³⁶⁸²⁶

Tuesday, 1 March 2005

[Open session]

[The witness entered court]

[The accused entered court]

--- Upon commencing at 9.07 a.m.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, yes. Continue your examination-in-chief.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you, Mr. Robinson.

WITNESS: DOBRE ALEKSOVSKI [Resumed]

[Witness answered through interpreter] Examined by Mr. Milosevic: [Continued]

Q. [Interpretation] Dr. Aleksovski, you have two tabs in front of you with different reports. I hope that you have it.

A. Yes.

Q. Please be so kind and explain to us the contents of tab 1 and also the contents for document under tab 2.

A. These two tabs, 1 and 2, are two different documents. Tab 1 deals with patients who are citizens of the Republic of Macedonia, whereas the other one deals with refugees only. The first logbook or the first register has names of both Macedonians and the refugees.

Q. Doctor, please tell us, how was this information collected? How was this data entered into it? Or to be more precise, was the data entered into the documents in the same order as the calls were received by your service?

A. Mr. President, Your Honour Judge Robinson, in order to make things ³⁶⁸²⁷ clear, I will tell you exactly how we receive calls and what procedure follows after we receive calls and how everything is registered. Once we receive a telephone call -- or, rather, the telephone calls are answered by two physicians who take these calls. They enter the first and last name of the patient, if they're provided, also the location of the injured person, and also the time when the call was received. This data is then turned over to the dispatchers, which are normally nurses or medical technicians, and they in turn send it to the medical team which is supposed to respond to the call. The time when this data was turned over to the medical team is also entered, registered, as well as the time when the team set out to respond to the call. So the initial call is taken by the physicians and then further processing is done by nurses. So this is all entered in the first part of this register or logbook, and the second part is filled by the doctor who actually conducts the examination. The doctor registers in what position the patient was found, whether it was in the street or the patient perhaps collapsed in a room or in a hallway, also what problems the patient is complaining of, whether the patient is conscious, whether there's any bleeding and so on, and then they record the blood pressure, pupils, the status of the pupils. This is all registered or entered by the doctor, and then the doctor enters the diagnosis and the therapy, which is then administered by the nurse or the technician. And then this is sent to the medical service, and all of that is entered into this logbook or the register. And this is the procedure that follows every call that we receive.

Q. All right. So this is the original procedure registered in this ³⁶⁸²⁸ logbook or register, and you just described the chronology to us. Doctor, can you confirm that all data entered into this document is authentic and corresponds to the actual situation regarding a patient?

A. That's right. These documents are considered to be long-term documents. This is how they are defined by the law. And all of this information has to be accurate, because frequently we have judicial proceedings instituted regarding this information, and in my 30 years of experience, I never encountered a problem. This data reflects the situation, the actual situation on the ground.

Q. Doctor, please tell us, do you have the original document, this first one, which is actually the register or the logbook of Kosovo refugees?

A. Yes, I do. I have it here. This is the register or the logbook, the original one. You can see that it says here in the beginning "Refugee Logbook, refugees from Kosovo." And then when you open it up, on page 1 you see that entry number 1 comes first and that the last one is 1376.

With your leave, I will explain why we have two different documents. While we were at the border while the refugees were concentrated there at the border, we responded to calls from our patients and from refugees. Normally the medical team and the ambulance cannot leave the compound without receiving a call. So the call has to come first and then the team responds to the call. We worked in parallel, providing assistance both to our citizens and to refugees. Yesterday I was not given an opportunity to explain this. ³⁶⁸²⁹ This is how it came about that we have two different documents, for our citizens and for refugees, and I wanted to ask the Court to protect these names. This is a court, and we should ensure that the names of the people are not abused and the cases of refugees from Kosovo are given in such a way as to protect the names. We have the numbers and some other information, and I can leave a copy of this with you providing that you can protect the identity, the names of these people, because they are not citizens of my country.

The other document contains diagnoses and the names of the patients. If you wish these copies to remain with you, then once again I would need your guarantee that this information will only be used for the purposes of these proceedings.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson, in view of the comment given by Mr. Nice that this document contains confidential medical information involving several thousands of people and that it should not be disclosed in public, let me just say that I have no intention of reading out any specific names. I suggest that these logbooks be put under seal because they contain names of patients and their medical conditions, and in fact their names, their identities are not relevant for what we are dealing with here. What is relevant is that initially, while the procedure was not quite regulated, the information concerning refugees was also entered into the general logbook or register, and only several days later a separate logbook was established for Kosovo refugees. The original logbook is with the doctor. If you wish, you can examine it. And the photocopy was made of that original document. ³⁶⁸³⁰

JUDGE KWON: Mr. Milosevic, can you explain to us why we need this book at all?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Yes, I will explain. The reason is very simple. I have no reason to conceal my true intentions. All of the calls received for several hundred thousand refugees who needed medical treatment were received, and you can see how many of them actually received medical treatment. And during the testimony of Dr. Aleksovski, we will establish what kind of assistance precisely they needed.

You heard the testimony of Dr. Andric here yesterday about how these people were treated, the refugees, and here it has been claimed that this whole population of refugees was threatened, was fired at, that their lives were at risk. However, these documents reflect the exact condition of their health, and I think that this is very relevant, and it shows exactly what was the medical status of these people who crossed the border and what happened to them afterwards.

JUDGE ROBINSON: That is one of the allegations in the indictment, that the refugees were not treated properly. So this evidence is to deal with that allegation. I'm just asking you to confirm that, Mr. Milosevic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Of course, Mr. Robinson, of course. If masses of people are leaving, if they're being shot at, then I assume some of those people would have to be wounded and injured. And if masses of people were beaten up, then this would have been reflected in the documents of the register of the emergency service of Macedonia where nothing was entered and recorded selectively but all the calls were ³⁶⁸³¹ recorded and entered into the register as they were received.

JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Milosevic, after this rather lengthy introduction, I am afraid I am completely confused about what's in each of these tabs. The doctor has at different times ascribed to tab 1 Macedonian nationals and refugees. Now, can you clarify for me just in very general terms what these two tabs contain and what the difference between the two of them is.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Yes. I'll explain to you briefly. There's just been a misunderstanding. Tab 2 is the general register, tab 2. That is the regular register kept by the emergency service. And at the beginning, from the 24th of March onwards, the emergency service had not yet opened a separate protocol or register for the Albanian refugees but introduced the emergency calls into its regular register, and it continued working as it had already done and recorded those calls into its register. So that's the register which has the entries of emergency calls from Macedonian citizens on a daily, regular basis. But in that document, too, we have the individual calls or, rather, the cases of the refugees. Several days later, the emergency service decided to organise itself better and opened a separate register for the Albanian refugees themselves, and that is in fact tab 1, and it is the book or the document shown a moment ago by the doctor. It is in hardcover copy if you were able to see if you want to, and the photocopy of which was placed into tab 1. So in the first stage of this wave of refugees, they didn't make any difference or differentiate between patients. That is to say they ³⁶⁸³² didn't enter their names in different books. But after a certain time, on the 25th or 26th, that is five or six days later, they opened a separate register for the Albanian refugees. So tab 1 contains only the Albanian refugees. That's in tab 1, refugees alone.

JUDGE BONOMY: I think I understand that, but there's further confusion caused by the reference to dates, because tab 2 relates to the period from the 1st of April to the 25th of April, and tab 1 relates to the period from the 7th of April until the 24th of April. Now, I assume from all of that that what you're saying is that tab 2 is relevant to refugees between the 1st and the 6th of April and that from the 6th of April onwards the refugees are all contained in tab 1.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Bonomy, all the refugees which needed medical care are recorded in these tabs. Just a certain number were entered into the general register as they came in, and another was opened separately for the refugees. But they're all there, because nobody else gave medical aid except the institute headed by Dr. Aleksovski, the emergency service institute.

JUDGE ROBINSON: You can now put questions to the witness about these documents.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Dr. Aleksovski, I apologise to you because we got the tabs mixed up. Tab number 2 should have been tab 1, and tab 1 should have been tab 2, but we'll find our way quite easily around that. So tab 2 is the emergency service register, and it says at the top the service for emergency medical treatment, and that document contains entries - we're ³⁶⁸³³ looking at tab 2 now - which includes the Macedonian citizens as well. So tab 2 includes both population groups, all the patients, Macedonian citizens and Albanian refugees, with their particulars. Can you see that?

A. Yes.

Q. Now, since in tab 2 we have many Macedonian calls, calls from Macedonian citizens which have nothing to do with the refugees from Kosovo, can you tell us, since you were able to deal with all the refugees entered here and then opened a separate book, but as far as I can see myself, and I'd like to ask you for your confirmation or denial, on the 25th of March, 1999, for example, two calls were recorded. They were 5563 and 5564. So they were the first calls came in on the 25th of March; is that correct?

A. Yes, that is correct.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Where do we find that, Mr. Milosevic, in the documents? Is this tab 2?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] It should be in tab 2, but may I ask the doctor to help us out.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] It seems that the copy, the pages of the copies have been mixed up. It's all there, but when the photocopy was compiled, some of the pages got mixed up.

JUDGE ROBINSON: We are looking for numbers -- is it 5563 and 5564?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. Yes.

JUDGE KWON: And it seems to me the first date we've got is 31st of March. ³⁶⁸³⁴

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] What numbers are we looking for, please?

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Well, the first people that came in on the 25th of March, 55653 and 55654, according to what I have here as taken from the register, the first calls that came in on that day.

A. They were two registers, and when they were put together, some of the pages seemed to have got mixed up. We should have it all here.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, this is not satisfactory. It's not satisfactory at all because we're losing time. The witness can't find it. We can't find it. I don't know whether the Prosecutor has found it.

MR. NICE: I haven't found it. Indeed I can only see digits that are either three-digit numbers or six-digit numbers if you add three numbers before, so I'm completely confused. The document was the document we first received yesterday. While I'm on my feet, I have other grounds for objecting to the production of it to which I'll turn later, but I'm still completely confused about what the real relevance of this document is beyond what the witness may be able to say without reference to the document.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] May I be allowed to say something? I'll find the numbers, but this is authentic, original. I say that with full responsibility. But I'd like to ask the photocopy service to send me the photocopies once again, because when the document was put together, the pages seem to have got mixed up. But I guarantee -- I remember the numbers, actually, myself. I remember the numbers very well, so I ³⁶⁸³⁵ guarantee that they are authentic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Dr. Aleksovski, would you just pay attention to what I'm saying to Mr. Robinson now.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Since in this tab there are many Macedonian patients and a number of Albanian refugees, Dr. Aleksovski has looked through the register very carefully and set aside all the Albanian calls. He extracted the Albanian calls that came in at that time in a separate piece of paper. So we have here -- it says "Intervention by the emergency service during the refugee crisis and refugees coming in from Kosovo to the Republic of Macedonia," and this is what it says, what the title is, in the Macedonian language. So it is assistance during the refugee crisis, refugees coming in from Kosovo to the Republic of Macedonia. So he has extracted all the cases, set them aside and listed them in the cases of the Macedonian refugees. And if you wish to check and see whether this is correct, you will be able to do so because there's nothing on this separate list, separate piece of paper than exists in the register itself. You have the original pages as they were recorded in handwriting, but to make our work more efficient, we extracted or, rather, Dr. Aleksovski has taken out all the names from the general register, that is the one that contains Macedonian citizens and Albanians too, and I now suggest that we allow the doctor to look at the list of Albanian refugees extracted from the general register. ^{36836 BLANK PAGE 36837}

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I have the numbers here, and they are 55653 of the 25th of March, and 55654. And I remember this well, those cases well. The border service just informed us that a group of Albanian refugees had come in from Kosovo. We went to the spot, but there was nothing to do. We didn't have to intervene.

And then on the 23rd [as interpreted] we also received two calls from the border service. With one of them we didn't need to intervene or give any medical assistance, but with the other person there was a spontaneous delivery. A woman had given birth. So that is recorded under those two dates.

JUDGE ROBINSON: The document you're now looking at is one that you prepared on the basis of extractions from tabs -- from tab 2?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That's correct. They are extracts, excerpts from the tabs. In the original but minus the names. I said that I wished to protect the identity of the Albanian refugees by not writing out their names.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. The first two were Albanians, 5563 and 5564, those that you've just referred to?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, yes. Yes.

JUDGE ROBINSON: What is it that you need to know about these now? Are you trying to show that they were -- that they received treatment, they received medical care? They didn't need any medical care?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] First of all, Mr. Robinson, you can see here that the first calls that came in for medical assistance, that they arrived on the 25th of March. That's the first point. And that is ³⁶⁸³⁸ what the doctor extracted from the register that he has.

JUDGE BONOMY: The witness has just directed attention to refugees arriving on the 23rd of April -- 23rd of March. He just mentioned that.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] The 25th. The 25th of March.

JUDGE BONOMY: Well, it was translated and is in the transcript as the 23rd.

THE INTERPRETER: The interpreter heard the 23rd.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] On the 25th of March, 1999, number 55653 and 55654.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] There were two calls on the 25th of March, and in both cases, according to what it says in the register and according to the doctor's knowledge, no medical aid was administered because there was no need. The calls came in, as often happens, without any proper grounds.

And then the next one was on the 29th of March.

THE INTERPRETER: Interpreter's correction: It wasn't the 23rd. It was the 29th of March that the witness said.

[Trial Chamber confers]

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, can you direct us to the paragraph in the indictment to which this evidence relates?

MR. NICE: While he's doing that, you may want to look at paragraph 59, which is the best that I've been able to find. 59 doesn't relate to this evidence at all, but it may be what he has in mind.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson, the entire Kosovo indictment deals with, as it says, that the Serb forces of the army of ³⁶⁸³⁹ Yugoslavia and the police violently expelled, forcibly expelled Albanians from Kosovo, that they shot at them, that they beat them up, et cetera, et cetera. Therefore, it is assumed that that portion of the population that might have been injured, that is those people who asked for medical assistance, must have been or would have to have left some traces and have traces on them of either gunshot wounds or beatings. So we're dealing with this assertion that there was violence committed against Albanian citizens for them to be expelled from Kosovo.

