⁴⁰⁴²⁹

Monday, 6 June 2005

[Open session]

[The accused entered court]

[The witness entered court]

--- Upon commencing at 9.02 a.m.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice, you may continue.

WITNESS: OBRAD STEVANOVIC [Resumed]

[Witness answered through interpreter] Cross-examined by Mr. Nice: [Continued]

Q. Mr. Stevanovic, last week you had access to documents and photographs in order to consider or reconsider the position about certain things. So far as the documents are concerned showing the presence of MUP/Skorpions in the area of Srebrenica and Jahorina at the time of the Srebrenica massacre, what's the position?

A. Do you want me to answer the obligation I had taken with respect to checking out some of the data?

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... know whether you are now in a position to accept that the documents are what they purport to be.

A. No, I'm not in a position to accept that those documents show that the members of the group that we saw on the photograph at that time belonged to the Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Serbia.

Q. Let's deal with it in smaller topics. Forget for the time being the video. Just focus, please, on the documents that you were inclined to challenge, documents that showed presence of MUP or Skorpions in the area of Srebrenica, Jahorina. ⁴⁰⁴³⁰ Are you now able to accept that those documents are genuine and -- well, are you now in a position to accept that those documents are genuine?

A. You must tell me what documents you mean.

Q. My understanding is that you were given access to by the Court certain challenged documents, because I checked that last week and I understood you were -- had already been provided with them. Do you remember the documents with which you were provided?

A. Yes. Now things are clearer, of course.

Q. Well, have you been able to check on the -- on those documents?

A. Well, on the last day of my testimony I did manage to contact certain persons in the Ministry of the Interior, and on that day I sent them a fax of the documents that I took over, and I have information as of yesterday that during the course of the day today I would be receiving certain information with respect to three written documents which I sent out to them.

I do believe that the Tribunal knows and that you know that with respect to the photograph and the individuals showed on the overhead projector, that steps have been taken --

Q. I'll come to that in a second. I want to deal with things separately. So that we can forecast receiving sometime today an answer by the government on the three documents that you forwarded to them that apparently reveal the presence of MUP or Skorpions at the area of Srebrenica in the July of 1995.

A. I do not question, Mr. Prosecutor, the presence of the Skorpions ⁴⁰⁴³¹ that you showed in Srebrenica. All I am challenging is, and I'm definitely challenging that, that they belonged to the sector of public security. Now, whether they belonged to some other sector of the Ministry of the Interior I said that I had absolutely no knowledge of any of that.

Q. Well, staying with the documents, we're not thinking about or talking about the video yet, is your answer that you do not question the presence of Skorpions in Srebrenica, is that different from or the same as the evidence you gave last week?

A. I am not bringing into question the presence of those persons from the photograph at the location that we saw, but I did not see nor do I have any proof or evidence that it was indeed those --

Q. Sorry if my questions aren't clear but I'm going to keep you on the track I wish, if you would be so good. You were asked, before you were shown the video, questions about documents. The documents showed the presence of Skorpions or MUP in Srebrenica. You challenged those documents. And unless my recollection is entirely false, you did not accept, on the basis of the documents, that Skorpions were present. Now, have you changed your mind? Have you changed your position, please? And, if so, why?

A. I have not in any sense changed my mind with respect to the fact that the Skorpions, according to your statement, belonged to the Ministry of the Interior. So in that sense, I have not changed my mind in any way.

Q. I think you knew what I was getting at, Mr. Stevanovic. Have you changed your position on whether Skorpions were present in the Srebrenica in July of 1995? ⁴⁰⁴³²

A. Let me repeat: I do not exclude the possibility of the fact that members of that group were there, but I do exclude the possibility that they in any way belonged to the sector of public security of the Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Serbia.

Q. To that I will return. Now, let's turn to the second topic, the video. It may be everyone in court knows this, but for the sake of the record it's as well that I explain something you can confirm. Following the playing of a small part of the video here and the request to you to identify individuals, it happened that either a full version of what would appear to be the same tape or very much more, a very much longer version of the same tape, was played on television in Serbia; correct?

A. I do know that some of the tape was shown, but I don't know how much. I thought that what was shown there is the same footage that was shown here.

Q. And as a result of the showing of that footage in Serbia by an agency entirely different from the Office of the Prosecutor, nothing to do with us, victims were identified and perpetrators or alleged perpetrators were arrested, weren't they?

A. I have that information from the information media in Serbian.

Q. And as many as ten people were arrested within hours, four of them being -- I think something like four of them being detained in custody.

A. I have information about the first part of your observation, that eight to ten alleged members of the unit that were shown on the footage were arrested. ⁴⁰⁴³³

Q. Help me as a former active policeman and present employee of the

MUP: How was it possible, do you know, for these men who you say had nothing to do with the MUP to be arrested within hours of that broadcast of a larger portion of the tape?

A. Well, it is difficult to answer that question, but I have given it a great deal of thought about everything that happened here, and it is quite certain that while I was an active duty assistant minister of the interior that had we had footage of that kind we would have taken urgent measures to uncover those individuals and arrest them, and I do believe that the Ministry of the Interior, starting out from the video footage and probably because they had some information before that, reacted in the way they did; urgently. And that is quite normal and natural for that kind of reaction faced with a case of that kind. The only question is whether the results are good enough, and I think that at this point in time they indeed are.

Q. Do you now accept that the video we saw last week in part and of which you have had the photographs and names provided, or proposed names provided, do you now accept that that shows a group known as the Skorpions killing people taken from Srebrenica?

A. I did not have any reason to doubt what you said and what you showed us. I, of course, really did not see any insignia or signs there on the basis of which I would be able to claim that it was that particular group, but I believe what you said, and I believe what you showed. But I continue to maintain that they certainly did not belong to the Ministry of the Interior or, rather, specifically, the public security sector of the ⁴⁰⁴³⁴ MUP.

Q. Very well. As a result of having the stills from the video with the proposed names, have you been able to make any inquiries so as to tell us one way or another whether the names provided to you were or were not members of the MUP at the time?

A. The names from the video and the stills I did not send to Belgrade because before I decided to send them I received information that the group had already been arrested. So my interests with regard to the group, despite the obligation that I took upon myself, would not have been professionally in proper order because in a way I could have influenced steps with respect to the investigation. I assume that you will be able to receive that information from the ministry. Very simply, I decided on three documents containing the 11 names that we discussed that I send that out and during the course of the day today I expect to receive feedback information as to what has been asserted up until now, and when I do receive that information I will send it in to the Registry or the people in the Registry in the Tribunal who communicate with me.

Q. Turn to your suggestion that the Skorpions were not subordinated to the MUP. Will you take, please, tab 151 in volume 4. This is a document for which we do have a translation, and to remind the Court, if we look at the English translation and if the witness looks at the original for tab 151, we'll see this relates to crime reported by an employee of the Podujevo OUP which is -- OUP is still part of the MUP, isn't it, Mr. Stevanovic?

A. Yes, it is part of the Secretariat of the Interior in Pristina. ⁴⁰⁴³⁵

Q. Thank you.

A. And of course the Ministry of the Interior as well.

Q. So this person reported several bodies in Rahmana Morine Street. There was on-site investigation.

A. Yes. I do know about that case.

Q. Nineteen bodies, and included amongst them children, women, and so on. And we see at the bottom that the criminal report was submitted for this incident against known perpetrators Sasa Cvjetan and Dejan Demirovic; correct?

A. Yes, I've already said that during the examination so far.

Q. And these men were shown to be members of the reserve force of the Republic of Serbia, SAJ, and without any doubt that is a unit that is under your part of the police, as you confirmed that last week.

A. That's right. It is a unit which came under the public security sector. At one period of time it was outside the sector, but I think during the period -- the material time it was within the sector.

MR. NICE: Your Honour, just give me a minute.

Q. Now, these men were two of the men eventually prosecuted for crimes, and I'm going to look at the overall statistics for prosecutions with you a little later. I'm dealing with this point now because of its connection to Skorpions.

A. Yes. I also, in reading the papers yesterday, heard that these people who were arrested and against whom a criminal report was filed do have something to do with the Skorpions.

Q. All right. Which people arrested? ⁴⁰⁴³⁶

A. Well, the two men against whom the criminal report was filed, who had been arrested previously.

Q. You're ahead of me, aren't you, Mr. Stevanovic, because you know that your account of Skorpions not being subordinated is dishonest, and you're leading with a defence to what you know is coming.

A. No, that's not true. All I'm doing is --

Q. What did you do over the weekend, pray help us, that suddenly drew to your attention that these two men, Cvjetan and his colleague, clearly subordinated to the MUP through the SAJ, were also connected to the Skorpions? What is it that drew that to your attention over the weekend?

A. Well, that's quite simple. I read the papers. I have them in my room. I can bring them in here. And I didn't read any documents.

Q. Which paper of yours shows, please, that Cvjetan and his colleague were members of Skorpions? We see from your papers that they were members of reserve MUP and SAJ -- or subordinated to the SAJ, but which document shows they were Skorpions?

A. Well, that's what I want to explain to you. I said quite clearly that from the information media, I learnt that these people had something to do with the Skorpions, but of course I didn't explain the rest. You have to ask me or you have to give me more time to answer. As I was saying, I received information that they did have something to do. At that point in time I cannot confirm or refute that information, but I still stand by --

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... you can help us as much as you can, but we're going to look at it logically. So -- ⁴⁰⁴³⁷

A. Of course.

Q. -- "information media" and "I received information." I want you to tell us precisely what you received over the weekend that told you that these men were members of the Skorpions.

A. All I can do is to bring in the papers that I read you. I'm talking about the news where there is sporadic mention of the fact that these two men against whom a criminal report was filed belonged to the Skorpions. I claim, and I still claim, everything that I said before; that these two men belonged to the reserve force of the special anti-terrorist unit and they could not have belonged to any kind of paramilitary group. They were only as individuals members of the reserve force of that unit.

JUDGE ROBINSON: General --

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] And quite possibly --

JUDGE ROBINSON: What was the date of the report that you read? When was that newspaper published?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] It is yesterday's papers or the day before. They are papers in Serbian, and they carry certain comments in Serbia with respect to the events we saw on the footage. And with respect to those events, they bring that group in connection with this crime that we have a document on here and the case here in the tab before us.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Nice.

MR. NICE:

Q. I'm not in a position to accept or reject at the moment, although I will of course check it, I'm not in a position to accept or reject ⁴⁰⁴³⁸ whether newspapers over this last weekend revived memories of the trial of Cvjetan and his colleague showing them to be Skorpions, but we will now look at two short contemporary records of their trial. If we can make these available, please, from Vreme. This is from Vreme on the 25th of December, 2003, and two passages translated. The first passage I'd like you to look at can be found on page 24 at the bottom, as it's given, 25. Thank you. And it reads as follows: "The crime on 7 Rahmana Morine Street, occurred on March 28th, 1999, only four days after the ... bombing... That day, a group of Special Forces - Skorpions (compiled from veterans from the wars in Bosnia and Croatia) as part of the SAJ ... was directed towards the city." It goes on, does the report, to say: "Even though the court is still deciding over the specific of what really happened after the Skorpions entered Podujevo, today the following is clear: Commander of the unit, Slobodan Medic Boca, left for a meeting in the town, and he ordered his soldiers to wait in the buses until he came back, yet the soldiers did not listen to him, they left the buses in groups and they dispersed around the surrounding houses, apparently looking for a place to stay, however, in their apparent search for a place to stay, they also robbed stores, searched citizens who they met on the streets, or within their homes, took their belongings ... Soon after one of the Skorpion groups entered a house full of civilians on Rahmana Morine Street, gunshots was heard, and in the yard of the house there was a pile of bodies in the courtyard. Immediately following the incident, Commander Boca arrived and spoke '... I cannot even leave you for a minute without ^{40439 BLANK PAGE 40440} you --'" and his view is expressed in vulgar terms. "He ordered the Skorpions back onto the buses, while one of the units was returned to Serbia ..."

Does that accord with your recollection of how the trial was presented against the two men?

A. I do not have any recollection of what happened at the trial of these people. Some of the elements and details here can be read in the newspapers, and since you're interested, I'm going to bring in the newspaper that I read and then you'll be able to see that what I'm telling you is quite correct. But let me put it this way: I never had, up until yesterday, information that there was a group of Skorpions over there. I never until yesterday, or the day before, rather, had any knowledge of the fact that Boca was there, but what I want to state here, if you allow me, of course, some important things, because I'm worried that if I answer briefly I'm not going to be able to give you all the important information I wish to give you.

It is a question of the reserve force, and within the force -- they can be included in the police force as individuals. At this point in time, I don't wish to challenge the possibility that after the war, in 1996, somebody, some of the members of those units, did join the reserve force pursuant to the provisions and law governing those -- that procedure. But I claim at that time within the ministry there could not have been any alien foreign unit from any previous war as a formation, as a unit per se. Some members of different formations and units, individuals, could have joined the reserve police force, or any unit, and ⁴⁰⁴⁴¹ that question is settled at a tactical level, decided at a tactical level. It is not a question which is decided upon at a medium level and particularly not a strategic level.

Of course at this point in time let me repeat: I cannot confirm or refute that. These are newspaper articles. There is no reason for me to doubt them but I do doubt quite certainly that they weren't interpreted -- the facts weren't interpreted in the proper way, although we can see clearly here we're dealing with a reserve force, and let me repeat: You cannot have a unit join a reserve force. You can have individuals join reserve forces if they fulfil provisions and conditions provided by law. If a unit were -- could enter, I don't know of any case like that where a unit became part of the reserve force.

Q. If I cut you too short too early you must ask for leave to conclude.

A. Thank you.

Q. But two immediate points arise before we press on. We're going to discover that it was about two or three, four or five or six MUP policemen in all prosecuted for anything. You, in 1999, were in charge in Kosovo to a large degree, and you're still in the MUP in 2003 when this trial happened. Are you telling us the truth when you say you have no recollection of this trial of people said to be subordinated to the SAJ committing these appalling crimes? Are you saying you have no recollection of that crime until the weekend? I see.

A. Absolutely that's not what I'm saying.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... in 2003, not looking at ⁴⁰⁴⁴² television, not reading newspapers, not talking to your colleagues? How could you be so ignorant, Mr. Stevanovic?

JUDGE BONOMY: Mr. Nice, the transcript says, "Absolutely that's not what I'm saying," so I'm a bit confused about the answer to that question.

