? Did you create such a list?

A. Yes.

MR. GROOME: Your Honour, I'd ask that the following exhibit be marked and shown to the witness. There's only one exhibit with this witness, so there's no binder.

THE REGISTRAR: Your Honours, it will be marked Prosecutor's Exhibit 344, under seal, confidential.

MR. GROOME: ¹¹⁹³⁷

Q. Sir, I'd ask you to look at Prosecution Exhibit 344. It's a three-page document. Is that the list that you drafted of the people who remained in the fire station?

A. Yes.

Q. Can you give us some idea of the ethnic make-up of the 43 people on your list who remained in the fire station?

A. Serbs -- two Serbs, and the rest, Croats.

Q. Do you have any personal knowledge as to what happened to the 43 people on this list, some of which were exhumed from Bacin several years later?

A. When I managed to get out of the building on Sunday evening, they remained behind. However, early in the morning they were loaded onto a bus and they took them towards Kostajnica, taking the road. Four or five kilometres away from Dubica, in Bacin, they got them off the bus by the river and they killed all of them. All 43 were exhumed.

Q. Sir, did you personally witness this or is this information you learned from other people?

A. I did not see it personally because I was on the run; I was in the hills. But across the river, in Bosnia, there is a village too, and that village is perhaps up to a kilometre away from the place where they were executed. People from that village said, and still say until the present day, that they heard gunfire and moaning.

MR. GROOME: I have no further questions for this witness. Thank you, sir.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Groome, I just wanted to clarify the ¹¹⁹³⁸ circumstances in which the witness went on the truck.

MR. GROOME: Yes, Your Honour.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Exactly why did he go on the truck? Did he go voluntarily or was he coerced, was he forced?

MR. GROOME:

Q. Sir, you testified earlier that you had offered to walk to the fire station. Did you feel that you were free to walk to the fire station if you insisted?

A. I don't think so.

Q. And can you tell us what you observed or what was said to you that led you to the conclusion that you were not free, that you had to travel with these two men in the truck?

A. They said that we were going to a meeting, that we should not go on foot, and we should make sure that everyone should come, all who had stayed behind, and that this was an important meeting. So I boarded the truck. I said, "All right."

JUDGE ROBINSON: Can the witness say why, as a person of Serb ethnicity, he was treated in that way?

MR. GROOME:

Q. Sir, you've heard Judge Robinson's question. Do you have any idea why you, as a Serb, were treated and detained with the group of people that were predominantly Croat?

A. The main reason is my refusal, towards the end of June and beginning of July, to be president of the SDS party. In my opinion, that's the main reason. They were distributing weapons too. I could not ¹¹⁹³⁹ get weapons because they were suspicious of me.

Secondly, even before that, and then I objected to some kind of behaviour that was wrong, and what was being done was wrong. However, some people didn't like that, especially the leaders, and that's how they behaved to me.

Q. Can you describe more specifically what behaviour you observed that you objected to.

A. Well, against looting, against persecuting people. They did some things arbitrarily, I mean this police of the SAO Krajina, the locals, the way they call themselves, the way they introduce themselves. The people didn't really want to move about at that time. Throughout the summer, everybody was frightened.

Q. The particular -- sorry, Your Honour?

JUDGE ROBINSON: Does he know the other Serbs? Did he know the other Serbs who were brought to the fire station?

MR. GROOME:

Q. Sir, do you know the other Serbs that were in the fire station with you?

JUDGE ROBINSON: And would he be able to say why they were brought there?

A. Yes.

MR. GROOME:

Q. And Judge Robinson is asking: Do you know why some of these other Serbs were selected and their names were on this list and they were detained in the fire station? ¹¹⁹⁴⁰

A. I can't really say. They collected everyone. I can just say one thing, though: One person who never got dressed, or rather, did not have a uniform, that is a person who took over when I refused to be leader of the SDS. Then this younger person was appointed, and that is what he was. And then, when I succeeded, after this entire procedure, to escape to Bosanska Dubica, he saw me there, by a building called Sumarija. I was standing there, he saw me, and he walked up to me, and he talked to me. He said to me, inter alia, that he had given orders to have my name deleted from the list. And I said, "Why only me? Why was this list made at all?" So I came to the conclusion that he had known that the list had been prepared, and all people who were on this list were taken to the fire brigade building.

JUDGE KWON: Mr. Witness, I'd like to ask some questions about the ten people who were released other than yourself. Were they all Serbs, or Croats included?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Both Croats and Muslims and Serbs.

JUDGE KWON: Are you in the position to tell us as to the reason why they were released?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I can't say. Somebody came to pick them up. Who it was, I don't know. And it wasn't all at once; it happened during the course of the day. I can give an example, an example that I saw.

A person came, a Serb who was married to a Croat woman. His wife had a brother. He had a bit of a hump. He was a cleaner, a street cleaner, in Bosanska Dubica. He took that wife's brother out. He's alive ¹¹⁹⁴¹ ^{BLANK PAGE} ¹¹⁹⁴² until the present day. And so on and so forth. A young man also came and took out a waitress. She was a waitress in a restaurant. I saw that too. I didn't see the rest.

JUDGE KWON: Thank you.

MR. GROOME:

Q. Sir, on Prosecution Exhibit 344, the list of the 43 people that were ultimately killed, how many names on that list, or how many people on that list were something other than Croat? And please feel free to look at the exhibit in front of you.

JUDGE KWON: If my memory is correct, he said there were two Serbs among 43 people.

Is it correct?

MR. GROOME:

Q. If you speak the answer.

A. Yes. Yes. Yes. Here it is. Two.

MR. GROOME: Thank you. I have nothing further.

[Trial Chamber confers]

JUDGE MAY: Cross-examination. I'm sorry.

[Trial Chamber confers]

JUDGE MAY: Cross-examination on Monday morning. We'll not start now.

Mr. Milosevic, you'll have an hour to cross-examine, the same as you had for the other crime-base witnesses in the other part of the trial, and slightly more than the Prosecution had. But that's on Monday morning.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. May -- ¹¹⁹⁴³

JUDGE MAY: What is it, Mr. Milosevic?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Of course I am going to cross-examine this witness too, but doesn't it seem quite absurd to you to have such witnesses brought here to testify in connection with the indictment brought against me? What do I have to do with this, and what does Serbia have to do with all the events that this witness described here? You could have brought anybody from the street --

JUDGE MAY: We'll hear you in argument in due course, but there's no need to be offensive about the witness at all. If you agree with the statement and you don't want the witness to be called, you can always do so. You can always simply agree that the statement be part of the evidence, and that will save a great deal of time for everybody. However, if you wish to cross-examine, then of course in certain circumstances you may do so. There is, as you know, a rule which allows us to admit a statement without cross-examination. But there's no call to be offensive about the witness.

Witness C-1141, as you're called, would you be back, please, on Monday morning. I think the time is half past 9.00. I'm told it is. So would you be back then. Could you remember, during this adjournment, not to speak to anybody about your evidence until it's over, and that does include the members of the Prosecution team.

No, Mr. Milosevic. We're going to adjourn now. Monday morning.

--- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 1.37 p.m. to be reconvened on Monday,, the 21st day of

October 2002, at 9.30 a.m.