So of those 100.000, not many called in for medical assistance, just those who needed it, who were ill in any way, and now we can see what they were suffering from, what their illnesses were or anything else. So this is important testimony, because if among those 100.000, you take a look at the register and you don't have anybody there who was injured or wounded through firearms or knives or anything, and if we don't have any people who were beaten up, then that shows us that the assertion is incorrect; that they were expelled under force of arms, violence, and so on and that that was the reason that they had to leave Kosovo. So it's a very important question, an important issue. If we look at paragraph 59, it says in addition thousands of Kosovo Albanians who fled their homes and were thereby forcibly transferred as a result of the conduct of the forces of the FRY and Serbia and the deliberate climate of terror that pervaded the territory, et cetera, et cetera. There you have it.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] And then it goes on to say -- it ³⁶⁸⁴⁰ says at the end of paragraph 59, "Others eventually crossed over one of the Kosovo borders into Albania, Macedonia --" so we're talking about Macedonia here -- "or they crossed the provincial boundary between Kosovo and Serbia." That's another matter altogether now. So here it says Macedonia.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, this is what I think you should do: Since the doctor went periodically to these sites, just adduce from him evidence as to the condition in which he found the refugees, whether Albanians or Macedonians. I mean, how frequently he went there, what condition he found them in, and you'll get the kind of evidence. And then that evidence, you say, will be substantiated by these two documents. Perhaps one or two references to the documents would be sufficient. But get the evidence in a general way from him first as to what work he did with refugees, how frequently, over what period, and in what condition he found them to substantiate the argument you're making, and then after that we can have a look at the two tabs.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Very well, Mr. Robinson. Any sequence is good for me.

I would just like to remind the witness of one thing. I already asked him how often he went to the border, and he replied it was at least three times a day. At least three times a day he travelled to the border as head of the emergency service.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Doctor, how often did you personally go to the border?

A. I went to the border personally at least three times every day, ³⁶⁸⁴¹ sometimes more often. Why? First of all, I went always at 8.00 a.m. I will explain why. In addition to the administrator, we have the head of shift who is responsible for the interval from receiving the calls until dealing with the calls, and upon receiving the report, he comes to see me --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Just tell us now what happened when you went to the refugee sites, the camps. What condition did you find the refugees in, and what did you have to do in your capacity as a doctor, if anything?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. At the time, I was working too. First of all, I went out to the field at 8.00 a.m. to see if our tent was in place and well equipped, if our teams were well equipped, and then I would go into the tent and carry out examinations. I would have with me the reports and carry out examinations of patients. And from what I could see, the general picture presented by the patients was no different than on a regular day in town. I can tell you what kind of conditions I found in those patients.

It was cold and rainy weather, so the majority of cases, the majority of complaints had to do with the respiratory system; sore throats, bronchitis, and such complaints. And there were pregnant women whom we took care of in cooperation with the maternity ward in Tetovo. They would be transported to the maternity ward. All pregnant women, that is regardless of whether they were refugees or not, the procedure was the same.

All those who needed to be hospitalised, who had more serious injuries or were in a more serious condition were transported by the ³⁶⁸⁴² ambulance, and then we would register these trips by the ambulance in the logbook. So I know exactly how many trips of the ambulance were made. Other interventions of a simpler nature, such as administering injections, et cetera, that could be made on the spot were also registered.

Those who needed therapy administered over a number of days would continue to receive it in refugee camps. If you look at --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Doctor, there was a reference in your testimony just now to some of them being injured. What kind of injuries did they have?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, I understand. There were some wounded people, not many. I think nine, nine injuries. Yes. There were fractures and wounds in the total number of 14, including fractures, injuries, and wounds. We paid special attention to such cases, because every injury is treated seriously. There were lacerations on fingers; we had one person who had a gunshot wound in the stomach, but that's the condition the man arrived in, and he later had surgery. Since his wound was serious, we transported him to the hospital.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Did you ascertain how the gunshot wound was sustained? How was it inflicted?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] We were not able to establish that. All we knew was that it was a serious wound, but that's the condition that he arrived in from Kosovo. He had already had one surgery in Kosovo, and he received another surgery in Macedonia.

He, when he arrived, was rather aggressive. He was armed with a ³⁶⁸⁴³ pistol, and he was difficult to deal with.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Doctor, the person who had a gunshot wound, before arriving in Macedonia, if I understood you correctly, he already had one surgery.

A. Yes. It was an old wound, but it needed bandaging and further treatment, and that's why we hospitalised him.

Q. Let's clarify this so we can move on. Among those thousands of cases, did you have another gunshot wound?

A. No, apart from this one case I told you about, because if that wound had been fresh, as we call it, it would still be bleeding, and of all the medical supplies we had, the least expenditure was of bandages, whereas bandages would have been the most necessary in dealing with gunshot wounds.

We had hundreds of people presenting more trivial problems, such as dislocations of joints, et cetera.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Do I understand you to say, then, that of the thousands of refugees, just a very small number had injuries?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I gave you the exact number; 14.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Fourteen, yes. Okay. Just -- just another question. You told us of one with a gunshot wound. Were you able to ascertain how the other injuries, the other 13, were sustained? Tell us what the injuries were and how they were sustained.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] There were fractures, but not open fractures. There were fractures that we knew about from the stories of patients. A patient would tell us that he had a fracture, and he ³⁶⁸⁴⁴ presented only bruises, and we would mark in our papers "suspected fracture." So we would send him to an x-ray, which could not be done in the field, of course. We would send him to the x-ray machine back in town.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Did you find out how he sustained that fracture? Remember what Mr. Milosevic is trying to show. Mr. Milosevic is saying that -- can you answer the question? Did you get any information from that person as to how the fracture was sustained?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] My colleagues made notes, but I also talked to people. Some told me that they were running and the ground was slippery and they fell and suffered a dislocation of the ankle or their ankle twisted. So these cases were qualified as suspected fracture that needed further examination at the hospital.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic. Yes.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Doctor, you said a moment ago among those 14 injuries there was a laceration of the finger, a simple cut.

A. Well, that's a trivial injury that any housewife can sustain. People in the refugee camp opened tin cans. It's something that can happen to everyone.

I think it's a negligible number of very mundane injuries that you see every day.

Q. In any case, you had only one case of a patient presenting a gunshot wound, an old one, who had been already operated on, and that one patient was armed. ³⁶⁸⁴⁵

A. Yes. The medical team summoned me because he was very insolent towards the medical team.

MR. NICE: I may have missed it. Had the witness volunteered that the patient was armed?

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. Yes, he did. Move on, Mr. Milosevic. Let us try to proceed quickly.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Certainly.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Dr. Aleksovski, whose calls did you respond to mainly in the first days when you went out to the border?

A. It was the border police who called us mainly, but also individuals.

Q. And as you said, you spent time at border crossings on a daily basis during that period. Did Albanians from Kosovo in that initial period after the 24th of March until the first days of April arrive in smaller groups or larger groups or one by one? What did it look like?

A. Judging by the records and from what I learned from my own medical teams, those were smaller groups and there were few interventions in those days, up until the 1st of April, 1999. The groups were small, the calls were few, and we responded to them. Interventions were rarely needed. And on the 30th, I received an order from the Ministry for Health to reinforce medical security, medical care at the border crossing of Gornje Blace and Donje Blace, which is also a minor, unofficial border crossing, but I complied. And three medical teams were available at those border crossings day and night. ³⁶⁸⁴⁶

Q. That's what I wanted to establish. You had round the clock medical service at those border crossings from the 1st of April?

A. Correct, at any time of the day or night.

Q. Just to make things quite clear, on the Yugoslav side, opposite that Donja Blace place, is Djeneral Jankovic settlement?

A. Right.

Q. At the time -- or rather, I'll let you specify the time -- the Albanian refugees had not yet been accommodated in camps?

A. Correct. They were sitting at the border crossing, surrounded by the border police or, rather, I think there was even a fence around them. They were unable to go to town. And it was on the 5th or 6th of April that I received a call from my head of shift who said the border police were refusing to guard our tent, and I said, "How come?" And he replied that they established a camp and that they are moving people to the camp. And we continued providing medical assistance.

Q. When you say the police blocked the refugees, what do you mean?

A. Well, the police had to block their passage. You couldn't just let them rush into Macedonia. You had to keep them at the border crossing until the refugee camp is established and set up.

Q. All right. That's the time when Stenkovac 1 and Stenkovac 2 were set up. Those were refugee camps.

A. Correct. Stenkovac 2 was six and a half kilometres away from Skopje and Stenkovac 1 was in the near vicinity.

Q. All right. According to the records of your service, how many Albanians were examined at border crossings before being placed into ^{36847 BLANK PAGE 36848} camps?

A. I think I can give you the exact figure. It's 40.

Q. Was everybody examined, everybody that asked your service to cater to them?

A. Exactly, including some who would not be examined under normal conditions because their cases were not urgent, did not qualify for emergency assistance, but even those people we accepted and we catered to all of them unselectively.

Q. So you accepted even cases which were not exactly suited for emergency assistance, such as sore throat, cold, whatever?

A. Everybody received medication. At first we used to administer entire packages, and later when we found packages thrown and discarded without being used to the full, we started issuing portions.

Q. Very well, Doctor. Now, let me ask you this: Did you personally hear, because you yourself went to the border at least three times a day, as you have told us, you and your colleagues did, now did you hear what reasons for leaving Kosovo and going to Macedonia were given by these Albanians whom you examined and whom you treated in those first days?

A. I mostly heard this from my colleagues. And there is just one case, which I think was on the 2nd of April, when somebody entered our tent and we were there, and I heard the nurse ask the persons, "Why did you come here?" You know, "You came here with a small child." And the person answered, "Well --" the person spoke in broken Macedonian and started saying, "The bombs are falling," and so on. And I was an eyewitness. I was present there. So that was one case that I know of ³⁶⁸⁴⁹ personally and the rest I heard from my colleagues, people explaining that they had come because the bombs were falling. And this is one case that I heard of personally from this woman.

MR. NICE: [Previous translation continues]... colleagues. Hearsay of this kind is probably now in any event --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Could you start again, Mr. Nice?

MR. NICE: What's being said by the colleagues should be excluded. I'm not even sure what's said directly to this witness is admissible in light of the decisions made yesterday, but certainly what the colleagues are going to say is hardly going to assist this Chamber.

JUDGE BONOMY: What -- what decisions are you referring to?

MR. NICE: Well, yesterday when we were looking at the position with the previous witness, and I observed that Mr. Kay's argument about evidence of this kind best coming from the witnesses, the individuals themselves, the argument that the Chamber accepted in its ruling. Although I'm not going to object to the odd single reference of the kind that the witness is given that he heard himself --

JUDGE ROBINSON: But isn't this hearsay?

MR. NICE: Yes.

JUDGE ROBINSON: But we take hearsay.

MR. NICE: I know, but in relation to these sorts of matters, as Mr. Kay said yesterday, if it's to be relied on by the Prosecutor, it should come in the usual form and be subject to examination in the courtroom.

These issues of reasons for leaving Kosovo are an important part ³⁶⁸⁵⁰ of the Prosecution's case. We've called our witnesses on this topic before the Chamber.

JUDGE ROBINSON: These are reasons that would have been given to this witness. That's firsthand hearsay.

MR. NICE: Not available for me to cross-examine. The same problem we had yesterday.

As I said, I'm not going to object if it's just the one reference made to this witness, but if it goes beyond that and we start having records of other people and I don't know whatever else, I can't cross-examine on it, and I won't.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Please, may I say -- may I say something, Mr. President?

JUDGE ROBINSON: No. Just a second. We'll confer.

MR. KAY: Did you want to hear from me on the issue?

[Trial Chamber confers]

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. You can answer the question, yes.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I, as the chief, did not really go and talk to refugees or people. I received reports, official reports from my colleagues on a daily basis, and they informed me about everything that was going on because I was official head of service. I would receive it from individual doctors and from the chief head of shift. This is what the procedure was.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. All right. So the information about the reasons for Kosovo Albanians leaving or fleeing Kosovo, you received this information in your ³⁶⁸⁵¹ capacity as the chief of emergency service. You received it from doctors and other medical staff who worked with these people on a daily basis; is that right?

A. Yes. That's what I said.

JUDGE ROBINSON: He has already said that, yes.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Based on what you know for a fact, did these people have any money on them, and did they have any documents? When I say "these people" and "they," I'm referring to refugees.

A. That was a bit of a problem for our service. Initially we wanted to have our data complete as to their particulars and so on, but they would frequently tell us, "No, we don't have documents on us." And when it came to patients that needed to go to the hospital, such as pregnant women or people with fractures, we insisted that they needed to have an ID because they had entered the Republic of Macedonia, and they needed to have some sort of an ID. After some period of time they would normally find some ID. Some people would bring a medical health card, some people would bring a passport for an ID, but it was only done after our firm insistence, and later on we stopped requiring that because we couldn't really insist on this firmly.

Q. So you said that initially when you asked for them to produce an ID, they would say that they didn't have it, and that if you insisted, then they would come up with it.

A. Yes, that's right. We insisted on them producing some sort of an ID in order to receive further medical treatment, and they would normally ³⁶⁸⁵² provide one.

Q. All right. I asked you also whether they had any money.

A. Initially there was no need for us to ask for any money. However, later on, when they moved to camps, I personally saw them give through the fence money to people, asking them to buy something in town for them, such as cigarettes or bread or something like that. Later on, small kiosks were set up where they were able to buy things, and based on that we concluded that they did have money.

Q. All right. Please try to be as descriptive as you can because we want to gain a good impression, have a good picture of what the situation was. How were they dressed? Did they have proper clothes for that season? How did they look?