MR. NICE:

Q. Did you have any knowledge of this trial -- do you have any recollection of this trial until you read newspapers over the weekend?

A. Of course I'm familiar with the trial. I have said that the trial is under way in Serbia. On one of the earlier days I said that. But you are suggesting an answer to me to confuse me. I said several times that I know about these events ever since it happened. I know that the same minute the members of the group who were suspected of committing this act were returned to Serbia. The same minute. And I said the investigation started immediately. It was conducted urgently. The criminal report was filed several days later. Perpetrators were identified several days later. They were arrested in Novi Sad. Mr. Prosecutor, to me as assistant minister, those issues were of interest. As assistant minister I cannot deal with the CVs of 25.000 policemen and several thousand reservists. So I do not know their CVs, but I know everything that is written in the criminal report and I followed the trial, but I claim still that I did not make the link between the accused and the Skorpions. I have already said all of this at least twice.

JUDGE BONOMY: Can I ask a question here, Mr. Nice, or would that be disturbing the cross-examination? ⁴⁰⁴⁴³

MR. NICE: No, not at all, Your Honour. I'll be only too happy.

JUDGE BONOMY: Does it follow from that, Mr. Stevanovic, that your understanding was that these officers who were arrested were part of the public security section of the MUP?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Yes.

JUDGE BONOMY: And does it also follow from that that Boca was therefore part of the public security section of the MUP?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That obviously follows if he was there.

JUDGE BONOMY: Okay. And does it therefore also follow that the public security sector of the MUP were responsible for what would appear to have been a massacre in Rahmana Morine Street?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] That is not in dispute. That massacre was perpetrated by members of the public security of the MUP of Serbia.

JUDGE BONOMY: Thank you.

MR. NICE:

Q. We've had evidence in this Court from a man called Milan Milanovic or Mrgud, and I believe it was all in open session and I'll be corrected if any part of it was not, revealing that Medic agreed in answer to a request for troops to go to Kosovo in early 1999 with some 150 men from Novi Sad. Do you remember that happening?

A. I absolutely don't remember. I don't remember any discussions with that Mr. Medic. I told you when I saw him on what occasion and for what reason. I don't know where he was later, nor did I have any contact ⁴⁰⁴⁴⁴ nor do I know that anybody from the MUP was in touch with him.

Q. How could it be, with you in your very senior position and your -- with your -- with access to the information at the meetings you attended, how could it be that 150 men under Medic, a very well-known man, could be sent to help in Kosovo without your knowing? How could that happen?

A. If 150 men were -- from such a group were really sent to Kosovo, then it would be really incredible for me not to know but you may rest assured that I really don't know. First of all, I don't know that 150 men were sent. All I know is what is written in the criminal report and partially what you've just read, but I don't know the link between the perpetrators of this crime and the Skorpions group.

Q. Well, do you remember this, then: That after the commission of this appalling crime the Medic group was withdrawn from Kosovo?

A. I know very well that a group of reservists of a special anti-terrorist unit which was suspected at the time of committing this crime was returned from Kosovo the same moment, the same moment, literally half an hour later. We were all informed about this, and our unanimous position was that the suspects have to be returned from Kosovo immediately and an investigation started, and that's what happened. And in my opinion, that was the important thing; to prevent further crimes, to identify perpetrators, to file a criminal report, for them to be arrested, and that was done.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... please, this, the most -- what role did General Vlastimir Djordjevic hold in Kosovo in the period of March to June of 1999? ⁴⁰⁴⁴⁵

A. He remained in his position. He used to be head of the public security sector, and he's had the normal powers that you have in peacetime --

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. -- as head of that sector.

Q. Was he subordinate to you, parallel to you, superior to you? Help us.

A. No, he was not subordinate to me. But at that time, you could say that he was not my superior either. We were both in the public security sector but we were both assistant ministers. And in 1998 and 1999, I received my orders directly from the minister and so did he. So you could say that we were both in parallel subordinated to the minister.

Q. Did you and Djordjevic trust each other?

A. Well, in principle, yes.

Q. Did he ever keep things from you, General Djordjevic?

A. I don't know that. I don't know whether he kept anything from me. All I know is what he told me. I don't know if there is anything that he didn't tell me.

Q. Because you would need to know --

A. There's always probably something that people don't say.

Q. There could be no reason for Djordjevic to keep back from you his access to reinforcements or his deployment of reinforcements in Kosovo, could there?

A. I don't think he kept back anything. Reinforcements for Kosovo were a matter of course. I cannot claim that I knew everything, but I ⁴⁰⁴⁴⁶ knew, generally speaking, all about reinforcements and withdrawals from Kosovo.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... with this: The same witness tells us that a couple of weeks after the Skorpions were withdrawn, Djordjevic had them brought back. What do you say to that? It can be found on transcript pages 27830, thereabouts.

A. I don't know anything about that. I know very well, though, that several police units were in Kosovo at the time, all special units, the special anti-terrorist unit, and the SAJ. So if anyone from the reserve force of the special anti-terrorist unit was in Kosovo, that would have been normal. But I don't know that anyone from the Skorpions group was brought back to Kosovo because, and I'm saying this again, if in a special unit there was a reservist who was a member of the Skorpions from the Republic of Serbian Krajina, then it might have been only a result of his selection in keeping with the regular procedure, but the whole unit could not have been made part of the reserve force. The reserve force is a combination of individuals, not units. For them to be returned to Kosovo the decision of the minister would have been necessary, and I don't know about any such decision of the minister.

MR. NICE: Could we have a private session for a couple of minutes, please.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Private session.

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[Open session]

MR. NICE:

Q. Can we please then look, the last point, the same article ⁴⁰⁴⁴⁸ detailing the trial of Cvjetan, which is at page 25 for you, "The Guardians of the Oil," where Medic gave an account. See whether this helps you at all one way or the other.

"Slobodan Medic Boca, commander of Skorpions, spoke in the court about the history of his unit, but his statements on that subject sometimes were somewhat different. During the court appearance on the 28th of March, 2003, he stated: 'The Skorpion units were formed in 1991 as part of the Yugoslav army (sic!) as a regular unit. They operated in the region of Bosnia and Croatia. After the end of war operations in Bosnia and Croatia, they were transferred to Serbia and the men discharged. The core of the unit was preserved in accordance to the rules and in accordance to the instructions we received in order to provide that the men could have a normal life.' A few months later, on December the 5th, Commander Boca replied to the same question with the following answer: 'The Skorpion units were created on May 1992 in order to protect "Oil Industries of Krajina" and they stayed in that capacity from 1992-1996. Afterwards, because I demanded that my unit be part of MUP Serbia, the Skorpions became part of the reserve composition of Special Anti-terrorist Units of MUP Serbia.' By the way, it is well known that oil wells in East Slavonia were quite profitable source of income for the president of RSK Goran Hadzic and the deceased ... Arkan." Are you in a position to help us with any part of what Medic said, as to whether it's either true or false? First of all, the history of being part of the army. Do you remember its being part of the army?

A. I can only repeat what I have already said: All I know about them ⁴⁰⁴⁴⁹ I know because in 1995, in the second half of 1995, I visited Eastern Slavonia. I ran into the man by accident two or three times maybe, and I believed then that they belonged to the army of the Republic of Serbian Krajina or perhaps the police. I don't know any of the rest. I don't know when they were established, what he was doing. I don't know what happened with them after the withdrawal from -- of the army and the police from Eastern Slavonia. I don't know that he asked to be admitted into the reserve force of the MUP of Serbia. I don't know whether any of them were indeed transferred or admitted, but it seems incredible to me that they could have been admitted as a unit. It is something not envisaged by the law. Not even the head of the sector could have made a decision to allow them to do that. And of course the minister can decide such things and doesn't have to inform me, but I would normally know about such a decision because such a decision would be against the law. The law says that an individual who meets the requirements may be admitted into the reserve force, and that is done at the level of every unit. In order to admit an individual, a high level decision is not necessary.

Q. My final suggestion to you on the Skorpions and Slobodan Medic certainly at this stage is that, Mr. Stevanovic, you have been less than frank with this Court from the first time I mentioned the Skorpions and Medic, and you have been forced to make such concessions as you have by evidence that you see to be irresistible. Isn't that the truth?

A. That is not correct, Mr. Prosecutor. You seem to be linking me with everything bad that happened in the territory of the former ^{40450 BLANK PAGE 40451} Yugoslavia. I would really appreciate it if you would spare me from such qualifications. And I'm telling you, I have nothing to do with the Skorpions, and I know with the passage of time that will become clear, and I will still be here and we can confront this again. I understand you need to compromise me, and I understand the position of this Court, but I would really hate it to be put into -- to be linked with everything evil and bad that happened in the former Yugoslavia.

Q. I must turn to another topic, and the topics won't be in particular order but they have to be taken in the order I take them for various reasons, and I'm going to turn to Racak. If Mr. Nort would be good enough to get the plans lying on the wall over there. It may need an easel. And we'll turn briefly to Racak. You explained to us last week that you had basically no detailed knowledge of Racak at all. Do you remember that?

A. I have explained already that I wasn't there on the spot. I really never went to Racak. I also explained that at the time of the event, I wasn't in Kosovo, I was in Belgrade, and most of my information comes from official documentation and from reports received by the ministry from the staff in the SUP in Urosevac.

Q. Even on the basis of having read the material, you had limited knowledge of what happened at Racak, as I understood it; correct?

A. It is true that I did not have complete information. Of course I would have had more information had I been there, but I read the case file on Racak and I have seen most of the documents. ⁴⁰⁴⁵²

Q. And you understood those who died to have died -- are said to have been attacked as a group or to have been attacking as a group and been defeated as a group, with their weapons taken from them where they fell. Would that be about right?

A. First of all, I didn't understand that they were attacked, and I have tried to explain what my understanding was several times. The police were attacked from Racak when they tried to perform their legitimate job and achieve a legitimate goal. It is because of the attack from Racak that armed combat ensued.

All that I know about it indicates that all those who died died because of the legitimate use of weapons by the police.

Q. Now, because you weren't able to help us with the plan, I'm showing for you, and you can take a moment or so to familiarise yourself with it, an aerial which has been marked. I -- don't worry too much with the English on the left. I'll interpret that for you as necessary.

MR. NICE: If the camera could possibly be focused on the plan, I'd be grateful because I can't see it quite well enough from this distance to read it.

Q. Are you aware yourself at all as to where the main body of dead people were found, Mr. Stevanovic?

A. I don't know exactly all the locations where bodies were found, but I remember the scenes from the mosque where the bodies were gathered, and I remember part of the external examination and maybe part of the post-mortem was performed, but I don't know where the bodies were before the mosque. ⁴⁰⁴⁵³

Q. If you look at the map before you, number 5, which you can see there, marks what's called a gully where a very large number of people were found dead, 20. Did you know about 20 people or did your reading lead you to learn about 20-odd people found dead in a gully?

A. Yes. I remember some photographs related to that gully.

Q. Here's two photographs I'd like you to look at. We'll place on the overhead projector. Just lay these two photographs on the overhead projector, please.

First of all, these are from Exhibit 156, tab 5. These, you see -- we can now put first of all the first photograph on the overhead projector. Look at that. That shows one of the bodies found in the gully.

Next photograph, Mr. Nort. That shows the head of the same body with the bullet wound beside the neck. Do you have enough experience as a policeman to know what that sort of wound indicates?

A. I can tell you something, but with a reservation that I'm not an expert pathologist and that I'm not a criminal investigation policeman; I'm a policeman in general terms.

The general comment I would make is that this is an exit and -- entry and exit wound, and all I know about such traces is what I learnt at criminology classes at school --

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. -- but I cannot tell you anything further about what that means.

Q. I'm only going to ask you a few questions to see if you can help ⁴⁰⁴⁵⁴ us. If you'd look on the map again, if we could see that. You'll see that -- you'll see round and about number 5 there are lots of other places marked. You can see 4, 3, 2, 1. And you will know from the area that the distances between 4 and 5 or 3 and 5 is quite substantial. We're not dealing with a few metres, we're dealing with considerable distances. And so can you find the one that -- see number 3 and 3/7? Can we just lay these three documents on the overhead projector so that you can understand the evidence before I ask you a question.

First of all, the title page, please, Mr. Nort for scene 3/7. This is direction of travel of the victims and the witness pointing to the areas where three Mehmetis, one aged 22, one aged 54 -- sorry, two Mehmetis were killed. That's father and brother. Father and daughter, I beg your pardon. I'm grateful.

Now, let's look at the first photograph, please. This shows the surviving son who was injured and could have been seen in a hospital to be spoken to, pointing to where his father and sister was killed. Next photograph, please. And another view of the same. Now, if you look at that location on 3/5, you've got your thing pointed on it, help me with this: From all the materials that the accused wants you to put into evidence and that therefore I assume you're familiar with, is there any document that shows that weapons in the hands of the man and his daughter who died there were collected from that place?

A. Of course I cannot answer this question because I have no knowledge about this whatsoever.

Q. I'm sorry, Mr. Stevanovic. Your -- the invitation, which I'm ⁴⁰⁴⁵⁵ resisting, is that the Court should accept 140 documents analysing the Racak incident. My search, and earnest search, is to find material that shows in any way the recovery of weapons from these locations away from location number 5.

Here is a location where a man and his daughter were shot and where the son was injured. It's your material. It's not my material. You're bringing it in. Is there any material anywhere that shows that weapons were recovered from these out -- these distant places where people died? Please help us.

A. I can help you in the following way: It is quite certain that in the village of Racak there was fighting. There's no doubt about that. Of course the reason for the fighting is the attack that came from Racak that was launched against the police unit that had as its task to search for the terrorists and find them.

I cannot testify in any great detail. I cannot testify about how a particular person was killed or whether that particular person had weapons or not.

You know and I know, of course, that in relation to the investigation and other things that were supposed to be carried out after the event itself there were quite a few problems. I know that the bodies had been moved, that the unit did not stay there overnight to secure the crime scene because of the danger of being attacked. So I really am not a witness who can talk about minutiae of that kind that are yet very important, and you insisted on that in your last question. That is a matter for detailed and long investigation. ⁴⁰⁴⁵⁶

Q. Well, Mr. Stevanovic, at every possible point in your evidence-in-chief to this accused, when asked about any crime site, you gave answers that exculpated him and the Serbs. You do it on the basis of documents you say you have examined, and I am unapologetic about seeking your detailed help, for if you can't help us on the accused's behalf, I don't know who can, you see.

Perhaps have a look at two more, and we'll look at this one. Find on the map crime location 4, scene 9.

