MILOSEVIC "TRIAL" SYNOPSIS: OCTOBER 16, 2003
www.slobodan-milosevic.org - October 16, 2003

The 245th day of the so-called “trial” of Slobodan Milosevic began today in the Hague with the continuation of the secret witness known simply as “B-1445.” If you remember from yesterday B-1445 was one of the founders of Alija Izetbegovic’s SDA, and was an MP from Doboj in northern Bosnia Herzegovina.

B-1445, even though he is a Muslim, claimed to have no idea how the Muslims managed to arm themselves. This however didn’t stop him from claiming to know all about how the Serbs were armed. According to B-1445 Slobodan Milosevic was the one arming the Bosnian Serbs. Of course B-1445 didn’t produce any evidence that President Milosevic was doing this, he just made the claim without providing any basis for doing so.

B-1445 didn’t know anything about the Muslim paramilitary formation known as Patriotic League either. B-1445 claimed that when the war broke out the Patriotic League didn’t exist. This was a mistake for B-1445 because President Milosevic had a document issued by the Command of the 2^nd Corps of the Patriotic League inviting people to attend the 1^st Anniversary celebration of the Patriotic League at a hotel in Tuzla on November 28, 1992. This of course means that the Patriotic League was formed on November 28, 1991 – one year before it’s 1 year anniversary – in other words the Patriotic League was formed in 1991, well before the outbreak of war.

President Milosevic didn’t stop there either; he had another document proving that the Patriotic League existed before the war. The document was dated February 25, 1992 and was issued by the Patriotic League commander Sefer Halilovic and it stated that the Patriotic League was already formed into platoons and detachments and had a fighting force of more than 150,000 men already in February 1992 – again before the war.

Of course B-1445 tried to claim that the Muslims were unarmed and that the Serbs attacked Doboj for no reason. President Milosevic, again with documents, demonstrated that the Muslims in Doboj were armed and were using their weapons to attack the Serbs with.

President Milosevic even had one document from the B-H Army stating that 7 Serb tanks, and 3 APC’s were destroyed and that heavy losses were inflicted on the Serbs precisely in Doboj. But according to B-1445 the only weapons that the Muslims had were hunting rifles. So how is it that the Muslims managed to destroy tanks and APC’s with hunting rifles?

Seeing that President Milosevic was getting the better of him, “B-1445” resorted to the old “Greater Serbia” rhetoric. Of course B-1445 couldn’t point to any concrete example where he heard Serbs discussing the formation of “Greater Serbia,” but he did talk about how Serbs would express a desire to live in one state. Of course President Milosevic pointed out that Yugoslavia was one state and that the Serbs had been living in one state for 70 years, and for that matter so had the Muslims and the Croats. Therefore, the Serbs were talking about preserving and remaining in Yugoslavia, and not about forming any “Greater Serbia.”

To prove his point President Milosevic pulled out a document that was submitted by the prosecution as an exhibit. It was a statement from the SDS expressing the sense that Yugoslavia was a state of free and equal people, and pledging the loyalty of the SDS membership to the Yugoslav state. Not to any “greater Serbia,” but to Yugoslavia as a state of free and equal people.

President Milosevic wondered what crime that the prosecution is trying to prove with such a document; he wondered if it was considered a crime to express loyalty to one’s country? With that the testimony of B-1445 ended.

The “tribunal” then asked the parties how much time they all needed to examine Lord Owen, who will testify as a court witness, but not as a prosecution witness. The Prosecution asked for two hours, the Amicus asked for one hour, and President Milosevic asked for one day.

The next witness was Sejo Omeragic a former war reporter for the Sarajevo daily Slobodna Bosna. Mr. Omeragic traveled from Sarajevo to Bijelina with Fikret Abdic and Biljana Plavsic on April 4, 1992.

According to Omeragic, when they arrived in Bijelina it was under the control of Arkan’s Tigers, and the women and children were scared and seeking shelter at the JNA barracks.

Omeragic’s claim was that both Ms. Plavsic, and the JNA Generals that were in the area, acted as if they were suborned to Arkan. What he saw was Ms. Plavsic kissing Arkan, and thanking him for saving the Serbs in Bijelina and 2 JNA generals greeting Arkan, and this is what was supposed to prove their subordination to Arkan.

The purpose of the trip was to attend a meeting in Bijelina. Apparently the meeting was held because the JNA wanted Arkan to leave Bijelina. The JNA had representatives at the meeting, Arkan was at the meeting, Ms. Plavsic was at the meeting, and Fikret Abdic attended the meeting. The witness however, was not allowed to enter the meeting.

The only thing that the witness saw was the parties greeting each other before the meeting and saying goodbye to each other after the meeting. He didn’t know how everybody interacted during the meeting because he wasn’t there.

The main point of Mr. Omeragic’s testimony was not to talk about the meeting that he didn’t attend it was to smear Fikret Abdic. For those of you who don’t know Fikret Abdic got the most votes in the 1990 presidential elections in Bosnia, and by all rights he should have been president instead of Alija Izetbegovic.

Fikret Abdic, was a moderate Muslim and got along well with the Serbs. He was not a fundamentalist like Izetbegovic, and he didn’t attack the Serbs like Izetbegovic did. In fact in the 1990 elections many Serbs voted for him.

Fikret Abdic went on to govern Cazinska Krajina a predominantly Muslim region around Velika Kladusa in the northwest corner of Bosnia. Because of Izetbegovic’s warmongering policies Abdic proclaimed declared the Cazinska Krajina enclave an autonomous republic, and successfully co-existed there along with the Serbs.

Fikret Abdic is the best proof that the Serbs were not committing any sort of genocide against Muslims in Bosnia. If the Serbs were committing genocide then they would have attacked Abdic and the Cazinska Krajina enclave, but they didn’t, because Abdic wasn’t attacking them.

It was in fact Izetbegovic who on June 10, 1994 attacked the Cazinska Krajina enclave and drove Abdic and his Muslim followers out of Bosnia, because they refused to wage his fascist Jihad against the Serbs.

Abdic and his followers were driven, by Izetbegovic’s forces, into the Serbian Krajina in Croatia, and were given refuge there by the Serbs, until the Croats launched their operation Storm and cleansed Croatia of practically every last Serb.

Today Fikret Abdic is locked-up in a Croat jail accused of war crimes, simply because he got along well with the Serbs.

Slobodan Milosevic calls Fikret Abdic “a man of peace.” Mr. Omeragic, on the other hand, tried to make it sound like Fikret Abdic was a coward and a quisling who betrayed the Muslims. It was a really obscene display, but that is what I have come to expect from the Hague Tribunal.

The final witness was another secret witness. This witness was called “B-1453.” He was a Muslim traffic cop working for the Serbian police in Bijelina. The prosecution heavily relied on Rule 89(F) and so I don’t know what they were trying to prove with this witness.

Slobodan Milosevic, on the other hand, did make some useful points with this witness. First of all according to B-1453 Arkan was only in Bijelina because the local population hired him and paid him to come there. In other words he wasn’t sent there by anybody from Serbia, he was invited to come there by the locals.

The next useful point was that as a Muslim working for the Serbian police in Bijelnia, B-1453 didn’t suffer any discrimination. According to B-1453 there were 12 Muslim traffic police and 25 Muslim regular police working in the Serbian police department in Bijelina and none of them was discriminated against.

B-1453 also confirmed that there were Muslims who responded to the VRS call-up, and joined the Bosnian Serb Army.

The witness concluded and the “court” adjourned for the day. The next hearing will take place next Tuesday.
 

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