A. As I told you, I went there several times. I didn't see anybody wearing just a shirt. Everybody had proper clothes on them. The weather was quite rainy and fairly cold, and they improvised tents themselves. They had large nylons with them. Some people even had a tent, and they set it up. Right there at the border crossing they set up an improvised camp with the things they had brought with them. They were properly clothed, they had good clothes.

Q. All right. Let us set aside tents and camps. Tell me, how were these people dressed?

A. They were dressed properly, you know, like people who prepare when they leave their house. They take proper clothing and everything else they might need when leaving house.

Q. Based on their clothing, would you be able to distinguish between ³⁶⁸⁵³ them and Macedonian citizens that you would come across in those days?

A. Well, one could perhaps distinguish because their clothing is not exactly the same as the clothing that we normally wear, but I think that they were properly clothed for that season, yes.

Q. All right. You mentioned that there was one patient who had a wound and was armed, had a pistol. So let us set aside that person. I'm not asking you about that person, I'm asking you something else. Tell me, please, whether among them there were armed people or not.

A. Yes.

Q. So they had firearms.

A. Yes.

Q. When I say "armed," I'm referring to firearms.

A. Yes.

Q. Can you tell us something more about that; what kind of firearms they had, what happened with their firearms?

A. It is very difficult for me to say this, but I can tell you specifically that our team left our tent and went to this improvised camp at the border, and our team was attacked by a group of refugees. One of them physically attacked and also verbally. And I know the names of all of our staff members who were in the team. So our people were attacked. They were shoved and pushed around. And there was one person who had a pistol among the refugees. This footage was shown on Macedonian television, and all Macedonians are well aware of this. It was very difficult for me, that situation, because the medical team came to me. Women were crying. And as time went by, they became -- ³⁶⁸⁵⁴ the refugees became even more aggressive towards us and started treating us differently, and our teams were reluctant to go and treat them.

Q. All right. You said that Macedonian TV reported on this. Were you able to see some foreign TV crews at the border crossings at that time or were there just Macedonian TV crews present?

A. There was one Macedonian TV crew and many foreign ones. They would normally park their vehicles in front of our tent and in front of our vehicles.

Q. All right. So if these foreign international crews were parked in front of your tent and in front your vehicles, were you able to see whether they had received any information when a group was about to show up? Did you see anything specific regarding that?

A. Almost all TV crews were housed in a hotel. Perhaps I should not mention the name of the hotel, but this is the hotel that we would normally pass by when going to the border crossing. When going by the hotel, we would normally observe an activity there. And when arriving at the border, we would see that all of them were already present there, putting up their tripods and preparing to film. And after perhaps ten or 15 minutes only, a large group of refugees would come by. Therefore, that means that they were informed, they knew about the fact that a group of refugees would arrive and were ready to film.

Q. All right. Just to be more clear, it was obvious that these TV crews were preparing to film something even when there was no activity, and then after some ten or 15 minutes a group of refugees would come and ³⁶⁸⁵⁵ they would film it.

A. Yes, that's right. We were able to observe this because TV crews were right there in front of us, and we would see them several times, on numerous occasions, how they were preparing to film, and then after some ten or 15 minutes, a large group would arrive, which meant that they had prior information.

Q. So based on what you were able to see, they received prior information about a group arriving, and they would go out there to prepare to film that.

A. Yes. They certainly knew in advance.

Q. All right. You said that initially in those first days they said that they were fleeing from bombs. Did they start later on saying that they were fleeing because they had been expelled or attacked by the Serb army or police? When did they start giving those reasons?

A. After the 1st of April, 1999 --

MR. NICE: [Previous translation continues] ... conceivable way.

JUDGE ROBINSON: That's very leading.

MR. NICE: And I repeat that there's a complete difference between the position that I'm facing with this witness and even the position I faced with the previous witness where, as will be known, there were some people who I could identify by name and locate. It's not going to happen here.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, you must reformulate that question.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Very well. ³⁶⁸⁵⁶

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Dr. Aleksovski, when I asked you just now to tell us about the reasons given by Albanian refugees for fleeing Kosovo, you told me that they said that it was because of the bombs. Later on, did they quote some other reasons other than bombs for fleeing Kosovo?

A. Yes, that's right. I did say about the bombs and the reason that they gave.

After the 1st of April, when the camps Stenkovac 1 and Stenkovac 2 were set up, almost all of them said that they were forcibly expelled from Kosovo by police and the army who shot at them, beat them, and so on. I wasn't present there, but based on what we saw --

Q. All right. So this is what they said after the 1st of April, that they fled because they were fired at and beaten. Now, tell us this: Did you see any traces on them that would confirm or corroborate these stories about physical abuse and mistreatment?

A. No. That was not our impression. As I told you, there were no fresh wounds nor bruises, and we provided the medical treatment they required, but we did not -- that was not our impression.

JUDGE ROBINSON: What was the time period between the time when they first gave the reasons for leaving as fleeing from the bombs and the 1st of April when they gave another reason?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I think I've already mentioned that. Up until the 1st of April, these first groups that arrived and were at the border, I know of one case personally, and the official reports given to ³⁶⁸⁵⁷ me by my doctors listed them as saying that they were fleeing because of the bombs that were falling. After the 1st, after they were housed in Stenkovac 1 and Stenkovac 2 camps, all of them said that they had been expelled by the police and the army and that they were firing at then. I was not present there. However, based on what we saw, that wasn't our impression that that was indeed the case.

JUDGE ROBINSON: No. What isn't clear to me, are these the same refugees who had previously said that they fled because of the bombs or are you talking about a fresh set of refugees, a new set?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Ah. Well, when you have so many people, masses of people, you can't really see whether it was the same person saying it or someone else. It might have been the same, it might not. We weren't able to establish that, given the mass of people there. We just talked to the people who came into our tent to ask for our medical assistance. We didn't go around interviewing people about that kind of thing. We just talked to them as doctor and patient, the people who came to us for medical assistance, who came to our tent for help.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. All right, Doctor, let me be more precise and ask you this way: Did you notice on the Albanians any traces of physical abuse? For example, were their clothes torn or bruises from the fact that they had been beaten up or certain injuries that could be caused by that kind of thing? All right. You talked about the wounds. You said there were no wounds caused by firearms, but did you notice any traces of physical abuse, such as torn garments or bruises as a result of beating or anything ^{36858 BLANK PAGE 36859} like that?

A. I said that I personally did not see any bruises from batons or truncheons or anything like that. And based on the reports, official reports coming in from my colleagues, those things weren't noted. I didn't see anybody with their clothes torn or anything like that. So that's why I said that that was not the impression I gained.

Q. All right. Let me ask you a general question. You were in those camps yourself, Stenkovac 1 and 2.

A. Yes.

Q. The people there, their general appearance and their general conduct, the clothes they were wearing and everything else, did they appear to you to be people who were in trouble? I mean -- let me explain what I mean.

For example, you were there during the earthquake in Skopje when there were masses of people who were in very dire circumstances, in trouble. So if you compare that scene, the earthquake scene in Macedonia a long time ago, did these people look like people in a difficult situation? What did they look like? What did they appear to you to be like? What was their situation?

A. Unfortunately, I'm getting on now in years, and unfortunately I have had occasion to be in the midst of terrible tragedies. In '62 there was the great flood in Skopje. In '63 we experienced the great earthquake in Skopje. So in both cases I was an active participant. I was a young man, a young medical worker at the time, a doctor. And then we also had a group of refugees who came in from Bosnia at one time, and we have to the ³⁶⁸⁶⁰ very -- to the present day Roma people coming in from Kosovo to Macedonia, and we have Macedonian refugees, refugees in their own country. And we have to deal with people like that on a daily basis, every day, even now. So I can differentiate and distinguish between what people look like. Now, my impressions are these: When somebody is in trouble, in a difficult situation, they have no clothes, when they have been attacked, injured, they know what it means to receive assistance and care from someone. I know how happy the group for Bosnia, for instance, were if we gave them a tin of something or a piece of bread or a yogurt. And I saw with my very own eyes - and this is something that is common knowledge - that these people, their reactions to these refugees, that they would choose the type of bread they wanted to eat. They didn't want to eat Macedonian baked bread, they wanted to eat the kind of bread -- they didn't want to eat bread from Skopje, they wanted to eat bread from Tetovo, so they differentiated, which means they didn't need it that badly.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, bear in mind your own time estimate for this witness was one and a half hours, and we are beyond that, of course.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Yes, yes, yes. I'll be very brief. I'll conclude very quickly, although I would like to go back to the tabs briefly at some point.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Dr. Aleksovski, did you doubt the stories told by the Albanians that they were expelled from Kosovo by the army and police forcibly, with ³⁶⁸⁶¹ firearms and so on?

A. Well, I did doubt this. As I said yesterday, I was a member of the army at one point, and the role of the army was to train young people. The officers would train the young recruits and conscripts and to look after property --

MR. NICE: [Previous translation continues] ... first of all, the question is leading. Second, it's --

JUDGE ROBINSON: No, I don't think it's leading, because he has already given that evidence.

MR. NICE: "Did you doubt --" never mind. How is it proper for us now to be dealing with this witness's belief on something that comes from either one witness or maybe more than one -- not one witness, one refugee or more than one refugee, by his colleagues? How is his belief on that when I can't even know the identity, I expect I'm going to discover, of the refugees, certainly with no prospect of cross-examining them --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, I agree. Next question, Mr. Milosevic.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Very well. Dr. Aleksovski, I asked you whether they appeared to you to be as people in trouble, the people in the camps.

A. Well, I said that wasn't the intensity of -- I know that everybody suffers in one way or another, of course, but they didn't look to me as being people in distress at all, and especially these camps Stenkovac. They were very aggressive. They demonstrated aggression. They were aggressive towards us. They demonstrated hatred towards us. They threw stones at us. They had conflicts with the Roma refugees, for example, and ³⁶⁸⁶² we had to separate them.

So if you come to somebody else's territory, you don't usually show aggressiveness to the people who want to help you. So my impression was not that these people were truly in distress of any kind.

Q. I asked you about firearms and you answered that question. Now let me ask you this: Did you have any cases of encountering anybody who had been raped, for example? Did you hear of any rapes at all?

A. I heard about rapes, and of course you can't see it actually happening, very rarely can you actually be an eyewitness, but in Stenkovac 1, there was, for example, an Israeli hospital that had been set up with gynaecologists and surgeons, very well equipped, and I personally went to see the field hospital there. It was very well equipped, and everybody thought a surgical team of that kind was necessary because they probably expected to see more injuries and wounds coming in. And three days later there was some commotion going on, and the rumour had it that they had tried to rape an Israeli doctor, and the Israeli team withdrew because of this incident, first of all, and secondly because they had no work to do. Nobody needed surgical intervention.

Q. Did you hear about any Albanian person being raped?

A. Well, there was this rumour going round. I did hear about things like that, but -- and of course I couldn't have been an eyewitness at all.

Q. Well, what was it that you heard?

A. I heard that an Albanian woman, and this was done in tents, that she was raped, but among them she complained to us that somebody had raped here among -- in that tent, and could she get out of the tent because she ³⁶⁸⁶³ had suffered from her closest, from the people round her there. That's what I had heard.

Q. But you didn't hear of a case where the Serbs raped an Albanian woman of the people who came there, for example? Did you hear anything like that?

A. No, I didn't hear anything like that.

Q. All right. And were there any cases in which the Albanians in your -- in the camp offered any money to any members of your team; and if they did, what did they ask -- what were they paying for?

A. Well, as I said before, we later realised that they did have money on them because they asked people to buy them things and would give them money to buy them things. And they would give a lot of money to our drivers, for example. We would go in and out freely. They asked drivers to drive them out of the camp, and then I assume they had documents on them, and then they could go on to somewhere else. And that was what happened quite frequently. And I was forced to call the drivers, especially one driver because he said that someone had offered him 500 German marks to drive him out. Sometimes the figure was 5.000 German marks. And I issued a warning as the head of service, telling the drivers that nobody was allowed to take any money for any services at all but just to get on with their own job and do their own driving. But, yes, these enticements did occur on several occasions.

Q. So they would offer money frequently, would they?

A. Yes, frequently. And I threatened one driver and said I would sack him if I noticed he had accepted money for rendering any services of ³⁶⁸⁶⁴ that kind.

Q. All right. You said that the Roma stayed on. Did you have any cases whereby the Albanians in those refugee camps abused or mistreated the Roma?

A. Well, that was publicly shown, I think, on television. The Roma at the time, and today, too, they have representatives in parliament, a representative in parliament, and he issued an official protest. He said if nobody can protect the Roma people, then I will issue arms to them and they'll be able to protect themselves. And this was a well-known case. And they were withdrawn from the camp and to the present day they are living in Macedonia, most of them in Skopje.

Q. Why didn't they go back to Kosovo?

A. Well, as to that I really can't say. I can't give you an answer why they didn't go back. I can't say. I'm sure other people will be able to tell you.

Q. Doctor, I just have one more question for you. You, as far as I know, made your own statistics based on these tabs here. You did your own arithmetic, and here in the tabs you recorded all the cases you intervened in. Can you briefly - this will just take up a minute - give us those facts and figures, your statistics, please.

A. Would you be interested in the period we were at the border or in the camps?

Q. I mean the statistics about the diseases, the break-up of the diseases, looking at the register.

A. Well, diseases of the heart and blood vessels, 14 cases of that. ³⁶⁸⁶⁵ Disease -- that is to say blood pressure complaints, 13. Respiratory complaints, 42. Digestive complaints or complaints of the digestive tract, 17 cases. Psychoneurotic conditions, 10. Urinary conditions, urinary tract diseases - there were a lot of kidney disorders and kidney complaints - 17 of those. Pregnancies, 22. Unconsciousness in 18 cases, or fainting. Changes on the skin and allergies, 14 cases. Brain haemorrhage, strokes, 14. No, 16 cases of stroke. Eye complaints, 1. There was conjunctivitis in one case. Joint complaints, six. Malignant diseases, 13. Skin diseases, 4. Allergies and poisoning 4. Temperatures and dehydration, 2. Diabetes, 2. And one death.