A. I assume, Mr. Prosecutor, that this question is structured along similar lines as the previous one was. If I'm supposed to answer what happened at a specific point in time at a specific place, then for me that is a question that --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Wait for --

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Thank you.

MR. NICE:

Q. Now, if Mr. Nort would show on the overhead projector, you having seen where crime scene 4/9 is, now please look at the photographs in order. First of all the title page. Yes, leave the title page there. This is crime location 4, scene 9, photographs showing the direction to and the areas where three people were found, one aged 21, one aged 14, and one aged 54.

Next photograph, please. Here we see a map showing where that location is aerially viewed, at the end of an intended escape route. Next photograph, please. This shows the three deceased clearly moved from where they died to inside a house nearby, but it shows them. ⁴⁰⁴⁵⁷ The 14-year-old boy and the two others.

Now, looking -- and last photograph, please, Mr. Nort. That's the father with his walking stick, as you see.

I'm going to ask you two questions about this part of the scene that you've brought evidence about. First, the same first question: Do you -- can you point me in your materials to any piece of paper that shows the recovery of weapons from roughly the area of scene 4/9 where these three people died?

A. I think that as for these tabs, there is not a single document that would show that weapons were found on a particular person. As far as I can recall, at the moment of the on-site investigation weapons were found in one particular location or a few, due to the fact that the police had left the scene.

I brought the documents that could have been compiled at the time when they were compiled. The documents were compiled sometime after the actual events and sometime after the situation on the scene itself had been changed. All my information indicates that it was not the police that changed the situation on the scene but it was the villagers who did it or the terrorists, depending on what would be proven to be correct.

Q. All your information indicates that. Well, you better tell us what it is, then. What is this information that shows the villagers had changed the scene? If you want to say that, make it good.

A. I only know about that from information from documents that I read or from the oral information I had from persons who were in charge of that sector. I think that documents also indicate that fact, that is to say ⁴⁰⁴⁵⁸ that at least for one night the scene had not been under the control of the police. That is the knowledge I have.

Q. Absolutely correct. Now, go -- but before you slur, if it is a slur, the relations of those who died, I want you to make good your observation that it wasn't the police that changed the situation on the scene but the villagers who did it or the terrorists. I want you to make that good.

A. Of course what I can prove to you is my own knowledge about that, the knowledge I have from the documents that are presented here. I repeat: I was not an eyewitness. I cannot, therefore, say to you that the situation had been changed by the police or by the other side.

Q. Don't hold back. Tell us everything you were told by local people, point us to every document to show that this scene was corrupted by the bereaved and/or by the terrorists.

A. Mr. Prosecutor, the knowledge I have is that during one of the continuations of the on-site investigation the bodies were found in the mosque. I really cannot imagine any logical version that would involve the police collecting the bodies and putting them into the mosque when the danger was there of continued fighting and when the police had to withdraw from the site.

Q. Absolutely right and everybody agrees that the bodies were recovered. But that's not what you're saying. You're suggesting there was some misrepresentation of where the bodies might have been found. I want you to make that good.

A. No. Please, that's not what I said at all. I made a general ⁴⁰⁴⁵⁹ statement that when the fighting stopped and all the way up to the arrival of the police investigation organs on the scene the situation on the scene had been changed in the meantime.

Q. Would you like to turn to the map this time and look to crime location 2, scene 2, and we'll all see that displayed with the audiovisual booth's assistance, if we could have a look at the map. Crime location 2, there we see it, scene 2. Still some considerable distance from number 5, the gully.

Mr. Nort, if you'd now be good enough to display on the overhead projector the title page. This is 2/2, photograph showing the direction from the village to and the areas where three men, 60, 62, and 58, were killed. And let's take the first photograph, please. Now, these three brothers who you see lying there in the area of I think their home but I'm not sure of that, the same question again: Any material in the papers that can explain who, when, and how their weapons were removed from this scene?

A. Quite certainly there is no fact that can be ascertained in terms of who took what weapon from what individual. Could you please be so kind as to tell me the origin of these photographs? Were these taken by the police or by who? I do not recall having seen this photograph.

Q. These were taken by OSCE on the first arrival of the international presence there, by a witness who has been called before this Court.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] It's finally now that Mr. Nice ⁴⁰⁴⁶⁰ explained to the witness what kind of exhibits these are. He's bringing into question the documents that are very voluminous, that pertain to Racak, and that General Stevanovic testified about. And then, while bringing that into question, he is not showing him exhibits that have to do with his testimony. He's showing him his own exhibits, and General Stevanovic is not testifying about that. I don't think that that is proper to challenge things in that way during the cross-examination, to challenge something that the witness did not even speak about at all. The witness did not speak about the exhibits that Mr. Nice has, he spoke about the documents that the police had, and he's asking him to explain his exhibits. How can General Stevanovic explain Mr. Nice's exhibits?

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, the Prosecutor is entitled in cross-examination to put an exhibit to the witness notwithstanding that it wasn't put in chief.

If there is a problem with the authenticity, the source of the witness, then that is a matter that can be raised either by the witness or by yourself.

Proceed, Mr. Nice.

MR. NICE:

Q. Mr. Stevanovic, you have heard the accused's observations. You will have heard me ask you half a dozen times in the last 15 minutes to point us to any exhibit in the pile of exhibits that the accused wants to produce through you that deals with the issues I raise. Are there any documents in the exhibits you produce or, rather, that the accused wishes to produce through you that deal with the issues I've raised? ^{40461 BLANK PAGE 40462}

A. I really looked at all the documents that were put into several tabs and that have to do with Racak. These are documents that the police and the investigative judge in charge prepared, and those are the documents that I had occasion to see. I did not have an opportunity to see the photographs that were made by someone else. Possibly I saw them on television without knowing whose photographs they were. Of course, according to what I know and according to what exists in the Ministry of Interior, I said what I said and I brought here, that is contained in the binders, in the documents, a series of documents in terms of what I said.

As for the details of the event itself, I repeat once again, and the events at the microlocations, I really do not know about the details.

Q. You remember that we -- you were asked a question, I think by His Honour Judge Bonomy in respect of Racak, Is there a statement from the man in charge of the exercise? You were asked a similar question by me. It was made clear to you that you were the policeman, whether just public or public and secret is another matter, but you were the policeman dealing with all crime sites. I don't have anybody else to ask apart from you. That's why I'm asking you these questions. Do you understand that? All right. Mr. Nort, the next picture, please, or the next --

A. I would like to answer, of course. I could give answers to questions about which I have knowledge. Regrettably, as a rule you put questions to me about which I know less, but that's simply the way it is. Had you asked me about details about which I do know, of course my questions [as interpreted] would have been positive for the most part. ⁴⁰⁴⁶³ Since your questions are such that you are basically asking me about microdetails which, I repeat, are very important, it is only natural that I, generally speaking, give negative answers because I was not there. I was not an eyewitness.

Q. I'm still going to ask you a few more questions and then we'll move on, but this photograph here has white and blue markers. On the evidence, the white markers are the bodies and the blue markers are the bullets or are bullets. You see?

It may be suggested, I don't know if this is your suggestion, that the bodies were redistributed around the area of Racak after they died somewhere else. Is there any document in -- that you can turn us to or any piece of information or any bit of hearsay that a villager gave to you, anything you like, Mr. Stevanovic, that could explain how it is that these three men, 58 to 60, are lying where they are with bullets in the appropriate location with no evidence of weapons being taken from the three brothers? Is there anything that can explain that?

A. Unfortunately, my answer will be similar to the previous answers I gave. First of all, I don't know whether weapons were found or not as regards these three particular casualties.

Secondly, I don't know whether they were moved or not in relation to the specific microlocation. I know, generally speaking, that when the -- after the on-site investigation had started, the scene had been changed significantly, because most of the victims happened to be later in the mosque, which is in the village, in the centre of the village, wherever.

Q. My last question on this type relates -- if Mr. Nort will be good ⁴⁰⁴⁶⁴ enough, and we'll move on to another issue. 156, tab 12. Just lay that on the overhead projector, please.

We're now back, Mr. Stevanovic, to the gully where the large majority of people were found, and European Union expert team -- the colours aren't showing very well, at least not on my monitor but I hope they're sufficient -- discovered bullets and bullet casings at the scene of the gully, the black numbers referring to various bodies that were found there. Do you follow?

A. Yes.

Q. The blue, almost all in the gully or thereabouts, are bullets. The red are bullet casings.

Now, you've had a lot of experience in Kosovo, as you tell us. You were in charge of special units in Croatia, and you were the senior officer in the Bosnian borders, so you had a lot of experience of this war. Does that distribution of bullet casings and bullets and dead men suggest an execution to you?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Nice put that kind of question to Professor Dobricanin, who is a forensic expert, and the answer he got is that is impossible because of the bullet path direction. I think that it is pointless to put this kind of question --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic, if the witness cannot answer the question, he's competent to say so.

Are you in a position to answer the question? ⁴⁰⁴⁶⁵

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Well, I really am not a forensic expert or a ballistics expert. As the Prosecutor said, I did not have any experience from combat. I did not take part in any combat, and I never analysed the traces of the projectile, the place where the casings are, the place where the casualties were, et cetera. I can talk about that as someone who is a bit in a better position than a pure layman, because I have graduated from the military academy after all, but I really cannot give you a qualified answer to any one of these questions.

MR. NICE:

Q. Last question on this document: If the men in the gully died where they fell and if they were firing back, you would expect to find shell casings from their guns in their positions. Is there any document that you know of in the material that you've produced that explains why no such shell casings were found?

A. In principle, I can agree with the first statement you made, but I repeat: The police did not carry out an on-site investigation immediately after the event concerned and at the moment when the victims were in the place where they got killed. Obviously you made a considerable effort to do this and to have your concept of this. This is the first time I see this picture. In order to give any kind of answer, I would have to give it a great deal of thought and I'd have to consult and so on and so forth. A lot of things could have happened within a single hour on the scene, not to mention all the things that could happen within one year or even more than that. One of the axioms of criminal investigations is that nothing should be changed on the site itself so that the investigation ⁴⁰⁴⁶⁶ could start on a stable basis. Regrettably, what happened here happened.

Q. You've never considered the forensic scientific evidence, the evidence of photographs, and all the other material available to this Court, have you?

A. I have seen what is contained in the tabs that are here right next to me. As for the other exhibits you have, I have not seen them except for those that you showed me during these proceedings.

Q. Now, as to the --

MR. NICE: Thank you for that, Mr. Nort. I think that's ...

Q. As to the identity of the victims, what can you help us with so far as that's concerned? What sort of victims were they?

A. As far as I can remember, a vast majority of the victims were men. I seem to remember only one woman and one child. I don't think there were more persons who belonged to those categories. There were persons belonging to different age groups, though.

Q. And as to the suggestion that the victims were either civilians or members of the KLA or fighting members of the KLA, how can you help us, please?

A. All my knowledge indicates that these are persons who were engaged in fighting.

Q. Detail, please. All your knowledge.

A. Of course, in fighting there can be collateral consequences as well. I haven't got any details. I really have not got any details.

Q. All your knowledge, can you -- if you want to say things like that, can you explain why? Why do you say these people were KLA? ⁴⁰⁴⁶⁷

A. I say that on the basis of the information that I believed and that I believe now, too, on the basis of the information received from the persons in charge of the territory of Racak and on the basis of the documents that I read, that I familiarised myself with, and that are contained here.

Q. Generalities aren't going to help us assess your evidence, Mr. Stevanovic. Who spoke to you and told you they were KLA? Which documents have you relied on? Point us to them.

A. It was an attack on the police using firearms. It is quite certain that civilians would not attack the police using firearms. That would be an extreme case. But if that happens where the KLA headquarters is anyway, anybody who attacks the police, it is only logical, would have to belong to that group, that formation.

There can be some exceptions, though, and of course the consequences may perhaps be broader than consequences sustained by the terrorists only. When there is fighting in an area that is so close to residential areas, that kind of possibility cannot be precluded altogether.

Q. You know there's no statement in all the papers from the man who led the operation for the Serb police, so can you point me to any other statement, written statement, or you can tell us what you were told by one of policemen. Go on, tell us what you were told or what you read.

A. In this documentation, indeed there is no statement of the person who led the operation itself. We have stated that several times now. But there is a report that includes that kind of information too. Of course ⁴⁰⁴⁶⁸ that does not mean that a witness will not come here, as you said awhile ago, who would bring all of this and who will be an eyewitness who will testify to all of that. I can only testify to what I know, and I can only tell you about things I know. You keep insisting that I should talk about the situation on the ground, and it is general knowledge by now that I was not there.

Q. Well, within the papers you've produced, is there any particular category of document that you rely on to show that these victims were actually members of the KLA?

A. I used documents that we quoted in part during my testimony.

Q. Well, what were they? You tell us.

A. I've already mentioned one of them. That is the report that we quoted in part. Then there is the record of the on-site investigation. It is the entire documentation contained in these tabs. We can have a look at it again now and analyse it again.

You have to decide that. I cannot search for it through the tabs now and remember each and every individual document.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I would like to draw your attention to the following: The documents that have to do with Racak and that were tendered here during General Stevanovic's testimony are in 7, 8 and 9, tabs 7, 8 and 9. These are three tabs with a large number of documents. If Mr. Nice wants to ask him about some document, he has to indicate the document he has in mind. No one can expect the witness to know all those ⁴⁰⁴⁶⁹ documents just off-the-cuff. They're right next to him. Show them to him. But this is not a fair way of dealing with it.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice, if you have in mind a particular document from any of those tabs, then you can direct the witness to that.

MR. NICE: If I chose to, Your Honour, but it's not my choice.

JUDGE BONOMY: Indeed, why should Mr. Nice direct the witness to documents that he is professing a knowledge of?

MR. NICE: I'm grateful to Your Honour.

Q. I'm going to turn to -- that's all I'm going to ask specifically related to Racak, I think, for the time being, but I want to ask you one other question that may ultimately become associated, and it's this: As a senior policeman, if material's published going to show that one of your police stations is behaving improperly, what action would you take?

A. Whenever knowledge reaches me that any policeman, and especially a whole police unit, is behaving unlawfully, according to the rules the leader of that station is informed about the report coming in, and he is required to report on it. If the complaint is of a more serious nature, then as a rule a group is set up at a higher level which is given the assignment of looking into the matter, checking everything out, and talking to the person submitting the criminal report, talking and interviewing the people concerned --

Q. Very well.

A. -- and so on.

MR. NICE: I don't know whether --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, it's a convenient time. We'll take a break ⁴⁰⁴⁷⁰ for 20 minutes.