Q. Now, the person that died, that one death, what did he die of and what -- how did he die?

A. It was an elderly person. I think his date of birth was 1924. And in addition to Parkinson's disease he also suffered from an adenoma on the prostate gland.

JUDGE ROBINSON: What period is covered by those statistics?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes. These statistics, these figures, that is 229, I think, cases in all, they were all the cases that we treated, that the emergency service treated from the border area and from the camps, because our teams that were put up in the camps --

JUDGE ROBINSON: From what period? What dates? What dates? What period?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Oh, I see, see. The date. Well, from the 25th when we took in our first patient, it was that pregnant lady that gave birth, up until the 27th when they withdrew from the Stenkovac 1 ³⁶⁸⁶⁶ camp.

JUDGE ROBINSON: And roughly how many refugees would have been in those camps? What would be your estimate of the total?

A. Well, an estimate. I don't like to make an estimate. It's difficult to look at all the tents and people inside the tents, outside the tents. I would say -- well, I just listened to the media giving their figures. Some said 300.000, others said 350.000. I really couldn't give you a figure. If it was on a stadium, a football stadium, I could give you a rough estimate, but the tents and outside the tents I really couldn't venture a guess.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you. Any other questions, Mr. Milosevic?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I have completed my examination-in-chief of this witness. I would just like to tender these two exhibits, these two tabs. I would like to have them admitted into evidence.

If you wish to take a look at the original which Dr. Aleksovski has brought with him in his attache case --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice.

MR. NICE: Yes, I object to the production of these documents for the reasons I've already given but also -- and I've got a chart that incidentally, prepared by Mr. Valliers-Roland which, if it can be made available to you, sets out the history of the document, because I think it's time we looked at the formalities and the rules applying to productions of documents. Has that been distributed? If your officer can just make it available to you. It's just a chart to save time, really. ³⁶⁸⁶⁷ This is a document in summary, I make the point and you can perhaps take this document with you at the adjournment. This is a document that wasn't listed on the original 65 ter list. It hasn't been provided. When we first -- we went through the process of these witnesses being added to the witness list with requests for details and rulings by the Chamber, the first we knew of the possibility of the existence of a document like this was, I think, at the end of last week or sometime during last week. We pressed the accused's associates and/or the legal officer for the document. The first time we got the document was, tab 1 last Friday, we got tab 2 yesterday. Neither is translated. We now can see that one of them is in a considerable state of disarray so one can't even find one's way around the document.

In the absence of a translated document, I am in no way to cross-examine this doctor and will not do so on the detail summary that he's given because I simply can't do it. It's certainly not worth asking the doctor to come back at a future date, if and when I would choose to do it, with the leave of the Court. Our submission is that the time has come to say when documents aren't produced in accordance with the Rules of the Court for production of documents, for listing the documents on the 65 ter list and so on, consideration should be given to declining to allow them into evidence for that reason alone.

JUDGE ROBINSON: But you can cross-examine him on the basis of the evidence that he has given.

MR. NICE: I'll ask him a few questions today. But I can't cross-examine him on this document. And further, the document should be ³⁶⁸⁶⁸ excluded on the grounds of not just being shielded, it should be excluded on the grounds of being medical records. We needn't go into all the law on that. The witness is obviously alive to the fact that it is improper to release medical records in public. If one looks at Article 8 of the European Convention, there are balancing acts to be considered. We really don't want to spend our time on that now.

JUDGE ROBINSON: It is not necessary because they have numbers. They could be identified by numbers.

We are going to take the break now for 20 minutes, and when we come back, we'll -- oh, Mr. Milosevic, you wanted to say something?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I wish to remind you that I did suggest that this register be placed under seal to protect the privacy of the patients and their names inside.

Now, as far as the comment made by Mr. Nice that the document has not been translated, I think that it would be highly improper on my part -- I could have done it, but it would have been highly improper on my part had I given this document to the translators to translate. There would be absolutely no purpose in that because the only essential thing is the titles of the columns, not the names or anything else, because they contain patients, Albanian refugees, and the vital point is to see what they were suffering from. Now, to translate that would be the dissipation of time for the translation service. Of course I could have asked for that, but it would have been quite senseless to do so. Please, please. Please.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Kay, very quickly. ^{36869 BLANK PAGE 36870}

MR. KAY: Yes. I've been trying to trace -- I seem to remember -- perhaps Your Honours may -- Captain Dragan and his 10.000 pages of injuries and other matters concerning those afflicted in the conflict, which was served by the Prosecution. I'm trying to establish whether it had been made an exhibit. I haven't found it on the exhibit list, but I certainly remember that the Prosecution were intending to use that material, if they didn't. Remember, he had the war records of the various peoples and units which the Prosecution had no problem in adducing or seeking to produce through him because they said that it established the movements of people and where those people came from, that they were supposedly out, from outside Bosnia and outside Croatia. So it's certainly materials that they've put their hands upon and would have sought to use at various stages. It seems to me that it's highly relevant and, according to this witness's evidence, it doesn't disadvantage the Prosecution at all. They can ask questions on the matter. They're not going to go through every name of every person. They don't intend to do that. They're just seeking to keep the material out.

JUDGE KWON: I'm concerned about -- that this was not listed in the 65 ter list, and it was not mentioned either in the motion to add the witness.

MR. KAY: Yes. At the end of the day, I'm not really sure it makes any -- any problem for the Prosecutor in dealing with this problem. It is true it's not there, and the formalities have not been followed, but this doctor can be cross-examined on what he has told the Court without any difficulty, in our submission. Mr. Nice is well up to that task. ³⁶⁸⁷¹

JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you. We'll take the adjournment now for 20 minutes.

--- Recess taken at 10.43 a.m.

--- On resuming at 11.07 a.m.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.

JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Nice, I'm in an even more confused state today than normal. Perhaps you could assist me with one or two of the points you're making.

My understanding was that your basic position on the document was that it was immaterial to the case, basically.

MR. NICE: Yes.

JUDGE BONOMY: However, your position seems to have strengthened a bit on that since. You then indicated certain difficulties about cross-examination, but can you clarify for me this: What essentially is the difference between the evidence of this witness about the condition of and the attitude of and the explanations given by refugees at the border or over borders and that evidence led by the Prosecution accumulated by those who investigated the circumstances and talked to people and gave an account in very general terms of what explanations these people were giving, the condition they were in, and so on? What's the difference?

MR. NICE: For example, you mean the two books "Under Orders" and "As Seen, As Told". The difference is considerable. First of all, and this has always been material for the Chamber, the documents concerned, the other two documents, were prepared by entirely neutral parties with a revealed methodology and with records of what they'd recorded. Whether or ³⁶⁸⁷² not produced to this Court, nevertheless those records existed. And of course even if the informants were anonymous as identified in the footnotes to those volumes, the material exists for identifying individuals, I think, in certain or all cases were it ever necessary to test them.

Now, there's incidentally one other historical oddity about those documents that Your Honour may not recall or even know about, and that is that they first came to be produced as exhibits because the accused was putting passages of them in for himself.

JUDGE BONOMY: But being realistic on the question of cross-examination, it's never going to be possible to cross-examine a substantial number of people who fall into this category, and it must surely simply be a matter of weight whether the investigation is carried out by an independent body or carried out by an official in the course of his duties.

MR. NICE: I rather agree with that last point although it's also worth having in mind that the Chamber on more than one occasion excluded the possibility of any broadly similar exercise conducted by a representative of the Office of the Prosecutor. That was the summarising witness litigation.

JUDGE BONOMY: Yes, well --

MR. NICE: That's another side --

JUDGE BONOMY: -- that's a different story. Can I then just deal with one other matter because I don't think we should take up too much time on this. ³⁶⁸⁷³ I'm quite sympathetic to the point you advance about not having time to investigate the background of this particular document, and that's because it was not on the original 65 ter list. I see a difference in that situation from that of a document that's always been available to you for you to decide whether to devote resources to investigating it or not. But one would expect that if a public document, an apparently public document like this became available and might have an impact on the case at all, that even a Prosecutor would want to ensure that it was available to everyone to at least consider before abandoning it. So my inclination on that point might be more favourably disposed to postponing your cross-examination on the detail of the document, if there is to be such cross-examination, to give you a chance to examine it, because you might end up convinced that it's perfectly properly compiled whereas today you could carry out your cross-examination on other matters.

MR. NICE: Your Honour, I might indeed find out that the document was properly compiled indeed. Until a late stage of this witness's evidence, I thought I probably would have no questions to ask him of any kind and would have drawn to the Chamber's attention and to the accused, again, the ability to get evidence of this kind in more swiftly in writing.

And as I stand the position, and I will have to ask the witness a few questions about it, the individuals are named but they're then given numbers as well. That, I think, is obvious. I don't think the witness is telling us or going to be in a position to tell me about any individuals who said particular things to him so that I'm not going to be in the ³⁶⁸⁷⁴ position that I was with the previous witness where it was possible to go and see and, indeed, in the submission of the Prosecution, to confound many of the things that were said by the previous witness. That leaves these documents as of significance, as I understand it, only for the statistical matters that the witness has very recently given us, and also there was an earlier passage where he spoke statistically of a very limited number of people who have turned up with reported injuries on a particular time. I'm afraid I have trouble following the timetable he gives. But those are the only points, it seems to me, on which he relies for these documents. And I think it's -- whether there are allowed in as exhibits or not, I think it's highly unlikely I would want him back for those reasons alone in the context of this case.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you, Mr. Nice. We'll admit the documents. That's binder 1, as well as the original, which the doctor said he could leave. They are to be under seal.

THE REGISTRAR: That will be D281.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Doctor, does the original relate to both tabs 1 and 2 or only to 1?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Tab 1 relates exclusively to refugees from Kosovo.

JUDGE ROBINSON: No, no.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] It has been photocopied --

JUDGE ROBINSON: I'm talking about the original document which you have. Does it relate to the two tabs which are in this document? ³⁶⁸⁷⁵

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] No, only the first one.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Okay. Thanks. Exhibit number D281. Mr. Nice, yes.

MR. NICE: And I know Your Honour will have found Blace and the Djeneral Jankovic crossing on page 16 of the atlas Exhibit 83, if you want to.

Cross-examined by Mr. Nice:

Q. I have only a limited number of questions to ask you, Dr. Aleksovski, but let me see if I understand your evidence a little bit first. Where you say there was one person who spoke to you of the reason for leaving Kosovo, are you able to identify that person by reference number or indeed by name in the exhibits you've produced?

A. No. It was a person who was standing in line to be examined. At that moment, the person had not yet been identified. And if I saw him or her today, I wouldn't be able to recognise them.

Q. Likewise the other people who you say were spoken of by your staff giving this as the explanation, are you able to identify any of them by name or by reference number in your exhibits? Just yes or no, please.

A. Yes.

Q. Which are the individuals who gave this account that you can identify for me, who gave this explanation for leaving Kosovo?

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice, you'd better identify the explanation, because there are two.

MR. NICE: Yes.

Q. The explanation for leaving because of the NATO bombs. Can you ³⁶⁸⁷⁶ point to the individuals by name, in private session, or by number in your exhibit so I can know who they are?

A. I said I heard one such person giving that explanation, but the person's turn for examination had not yet come, and by that time he hadn't yet been received, and we hadn't gotten his name down. So if we had known in advance that you would be asking this question, that there would be this entire procedure --

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... line of questioning. I'll move on to something else.

You as the chief did not go out and talk to the refugees. That's one of the things you said; correct?

A. I said I did talk to some of them.

Q. You didn't go out routinely. You didn't go out regularly and speak to the refugees.

A. Right. It was not primarily my job to go out and talk to refugees, but in passing, yes, I came into contact with some of them and talked to some of them.

Q. And your teams only went out and responded to requests for medical assistance. You didn't examine -- your teams didn't examine every incoming refugee as a matter of routine.

A. They examined only those people who wanted to be examined. They would come to the tent, be examined, and leave. We didn't even -- we didn't need to examine all the refugees.

Q. Your records only cover the period 25th of March or 24th of March until the end of April? ³⁶⁸⁷⁷

A. Until the 27th of May.

Q. Your last answers before the refreshment break, Dr. Aleksovski, where you gave a lot of statistics, you said related to the period 25th to the 27th. Now, that was the 25th to the 27th of which month?

A. Our activity began on the 24th without any interventions involved. On the 25th March we started actually working with patients, until the 27th of May, 1999.

Q. Very well. So this covers the whole period. In that -- very well. It was a matter of clarity, and thank you for that. Obviously -- how many medical staff did you have altogether?

A. In the emergency service, until the 6th of May, there were four medical teams, three at Gornje Blace, one at Donje Blace. On the 6th when they moved to the Stenkovac 1 refugee camp, there were three medical emergency teams and one team supplied by the health centre in Skopje.

Q. So you were simply in no position to service the medical needs of 300, 350.000 people, obviously.

A. We did cover all their requests. We met all their requests. It was only later that some other humanitarian organisations arrived, and we referred milder cases to them, but all the serious cases went through the emergency medical service.

Q. The medical conditions and the humanitarian conditions in the Macedonian camps were subject of widespread international comment and some criticism; correct?

A. I don't know how the foreign media reported this, but I know that at the end when all the impressions and reports were pulled I can say that ³⁶⁸⁷⁸ our emergency medical service was praised by our trade union for dealing with the job with flying colours.

Q. Was there a river bordering one of the camps?

A. Yes, indeed. It was a river that was close to the temporary admission camp, the Lepenac River.

Q. Did the Croatian Red Cross, to your recollection, record bodies being deposited in that river? Do you remember that as a public report?

A. No. I haven't heard of any bodies. I heard that pistols had been thrown into that river, but there was no official confirmation of that. I personally didn't see it, but people talked about it a lot.