--- Recess taken at 10.31 a.m.

--- On resuming at 10.54 a.m.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Nice.

MR. NICE: Before I return to where I was, so as not to overlook something, I should tell the Court that we have identified a newspaper article this morning - today is the 6th of June, is it not? - referring to the sitting of the Skorpions trial of the -- or the trial of the Skorpion Cvjetan, resumption of the trial. It doesn't in any sense change my position vis-a-vis this witness, but it is true that the matter was referred to in Serbian newspaper today.

Q. I return to where we were. Would you look, please, at this document, which is not yet an exhibit. One for the overhead projector because it's in English and it's not in. One for the accused. One for the accused and then we'll deal with the overhead projector. It's in English, Mr. Stevanovic, so --

MR. NICE: No, Mr. Nort. One for the accused. Thank you. And one for the overhead projector. If we could go to the last page but one, Mr. Nort. It's got 31 on the bottom right-hand corner, so that we can just see what it says there. 31, bottom right-hand corner. Second to last page. Thank you. You were there.

Q. This is a document, right at the bottom under "Note." Right. "This Spotlight --" thank you very much. "This Spotlight Report," says the document, Kosovo Albanians, it has been sent to the parliament, government, Ministry of the Interior, Ministry of Justice, prosecutor's ⁴⁰⁴⁷¹ office, and the president of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, and to the same institutions of the Republic of Serbia. "The report is being sent to the United Nations General Assembly, Security Council," et cetera, et cetera.

This is a report prepared by the Humanitarian Law Centre, of which we've spoken earlier.

And if we come back to the front page, please, Mr. Nort, you will see what that says about it. It's report number 16, "Kosovo Albanians," dated February 1995.

Were you aware personally of the receipt of this document by the organs of government referred to?

A. No. This is the first time that I see a report with this title page, cover page, and I don't know that it was sent to anybody, but of course I have no --

Q. You have no reason to doubt, do you, that the Humanitarian Law Centre, whose aim is to publicise wrongdoing and get action taken, would have sent this document to the organs of government identified. You have no reason to doubt that, do you?

A. In principle, I do not, but I don't have any knowledge as to whether it was actually sent or not.

THE INTERPRETER: Might the volume of the interpretation be put up, please, for the witness.

MR. NICE: Mr. Nort, if we could turn, please, to the bottom right-hand corner of page 15 and we'll rapidly turn to page 16.

Q. This report, you see, Mr. Stevanovic, sent as it suggests to all ^{40472 BLANK PAGE 40473} the organs of government - right at the bottom of the page, please - says under 3.3 this: "Electric shock at the Urosevac police station." And it reads: "FE, an 18-year-old, lives with his mother and younger brothers. On the morning of 11 April 1994, he was awakened by the doorbell. Before --" Over the page, please. "Before he could get dressed and downstairs, the police were already in the house. They had broken the glass in the front door and entered. They spoke Serbian, but when FE said he didn't understand, they switched to Albanian. They asked for and took his passport and driver's licence. They said they knew he was hiding weapons and would search the house. They looked under FE's bed, nothing more, and then took him with them to the police station.

"They made me take off my shoes and sit on the floor. Two of them sat on my legs and asked if I had guns. 'No,' I answered, and the two of them ten truncheons each to the soles of my feet. They asked again. I answered the same. Again, ten blows from each. Then it was that they'd kill my mother if I don't tell them where my guns are. I said nothing. For the third time, ten blows from each. A total of 30 blows on each sole. They pulled me up on my feet, leaned me against a wall, boxed my head and ears, went at me with their truncheons until I was bleeding from the mouth. I fell, they pulled me up and again the same question. I answered they could do what they like, but I still had no guns. They ordered me to take off my pants. I was slow because of the pain, so they pulled them off. They tied my hands behind my back with my belt. They made me lay on the floor. I saw something that looked like a telephone. When I tried to get up, they pushed me down even harder. One held down my ⁴⁰⁴⁷⁴ head and the other sat on my legs. They stuck wires from the apparatus that looked like a phone in my ears and on my sex organs. The pain was horrible. It was so terrible I lifted both of them, even though I was lying flat. When I screamed, they interrupted saying, 'Don't scream, it's disturbing.' They switched on the electricity three times. In between, they smoked cigarettes. They offered me one. While the electricity was on, they forced me to say, 'Hello,' 'I'll come tomorrow,' and similar nonsense. Finally, they told me to think it all over carefully and to bring in the guns in two days. They never mentioned what kind of guns. I had to hang on the fences to make it home."

If true, a terrible indictment of that police station. Do you agree?

A. Of course. If even part of this is true, then it's a terrible indictment of that police station.

Q. In light of what you said before the break, such information demands an inquiry by the police authorities, including yourself.

A. Information of this kind of course demands urgent inquiry and investigation on the part of the authorities of the MUP, but let me say that I really don't remember an event of this kind. That, of course, does not mean that it wasn't investigated and that the corresponding steps were not taken, but I really don't have any information about the event or whether any steps were taken by the police in that regard.

Q. And -- you're ahead of me. I want you to take us to, point us to, tell us where we can find any investigation by your police of this allegation identifying as it should and could the policemen involved. Can ⁴⁰⁴⁷⁵ you point me to where I can find such an investigation?

A. Of course. The place to check out what was done pursuant to that information and whether the information was indeed sent to the Ministry of the Interior is the Ministry of the Interior of Serbia. I do not believe that it could happen that anybody in the Ministry of the Interior should receive information of this kind and not take urgent steps to check out the allegations.

Q. The truth is that by 1995, Kosovo was a violent police state and allegations like this would simply be overlooked because they would be standard. Right or wrong.

A. No. Let me remind you, and let me explain why I probably didn't have information of that kind if it did reach the ministry at all. Let me remind you, as I was saying, that in 1995 and 1996 I spent time in Eastern Slavonia, and that was my assignment at that period. Of course, I didn't actually look at the date of the information, when it was sent to the ministry. I do not believe that it could happen that I don't know about this piece of information had it arrived in the ministry when I was in Belgrade. Quite possibly it arrived when I was not in Belgrade. But regardless of when it did actually arrive, I'm quite sure and certain that, having received information of this kind, all measures must have been taken to establish or challenge the truth of those allegations.

Q. Well, I call for those documents if you're able to find them and provide them for us.

Let me tell you something else: On the 22nd of May of 2002, three years ago, and at page 5554 to 5557 of the Court record, a witness gave an ⁴⁰⁴⁷⁶ account not of being beaten himself but of seeing beatings by two police officers whom he named, a man called Jasovic and a man called Sparavalo. Do you know anything about those officers or nothing?

A. I met Mr. Jasovic in The Hague while we were waiting to testify. Before that, I had not heard of either name.

Q. You see, what this witness said well before the Defence case, well before any of the issues that you raise was that he saw a 50-year-old man Muhamed Bega from Ferizaj tied to a chair, handcuffed, and being beaten by those two officers. You know nothing to challenge the evidence of that witness, do you?

A. First of all, I don't know the testimony of the witness and then I don't know whether the witness did or did not tell the truth. For me to be able to say anything about any specific event and concrete information, I would have to know the contents of the information and to try to remember whether I know anything about it. Perhaps it would be important to note - let me repeat this once again - that in both cases, if they did actually occur, are very grievous cases, but on condition that they did happen, this was individual unlawful action on the part of individuals, on the part of individual policemen, and this is recorded in all countries. I'm well aware of that.

Now, the question is how far that behaviour was prevalent and what the reactions to that kind of behaviour and conduct is. But we cannot generalise this matter and conclude that the police as a whole in Kosovo was violent and brutal and that there was a police state, as you termed it, in Kosovo. And of course both cases are to be condemned, that is not ⁴⁰⁴⁷⁷ to be challenged at all, if they did indeed happen.

Q. Very well.

MR. NICE: Well, Your Honours, I really have now, I think, concluded with Kosovo. Can I make, however, for your assistance the following observations -- no, perhaps I'd better ask the witness one question first and then I'll come back.

Q. So far as Racak is concerned, Mr. Stevanovic, the materials you produce show, as is evidenced in this Court, that the KLA were present in Racak and indeed they did fire weapons on the morning of the 15th.

A. Yes. That is shown by the materials that I read out and the information I had with respect to the event in Racak. And there are a series of operative informations, that is to say Official Notes, which speak of the activity of terrorists in Racak.

Q. Thank you.

A. And the way in which they jeopardised communication lines between Stimlje and Prizren, and Stimlje-Urosevac as well.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... try and keep you short. But the materials you've produced, the papers you produce, none of them gives a narrative account from an eyewitness of what happened, and it's all, so far as the Serb side is concerned, a matter of inference at best. Isn't that the reality?

A. In the tabs, you will find a report on Racak or it contains a report on Racak compiled by the corresponding working group, and from that event we can see the sequence of activities on that day, what actions were taken and what each of the units did and what the consequences of their ⁴⁰⁴⁷⁸ actions were. All the other documents show quite a bit more detail on it. Of course, all the details contained in the documents are based on knowledge before the event, knowledge about the event, and especially knowledge after the event, which is when the investigations were launched, with all the problems that we highlighted when we discussed the matter.

Q. And finally, although you may say you can't answer this I must make the suggestion so my position is clear: The documents prepared by the various Serb authorities avoid dealing with detail in order to obscure the truth and thus never cover issues like the recovery of weapons or the location of dead bodies. What do you say to that?

A. If you mean Racak itself, if that's what you have in mind with that question, then it is clear why those details are not there. They're not there because the documentation of the entire event was conducted after the situation changed on the spot, on the location. If you look at other cases that are also to be found in the tabs, you will be able to see that you have the most minute details that are recorded and documented on the scene of the crime once an on-site investigation took place after the event, immediately after the event itself, like the event in Suva Reka and I can't remember the others now.

MR. NICE: Your Honours, can I explain what we've done, although it may be simply a matter of interest. I've drawn from every source that I can accounts coming from the Serb side about Racak and put them chronologically. To explore it with any witness would take a very great deal of time. The majority of the documents come from sources other than this witness's proposed documents but some do come from his 140-odd ⁴⁰⁴⁷⁹ documents. I mention that now because obviously we'll have to deal with that when I seek to exclude either all his documents or all his documents bar those few, but at some stage an analysis of the documents in chronological order is likely, in the conventional way, to assist but it would simply take far more time than I'm disposed to take on this occasion. We may be able to deal with that material through another witness.

Q. Can we turn to Izbica, please. You gave evidence about Izbica. Again, of course, you weren't there, were you, ever, or were you? Never there?

A. No, I was never there.

Q. Can we look at tab 69, please, in volume 2.

MR. NICE: Your Honours, just bear with me one minute. I haven't marked it, I'm afraid.

Q. Is this a meeting at which you were present? Yes, you were. And we will find --

A. Yes.

Q. We will find in it -- I've temporarily mislaid my reference, my reference to Izbica.

A. Izbica should not be mentioned because we're dealing with the 17th of February, but perhaps that is possible. Is it tab 69?

Q. Yes.

A. In those minutes? Thank you.

Q. I'll come back to that in case I'm in error. By March of 1999, is it right that both the MUP and the VJ were ⁴⁰⁴⁸⁰ operating in the Drenica region?

A. Up until March 1999?

Q. Yes. On or about March 1999.

A. Well, in 1998 and 1999, both the police and army were operating all over Kosovo and in Drenica certainly.

Q. Very well. Were they acting together?

A. Each of them did their own job within the frameworks of their competencies, and in the anti-terrorist activities, yes, they did work together.

Q. Your evidence about Izbica, does it challenge the fact in any way that the people gathering in Izbica were divided, men from women?

A. As to the division of the people gathered there into men and women, I learnt about that from the indictment and from your questions or quotations from parts of the indictment.

Q. But if there's been evidence given to this Court that that's what happened and the men were then massacred, do you have any reason to doubt the accuracy of that?

A. Well, I do have reason to doubt because of the fact, if I recall correctly, that in the indictment it says that the number of civilians was several thousand and that the men were separated from the women, children, and elderly and that they were then executed. So from that context and that wording, it would emerge that in a group of 4 or 5.000 civilians there were just 100 men, which is really illogical, and that lack of logic is something that I'm aware of. But let me remind you that everything the police knows about Izbica it knows from the moment at which on the ⁴⁰⁴⁸¹ internet or some television screen a satellite image appeared. So the police did not have any knowledge about what had happened before that in that zone, in that area.

Q. You see, the evidence that we have includes evidence of somebody who took photographs at the time. Part of our Exhibit 162, tab 4. Here is a photograph of a man with crutches, or with a crutch. Just have a look at that one as an example to remind us.

When you were interviewed as a suspect, you didn't suggest that the victim -- here's another one. Have a look at this one, please, Mr. Nort. Same exhibit.

You didn't suggest in interview that these victims were active KLA fighters. Is that still your position?

A. I spoke about the victims who were found in the, conditionally speaking, freshly dug graves in Izbica on the basis of the photographs. And I think I remember correctly I did not know where the victims had come from in that grave and what the cause of their death was. That was supposed to be the subject of investigation.

Q. The investigation has never, if it took place and was conscientious, it was never revealed that these victims -- Mr. Nort, this one, please -- it has never revealed, has it, that people shown, for example, in this photograph were members of the KLA actively fighting, has it? That's how they were found.

A. Well, if I remember correctly, during this testimony, from the documents we have here, we were able to note at least four pieces of highly valuable evidence that at least four persons belonged to the KLA. ⁴⁰⁴⁸² As far as the others are concerned, their membership in the KLA was neither refuted nor confirmed. But that evidence is related to the victims found in that grave, and that is part of the case file that we saw here.

Q. Please feel free -- if you want to say now different from what you said in your interview, that all these men were fighting members of the KLA, please do so. Is that your -- is that now your evidence?

A. Of course not. I do not wish to say anything that I don't know or I have no information about. Of course I don't want to change my evidence in any way.

Q. Very well.

MR. NICE: I'll take that one back, please, Mr. Nort.

Q. Then you lingered on the fact that the graves were individual and not a mass grave. Well, that's the evidence we've heard, that that's how they were dug, that they were all dug at the same time. It's quite clear from your own evidence and from the photograph you looked at, similar to the photographs produced in the Prosecution, that the graves were clearly dug at the same time; correct?