Q. May we look at three contemporary news photographs and see if you'd like to comment on them, please.

Do you read and speak English, Dr. Aleksovski, or not?

A. No, I don't.

Q. The first photograph has the caption -- has the dateline 1999 and simply reads: "A distressed mother with her daughter are prevented by Macedonian soldiers from leaving Blace camp." Does the photograph there fit with your recollection of circumstances at Blace?

A. This photograph is marked as being taken in 1999, but it doesn't say where it was taken. Clarify, if you will, because I haven't seen a scene like this.

Q. The caption says: "A distressed mother with her daughter are prevented by Macedonian soldiers from leaving Blace camp." Does this accord with your recollection of circumstances at the time?

JUDGE ROBINSON: Was Blace was of the camps that you went to, ³⁶⁸⁷⁹ Doctor?

Doctor, did you hear the question? Did you go to Blace camp?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes.

JUDGE ROBINSON: You did.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes, yes, I did.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Could you answer the question asked by Mr. Nice.

MR. NICE: Your Honours will see Blace on page 16, east of --

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I will. I will answer. Crowds such as this one in the picture were there. It is the true the police prevented them from entering town because I told you what would have happened if such a crowd of people rushed into the town uncontrollably. I can't say I saw this exact scene, but it's true they were not allowed from going further, from leaving, because at the time the camps were being prepared.

MR. NICE:

Q. Next photograph is titled: "A distressed Kosovar Albanian woman in the chaos of fifty thousand refugees living in the increasingly overcrowded Blace camp." It just says 1999, it doesn't give the month. Does this again accord in general with your recollection of Blace camp's conditions?

A. I will repeat: That picture is very clear in my memory. Wherever I went, I saw all kinds of scenes, but I can say also that there were scenes that had been stage managed. You now made me say something that I didn't want to say as a medical professional, but maybe you will see and hear more of my colleagues who will tell you the same thing. ^{36880 BLANK PAGE 36881} There were pictures that were set up, scenes that were rigged, and we were able to see how they were propping an alleged wounded person so that they could be photographed, and the photograph was presented the same day.

So this particular picture could be a reflection of something that was the truly happened but it could also be stage managed.

Q. Well, look at the next one, then, please. There are the police there -- or, rather, the Macedonian soldiers. Would they be willing to be stage managed on behalf of the photographer, or were they doing what they normally did?

A. I don't think that the army personnel did this at the border crossing. This was done by the police. You know, when someone sees a camera there, they become curious and perhaps pose for the photographer. Perhaps there was a crowd there. Perhaps some of them were queueing in line to get to the city as soon as possible and were prevented.

Q. Very well.

A. Therefore, I cannot interpret this photograph. I can just tell you that I see a crowd in the photograph.

Q. I'm going to ask you to consider part of the contents of some five reports on what happened at the Macedonian border, and I'm going to try and do it swiftly. Before I do, have I got your evidence correct to this extent, that in the first few days at the end of March the flow of refugees was small, low in number?

A. Yes. Yes.

Q. And it was in that early period of time that you say the ³⁶⁸⁸² explanation for the refugees being there was the NATO bombing? Is that correct?

A. In my presence, as I have explained to you, one woman said that, and I heard from other colleagues --

Q. Please, Mr. Aleksovski, don't repeat everything. We just don't have time in this court.

Was it right that the explanation coming from the woman and from your colleagues about NATO bombings was in the early days, that is, the last days of March?

A. Yes, around that time.

Q. Later --

A. 25th, 26th.

Q. Later when the flow of refugees went up and was of course in the thousands so there would be 300.000 there eventually, or 400.000, whatever it was, the explanation came of ethnic cleansing; correct?

A. Yes, that's correct. Later on in Stenkovac 2, everyone said that they were fleeing from the police and the army.

Q. Can we look, please, first on the overhead projector because it's in English, at a document headed "Medical Group." While this is coming, are you aware of an organisation called Physicians for Human Rights, a Nobel Peace Prize winning organisation, visiting Kosovo Albanian refugees in your camps?

A. Yes. If that's what it is. We called them Doctors Without Borders. I don't know if it's the same organisation.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... another organisation. ³⁶⁸⁸³ Physicians for Human Rights.

MR. NICE: If the report could go on the overhead projector, I'll read just a few passages of it, sufficient, I hope, to make the points I wish to.

Q. This is a report released on April the 4th of 1999, so fairly early, and the report concluded that at that stage the risks of death and disease were growing exponentially worse day by day, with people collapsing in the hundreds outside of medical tents, shaking from fever, cold, or exhaustion.

Now, does that accord with your recollection of events, this report coming from Physicians for Human Rights?

A. No. No. I have an entirely different opinion, and if you wish I can explain it.

Q. If I may, I'll just take you through the various short passages of this report and it may be more convenient and more economic in our use of time.

MR. NICE: If Mr. Prendergast can turn over to the next page. The overall situation -- further up. Headed "Overall situation."

Q. "The refugees --" this report says -- "cannot leave the border area or receive assistance there. An OSCE representative told [the organisation] -" that's PHR, Physicians for Human Rights - "that the Macedonian government was resisting taking in the refugees until other countries agreed to provide refuge to them." Is it right that at that stage, March turning to April, your government was resisting taking refugees? ³⁶⁸⁸⁴

A. May I reply? You see, the crowds in front of the tents mentioned in the first text, let me tell you something about that. When you place a large number of people in a limited area, that would normally lead to creation of crowds. But that doesn't mean that they were waiting in line in front of the tent for medical assistance or that medical assistance was denied to them.

I assure you that medical assistance was provided to each and every person, and we continue to do that to this day. I told you that we still have refugees, Roma people, Macedonians and others, and it is not true that Macedonia denied them medical assistance. If you remember, there used to be a deputy or foreign minister in charge of refugees. He later became president, and he gave this statement. I think he said if you think that this assistance is not enough, maybe we should stop it altogether.

MR. NICE: Further down the page, please, Mr. Prendergast, at the end of the next paragraph.

Q. It says this, middle of the page: "... once they'd crossed to the Macedonian side, international humanitarian agencies were not allowed by police to enter the 'no man's land' to provide aid for them. Some assistance was being provided by local Red Cross workers around the clock, but they were overwhelmed by the extent of the need." Now, that's the way this has been characterised by this human rights medical organisation. Do you agree with the way it is described?

A. I truly cannot comprehend a text like this let alone say that I agree with what is stated here, because we indeed provided assistance to ³⁶⁸⁸⁵ everyone who requested it. You know what the Red Cross teams are like and what the emergency medical teams are like. These are professionals who do their job, and there are many of them there.

Q. Next page --

A. It is really shameful that I have to listen to statements of this nature.

MR. NICE: Next page, please, Mr. Prendergast.

Q. "Medical Conditions. Despite the huge numbers of people in distress and suffering from serious medical conditions, medical aid was almost non-existent. Getting access to the medical tent is itself technically difficult for the population. Sick people had to cross out of the valley of mud and grass and pass police in riot gear in order to reach an emergency tent. Police sometimes refused to let sick persons pass. When they did allow passage, it was frequently only for the ill person, causing separation of family members. Another medical aid tent was placed amid the refugees in far reaches of the muddy field." Does that description accord with your recollection, please, Dr. Aleksovski?

A. Does this pertain perhaps to Stenkovac 1 and 2 camps or to the camp at the border? If this --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice --

MR. NICE: At the border, I think.

JUDGE ROBINSON: I was just coming to ask you to clarify that. Are we talking about the same time and the same place?

MR. NICE: This is the border camp, I think. ³⁶⁸⁸⁶

Q. What do you say about that, Dr. Aleksovski?

A. I have a lot to say, because this insults me and my state. It is not typical for us to deny medical assistance to someone, and we as professionals would never do it. The police was a bit further away from our tent and from other tents which were later set up by humanitarian organisations. These people had free access to us. There was no hindrance at all.

MR. NICE: Your Honours will find the geographical location identified on the first page, towards the bottom, where it says that they spent "... the day with medical workers and among tens of thousands of Albanian refugees in the 'no-man's land' between Kosovo and Macedonia at Blace." And as I indicated, the map shows that Blace is to the east of the border itself, and you can see that if --

JUDGE KWON: Page number?

MR. NICE: Sorry, page number 16. It's page 16, and it's 26-W, where you can see the Djeneral Jankovic crossing and then you can see Blace to the east of that.

Mr. Prendergast, if we could go to the last page -- second to last page of this document.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I cannot find this. Mr. Nice says on page 16, whereas this entire document has five pages. So what is he referring to exactly? Oh, he's speaking about the atlas. I see.

JUDGE ROBINSON: That's the map. ³⁶⁸⁸⁷

MR. NICE: We can return to the overhead projector.

Q. Access to refugees was described by this body in this way: "Access to the refugees is severely restricted. This is partly due to the Macedonian police, who have set up check points on the way to the border and prevent journalists and sometimes aid workers from getting in. PHR's physician-investigator was stopped at the border two days ago by police and, after providing identification, was told, 'There are enough doctors in there.' He was allowed to enter but only after the invitation from a physician inside. Representatives of the local Albanian refugee agency also told PHR that they had experienced difficulty in obtaining permission to provide assistance to the refugees."

Were there difficulties put in the way of those seeking to help the refugees?

A. I disagree with this. I've already stated, and I can repeat, that this is offensive for my country and for me as a doctor. Our policemen, our soldiers, were brought up in such a way as to never deny an assistance to somebody who needed it. The same applies to doctors.

Q. My last question on this report: You didn't recall Physicians for Human Rights. You did recall Medecins sans Frontieres. Can you point to any reason, do you know of any reason why an organisation like Physicians for Human Rights could get its reporting so wrong?

A. Well, you'd better ask them. I don't know how they could publish something like this. I disagree with this, and I would like to confront this colleague of mine and discuss it. I don't understand. We were present there. We walked around, and I told you that many photographs ³⁶⁸⁸⁸ were rigged, set up, and there were things like that, but I disagree with what is stated here.

Q. Next report, which I can take quite shortly, is the 9th of April, again quite early, having been released by the US State Department on the 7th of April. And it comes from the ambassador at large for war crimes, David Scheffer, who visited a large -- visited Blace, Macedonia, and interviewed a large number of Kosovo refugees.

Dr. Aleksovski, the first paragraph of this report suggests that the ambassador visited Blace on three occasions, including during the night of April 1st and 2nd, and was able to interview refugees at length for a total of 15 hours without disclosing his identity but being free to move through the Blace camp, interviewing an estimated 200 refugees. First, were you aware at the time personally of any -- of this visit by American Ambassador Scheffer?

A. I do not remember that visit.

MR. NICE: He -- we can go to the foot of the first page and I can deal with this report briefly in light of the witness's earlier evidence.

Q. The ambassador says that by the date of his visit, April the 1st to the 2nd: " ... there was remarkable consistency in the refugees' accounts. Of course, because of the actions of Serb forces in Kosovo, these accounts cannot be individually verified at the present time. But the large and growing number of consistent reports by the refugees is too significant either to ignore or to understate. Kosovars are fleeing Kosovo not because of the NATO bombing campaign but because of the Serb assault on the civilian population." ³⁶⁸⁸⁹ Pausing there, do you accept that by April the 1st or 2nd the complaints made were not of the NATO bombing campaign but of assaults by Serb forces on the civilian population?

A. No. I've already said that in the beginning they complained of the bombs falling, NATO bombs. And then later on as those stage managed, every one of them to the last one said that they had been fired at by the army and the police. I was there. Therefore, I cannot accept this.

Q. I think you're actually agreeing with me, but what I wanted to know was, and I'm not interested in your stage managed, I'm just interested in the change of account and the dates. Did this change of account that you referred to occur by about the 1st or 2nd of April?

A. I've stated that too. When they transferred to Stenkovac 1 and 2, which was on the 5th and 6th, their accounts changed for the most part, and after that every single one stated that they had been forcibly expelled.

Q. I'm not sure that you're following the point, Dr. Aleksovski. It's probably my fault. But this report from Ambassador Scheffer is built on his visit of the 1st and 2nd of April. We've looked at the way he opens his report, and although I'm not going to go through it, if Mr. Prendergast --

MR. KAY: Just one matter. I don't think it's a report by him. It's compiled by someone called Dr. S. D. Stein.

MR. NICE: I'm quite happy with that.

MR. KAY: Just so it's clear.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. Thanks for the clarification. ³⁶⁸⁹⁰

MR. NICE:

Q. If we go to the page that's on the screen at the moment, although I'm not going to go through it in detail, the visit by Ambassador Scheffer on the 1st and 2nd of April had the refugees giving consistent accounts of being told, "Go to NATO. Let NATO house you," or being deprived of their cash and identity documents, of being forced out of their homes, being told that they leave or die, being beaten, and being force marched and put on trains.

Now, all I want to know from you, Dr. Aleksovski, is were those accounts being given by the 1st and 2nd of April?

A. You're making me repeat what I've already stated. I told you that on the 1st, we started -- and after the 1st we started hearing an increasing number of accounts referring to the army and the police. And later on, everything we saw in those people, the injuries and their medical condition, that was not consistent with their accounts.

Q. The third document, please, is the report or statement from the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, dated the 6th of May, 1999. And we're moving on, Dr. Aleksovski.

Very briefly this: Mary Robinson visited the region and visited, as we can see on the first page in the second paragraph, she visited Blace. Do you remember her visit?

A. No, I don't remember that. I know that she was in Skopje, but I don't remember her visiting Blace.

Q. Blace. I'm sorry. Were you working in the camps in May of 1999?

A. In May of 1999, yes, I worked there. ^{36891 BLANK PAGE 36892}

Q. Just a couple of passages from this --

JUDGE KWON: Mr. Nice, if you can help us with this. This is again compiled by Mr. Stein.

MR. NICE: Yes.