A. Individual graves were dug at the same time, relatively speaking, during the same day, but every person that was buried was buried into an individual grave, and all the individual graves were in one location alone. I did not believe that that was called a mass grave. I believe that to be a graveyard. That is how I understand these concepts.

Q. Are you in some way critical of the villagers and the bereaved who allocated individual graves to individual bodies? Would you have ^{40483 BLANK PAGE 40484} preferred them to be in a mass grave?

A. That has absolutely nothing to do with what I said. I'm simply speaking about the facts from the site. Of course I would not have preferred to have found a mass grave, and of course I wouldn't like any bodies to have been there. I would have preferred that there had been no war and no terrorism in Kosovo at all, and I regret it deeply that you are trying to portray me as the creator and architect of what happened in Kosovo. Of course it would have never crossed my mind.

Q. I want to know, as we listen to your evidence about individual graves, what point you're trying to make. But if you're saying that you believe in the dignity of the dead, help me with this: When your authorities exhumed those bodies, what machine did they use?

A. I really don't know that. I really don't know which machine they used.

Q. An excavator?

A. I cannot believe that an excavator was used, a machine normally used for digging trenches. There are photographs of the grave, and I -- it would be below everybody's dignity to have used an excavator. I can't believe it.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... tab 69. It was the right tab. My colleagues were right and I missed the point. Can we look at 69, please.

It's on page 2 in the English, and it's at a paragraph beginning with the words "Montenegro," in English. So that will translate to the -- I think the bottom of the first page and over to the second page in your ⁴⁰⁴⁸⁵ version. I'm not sure.

Do you see a passage there, it's about three-quarters of the way down, which says at this MUP staff meeting: "The staff plans to carry out three mopping-up operations in the Podujevo, Dragobilje, and Drenica areas"? Do you see that passage? It's right at the foot of page 1. Because it goes on to say "and has allotted around 4.000 policemen, around 70 policemen of the operative pursuit group, and about 900 police reservists." Do you see that? At the bottom of page 1.

A. I regret to say I haven't found it yet. The first page begins, in my version: "The main thrust is towards stopping covert activities." Maybe we are looking at different documents.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... five lines up. "The staff plans to carry out three mopping-up --"

A. I'm sorry. I was looking at a completely different tab.

Q. Before we come to the events at --

A. Yes, I can see that now.

Q. Before we come to these events that happened in March, we see that the MUP were planning mopping-up operations in the Izbica area. What did you mean by "mopping-up," those of you attending this meeting on the 17th of February?

A. I have explained more than once that the term "mopping-up" means only mopping up the territory from terrorists. It has several meanings. It means to clear up roads, and it means also sanitisation. But in the context of anti-terrorist actions, what is meant are certain specific anti-terrorist actions that were planned to take place in certain areas. ⁴⁰⁴⁸⁶ That should not be a problem. Podujevo, Dragobilje and Drenica are three regions in Kosovo that were notorious for the presence and activities of terrorists.

Q. I suppose the lawful police force in February of 1999 would be using the word "mopping up" to mean arresting wherever possible and only resorting to violence and killing people if absolutely essential. Would that be about right?

A. In a certain sense, what you said is correct. The objective is what I have already explained it to be, and the consequences were undesirable.

Q. Let's go to your diary next, then, please, at page 98 in the English, which we'll place on the overhead projector, which I think will be -- I'll find it for you. It's coming.

MR. NICE: You might like to put these -- if you can, Mr. Nort, if you can put the B/C/S on the overhead projector, as well as the English. I don't know if that's going to be possible.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] Could you help me? Which tab is that?

JUDGE KWON: 440.

MR. NICE:

Q. 440. Thanks very much.

JUDGE KWON: Binder 17.

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] I don't have it here. It seems I don't have it in my set.

MR. NICE: ⁴⁰⁴⁸⁷

Q. Can you have this copy in front of you to save time. What we see on this entry --

THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, please.

MR. NICE:

Q. What we see on this entry, which is for the 21st of May, according to the previous page in English, is an entry that says: "Clearing up the terrain, Izbica."

Well, now, what was that all about?

A. I need to find it first. Please, I can't find it. Did you say it was page 79?

Q. Item number 2 in the list of --

A. Yes, yes, yes. I've found it.

Q. "Clearing up the terrain, Izbica. Criminal offences. Isolation. Return of weapons." What does all that mean?

A. Please. Under item 2 it doesn't say clearing up the terrain, it says "asanacija," "sanitisation," but I will remind you that I said before that we had found about Izbica through an aerial photograph and that we spent several days looking for that place Izbica. I cannot confirm now that we found it, but it seems that we did.

And do you know what "sanitisation" means? You have seen it at the example of Pusto Selo. It implies in this case all that is done in keeping with the law on criminal procedure, that means exhumation, verification of information received, in this case the information was obviously checked, and then all the subsequent steps, exhumations pursuant to the orders of the investigating judge, on-site investigation, ⁴⁰⁴⁸⁸ post-mortems and everything else that you can find in the case file that I brought.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. So this is about casualties, people who were killed.

Q. The reason Izbica had to be investigated is because it was publicised and aerial photographs were produced by international bodies and you had no choice. That's the truth, isn't it?

A. That is absolutely not the truth. There were only two cases in Kosovo when we found out about such things, Izbica and Pusto Selo.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. In all the other 1.500 cases, we found about these cases in a different way.

Q. But you're -- you're asking us to accept, I take it, that with however many policemen there were on the ground in Kosovo altogether, perhaps 15.000 [Realtime transcript read in error "150.000"] police at the time, and with 100 people dying you needed international assistance to tell you that the crime was committed and then you needed days to find the village. Is that really your position, Mr. Stevanovic?

A. First of all, let me say that there were never 150.000 policemen. There were 15.000 at the most. And of course we didn't need the international organisations to tell us first. We simply needed --

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. -- information, reports.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... small territory like Kosovo. That can't be right, can it? Who -- ⁴⁰⁴⁸⁹

A. I am telling you that it is true, but it does seem illogical. We were simply unable to find it. There is footage showing journalists searching together with us, and they indeed did. We found the place seven days after we started looking. Approximately seven days.

Q. Then we move, if we can, please, to page --

A. That is accurate. That is true.

Q. I should ask you, what does the word "crimes" mean on that -- "criminal offences" mean on that entry? What criminal offences are you referring to there if it's only asanacija, sanitisation, that you're dealing with?

A. Well, if you look more carefully, item 2 is subheaded "Legality" in general terms, whereas sanitisation is one of the measures to ensure legality. "Criminal offences" implies detection of criminal offences, pursuit of criminal offences, et cetera; work on criminal offences in the broadest sense.

Q. Sorry, I don't understand you. What criminal offences did you at this time think had been committed? Or was it a question of you knew that criminal offences had been committed?

A. It is not at all in dispute that at the time there were a lot of criminal offences. I have already shown you tables showing exactly how many, and there are lists for every crime in particular. But in this context when one insists on legality, criminal offences are a priority in terms of detecting, investigating, processing perpetrators, et cetera. So all the work related to criminal offences must be done intensively in order to ensure legality of procedure. ⁴⁰⁴⁹⁰ Maybe you think that -- I simply cannot understand your thinking, your reasoning, because if you are biased or ill-intentioned, every theory can be interpreted in different ways.

Q. Mr. Stevanovic, I want to give you an opportunity to interpret for us words that may be of interest for the Court in due course. If you've got nothing more to say on the meaning of crimes in that setting, let's return to page 100 that we looked at before, coming your way for speed. We looked at this in the setting of the entry towards the top of the page which says: "Remove traces of violence against property." We substituted the word "property" for "civilians," as the court will remember. But I want to look a little bit above that in this entry which speaks of "Clearing up the terrain."

A. Yes.

Q. "Clearing up the terrain --"

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Would you please ask Mr. Nice that when he is showing pages, he should do it the way he did it before, quoting the ERN number, because it is difficult to find these pages in the diary the way he's indicating them now.

MR. NICE: R0172446 for the accused.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you, Mr. Nice.

MR. NICE:

Q. Mr. Stevanovic, here, you see, we have: "Clearing up the terrain. We must know the truth. Each case must be solved. Izbica - Buha." Now, tell us about Buha. He was a PJP commander, wasn't he? ⁴⁰⁴⁹¹

A. Correct. He was the commander of one of the PJP units, and at that point in time we assumed that he had a unit in that area, and obviously there is reference here --

Q. Not too fast. Let's just deal with it step-by-step. "We assumed he had a unit in the area." Why did you make such an assumption?

A. Because we knew roughly the area of deployment of each unit, although I did say before that, depending on the assignment, these units changed their area of activity.

Q. So if, for example, a PJP unit had committed this dreadful massacre, the probabilities are it was Buha's unit. Correct?

A. Well, on the assumption that he was really there at that time. We are talking about the time when the graves were found. We are not talking about the time of the event, because let me remind you, the time of the event, as indicated in the indictment, is the month of March, and the time when the grave was found was the month of April. And the assumption here is --

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. -- that he was then in the area.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... "We must know the truth."

A. I'm sorry, I really don't have that intention.

Q. "We must know the truth. Each case must be solved. Izbica - Buha." Explain to us please how the finding of the graves is likely to solve the case and establish the truth.

A. Well, the first thing to do is to find the graves that we saw on the aerial photograph. One cannot do anything before verifying the ⁴⁰⁴⁹² allegations from the aerial photograph, the satellite photograph. After that follows a number of criminal investigation steps to establish the truth.

We see a case file specifying what exactly was done after the thing was found.

Q. The unit of most interest to you in your effort to know the truth and solve the case would be the unit present in the area of Izbica at the relevant time, the end of March. So which unit was that and why haven't you recorded it, please?

A. I am telling you again: At the time when we were discussing Izbica, we had no knowledge of the event that you later described in the indictment. We were unable to think at that time about March. We were simply thinking about the facts in our possession, and the facts were that there was a grave in a certain location. In order to reach the month of March, we would have had to read the indictment. We had to read the indictment. At that moment, we did not --

Q. I must suggest to you, Mr. Stevanovic, you're pretty much making it up as you're going along to fit the contemporary documents.

A. I'm not making anything up.

Q. Then help me with this: Eventually you discover a hundred people murdered in the way we can see in the photographs. You understand it happened at the end of March. You should find the PJP unit in the area, and you should investigate. Can you take me, please, to the documents showing an investigation of the PJP unit in the area at the time.

A. You said again at the end of March, and I really have to repeat ⁴⁰⁴⁹³ that we only had information at the end of May. And you will see from the documents that investigative steps were taken somewhere near the beginning of June. And I will remind you again that I left on -- for Belgrade on the 30th of May and on the 3rd and 4th I was in Kumanovo, and until the 20th I was in Kosovo. So I did not continue to work on that case. I was instead involved with KFOR in the development of a very important technical agreement.

Q. You bring all these documents, you see. Let me just remind you, the NATO press statement was, I think, on the 17th of April and the matter was even discussed in a negative way on Belgrade television on the 15th, 16th of April. You could isolate the group in the area of Izbica down to the period preceding the middle of April. Now, has the police ever done that? And if not, why not?

A. I really don't know what more I need to say if you refuse to believe me that we didn't know where Izbica was until after the 20th of May. That's the only reason. We found Izbica at the end of May. The first patrol that arrived on the location found this site sometime around the 25th. I'm not sure about the exact date, but it was certainly after the 20th. And all the steps that were possible to perform were performed by the beginning of June. And we have no information whatsoever about any event taking place in March.

Q. By the way, was the Buha who was in charge of the PJP unit Bosko Buha who was assassinated on the 10th of June of 2002? Was that the one?

A. Yes, that's the one.

Q. Is this an assassination that was ever solved by the MUP or is it ^{40494 BLANK PAGE 40495} another one that's gone on undetected?

A. I think it is one of the unsolved cases, but I know that intensive investigation is underway in Belgrade in connection with this.

Q. What are the rumours as to why Buha was -- if you know of any, Buha was eliminated?

A. I don't know. I really don't know. I don't listen to rumours. I'm a professional, I've already told you, and rumours can only help in an investigation to some extent, but I'm not involved in investigations. Since 2001 I work exclusively in the police academy, I am involved in teaching and scholarly work.

Q. After the -- after the bodies were exhumed by the forces of Serbia, what happened to them?

A. According to the information and the documentation I have, external examination, as it is termed, was performed.

Q. Why?

A. I also believe post-mortems were performed. I'm not certain enough to -- to claim that with 100 per cent certainty. I -- what was your question?

Q. Why external examination of the bodies? You dug them up, the Serb forces, and I'm going to come back in a minute to confirm or withdraw the suggestion of the use of an excavator. So there can be no doubt about it what I'm putting: You dug them up, you examined them very briefly, in a day or so, and then what did you do with then?

A. From the order of the investigating judge to perform an exhumation, all further steps are taken in keeping with the orders of the ⁴⁰⁴⁹⁶ investigating judge. If I remember correctly, the case was referred to military investigating organs or maybe it was that experts from the Military Medical Academy were involved in the examination and post-mortems.

That information was submitted to the prosecutor, and the prosecutor made a request to the investigating judge. All further action was taken pursuant to the orders of the investigating judge, and the police was only assisting the investigating judge.

Q. Well, let's have a look at a map, if we can, please. It's not an exhibit yet, but it's a map of the territory with some places marked on it.

You accept, don't you, that evidence of the destination of bodies has grown over time since this trial started, in particular because of the findings in Batajnica and thereabouts?

A. You mean the destination of the bodies found in Izbica?

Q. Yes.

A. Yes, I did have that information, namely that some of the victims were found in the mass grave in Batajnica.

Q. Let's look at a summary, as I suggest it is, of what happened to those bodies after they had been dug up by the Serb forces. They went to, amongst other places in the area of Izbica, they went to Suvi-Do, Mitrovica North, Supkovac, Nevolane, and Brusnik, but also they ended up in Petrovo Selo in the north and in Kladovo. Can you explain why?

A. Well, I've explained that very clearly already. I truly cannot explain why the bodies that were documented and buried in certain ⁴⁰⁴⁹⁷ locations were transferred to Batajnica or perhaps Petrovo Selo. I don't know about Petrovo Selo, I haven't heard of Petrovo Selo.

Q. I'm going to ask you now, please, to look at a schedule that we've prepared. If that could be distributed.

MR. NICE: Your Honours, this is partly built on existing evidence and it's partly built on material that's come to light since, and will be subject to the appropriate application unless admissions can be made by the accused or those on his behalf or by any Defence witness. The document for the witness, please, first. He's got it, has he? Good.

Q. If you look at the schedule, I'll explain its format to you. It's on your right-hand side, Mr. Stevanovic. If you'd go to the last of the -- to the fifth page, you'll see the key to exhumation sites, PSII, FHH, FLP, and so on. If you then come back to the first page, you'll see how the table is formed. It gives the victims names which is according to the eyewitness who filmed, and other eyewitnesses, I think, who were present at the scene when the bodies were found. It then says - and this is in English so I'm afraid it won't necessarily be immediately clear to you - but the next column is "Victim Recovered in: Kosovo." The next entry is "Victim Recovered in: Serbia." So that looking at those, we can see that Asllan Amrushi was recovered in Serbia at PSII-17, and that's Petrovo Selo, whereas Asslan Bajra was recovered at the Suvi-Do cemetery in Kosovo. Do you understand that part of the document?

A. Yes, I understand the principle involved.

Q. You drew to our attention, or the accused drew to our attention ⁴⁰⁴⁹⁸ through you differences between the lists of names running down the left-hand side and those who had been identified following the exhumation by Serb forces, and we see, for example, number 12 does appear in your exhibit tab 417. Looking at the bottom of the page, so does number 23. Turning on two pages, so does number 52. If you'd go to number 52. Number 54, number 67, number 73. Next page, number 86, number 103. Last page, number 109, number 113, number 115. So all those bodies, your exhumation evidence matches the name given by the witnesses giving evidence to this Court. Do you understand?

A. Yes, I understand.

Q. Thank you. Now, let's come back to number 17. You see, for number 17, Dibran Dani, he was a person who was identified at the scene. He's a person who appears in the Serb lists of those they exhumed. And do you see where he landed up, Mr. Stevanovic? His body landed up in Petrovo Selo. We have the death certificates. I don't -- I'm happy to produce them, but it will take time, and we can produce them in a swifter way later.

Can you explain for us, if the Court is ultimately satisfied that this is what happened, how one of the bodies at least of those the Serb forces exhumed is moved from its place of death, its place of family, to the north of Serbia?

A. Of course I cannot give you an answer, and I've explained already a few times why I cannot give an answer. This really causes surprise.

Q. Well, you tell me --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice, what's the distance between Izbica ⁴⁰⁴⁹⁹ and --

MR. NICE: And Petrovo Selo? I suspect the witness, as an experienced policeman, could give us both the -- on the -- as the crow flies and the by the road time.

Q. How many kilometres or miles -- how many kilometres, roughly, from Izbica to Petrovo Selo?

A. About 350 to 400 kilometres. This is a rough estimate, a very speedy one.

Q. And none of the roads, unless I'm mistaken, between one and the other, apart from possibly using a short stretch of the motorway, none of the roads would be other than slow-ish roads?

A. Well, they're not local roads but they're regional roads.

Q. The survivors who have given evidence, Mr. Stevanovic, say that excavators were used to dig up these bodies. The purpose of digging up these bodies was to hide them, wasn't it?

A. That would really be highly illogical. There is documentation about that, where each and every individual body was buried. There is a sketch, and if I remember correctly, there are photographs of each and every one of them too. It defies explanation, really, why this kind of documentation would be compiled, why it would remain there, accessible, public, permanent in nature, if it involved any intention of removing the bodies. This is unfounded in logic or in reason as such.

Q. Well, then, if you can't help us with how it is that a body under Serb control, a corpse under Serb control, finds its way 350 kilometres by road to Petrovo Selo, can you tell us who can help us? ⁴⁰⁵⁰⁰

A. Those who did it. If you find them. I don't know who organised it. I don't know who did it. Only those who did it know. What we did at that time is what you can see here, and what somebody else did without my knowledge is something that I cannot help you about.

Q. It is shocking disrespect of the dead to dig them up and to transport them to places where they might not be found. Would you agree with that?

A. I absolutely agree with that.

Q. No one yet, is this right, has been identified as the transporter of the bodies from -- I beg your pardon. There's been no inquiry, is this the position, that has so far identified who drove the bodies or moved the bodies from Izbica to Petrovo Selo?

A. As far as I know, from the moment when it was learned that there are graves in Batajnica and in Petrovo Selo, an investigation started. And again, according to the general state of information I have, this is under way, this investigation, it is under way in Serbia.

Q. By compulsion only, I suggest, of external knowledge. Let's have a look at the last question on this topic. 320, tab 75, please. My suggestion to you is the whole purpose of this movement of bodies can be shown in the first place by the callous way they were dug up. See, this is an aerial photograph taken on the 15th of May of 1999. Do you see the tractor, the trailer marks there? This is grave tampering at Izbica. Do you see the disturbance of the ground on the 3rd of June? What -- what vehicle with caterpillar tractors would be required to do a ⁴⁰⁵⁰¹ sensitive exhumation of bodies from individual graves? Can you tell us?

A. This is the first time I see these two photographs. On the one on the right, of course, I can recognise one trace which does look like a heavy vehicle imprint, but just one, and it's obvious that it leads to this dark stain and then it goes away further. Again, according to my very lay experience, had excavators been used there would have to be more traces, or perhaps I just don't see them.

There's too much of a shadow on this photograph where the grave had been, so there's nothing I can see here except for this very dark shadow.

JUDGE KWON: What's the tab number again?

MR. NICE: 320, tab -- 320, tab 75. Your Honours, just give me one minute.

My apologies to the Court. Before I turn from crime scenes, and I've dealt with all of them that the witness dealt with bar, I think, one. Can I make the position clear about Kotlina. His corner Judge Kwon asked me at one stage, in light of a document that had been handed over to the accused, whether all the names on the Kotlina schedule, Schedule L, were identified as coming from the KLA. At the same time, reference was made to a KLA book which is called The Phoenix of Freedom which had itself been recently served on the accused. Taking those two points in reverse order, the KLA book was served under cover of a Rule 68 letter but in fact it didn't need to be because the material is open source material, simply available in a book shop and is therefore not subject to the 68 regime but it was served out ⁴⁰⁵⁰² of an abundance of caution and to ensure that the accused wasn't missing something that was available to him.

I think it is four of those names on the Schedule L of 17 names that appear in the book, and I think one of those names has been further confirmed by a brother of one of the deceased as being a member of the KLA. The reference to all the victims having been members of the KLA was linked to the particular disclosure made to the accused where an investigator's report spoke of them being buried at a UCK cemetery, or 12 of the 24 victims, rather, being buried at a UCK cemetery, but no names were given. So that boiling all that down, in light of all available material, four of the names appear to be the names of those credited in the book The Phoenix of Freedom as being members of the KLA. One name is also confirmed as being a member of the KLA by his brother. But the significance of entries in the KLA book is another matter for another time, but that's what all that amounts to.

I may have one more question to ask about the movement of bodies later but I move now to what you've been able to tell us about Prosecution of alleged MUP offenders. Shall we look first, then, at tab 79.01, which is in the same volume, I think, volume 2.

Your Honours, I suspect that this one is translated. No, 79.1. I beg your pardon.

Before I develop this topic, can I remind the Court that we are still short of many translations, and there's one particular translation that I've pressed the liaison officer as one of importance, number 144, and it still isn't available. I don't know if it's maybe been translated ⁴⁰⁵⁰³ so that I can deal with it this morning, but if not, although it will take some time we may have to just go through it because it's a potentially important document, and without a translation we will nevertheless have to deal with it.

Right. We come, then, to 79.1. This document reveals a total -- if we just look at murders by MUP staff, Mr. Stevanovic, and we combine the translated part of the list with the statistics given, Your Honours will see, in the original version, and we see that murder comes, whatever it is, six or seven lines down but you can track it perhaps by its being three items after "grave incidence of robbery." That's one, two, three. And we can see that the total of murders between January and June of 1998 is one, between July and December is two, and then underneath that we have manslaughter and we see that there were two manslaughters between July and December of 1998. Is that correct, Mr. Stevanovic?

A. Yes, that is what is written in this table.

Q. Neither murder nor manslaughter in the first two and three quarter months of 1999, five murders between the 24th of March and the 10th of June of 1999. Correct?

A. Correct.

Q. That's murder and manslaughters, but to take just two famous name events, the Jashari killings and the Salihaj killings where, in the first case, maybe several members of the KLA were killed along with a large number of family members; in the Salihaj case where one member of the KLA was killed with a large number of family members, I think seven altogether including children, do those killings feature in your statistics at all? ⁴⁰⁵⁰⁴ That is, the killings of people in the course of events like Jashari and Salihaj?

A. Crimes are shown here, those that were qualified as murder. So as for the events concerning Jashari, and I cannot recall the other one that you mean, was probably qualified in a different way. Perhaps it is still in the investigation stage as conflict, as fighting, as a clash. And in this clash indeed a certain number of persons were killed, and as far as I can remember, at least one policeman was killed, perhaps even two or three policemen were killed in the clash. Probably or, rather, most certainly it was not qualified as murder. It is still in the sphere of investigation, and the investigation is supposed to show how the event concerned will be qualified.

These are pure crimes here that were --

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. -- evidently uncovered as murder.

Q. I'm anxious not to cut you short but it has a consequence on the time that is taken. My question, I hope, is simple. Where you have women and children killed, as in Jashari, or in Salihaj, a man aged 70 and a boy aged 16, along with other family members, where that happens, the police have got to bear responsibility for what they did by way of killing these people. Now, they may be excused, but they've got to bear responsibility. Do the statistics that you've produced, does all this material that you've produced cover those killings in any way, either by showing that they've been excused or justified, that they've been investigated, or that they've simply been brushed aside and forgotten? Does this material ^{40505 BLANK PAGE 40506} cover that?

A. The material that is here doesn't cover it, but the Jashari case and what happened in that village near Srbica, there is a case file with regard to all of this. It's very similar to all of these cases, Izbica, Pusto Selo, Suva Reka, the Podujevo case. It is similar in terms of the content of the material involved. Of course I'm going to repeat this once again: This is an attack against the police, and this is a clash between the police and the citizens, and everything that happened there is certainly contained in the case file and is well documented. Investigation is still possible. I talked about the problems that we confronted in Kosovo.

Q. Does it amount to this: That any death at the hands of the MUP that is categorised as non-criminal simply doesn't feature in the statistics at all?

A. It's included in other statistics, in dossier A, including incidents involving loss of life. It is certainly there in terms of the number of the persons involved, but it is recorded as a single incident involving a certain number of casualties on one side and on the other side involved in the clash.

The police sends its report to the prosecutor. The prosecutor decides how he is going to act and then orders the police and investigation organs what they are supposed to do. At this moment, I cannot say what was done with regard to this case, but this case, like many cases here, certainly does exist. There is a case file.

Q. I may return -- ⁴⁰⁵⁰⁷

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice, if it's convenient to take the break now.

MR. NICE: Certainly, yes.

MR. NICE: We will adjourn for 20 minutes.

--- Recess taken at 12.16 p.m.

--- On resuming at 12.40 p.m.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Nice.

MR. NICE:

Q. Tab 77, please, Mr. Stevanovic. If you'd take it out. Tab 77. This one has been translated. It's described as "Summary of crimes against Albanians in Kosovo and Metohija between the 1st of January, 1998, and the 10th to the 20th of June, 1999."

On page 1, A2, Article 47, which is murder, we see a total of 408 murders of Kosovo Albanians identified in that period. Now, your documents suggest, as we shall see, that only five of those cases could be attributed to crimes by the MUP; is that right?

A. Well, I don't know whether it was only five. As far as I was able to note a moment ago, eight crimes. But I would like to mention this: That does not mean that mean that 408 persons were killed. The number might have been higher. There were 480 [as interpreted] acts or -- now, the number of casualties, persons that died, can be higher than this number. Perhaps that is self-evident, so I apologise if I was too lengthy in my explanations.

Q. What does it reveal? Does it reveal that on your case and on your statistics civilians are killing each other, or does it reveal that the ⁴⁰⁵⁰⁸ military are killing civilians? What does it show?

A. It shows the number of crimes, criminal acts. And the perpetrators can, of course, come from all the structures of society. I had occasion to speak about different examples, quote different examples which speak to the fact that the perpetrators were different and the victims were different. In this case, the victims were mostly Albanians. And the perpetrators of all these acts were --

Q. We've heard evidence of hundreds and thousands of people being killed and the case is that they're killed by, in large part, by the forces of the police and the army clearing people out of Albania. Are those allegations covered at all in this 408? Because if so, they haven't been investigated. You see, that's what I want to know.

A. These are only 400 acts which were qualified as murder, as killings. And I've already said there were about 1.500 events involving casualties, victims, but to the present day they have not been qualified as murders, which doesn't mean that they won't be, as killings. So if any of these events, if light is thrown and these cases solved, they will be qualified as murders or the corresponding qualification pursuant to the Criminal Code.

Q. Let's go back to the prosecutions or investigations you've told us about.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] I have the impression that Mr. Nice isn't asking the question properly, putting a proper question to the ⁴⁰⁵⁰⁹ witness, because the document that he refers to, if you look at page 2, it says the number of uncovered perpetrators of crimes, and then you have civilians, the police force, the active police force, the reserve police force, the army, reserve and active, and so on and so forth. All that information is on page 2 in the same table. The answers to his questions are listed there.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic, and this is a matter that you may bring up in your re-examination.

MR. NICE:

Q. Let's turn now to the crimes you've told us about. We've dealt with Cvjetan and Demirovic. Two other points about those. First of all, Demirovic escaped to Canada; correct?

A. I do know that, yes.

Q. Cvjetan was eventually sentenced to 20 years, I think; correct?

A. I don't have that information, unfortunately.

Q. He was the only one of all those offences that you can point to, I suspect, you'll confirm, charged with a war crime.

A. Well, I'm not sure about that qualification, but I think I have information that of late that is the case.

Q. And the only reason it was charged as a war crime was between non-governmental organisations and his own Defence lawyers insisted on its being charged as a war crime rather than a simple murder; is that correct?

A. I really can't say. I don't know about that. I don't know who put forward what position in the proceedings.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice, if you have information about that, I'd ⁴⁰⁵¹⁰ be interested. I think it would be useful for the Chamber to have it.

MR. NICE: Certainly. We'll find it if time allows. It's in one of the tabs.

Q. The reasons this case has come back to court, as it happens today, is because even in Cvjetan's case, despite the enormous number of people who died, his sentence was annulled in the court of appeal; is that right?