JUDGE KWON: Would you tell us if this is a newspaper article or is it a report done by Ms. Robinson?

MR. NICE: It comes from the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights website.

JUDGE KWON: But you get it from this Mr. Stein's website, not from the UN website?

MR. NICE: Would Your Honour give me a minute?

[Prosecution counsel confer]

MR. NICE: It comes from Mr. Stein's website. It's identified as coming from the High Commissioner's website. It couldn't be located on the High Commissioner's website.

JUDGE KWON: Who is Mr. Stein?

MR. NICE: That I'm afraid I can't help you with. But I can find out and I will help with you it. The material was located because of its connection with the expected evidence of this witness, but we'll find out a little bit more about Mr. Stein.

Q. But, Dr. Aleksovski, Mrs. Robinson -- Mary Robinson visited Macedonia and Blace in May, according to this document - and we'll find out a little bit more about it - she said this -- the bottom of the first page. Thank you. "The full magnitude of the problem and its tragic consequences can only be realise when seen firsthand. Although I have ³⁶⁸⁹³ been receiving reports from my field staff on the scale of the suffering being caused by this deliberate violation of human rights, I have been shocked and appalled at witnessing the actual plight of thousands of Kosovar Albanians forced from their homes."

Now -- she then deals with those who didn't make it to the camps. By May of 1999, was the condition of the refugees in the camps such as to shock and appall a visitor?

A. Mr. Nice, you describe the visit of Mrs. Robinson to Blace camp, and then you believe that what she saw there for an hour or two, no more than that, you would rather believe her account than our account, us who were there on a daily basis, who lived there, worked there, dealt with that every day.

Naturally, when you see a large number of people in a small area, the impression cannot be a positive one. And yes, there was suffering there. Yes, there were injuries there. And this is something that I wouldn't wish upon any -- anyone, to have a large number of people in a small area. So naturally, for somebody visiting for an hour or two, the impression would be unpleasant. I'm sure of that.

Q. And -- that's all I ask from that one. And the last document, which again is sourced directly from Stein but attributed to the UNHCR as a source, and I'll find out more about the routing of the material in a second, I hope, is a report by the High Commissioner for Human Rights, dated the 31st of May, said to be an advance and unedited version. I just look and see and ask your comment on these few observations. ³⁶⁸⁹⁴ Do you remember the High Commissioner for Human Rights at the end of May reporting on the conditions generally of Kosovo refugees and dealing with the position in Macedonia to an extent?

A. At the time there were reports, statements, all kinds of statements from different people, and I really can't put names to reports, or names and surnames, but there were many. And this last report, what I can say about that is that I remember that there were criticisms. There were praises too. But let me repeat: Please don't insult my country, because we really did everything that we could. We did the maximum we could and sometimes even to the disadvantage of our own citizens in order to give assistance and help to the refugees, both with respect to health protection and care and also with respect to other kinds of assistance and help, and that is why I really can't comment on reports like this. I know what we did. I know all the things that we undertook.

Q. Dr. Aleksovski, it's only really for me to ask questions. You recurringly said please don't insult your country. I'm not insulting your country, I'm simply giving you an opportunity to comment on contemporaneous reporting that may be different from your evidence so that the Judges can have that in mind. I'm personally expressing no opinions, I'm only asking you questions.

MR. NICE: And if we could just look, please, Mr. Prendergast, at the second page of this report to see the -- from --

Q. We're told that between -- or by this document that between the 2nd and 13th of May, the High Commissioner travelled to Macedonia, Albania, Bosnia and various other places so that the material was gathered ³⁶⁸⁹⁵ in that first half of May.

And if you'd go on, please, to the page, at the top, 4 of 16. A little further down.

"The High Commissioner for Human Rights visited the Blace border crossing on the 2nd of May and spoke to some of the thousands of Kosovars waiting to be registered and granted permission to enter Macedonia. Several persons described how they had been compelled to leave their homes and all their possessions behind, either due to violence, threats, or the prevailing threatening atmosphere. In several cases males were separated from their families ... One victim showed a gunshot wound to his knee, while several others displayed fresh marks of beatings inflicted by Serbian police forces. Some refugees had spent weeks in the forest before leaving Kosovo."

Now, this is, I repeat, the 2nd of May. Any reason to doubt first that such accounts would be given to the High Commissioner?

A. This report describes the situation, some we have discussed, some aspects of it. Now, what he says here, the fresh situation, if it is -- fresh wounds, then fresh wounds would have to bleed. So I don't know about that, and I didn't understand what camp this refers to. So we recorded everything, but since you keep going back to this, you will see in the document that it was only later that injuries came to us. First of all, they hid their injuries and wounds because they were old injuries. So I don't know where the woman said this, what injuries she showed or whatever. But as to fresh marks, what I said was that our register reflected the truth. We recorded the truth. Now, what these ³⁶⁸⁹⁶ people recorded, what these people filmed, if that woman had perhaps gone to a visitor without having asked for our help, I don't know why she would have done that, I really can't say.

MR. NICE: A few more references in this report and then I think I'm done.

If you go on, please, Mr. Prendergast, to page 6 of 16. We come to torture and ill-treatment.

Q. The Commissioner is reported to have interviewed refugees who had "experienced various forms of ill-treatment at the hands of Serbian paramilitary and police as well as of Yugoslav army soldiers. Various forms of ill-treatment have included beatings with fists and rifle butts, cruel treatment, rape and other forms of sexual assault, mutilation, shooting and threats of violence."

And then this: "In Macedonia, the High Commissioner spoke with a refugee whose ear was mutilated by paramilitary forces ..." Now, it doesn't specify the location of this refugee there. It goes on, however, to say others reported to have physical abuse, including beatings with batons, being inflicted by Serbian authorities just before the refugees reached the border crossing at Blace. So it may be at Blace. Do your records contain anything about a refugee with a mutilated ear?

A. No. I hear about a case like that for the first time, and I don't think there would have been a case like that without coming to us and reporting to us, because at that time in Blace there was no team to -- which could have taken care of that. It would have needed hospital ³⁶⁸⁹⁷ treatment, quite certainly, because it was the -- the auditor organ, the ear, and she would have come to us and so would the other people if they had been beaten and so on.

So I told you about what we had seen, the work we had done, but that does not confirm this report or, rather, vice versa.

Q. Page 10 of 16, please. And it's at the foot of the page under "Macedonia."

"According to official government sources, Macedonia harbours more than 200.000 refugees from Kosovo.

"Poor hygiene, lack of adequate medical attention and overcrowding of camps puts the health of refugees at risk. The lack of space is also affecting school programmes. The number of reported security incidents in the camps is low; in several cases, refugees have been arrested and taken away to local police stations for attempting to leave the camp without authorisation."

Now, those are, I think, three or four aspects of the camps as at the first half of May. The first one was "lack of adequate medical attention and overcrowding puts the health of refugees at risk." Do you agree with that?

A. As far as giving health assistance and attention, I think that everything was done, of course, under the prevailing conditions. I know what it means when you come into a clinic, for example, when you have the state-of-the art equipment and everything, and it's quite a different thing when you give assistance in a tent. But given the prevailing conditions, we did what we could and gave sufficient medical attention and ³⁶⁸⁹⁸ did what we could to help the people. Of course there were many cases -- even now, if you were to go to an outpatients department here in The Hague, you would see a different situation. You have hospitals, you have well-equipped clinics and so on. You can't organise that kind of thing under conditions in a tent.

Now, as for the conflict with the police, I only remember that happening when there was a conflict between the Roma and the Albanian themselves, and then the police did have to intervene to separate the two groups, and the authorities were forced to separate the Roma from the Albanians. I know about that case. As to another conflict, other conflicts, other clashes, I don't know about that.

MR. NICE: With regard to this witness, the Chamber will appreciate I have simply been putting to him contemporaneous reporting. As to Dr. Stein, he is a lecturer in England. He has his own -- or he runs a website called Web Genocide Documents Centre, of which he is the director. These documents come from there. Whatever may be the status of these documents, if the Chamber would like them to be verified as coming from a different or more authoritative website, I will do my best to ensure that that is done.

As to the documents themselves, obviously I would have preferred and would seek for them to be admitted into evidence. It's a matter for the Chamber. I realise that the practice to which the Chamber is inclining is that if the witness doesn't adopt something it may be that it's not going to be admitted. I don't want to keep arguing the same point. This material could be of value to the Chamber, but I'm ³⁶⁸⁹⁹ comparatively neutral, having put the propositions from it, as to what happens to the documents.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, re-examination.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you. Just something in connection with what Mr. Nice asked for. I should like to draw your attention to the fact that the witness states quite clearly that it is not true what it says in this -- that what it says in these documents is not true, and I don't think that these documents can be introduced into evidence through this witness. The witness was there on the spot himself in an official capacity as head or director of the emergency service.

JUDGE ROBINSON: We heard what he said, Mr. Milosevic. If you have just one or two questions, as I think would be appropriate in these circumstances, we could work for another five minutes. The witness could then leave.

Re-examined by Mr. Milosevic:

Q. [Interpretation] Dr. Aleksovski, you mentioned in passing while you were saying how various footage or events were stage managed, that you saw allegedly people positioning somebody who was wounded in order to film that and then you saw this on television later on. Can you describe this event, this stage management of somebody who was allegedly wounded and how he was being positioned and how you came to the conclusion that he wasn't actually wounded.

A. I was at the camp at the time, the Blace camp, and I described what happen. The cameras were placed in front of us, they called some people up, and this one man, one person walking quite normally went off ³⁶⁹⁰⁰ with a cameraman, quite literally passed in front of our tent. He was taken off by the cameraman, and later on our team told me -- they came to me and said, "Director, we saw them positioning a perfectly healthy man and took footage, filmed him on crutches." And that evening I saw it televised over Macedonian television. We saw that same case, the same person, whereas he never came to us for help. We did not see that he was not able to walk or that he was in pain at all, and my conclusion was that that was all stage managed, and that's why I brought it up.

Q. So you saw the first -- you -- first of all you saw the man walking past your tent and later on you saw him filmed in pain on crutches. Is that what your explanation was?

A. Yes.

Q. And that was on a stretcher, and that was televised by television; is that right?

A. Yes.

Q. Dr. Aleksovski, this first picture shows a fence, a barrier. On one side of the fence we can see policemen and on the other side we can see a group of refugees. Is that what you were telling us about, that the police for a time did not allow the people to leave the camp until the permanent camps, Stenkovac 1 and 2, were set up to accommodate them?

A. Yes, that's quite true. They didn't allow them to pass because it would have been chaos in town if all these people had descended into town. So they were held back there until the camps were being prepared to accommodate them. Everybody knew about this, and of course that area there, there were large crowds of people, lots of people in a small space ³⁶⁹⁰¹ were kept there.

Q. Tell me this now: Did you have your own doctors teams on the other side of the fence or this side of the fence? That is to say, within that space, did you have your medical teams go within that space or were they outside that space and beyond the fence?

A. They were inside, towards the border crossing, and the police were on the other side, towards Skopje, on the other side of the barrier, so our teams were on one side, the police on the other.

Q. Does that mean that there was no obstacle between the refugees and your medical teams offering and giving medical assistance if they were amongst the people and within the space that was set aside for the refugees?

A. That's right. There were no obstacles. I absolutely deny that. And many times the policemen would come in if they needed anything, if they had a headache and wanted a tablet for their headache, or perhaps they had some stomach pains. We were there amongst the people and even the policemen would come and ask us for these tablets.

Q. Some of these reports suggest that you did not succeed in giving aid and assistance to everyone. Were there any long queues and large crowds in front of your tent or was everybody who considered they needed medical assistance reach your tent and ask for medical help?

A. It has been written down and I also said in -- there were 1.900 and some registered people. Some people came several times for help, either for tablets or for having some bandaged. But nobody was sent back by us. I ordered that everybody should be seen to. That was the position ^{36902 BLANK PAGE 36903} taken by the Ministry of Health, that everybody should be helped. And I've already said, given the prevailing conditions, we did what we could. We gave basic assistance, and that was sufficient. Now, I read through all these reports and I can say that we took 22 women to hospital who gave birth. They were -- they delivered their babies in hospital. And I really can't say. And as to these reports, they're not correct, not true.

Q. Well, you already said they're not true and incorrect, and they are in contradiction with what you as an eyewitness saw. Take a look at this report by the High Commissioner for Human Rights, for instance, the one that was given you. It is dated the 31st of May 1999 and Mr. Nice drew our attention to page 6 of that report, page 6 of 16 pages, and it comes under the chapter of torture and ill-treatment, chapter D, or paragraph D, torture and ill-treatment. This is what it says in the middle of that first paragraph. It speaks about the person with the ear that was mutilated by the paramilitaries "and others reported to have physical abuse, "[In English] including beatings with batons being inflicted by Serbian authorities just before the refugees reached the border crossing at Blace."

[Interpretation] That means beaten with batons just before they came into your territory where you gave assistance. Now, tell us this: Did you find a single Albanian with traces of beatings on their bodies, beatings with a blunt object, wooden object, not to say batons, but beaten and the traces of beatings? Did you have a single refugee with those kinds of wounds? ³⁶⁹⁰⁴

A. In the 32 years that I have been working in the emergency medical service, I have had ample opportunity of seeing people who were beaten with batons or blunt objects and everything else, and those kinds of cases comes to a -- come to us every day. Sometimes they are wounds from rifle butts and you can see it quite clearly when you're dealing with a wound of that kind. We know what batons are, what truncheons are, what rifle butts are and what kind of wounds and injuries they can inflict. And I can say quite certainly, and we would have no reason to deny this, that we had no reason to record cases of that kind because we never came across cases of that kind. I can't say that we ever had.

Q. You mean not a single case?

A. That's right.

Q. And here it says that they were beaten just before coming into your territory from Blace, at the Blace crossing. Would you have noticed injuries of that kind had they existed?