A. I really don't know about the parts of the trial and the outcome of the proceedings.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... something else, but while Ms. Tromp is looking for that particular piece of information, in case she can find it before I get to the next topic, just one other little detail: Did you hear the evidence in this Court given by the man Gojovic about the prosecution by the military? Did you hear or learn about that?

A. No. All I know is that he testified, but I didn't follow his testimony.

Q. Did you learn, either in the press or elsewhere, of a man called Djurovic who resisted what he said was a policy of "letting people get away with it" in Kosovo and was sent, despite being a colonel in the prosecution's office, was sent back to Serbia from Kosovo? Did you learn about him?

A. No. The name doesn't ring a bell, the surname.

Q. Is it the position that both the MUP and the army in Kosovo were pursuing the same blind-eyed approach to what was going on and making either just nominal gestures of prosecution or prosecution only when they were forced to do so by circumstances? ⁴⁰⁵¹¹

A. Well, that isn't true, and I gave the example of great pressure and -- on the police to release detainees based on an example I know about, and the police didn't succumb.

Q. And are you aware and would it surprise you to know that simply for having his name mentioned in this Court - not being a witness, having his name mentioned as a somebody who proposed proper prosecutions - Djurovic has now lost his job? Do you know that?

A. Let me understand this; that he would lose his job if he were to testify? Was that the sense of your question?

Q. His name was mentioned in this Court as somebody who favoured proper prosecution and he since then lost his job. Do you know about that? Because that shows the environment in which people still operate, I suggest to you.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice -- Mr. Nice.

MR. NICE: Yes.

JUDGE ROBINSON: I'm also interested in the case that went to the appeals chamber and was annulled, because I don't find it helpful just to hear that it was annulled.

MR. NICE: No, no.

JUDGE ROBINSON: One needs to know why.

MR. NICE: Thank you. At the moment, all I have, which is the material coming from the press report that I called for when the witness said that he had improved memory because of what he had read in the press, simply informs me that the case is to continue on Monday with witnesses because Cvjetan, sentenced to 20 years for war crimes, the supreme court ⁴⁰⁵¹² annulled the sentence over appeals by attorneys and returned the case for retrial. The appeal -- the attorneys appealed because of violations of procedure and process.

I can have one of my colleagues read the balance of that for detail.

As to the other point that Your Honour raised, no, I haven't found the answer to it yet, but I will do.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you.

MR. NICE: But we must move on, for time.

THE INTERPRETER: Microphone, please, Mr. Nice.

MR. NICE:

Q. The next crime you told us about was the crime committed by Predrag Nikolic, Selatovic -- Zoran Djeletovic and Ivan Ivanov, the murder of the Bljakcori family. Your tabs 158 to 167, but don't get them out. Now, was that charged as an ordinary crime, not a war crime?

A. I think the criminal report was filed for the crime of murder.

Q. Yes. And of course charging for murder avoids the risk of a finding of war crimes which would associate superior military and political figures in the crime, doesn't it?

A. Well, in itself, no, although once again let me repeat I cannot speak as a legal expert because according to my profession I have a lot of experience in the police, but what I learnt about is that it was an isolated case, outside any fighting, outside any combat operations or plan of any kind. A murder took place of a family in a specific place outside any unit, outside any operation or anything like that. It was murder with ⁴⁰⁵¹³ intent, of four policemen against a family that happened to be in that particular place at that time.

Q. Well, before I conclude what I want to ask about this -- this particular crime, this point: One thing that neither you nor anybody else these days --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Milosevic. Yes?

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Do you consider it opportune that when Mr. Nice claims something, and he claimed that some colonel was let go from his job because his name was mentioned and that a judgement was annulled and you were interested in that, that it would be necessary to say when that colonel was dismissed and when the case was annulled on appeal?

JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Nice has promised to provide the information.

MR. NICE:

Q. One thing that neither you nor anybody else appearing for this accused can now, I suggest to you, can now challenge, is that the lawyers Agani and Kelmendi, murdered shortly after the start of the bombing, were good men doing good work; correct?

A. I heard the name Fehmi Agani. As far as I know, he was one of the leaders of some Albanian party in Kosovo and Metohija, but I really can't recall Kelmendi. The name seems familiar, but I don't know that he was a lawyer. And I know that Agani was killed. That is incontestable.

Q. You're seriously telling us as the senior policeman that you are unaware of the fact that Mr. Kelmendi and his son were taken by uniformed Serb forces from their home and murdered? You're seriously telling us ⁴⁰⁵¹⁴ that, are you? Almost one of the most famous civil rights murders in the course of this entire history and you're saying you just can remember his name? Yes?

A. I am saying with full responsibility that I know about the killing of Fehmi Agani, and I know that I personally wanted to hear how the investigation was getting along throwing light on that event. As to Kelmendi's murder, I can't remember any of the details, although I have it somewhere in my mind that that lawyer was killed but I can't remember where, when, or anything else related to that case. As for the killing of Agani, I do have knowledge and I was personally interested in having the matter solved. And at one point in time I thought that it had been solved parallel to the killing of the Bljakcori family, for example, and then later on it turned out that it had not.

Q. Well, exactly. Bljakcori -- I beg your pardon. Nikolic and Djeletovic -- I beg your pardon, Nikolic and, yes, Djeletovic were both arrested for, suspected of, and apparently investigated for the murder of Agani, the man pulled from the train as he was near to -- sorry, he left the train near to his escape, going to the defence of someone else, and that investigation then was withdrawn as against these two men who were simply left to face the ordinary murder of the Bljakcori family. Is that right?

A. I've already said that I had the conviction that that matter, that case had been solved, and I think I told your investigators that. That's what I thought. But I wanted to check that out after talking to the ⁴⁰⁵¹⁵ investigators, and then looking at the case, studying the case, I established that that particular killing, the killing of Fehmi Agani was not proved during the investigation and the investigation is ongoing. The killing of the Bljakcori family was established, and that was somewhere in the same locality, as far as I recall, and it happened on the same day. That was proved. And as soon as the case was solved, four policemen were taken into custody and remained in detention until the end of the war. Afterwards, I didn't follow the developments. I also said that. And I said that we had 20 days of pressure on us from the citizenry who were convinced that it wasn't those policemen that had committed that act and that they should be released from detention, and I told them that they had never been released from custody. So that is what I know about that particular event and with respect to the killing of Fehmi Agani.

Q. The killing of individuals like the -- the large number of victims of Cvjetan, the family butchered by Nikolic and Djeletovic can be described as excesses of an individual, but is this the position, Mr. Stevanovic, that the killing at a critical time of a civil rights lawyer like Kelmendi or of an important leader like Agani can never be disguised in that way because it has a political motive and that's why those investigations have never been concluded?

A. Please. It is quite clear that the police part of the investigation and the police part of the job, if I can be more specific, in those particular cases was completed. Criminal reports were filed against perpetrators unknown of that act and all the other available evidence and proof were sent to the responsible prosecutor. That is not ^{40516 BLANK PAGE 40517} contested. I haven't got the files, but we could see, I'm sure, that the police filed a criminal report first of all with an unknown perpetrator and then with a known perpetrator in the case of the Bljakcori family. And in the case of Fehmi Agani, I'm quite sure that a criminal report was filed against perpetrator or perpetrators unknown. I really don't remember what the situation was with Kelmendi, but I'm also quite certain that what was the minimum that was done was that a criminal report was filed against perpetrators unknown, but I can't say that with certainty because I don't actually remember the entire case myself.

Q. The next MUP killing of which you spoke was your tabs 172 to 3, Petkovic Boban and Simic Djordje. This was tried as simple murder, wasn't it, not as a war crime?

A. I apologise, but could you remind me what the place involved was? I can't identify the case without a place name just on the basis of the names. Perhaps it was Orahovac or Mitrovica, was it?

Q. Orahovac, yes. Thank you.

A. Yes, that was also -- I think there was two criminal reports or one criminal report for the two crimes, but a criminal report for the crime of murder was filed once again.

Q. That of all the crimes you've told us, is the only one that started to any extent before this accused left office, and even that one only started in June 2000; correct? When I say the crime started, the process of investigation or trial started.

A. Those were events which I had certain knowledge and I suggested that the defence prepare those cases, take those cases. Of course, there ⁴⁰⁵¹⁸ are a series of similar cases which have entered a similar stage or were completed when it was the -- was a question of civilian casualties and victims. I don't know how many more cases there are which are linked to policemen, but the statistics, of course, we do have here, and these several cases are cases on which -- about which I had a little more knowledge and information than I did compared to other cases.

Q. Well, that -- the first case, the Orahovac one of Boban Petkovic and Simic Djordje was the one that was tried as murder, but the next two that you told us about, Boban Petkovic, tab 174, and Goran Veselinovic and Dragan Todosijevic, tabs 170 and 171, were never tried, were they?

A. I can't confirm that. My information tells me that they were, but I can't confirm it.

Q. If you can find the material to point that out to in your materials, I'd be grateful. No offence of any kind charged for expulsion at any stage as against the MUP?

A. To the best of my knowledge, no.

Q. And of course the same thing applies in relation to those as applied in relation to prosecuting people for being politicians or lawyers. Expulsion, I suggest to you, would inevitably involve a superior, and therefore you can't just charge someone at a low level and get away with it. Is that the reason no expulsions were charged?

A. No. The reason for which no expulsions had criminal reports filed was that there wasn't any knowledge of anybody moving anybody violently, forcing anybody to move, although we did consider the possibility but there was absolutely no mention of any filing or non-filing of criminal ⁴⁰⁵¹⁹ reports that depended on the affiliation of the victim or the perpetrator. So we cannot say that the killing of Fehmi Agani and Kelmendi was not prosecuted because they were lawyers. I said on several occasions that all the victims in the sense of police investigation had the same treatment, and so did all the perpetrators, regardless of their status would have been treated in the same way.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. And expulsion must have been done by somebody individually had that been done. Of course, one would have to qualify the -- this conduct in a certain way.

Q. Anybody prosecuted for burning other people's documents?

A. I don't think so. I'm not quite sure. I have no knowledge of that.

Q. You say that the evidence, and there's been a great deal of evidence in one form or another about people being kicked out of Kosovo by police, by MUP, and having their documents destroyed at the border, makes no sense because they could have applied to get their citizenship rights back. Can you point me to anybody who made that application and had it granted?

A. For what? Granted for what, for their return? I wasn't following.

Q. Let me slow it down. Your evidence is that all the accounts we've heard of people having their documents taken from them, their car licence plates taken from them and destroyed, burnt in piles, so on, is insignificant and irrelevant because those individuals could apply to the ⁴⁰⁵²⁰ police or to the authorities and the database, a computer database, would confirm their entitlement to be treated as citizens of Kosovo. My question to you is: Can you point me to somebody who ever made such an application?

A. Let me first say that my answer did not have that context at all. I did not challenge the fact that this was contrary to the law, against the law if it did happen and if it happened in any scope. And I did not say that that was not important and didn't have any meaning or sense if we had a uniform database. I just stated a fact in response to your question. I said that that couldn't be a key reason for somebody -- the main reason why somebody wasn't given citizenship. Now, with respect to the second part of your question that I don't know whether anybody filed a claim for their papers, but I'm sure cases of that kind do exist in practice, but I don't know of any such case related to Kosovo.

Q. You know perfectly well, Mr. Stevanovic, that by the time people have been kicked out, threatened, seen crimes on the refugees lines and so on, there's no way that they were going to apply to the same forces to come back in. You know that to be the case, don't you?

A. That was not the case. And it was not the case as you generalise it, that everybody was expelled and that that was the goal and so on. So I don't want to go back to that question. Departure, in most cases, was up to the people's own will, the need for them to leave an area which had become engulfed by war. So for those reasons and all the other reasons that I tried to explain in giving my answers is how things stand. ⁴⁰⁵²¹

Q. Last three questions on killings by MUP forces, and I'm only going to deal with killings, I don't have the disposition to use time on other topics. It's right, is it, that there are just three cases where MUP have been charged with war crimes in respect of killings. One is the Cvjetan case that we've already referred to and it's back for retrial. That relates to Kosovo. The second case is the Strpce case. That's the train that runs between the border and from which people were pulled out and killed. Also called the Sjeverin case; correct?

A. Those two cases, but they are linked in one way. Sjeverin was abduction from a bus and Strpce was abduction from a train.

Q. In this case -- excuse me just one minute. This event happened, what, in 1992?

A. I'm not sure now. That happened in 1992. Maybe also in the beginning of 1991, but certainly in 1992. I remembered it better when I was answering questions.

Q. Very well.

A. One case certainly happened in 1992.

Q. The principal killer was a known mass killer called Milan Lukic; correct?

A. That kidnapping involved a group led by Milan Lukic. That kidnapping was associated with them.

Q. Yes. And what happened was that he was extradited, if this was something that could happen, to the body known as Republika Srpska, and from Republika Srpska he's disappeared. So he never had to face trial, did he? ⁴⁰⁵²²

A. As I remember very well, he was arrested in Uzice, I believe, and detained in Belgrade, and I believe that for some procedural reasons he was released. That's what I know. But I don't know whether he was handed over or extradited or simply released. That's something I don't know at this moment. This was happening when I was involved in those activities related to the Drina, which we discussed at greater length in the previous days.

Q. Can you --

A. What was important to me was for similar incidents not to happen again, and they never happened again since I engaged my units in that area.

MR. NICE: Your Honours, will you permit me on this occasion to make available to the witness an original of a document, it's an existing exhibit, and place on the overhead projector a copy that has got some underlinings and markings on it but I've scratched out what is relevant. This is part of Exhibit 667, tab 8. If the witness would like to have that up there, and if you would like to start there, please.

Q. There is a document exhibited in this case coming from the Supreme Defence Council, session 8, and if you look at the bottom of the page, you see the accused talking about Strpce and says: "There was just one man who conducted the control and others got on the train at the station at Strpce. One man was slipped in here and we kept looking all over. We must catch all of them.

"Bulatovic: A ransom was demanded and we tried to pay the ransom for those people. Of course they were all killed. Our state security ⁴⁰⁵²³ found out that Lukic's group intends to kill." Next page, please. "Our police arrested Lukic and he is behind bars. We will see what we are going to do next. We must not talk about that because we want to arrest some others too. He is a murderer and criminal." And then Bulatovic: "He is in fact a tragic figure." But enough of that.

Were you aware that the senior politicians were completely in the know about who had committed the Strpce massacre at an early stage?

A. It would seem logical to me that they knew because a serious massacre had happened. But I'm not aware of this meeting or the contributions that you just quoted.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. I don't know when it happened, but I know that everybody learnt about the incident itself very quickly.

Q. To what level would so-called extradition to a body like the RS have had to be referred for this man to be let go from Serbia to be tried elsewhere and then, as it happens, to disappear? To what level would that decision have to be referred? This accused?

A. That's some level in the structure of the judiciary. I don't think that when it comes to the extradition of a national of a different state anybody else can decide. That's what I would guess, but I'm not familiar with the issues of extradition.

Q. And the RS --

A. I think that procedure is prescribed by the law on criminal procedure. In fact, I know it is. ⁴⁰⁵²⁴

Q. Are you not aware that the RS is no state? Certainly not at that time.

A. Well, I cannot speak in terms of those categories now. Certainly Bosnia-Herzegovina is another state.

Q. Very well.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] Mr. Robinson.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Milosevic.

THE ACCUSED: [Interpretation] May I, too, receive this document that was quoted a minute ago? Mr. Nice said the 8th session of the supreme --

JUDGE ROBINSON: Let a copy be passed to Mr. Milosevic.

MR. NICE: As I explained to Your Honours, I was seeking your leave to use it just by showing it on the overhead projector. But perhaps he can have the original and I could have the English copy back. Then I'm content to work that way. That's the original, the B/C/S to the accused; the English copy back to me. Thank you very much. Thanks.

Q. Few small points that I want to deal with -- and I take it we still don't have an English translation of Exhibit 144. It hasn't arrived.

You told us at an early stage that you were unaware of the Red Berets being formed in 1991, later -- later to the JSO. You suggested to us that what had happened at the anniversary meeting in 1996 must have been different from what happened at the video meeting in 1997. Let me be quite clear about this, Mr. Stevanovic: I'm suggesting to you that was a complete lie by you and I suggest that can be proved by the following: ⁴⁰⁵²⁵ You confirmed last week that your superior Djordjevic was present and could be seen on the Kula video from 1997; correct?

A. General Djordjevic can be seen at the ceremony in Kula in 1998, that is true.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... his deputy, associated with him freely.

A. I was not his deputy ever. Only one in my career was I deputy of the head of a police sector. Djordjevic and I were appointed assistant ministers --

Q. Very well.

A. -- in the same procedure. He was head of sector, but we were both assistant ministers and I was never his deputy.

Q. I --

A. Maybe in his function of head of police sector.

Q. I suggest to you that your proposition that somehow the -- Frenki Simatovic put on a different display and gave a different history in one year from the history he freely gave to people, including your colleague then, or your peer, Djordjevic the following year is ridiculous and is something that you've been obliged to say because you're trying to hide your knowledge of the Red Berets.

A. No. That is not true. I am not trying to obscure what I know. I remember very well that I was invited to the ceremony to mark the establishment of the unit for special operations. Of course, I don't remember every detail of every speech, but my entire recollection of that ceremony indicates that that unit was established then or the day before, ⁴⁰⁵²⁶ but the ceremony was dedicated to the establishment of that unit.

Q. Next point relates to tabs 82 and 83. I needn't ask you to look to them. They're both dated mid-April, I think, of 1999, and they deal with the movement of civilians. Do you accept, as we have heard from Exhibit 234, the UNHCR Neill Wright, that by the 5th of April the cumulative refugee total was some 400.000? Do you accept that figure?

A. Well, I can't tell you this moment whether I accept this figure. Of course by that date there had been significant movements of civilians and a significant number of civilians had left Kosovo and Metohija. Every day MUP was informed of the rough number of people who had crossed the border, and I have recollection of the number of 8.000 people in total -- 800.000 people in total who had left Kosovo and Metohija during the war.

Q. My suggestion to you is that orders of the type that you -- we looked at in 82 -- tabs 82 and 83 were cover-up orders that it would be easy to draw -- easy to draft once the majority of people had been kicked out and that they are just that, cover-up.

A. I don't know the dates on those orders, but I believe they are contemporaneous, and I assert what I have been asserting all this time; the leadership of all police units and military units as well were very concerned over this and did whatever they could to stop the movement of civilians in any way apart from using force. And I can tell you that after the beginning of NATO bombing, that day was the -- on the agenda as a great problem every day. However, there was no way to stop the movement of civilians.

Q. When you -- ^{40527 BLANK PAGE 40528}

A. Except by using force, and that would probably have been a crime.

Q. Tab 3, Exhibit 144, which we don't have translated. No. It must be tab 4, beg your pardon. Binder 4.

We see --

MR. NICE: Your Honours, I'm afraid I really -- it's very difficult to deal with this document in the circumstances and I just simply, knowing that it was top of the priority list, did not allocate my unlimited resources to getting it translated when it would have been translated twice.

Q. But this document, just tell us again in a sentence what it's all about.

A. I think we quoted from parts of this document, and we can see from the title what it is about.

Q. Yes?

A. Although of course this name, "Operative intra-departmental staff for combatting terrorism" is unfamiliar to me as a concept. But from the group of people who attended, one can conclude that it is the name of that group.

Q. The accused called the meeting, did he?

A. That seems logical, but I was invited to this meeting by the minister of the interior, not the president of the FRY.

Q. We see all the top officials, political and military and police there, don't we? Djordjevic, Milosevic, Milutinovic -- Milutinovic, Sainovic --

A. Yes, we can see that. ⁴⁰⁵²⁹

Q. -- everybody is there.

A. Yes, we can see who was there.

Q. [Previous translation continues] ... what proposal?

A. Well, I have to refresh my memory. Yes. The conclusions are on the last page.

Q. "Continuation of the Joint Command." Is that one of the proposals?

A. Yes. I believe I read something to that effect. One of the conclusions was that, a Joint Command only in the sense that I explained.

Q. Any more documents exist of the same kind of meeting that this one is evidence of?

A. At this moment, I'm not aware of other documents related to the meeting that is recorded here.

Q. I'll have to deal with that document when it's translated through later witnesses.

You were promoted to the rank of general by this accused?

A. Yes. I was promoted by the president of the Republic of Serbia, in keeping with the then law on ranks.

Q. The police were regarded as paid very favourably in comparison with the army?

A. The exact data that was in my possession I'm unable to quote. I knew that the police was paid appropriately to the problems they had to deal with. Whether they had salaries higher than those in the army and what the ratio was, I'm not sure.

Q. The -- ⁴⁰⁵³⁰

JUDGE ROBINSON: Is that -- was that the point of your question, Mr. Nice, to say that they were more highly paid than the army?

MR. NICE: Yes. That's the suggestion, or the inquiry.

JUDGE KWON: I think I read one passage where it says, Don't tell the armies they are paid less. I don't remember the tab number at this moment.

Do you remember, General?

THE WITNESS: [Interpretation] One fact indicates that, but it was not about salaries. Those were compensations paid for tours in Kosovo, and since those compensations were regulated by a variety of regulations, the police had higher compensations or, in other words, per diem, but that was compensation for tours of duty outside the basis of their units.

MR. NICE:

Q. Military ranks were given partly because Badza wanted it but partly because it reflected the developing extreme militarisation of the police force of which you were a member; correct?

A. Let me say, first of all, that those were not military ranks. We can talk about ranks that had the same names as military ranks. There is a law governing ranks for police members. I don't know the exact name of that law. So we cannot talk about military ranks. We can only talk about names and terms used for police ranks that are similar to those of military ranks. And I believe I also explained in great detail that the existence of ranks does not mean militarisation, because rank is not the source of powers, duties, authorisations. It is the law that vests certain powers -- ⁴⁰⁵³¹

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. -- in the individual, not the rank.

Q. Pausing there. And as a matter of history, is it right that the Constitutional Court of Serbia subsequently found that the accused had acted unconstitutionally in doing what he did about the ranking system for the police?

A. First of all, it was some provisions of that law that were declared unconstitutional, and I don't need to tell you that the president of Serbia did not pass laws. We know very well who passed laws.

Q. Couple of other things and then one more short topic to which we must return. As a matter of fact, simply as a matter of fact, two of the ministers of the interior who would have lain between the accused and people below him, Stojiljkovic and Sokolovic, both committed suicide?

A. That is true.

Q. As a matter of fact, after the wars were over, you, Djordjevic, and Lukic were all honoured to the same degree by this accused; correct?

A. I don't know whether it was to the same degree or not --

Q. [Previous translation continues] ...

A. -- but it was together with another thousand policemen.

Q. Order of the Yugoslavian Flag First Class, you, Djordjevic, and Lukic?

A. Maybe you won't believe me, but I don't know the exact name of that order. I believe you.

Q. You were entirely to be trusted by the leadership from the moment of your promotion to general, and indeed before, and Srebrenica is the ⁴⁰⁵³² proof.

Remember you told us about what you did at the border and my suggestion to you that you knew and had to know what was coming and going through that border? Remember that?

A. That is what you said, indeed, and I replied to that, and I have to repeat my answer; namely, that I had nothing to do with the events in Srebrenica nor do any units under my command.

Q. We've seen -- sorry. As you drove -- as you escorted DutchBat out, do you remember being held up by Serb tanks, or by tanks, in any event, that were themselves passing from Republika Srpska into Serbia proper? Remember that happening?

A. No, that did not happen.

Q. There was a Dutch colonel called Franken. Do you remember him?

A. I don't remember an officer of that name. I would have thought it was a general. But if you remind me, I will tell you whether it is the same person or not.

I remember a Dutch general, grey haired, tall. I knew his name at the time, but I can't -- it eludes me for the moment.

Q. I probably got his rank wrong. Then that's him. I'm not suggesting he's given evidence in this Court of what I'm suggesting to you, but I'm suggesting that in his sight and at the departure of the Dutch from Srebrenica or from Bratunac, so far as you were concerned, there were sights of departing tanks, and you must have seen that as well.

A. No. I am absolutely certain that I didn't see any tanks on the way to or from Bratunac. I said Bratunac was two kilometres away, but ⁴⁰⁵³³ it's not even that. It could be a kilometre from the bridge across the Drina. I cannot tell you exactly, but I know it's very close to the Drina River.

Q. Now, I want to return to a topic, last couple questions. By the time you were down there in Bratunac, the killing had happened, or nearly all of it had happened, and as we've seen from the video, on a wide scale. From code cables we've got passing between Yugoslavian bodies in New York, Washington, and no doubt in Belgrade, seven days before you were sent there there was knowledge of the disappearance and probable fate of Muslims from Srebrenica.

Now, I'd like you to look, please, at a video.

[Videotape played]

THE INTERPRETER: "[Voiceover] I would have to answer first."

MR. NICE: Needs to have the screen at a different angle.

Q. We're going to see you in this video. Can you, by the way -- we've stopped the frame at the picture of the bearded man. Can you tell us who he was or who he is?

A. I really don't know. I can't remember the man.

Q. Tell us who the man to his right and our left, wearing the dark glasses, is.

A. I can't see him well enough, and I cannot recognise anyone from this image.

Q. Very well.

A. If you have a more complete image maybe.

[Videotape played] ⁴⁰⁵³⁴

THE INTERPRETER: "[Voiceover] Thank you for your hospitality. We will see each other there. Good-bye.

"Good-bye."

MR. NICE:

Q. Where are you?

A. Yes. Yes, that's me, of course.

[Videotape played]

THE INTERPRETER: "[Voiceover] Good-bye. All right. All the best to you. Good-bye. My best to you."

This was inaudible.

MR. NICE:

Q. Play it once more because I want to --

[Videotape played]

THE INTERPRETER: "[Voiceover] Gentlemen --"

MR. NICE:

Q. This is when DutchBat was being handed over by Mladic, they having been hostaged for a week or so, to you. Thousands already killed and with Belgrade being in possession of information for over a week that things were going badly, to put it mildly.

[Videotape played]

THE INTERPRETER: "[Voiceover]... to you?

MR. NICE:

Q. Who is that man to your right? Did he come down to you?

A. That's true. I can identify him now. It is General Mile Puzovic.

Q. What part of the services did he belong to? ⁴⁰⁵³⁵

A. He was -- he belonged to the public security sector, and I believe at that moment he was head of the department of border police.

Q. Very well. Where did you pick him up then, or did he travel independently?

A. No. We travelled together. He and I travelled together to Bratunac. We had the same assignment.

Q. So he would have had access to the leadership as well as access that you also had to Mladic; yes?

A. I don't know about that. I did not have access to Mladic. Mladic was there where we had gone to.

[Videotape played]

MR. NICE:

Q. This man, the man on the right there with the grey hair, who is he?

A. I'd have to take a look again. I didn't see him. I have to see. I do not recall anybody else arriving with us.

[Videotape played]

MR. NICE:

Q. That man there.

A. No. I cannot recognise this man. I really can't. I don't know this man.

Q. You coming from Belgrade were all trusted to deal with Mladic. Were you told not to ask any questions?

A. No.

Q. Were you not even yourself at that time concerned to know what had ⁴⁰⁵³⁶ happened to the people who had been clearly at his mercy with the Dutch being his hostages for over a week? Were you not interested to know that, as a policeman?

A. Mr. Prosecutor, you're getting me involved in a story that I have nothing to do about. That is one of my many assignments, truth to tell, a very delicate, a special one, but one of the many assignments that I received and that I carried out.

May I remind you that as far as Srebrenica is concerned and what happened in Srebrenica, my units took 800 soldiers of the BH army, and they were perfectly fine. Nothing happened to them. That is proof of how we treated anyone who tried to cross the border, even soldiers of the BH army.

This was a specific task, a specific assignment that I got from my superior to ensure safe passage to the Dutch Battalion through Serbia. I did not know any of what you're saying or could I infer from this conversation any of that. Since this was a general from the Dutch Battalion, it was only natural for someone who was at his level to go there.

Q. Thank you very much.

A. Of course, from the police, if there can be any --

MR. NICE: [Previous translation continues]... subject only to this, Your Honour: The answers to the documents, of course, are not with the witness at the moment. We don't know if and when they'll come through. Likewise any answers he may have further about the film. But that's all I wish to ask him. ⁴⁰⁵³⁷ Can we deal with exhibits tomorrow? Or at the end of re-examination.

JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes. Perhaps at the end of re-examination. We will adjourn now and resume tomorrow at 9.00 a.m.

--- Whereupon the hearing adjourned at 1.44 p.m., to be reconvened on Tuesday, the 7th day

of June, 2005, at 9.00 a.m.