A. Had conditions of that kind existed, those people would certainly have come to us for assistance. They had no nobody else to come to but us, and we would quite certainly have seen traces of that kind.

Q. Now we go on to page 4 of that same document. This is what it says --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, just a minute. You say that they wouldn't have had anybody else to go to for assistance. Were there other human rights bodies there, the Red Cross or other agencies, offering help apart from your medical centre?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] In the first days, no, there was no ³⁶⁹⁰⁵ one else. They arrived later. But as I said before, the International Red Cross was unable to deal with such cases. Their staff was -- consisted of beginners, young doctors. Serious injuries had to be taken to the close hospitals.

JUDGE ROBINSON: When did the other agencies to whom the refugees could have turned for help arrive?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, around the 1st. Some of them came on the 30th, but on the 1st of April some of them arrived to the border, set up their tents, but they had nothing. They had no vehicles, they had no particular equipment, and even those people who initially went to them eventually turned to us.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, we are about seven, eight minutes beyond the break. Are you bringing your re-examination to a close now?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, I am bringing it to a close.

JUDGE ROBINSON: I'm trying to determine when we should take the break now.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] It's all the same to me. We can take the break now and then I will have a couple of more questions after the break.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. We'll take the break now. Twenty minutes.

--- Recess taken at 12.24 p.m.

--- On resuming at 12.48 p.m.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, yes. You must finish very quickly now so we can move on to your next witness.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation] ³⁶⁹⁰⁶

Q. Dr. Aleksovski, in this document presented by Mr. Nice dated the 4th of April, 1999, "Medical group, witnessing public health crisis, condemns the refusal of Macedonia to accept Kosovo refugees," that's the document. I suppose you have the translation or you are receiving interpretation.

A. I don't have -- I don't have any interpretation. Does that mean I have to --

Q. Again in this document presented by Mr. Nice, this medical group testifying to health care issues, condemning the Macedonian government for their refusal to allow or, rather, extend assistance to Albanian refugees from Kosovo, urging immediate action by NATO, on page 2 it says "General Situation," and then it says: "The refugees cannot leave the border area --" You explained about that and we saw the footage or, rather, photographs, and then it says "or receive assistance there." Is it true that at the place where refugees were located inside the fence they were unable to receive assistance?

A. Absolutely inaccurate. They received both medical assistance, supplies, bread, everything at the border. They were not starving.

Q. All right. So you say that what is written here is untrue.

A. Yes.

Q. In paragraph 3, it says: "... once they crossed to the Macedonian side [In English] international humanitarian agencies were not allowed by police to enter the 'no man's land' to provide aid for them. Some assistance was being provided by local Red Cross workers around the clock, but they were overwhelmed by extent of the need." ³⁶⁹⁰⁷ [Interpretation] First of all, is it true that the Macedonian police did not allow humanitarian workers to come and extend assistance, whereas the latter were trying to come in?

A. Absolutely untrue. I know how the humanitarians worked. I know how our own Red Cross operated. It's not true.

Q. And is it true that you were trying to give assistance to people but you did not manage to cover everyone who needed it?

A. No. And you can see from the numbers of the work we performed, four medical teams were quite able to assist everyone who needed it.

Q. Were there some people who were simply left waiting, whose turn never came because you couldn't -- you didn't have enough time or resources?

A. Untrue.

Q. Then on the next page we have a subtitle, "Medical conditions." It says: "[In English] Despite the huge numbers of people in distress and suffering from serious medical conditions, medical aid was almost non-existent."

[Interpretation] Is this correct? So despite the huge numbers of people in distress, medical assistance was unavailable.

A. No. No.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic. Mr. Milosevic, I am addressing you. You don't have to use re-examination for this purpose, because the witness has already clearly disagreed with all the propositions put forward by the Prosecutor in relation to this information. You don't have -- there's nothing to rehabilitate this witness on. He has already ³⁶⁹⁰⁸ clearly disagreed, and we have taken note of that. You're now finished?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I haven't finished, Mr. Robinson. I am bearing in mind that there were various international agencies present, and Mr. Nice stressed that the people who were the authors of this even won the Nobel Prize. They reflected the status of Albanian refugees quite incorrectly and inaccurately, and it has to be stated here.

JUDGE ROBINSON: [Previous translation continues] ... against that is the witness's testimony that these reports constitute an affront to his country. The Chamber takes note of all of those bits and pieces of evidence. But I think we have spent a long time with this witness, and he need not have been here for this length of time.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I wish to ask the witness if it's true what it says on page 4 about access to refugees.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. "[In English] Representatives of the local Albanian refugee agency also told PHR that it had also experienced difficulty in obtaining permission to provide assistance to the refugees." [Interpretation] Is it true that some Albanian medical staff tried to assist the refugees and you didn't let them?

A. I didn't see any such humanitarian organisations, but I -- let me say again, there was not a single humanitarian organisation who was there, willing to help, and we didn't let them.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic --

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you, Mr. Aleksovski. ³⁶⁹⁰⁹

JUDGE ROBINSON: You're finished. Thanks. I was just going to say that the Chamber considered the admissibility of these documents, and we are not admitting any of the documents apart from the three photographs which speak for themselves.

We admit the three photographs minus the comments at the bottom.

THE REGISTRAR: That will be 829.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Aleksovski, that constitutes your testimony at the Tribunal. Thanks for coming to give it, and you may now leave.

MR. NICE: Two of the documents that came from the site of Dr. Stein have now been sourced to their original prime sites. The one -- that's the report --

JUDGE KWON: Excuse me, Mr. Nice. Whether the witness has left the original tab 1, whether he can leave that to the Tribunal or not. We have to find that out.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I think that they verified it's an original. I told you, our documents are designated for permanent filing. Anybody from our service can use the documents. Anybody who wants to use them can make copies, but I don't think I can leave the original with you.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Very well. Take the original with you.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I have the impression that there is a slight misunderstanding here. Can I just ask Dr. Aleksovski if he could let us have the original for a while so that it can be compared to the copy, after which we would return it. Maybe not today, after a delay, that you need to examine the original and compare it to the photocopies.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] If the Judges have any doubts as to ³⁶⁹¹⁰ the original or the photocopies, I can leave the original for a while, but sooner or later I have to bring it back. It belongs to the archives.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Well, the original then will, as I indicated earlier, be exhibited along with the tabs 1 and 2. They'll be under seal, and we will return the original as soon as possible, Doctor.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] If it is at all possible, I would really have to take it with me. It doesn't take long to check.

JUDGE BONOMY: You keep offering to let us have it and then changing your mind. Could you make your mind up, please.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I can provide it to you. I just don't understand how long you need it for, because I need to travel.

JUDGE KWON: The Registry is able to make a photocopy of it very promptly. There's no problem for you to take it back.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] All right. Fine. It's all right.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Very well, then. I think we understand each other now. So you may leave, and the original will be passed on to you after it has been copied. Arrangements will be made with the court deputy for that purpose.

MR. NICE: Your Honours, in response to Judge Kwon's sharp eyes and concern, the documents of Dr. Stein have been sourced as to two of them, the report of Ambassador Scheffer --

JUDGE ROBINSON: The witness may leave. I just want to make sure he understands that.

MR. NICE: Sorry. If I may carry on, making use of time. And the 5th of May document about Mary Robinson have been sourced respectively to ³⁶⁹¹¹ the State Department and United Nations web sites. The third one, the 1st of June advanced, unedited report has not yet been sourced to either of the two web sites, either UNHCR or HCHR -- or OHCHR. It may be the fact that there are two sites is one of the problems. Although it hasn't been sourced I can simply inform you that it is referred to in a BBC production I think for the same day as a report that was issued on that day, and it's also referred to in another government site. We'll carry on trying to find the original, but so far as we can see, it's a fair reflection of a report that was made even if we can't get it off the UN website.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you, Mr. Nice.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I think it really makes no sense for Mr. Nice -- it's really inappropriate for Mr. Nice to offer reports by an American ambassador at a time -- from the time when this ambassador's country was bombing Yugoslavia.

[The witness withdrew]

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, I stopped you because the comment is inappropriate. We have dealt with the matter. Your next witness, please.

MR. KAY: While we are just waiting for the witness, who obviously has to be brought here, just an administrative matter --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Let him call the witness. Before you call the witness, Judge Bonomy will give the Chamber's ³⁶⁹¹² ruling on those documents which the Prosecutor sought to produce through the witness Balevic.

JUDGE BONOMY: There are six items that the Chamber had to deal with, and we deny admission to three of them. Those are the document about the membership of Sloboda, the interview of Solevic quoted in Borba, and the extract from the Independent newspaper of September 1998 dealing with the rally at Nis. And we exhibit the clip of the video relating to the meeting on the 27th of April, 1987 - that's the meeting with the Kosovo Serbs - the extract from the book by Raif Dizdarevic, and the video clip showing the crowd at Gazimestan singing the Serbian anthem.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you, Judge Bonomy. Mr. Kay.

MR. KAY: It's just a quick matter. I've been asked by the Registrar to arrange an ex parte hearing before the Trial Chamber for 8.00 tomorrow. If that could be arranged with your legal officer.

JUDGE ROBINSON: We would have wished to be told to -- to what end?

MR. KAY: It's the matter concerning --

JUDGE ROBINSON: I know the matter that it concerns, but --

MR. KAY: It's a resolution.

JUDGE ROBINSON: It will be productive. Thanks.

MR. KAY: Oh, yes.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Tomorrow morning at 8.00. Tomorrow morning at 8.00. Yes. It will be ex parte.

MR. KAY: Yes. ^{36913 BLANK PAGE 36914}

[Trial Chamber confers]

JUDGE ROBINSON: We did have a procedure whereby, although ex parte, you had indicated that you wouldn't object to the accused coming if he wished to come.

MR. KAY: The matter doesn't -- the accused has shown no interest in the matter so it doesn't concern him.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.

MR. KAY: And it's not a matter for the Prosecution either, in our submission.

MR. NICE: The Prosecution attended on the last occasion at the invitation or the permission of the parties or the Court, I draw to your attention.

[Trial Chamber confers]

MR. KAY: You will be receiving a filing later on today so that you're fully briefed.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Very well, then. 8.00 tomorrow morning. Exhibit numbers for the last set of the Balevic documents. Three.

THE REGISTRAR: So it will run from 830 to 31, 32, 832.

JUDGE KWON: And as for the video clip, we admit it. The Chamber noted some insufficient translation but which were corrected during the testimony. That's why we admit it without any reservation.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Now your next witness, Mr. Milosevic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] My next witness is Mirko Babik. Babik is my next witness.

JUDGE KWON: Your schedule says Goran Stojcik is your next ³⁶⁹¹⁵ witness.

JUDGE ROBINSON: No microphone.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I'm saying this error in the schedule is of no particular significance, because we are dealing with three witnesses; Dr. Aleksovski, Stojcik, and Babik, all of them employed by the emergency medical centre, and their testimony is complementary.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Very well. Call the witness.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Then I'm calling Goran Stojcik.

[The witness entered court]

JUDGE ROBINSON: Let the witness make the declaration.

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

JUDGE ROBINSON: Please sit. And you may begin, Mr. Milosevic.

WITNESS: GORAN STOJCIK

[Witness answered through interpreter]

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you, Mr. Robinson. Examined by Mr. Milosevic:

Q. [Interpretation] Good afternoon, Mr. Stojcik.

A. Good afternoon.

Q. In order to be time efficient, I will cover several issues very quickly. I note the time.

Is it true that you completed your elementary school and secondary school in Skopje?

A. Yes.

Q. Where do you work presently and in what capacity? ³⁶⁹¹⁶

A. I currently work in the emergency medical service in Skopje as a driver.

Q. You are the driver of the emergency medical team?

A. Yes, the ambulance driver.

Q. And did you work in that capacity in Skopje during the NATO aggression on Yugoslavia?

A. Yes.

Q. Throughout the entire time?

A. Yes, throughout the entire time of the NATO aggression in Yugoslavia.

Q. Were you also on duty at a border crossing during that time; and if so, at which one? Were you also on duty in holding centres or camps; and if so, which ones?

A. I was present at the official border crossing in Donje Blace as well as in Stenkovac 1 and Stenkovac 2 camps.

Q. Mr. Stojcik, we have a map here showing this part of Macedonia. Would you please put it on the ELMO. The copy I have is better. Please take a pointer and show us the Donje Blace border crossing, the one that you were present at. Where was Stenkovac 1 and 2 camps located, and how far from Skopje?

You can find Skopje up in the northern section.

A. Well, right here --

JUDGE KWON: On the ELMO. Use your pointer, yes.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Very well. Here is where the official border crossing called Donje Blace is located. This is some 23 ³⁶⁹¹⁷ or 24 kilometres from the capital, Skopje.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Where were camps Stenkovac 1 and 2 located?

A. They were located six and a half kilometres from Skopje. They were some 500 metres from each other, in the directions of Blace.

Q. Please show us Tetovo.

A. Tetovo is some 40 kilometres from Skopje.

Q. In order to get to Tetovo, one must pass through Skopje.

A. Well, actually, going from the border to Skopje one must pass through Tetovo.

Q. Very well. You can now remove it from the ELMO because you have shown us everything we needed to see.

So you covered that route regularly. You were on duty at the border crossing as well as both camps, Stenkovac 1 and 2; is that right?

A. Yes.

Q. You were somebody who was on the ground, and as such you met with numerous Albanians who crossed into Macedonia; is that right?

A. Yes.

Q. Throughout that entire time that you spent there, did you see a single Albanian who had arrived from Kosovo injured?

A. No.

Q. Did you see anyone who had been beaten?

A. No.

Q. Did you see a single Albanian who had wounds inflicted by firearms or cold weapons? ³⁶⁹¹⁸

A. No.

Q. Did you see any foreign reporters, TV cameras, cameramen present at the border crossings?

A. Yes. There were many of them.

Q. Do you remember which TV crews were present, because you were there regularly. Were they near you?

A. Yes. They were very near our tents. And in the beginning of the NATO aggression on Yugoslavia, we immediately set up two tents at the official border crossing in Donje Blace. The camera crews were very near us. I think that these were crews from Turkey, Italy, BBC crews, CNN, many others. I can't enumerate them all.

Q. All right. Now, tell me, please, did you follow what was taking place there?

A. Yes. While I was there at work, I did follow.

Q. Did they film Albanians regardless of their age or were they selective in their approach?

A. There was some selective filming.

Q. What do you mean by "selective filming"?

A. When I say "selective filming," I mean that the children and the elderly were set apart and filmed.

Q. When you say that they did some things that were inappropriate for TV crews, what is it that you saw them doing?

A. Well, I was present there when an elderly man, some 65 years old, crossed the border crossing in Donje Blace. He had two children he held by the hand. And he came to the TV reporter who was there with his camera ³⁶⁹¹⁹ crew. They talked to the old man, and then the old man and the children retreated back some 50 metres and then re-entered but in a different light. The children cried loudly, screamed. It was an unimaginable sight.

Q. Very well. And these members of the TV crew, did they explain to the refugees what they needed to do in front of the cameras?

A. Yes. Before this scene was recorded, they had talked to them and stage managed the whole thing.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Where were these TV crews from, do you know?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] This was a renowned Western TV outlet.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Which one?

A. I would rather not answer.

Q. Why would you rather not answer?

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, you must answer. There's no legal reason for you not to answer.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, very well. I will tell you. The CNN was the most prominent there.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. In what way was it the most prominent?

A. Well, in stage managing, in setting up things that were to be filmed.

JUDGE BONOMY: What I would like to know is which organisation stage managed the particular incident which you've just described with the ³⁶⁹²⁰ elderly gentleman and the two children.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I did not understand your question quite.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Which TV crew stage managed that scene with the elderly man, the one that made the man re-enter with children crying?

A. I said clearly that that was CNN. CNN TV outlet.

Q. Did you see any other examples where it was obvious that the scene was prepared for the filming and where the participants were coached or given suggestions as to what they should do? Can you describe anything else?

A. Yes. I can describe an event which outraged me. In Blace, there was a holding centre on the left side, and people were gathering there between the highway and the Lepenac River. That was in the first days. I remember that they took a child and threw the child into the mud and then TV crews ran to the site and filmed that.

Q. And when the child was thrown into mud, it cried?

A. Yes, quite a lot, too.

Q. Did you see any other cases where the refugees were made to repeat the scene?

A. I was an eyewitness only in this case that I've already described to you. And as for others, I've heard things from my colleagues, and I can tell you about that if the Court will allow that.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Is there any need for the witness to state what he has heard from his colleagues, because the two cases that ³⁶⁹²¹ he described were the cases that he was an eyewitness to.

[Trial Chamber confers]

JUDGE ROBINSON: That's a matter for you, Mr. Milosevic.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. Do you have another case that you can quote that would be quite interesting in relation to the stage managing of the behaviour of refugees?

A. Yes. I know of another case which took place in the camps when the camps, Stenkovac 1 and 2, were set up. There was a group of young men, quite a lot of them, who took our ambulances without our permission, and they would go to the tents where a young man was moaning and was all bended down as though he had been injured. The TV crews came and filmed that, and as soon as the filming was over and the crews left, the young man jumped from the stretchers and all of them were quite happy and celebrating this event, and then they returned the stretchers back to us.

Q. All right. That was enough. Now, please tell us something about the behaviour of Albanian refugees in Skopje.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, may I just ask him a question about that.

That was a scene that you witnessed yourself? No? It was a scene of which you were told?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] What I just told you now is something I heard from my colleagues, whereas the first two cases that I told you first about were the cases that I saw with my own eyes.

JUDGE ROBINSON: When you witnessed these scenes which were ³⁶⁹²² staged, did you do anything? Did you say anything to the -- to those refugees who were -- who were acting out parts?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Your Honours, Mr. President, I would like to say that I was there in humanitarian capacity, providing assistance to the refugees. I had no authority to get into any discussion with them or to utter any comments. With all those security forces present, I don't think it would have been appropriate for a member of a medical team to say something or comment.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Very well. Mr. Milosevic.

MR. MILOSEVIC: [Interpretation]

Q. What was the behaviour of the Albanian refugees from Kosovo in Skopje? What was their conduct like there?

A. Some of them came from rural areas, some came from urban areas. Those who had money initially were transferred into the city. They had relatives in Skopje. Some of them rented out rooms, some went to hotels, depending on how much money they had. And I can tell you openly that they had a good time.

Q. That means that there were enough of them who had sufficient money to put themselves up in hotels and to go around town and act like any other citizens would; is that right?

A. Yes.

Q. Did you have occasion to observe whether they had IDs on them, money, mobile phones, weapons, or anything else, anything else you noticed and would like to tell us about now?

A. Well, as I saw the situation when I was present, I could see that ³⁶⁹²³ those who were in the camps had money because they bought cigarettes. Taxis -- taxi drivers from Skopje would bring cigarettes for them every day. Later on, kiosks were set up where they could buy things. As for mobile phones, I can tell you that some individuals had two or three mobile phones on them. There were some who were dressed quite well, I could even say extravagantly dressed. There were young people there with Walkmans and pets.

As for documents, I couldn't say anything, because all those who came to seek medical assistance in our infirmaries and so on, this is something that our medical staff can tell you more about because they have everything recorded in medical documentation.

Q. Did you see or do you know whether any of them were armed? Did you see any such cases?

A. I personally didn't.

Q. Among those refugees from Kosovo, in addition to Albanians, there were also the Roma there. Did you see the Roma there?

A. Yes. There were many of them. But from the border crossing, from the very border crossing, the Roma would go to a different area because there was some animosity from the very beginning there. The food that was distributed would be given to Albanians to distribute among themselves, and then one Roma man came, and I don't know how he managed to come out, but he came and complained about the fact that the food did not reach them at all.

The animosity escalated to such a level that in Stenkovac, somebody was almost lynched. And were it not for security forces and the ^{36924 BLANK PAGE 36925} German Red Cross, some Roma people would have been lynched.

Q. Were the Roma separated from the Albanians later on to try and protect them?

A. The Roma were separated, and they were put up near Skopje in collective centres, and I think most of them were put up around Saraj [phoen], which is a picnic spot, an excursion spot called Cicino Selo. And another portion were put up in collection centres at Vodna [phoen]. I think it was called Dare Bombol. And I think they were also put up in another centre, a youth holiday hostel, I think it was, in the village of Ljubote.

And let me also say that those refugees are living in our country to the present day, and we still engage in humanitarian drives involving them.

Q. So they didn't return to Kosovo?

A. No. Their return, according to what they said, was conditioned on the fact that they should either be called Egyptians or -- anyway, they couldn't return.

Q. Now, we have heard here that Albanians refused to take -- to eat bread from Skopje and asked that they be given bread from Tetovo, baked in Tetovo, and that the same thing happened with other foodstuffs. Now, you were a driver. Is it true that they asked to be driven to hospital in Tetovo instead of hospitals in Skopje, for example? Do you have any knowledge about that? Do you know anything about that?

A. At the beginning, they were well-received. There was no problems in the collection centres or holding centres. And once the camps were ³⁶⁹²⁶ established, Stenkovac 1 and Stenkovac 2, their conduct and behaviour changed. And as I say, the bread that we took to them from our company, the Zutolux company, bakery from Skopje, they refused to eat and asked that they be brought bread from the bakery in Tetovo, for example.

Q. And Tetovo is an Albanian majority population; is that right?

A. Yes. 90 per cent of the inhabitants of Tetovo are Albanians.

Q. Tell me this: Did you ever have a chance of talking to any Albanians and to the Albanian refugees, in fact, to hear why they had left Kosovo in the first place and fled to Macedonia? And did you have a chance to talk to the Roma refugees, perhaps, as well with respect to that same question, that is to say, to hear why they had left Kosovo and came to Macedonia?

A. Yes, I did have a chance to do that. From the very first day the bombing of Yugoslavia started, the first refugees who entered Macedonia, well, we were curious and we asked what was going on there and why they were fleeing, what problems they were encountering. In those first days they said, well, you would try to escape too if bombs were falling on your heads. But after they had been moved to the camps, that is to say Stenkovac 1 and 2, this situation changed.

Q. How do you mean "changed"?

A. Well, it changed in the sense that they said that they were -- had been abused, that they had been expelled and things like that.

Q. So was that the story that became the general account that was given afterwards?

A. Yes. They had a radical change of opinion or change of account ³⁶⁹²⁷ after some two weeks.

Q. Thank you, Mr. Stojcik, I have no further questions for you.

A. You're welcome.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Thank you, Mr. Robinson, too.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice. The map. Yes, the map is admitted. Exhibit number?

THE REGISTRAR: That will be D282.

JUDGE ROBINSON: D282. Mr. Nice.

MR. NICE: Just a couple of questions because I'm obviously not here to defend CNN and I was given no advance notice of any kind that this sort of evidence was going to be given.

Cross-examined by Mr. Nice:

Q. But perhaps you can help us with this Mr. Stojcik: The CNN news crew, did it include any identifiable or famous newscaster that we can ask about what you're saying?

A. Mr. Nice, I didn't want to mention names. However, I will tell you that it was Mrs. or Miss -- I hope she doesn't mind -- Christiane Amanpour was there throughout the time. She was there all the time.

Q. I just want to know so we can explore or get CNN to react, if they want to. Are you saying that she set up one of these two scenes? If so, which one? Just so I can --

A. Mr. Nice, I didn't say that she, that Madam Christiane Amanpour set it up, I said she was present there throughout the crisis. You had asked me whether I could identify anybody, as far as I understood the question. ³⁶⁹²⁸

Q. I just want to know who set up the scene with the child thrown in the mud, and who set up the scene of the man and the children? Because we'll give them a chance to react to it, you see. I have no view one way or the other on this. It's not important to us. Who set the scenes up?

A. Well, I said it's like this: I said that it was the CNN crew. Now, which individuals, which people, I don't know, I don't know them and I never had occasion to be introduced to any of them, meet any of them except for that lady. I know her, and other people said that that was her name and surname. So if you want to investigate this case you could do that easily. You could go to Macedonian Television, the state television station, a private television station. It was peak time bulletins. People were able to see them, and they were affronted to see it all, and then you could ask them who the people in question actually were.

Q. You obviously made no complaint or observation to CNN yourself about what you'd seen.

A. Well, Mr. Nice, I was not paid to complain one way or another for people filming or not. I was paid to see to the patients if they should come to us, and deal with the health problems, and if somebody needed to be driven off and transported to hospital to do that.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, do you really need to interrupt?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Well, I'm interrupting. The witness is speaking -- is saying some words in Macedonian. He said, "I wasn't 'pracen'." The word was "pracen," and it was interpreted "placen." "Pracen" means sent there. What he means is he wasn't sent there to deal with things like that. He was sent there to drive, rather than paid ³⁶⁹²⁹ there. And it says --

THE INTERPRETER: The interpreter agrees. The interpreter thought he said "placen" with an L and not "pracen" with an R.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] And he was sent there in that capacity.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you for the correction. The interpreter agrees.

MR. NICE:

Q. You've told us about two other things. You've told us about the German Red Cross being present. Were there lots of other Red Cross organisations from other countries there as well as the German? Which other Red Crosses?

A. Well, what I could say is that -- I apologise. There was an Israeli hospital and a French hospital, and they were put up in the Stenkovac 1 camp, whereas the German Red Cross was put up in the Stenkovac 2 camp.

And another piece of information, since you're asking me about those hospitals, I can tell you this: I think the Israelis came, and two or three days later they -- people left the camp, took up all their equipment and left.

Q. Finally this: You've told us about a change in the accounts that were given by refugees from leaving because of the bombs and leaving because of what happened to them at the hands of the police and the army. That change occurred before the end of March, before the 1st of April?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson, the witness -- there ³⁶⁹³⁰ must have been a slip of the tongue on the part of the interpreter. It said before the end of May, whereas on the transcript I can see that it says before the end of March. It says March in the transcript and I heard the interpreter say May, before the end of May, which is the interpretation received by the witness.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you.

MR. NICE:

Q. Am I right, the change in accounts, according to your evidence, happens before the 1st of April?

A. I said that the people had one opinion at the beginning of the bombing, and I'm talking about the 24th of March, and then that they changed their opinion once they had been accommodated in the camps Stenkovac 1 and 2.

Q. Are you saying that you spoke to the same people or are we dealing with different people? Because -- I'll come back to that question. We've got evidence from, for example, the United Nations Commissioner for Refugees - that's Neill Wright, as Your Honours were recall - about the flow of refugees starting about the 5th of April, and the question to you is this: The large number of movements into Macedonia started only in April, didn't it? Trains depositing thousands of people at the border.

A. Mr. Nice, the trains you mentioned I myself was not able to see, nor did I know whether people came in trains or on foot or in some organised manner. I told you that the most massive wave was between the 27th of March until the 4th of April. This wave of people coming in on the night between the 5th and 6th, these people were transferred to the ³⁶⁹³¹ camps.

MR. NICE: Your Honour, I'm not going to take it any further. It may be I'll have a CNN clip, either arising from what he said or indeed of our own, which may or may not be of interest but I can't deal with it without knowing that the witness was going to say what he said.

JUDGE KWON: Mr. Stojcik, can I ask you how old you are now?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I was born in 1969.

JUDGE KWON: Thank you.

JUDGE ROBINSON: He looks younger than that. Mr. Stojcik, that concludes your testimony. Thank you for coming to give it, and you may now leave.

We are going to adjourn, in any event. We will adjourn until tomorrow at 9.00 a.m.

[The witness withdrew]

--- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 1.44 p.m., to be reconvened on Wednesday, the 2nd day of

March, 2005, at 9.00 a.m.