First Insider Testifies to Massacres - Ethnic Cleansing: Former VJ captain says Serb forces massacred civilians in Djakova

Coordination and Planning

A 55 year old former captain in the Yugoslav Army (VJ) was the first 'insider' to testify in the trial of Slobodan Milosevic for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Nike Peraj, an Albanian, served in the VJ from December 1998 until three days before NATO troops entered Kosovo in June 1999. When he decided not to leave Kosovo with the Army on its retreat, he became a deserter and was later tried in absentia, convicted and sentenced to 15 years in prison. He remains free in Kosovo.

Mr. Peraj's testimony was an important piece in the prosecution's case, as it supported the central allegation that Serbian forces carried out a well-coordinated plan to drive the Albanian civilian population from Kosovo. He further testified that Serbian police, local police (TO), paramilitaries and the Yugoslav Army worked together to accomplish their mission under the leadership of the VJ. In his written statement, he named key individuals and identified their roles and responsibilities. Though Milosevic tried to discredit his testimony by insinuating that he was an underling without access to those in command, Mr. Peraj was steadfast in describing his numerous daily contacts with General Nebojsa Pavkovic, commander of the Pristina Corps with primary responsibility for prosecuting the war in Kosovo, as well as naming sources for his information. On redirect examination by the prosecutor, the witness clarified that regardless of his official position in the chain of command, he was in a position to see and hear the things he testified about.

Milosevic also tried to discredit his testimony by suggesting he was giving it to avoid being killed by the KLA for serving in the Yugoslav army during the war. Claiming that Mr. Peraj had been sentenced to the highest prison sentence possible for desertion, that he was on a KLA liquidation list and that he had talks with the KLA after the war, 'All this makes clear that you came to testify at someone's request, i.e. the KLA.' Mr. Peraj responded, 'That's not true at all. I have come here because of the lamenting and tears of the families left without loved ones who have come to me . . . and have asked if I knew about the fate of their loved ones because I was in the Yugoslav Army. So it is a moral duty for me to come . . . .'

Massive military actions in the Djakova/Djakovica area were conducted despite the fact that the KLA had not been there since early January. Moreover, according to Mr. Peraj, there was a significant build-up of military forces well before the NATO bombing. In addition to an influx of army and police reservists, paramilitaries and other volunteers set up quarters in Djakova. Though supposedly under VJ command, the paramilitaries were undisciplined, rowdy, and drank heavily. Efforts to bring them into line were ignored by the paramilitaries and countermanded by someone in Belgrade. Mr. Peraj characterized them as criminals and 'people without feeling, who would kill someone as if slaughtering a chicken.' Speaking of the 'Frenkies,' a paramilitary group allegedly founded by Frenko Simatovic, Milosevic insisted that what the witness claimed was 'impossible' because Simatovic was Deputy to the Chief of Security and had earlier headed an anti-terrorist unit. 'It's impossible that bandits should be members of units of this kind,' he protested. To which the witness responded, 'I can say quite seriously that this was a special unit with a Commander from Belgrade and he himself told me not to get mixed up with them.' Mr. Peraj testified that the Frenkies went among the houses setting fire to them and torturing inhabitants.

Milosevic asked the witness if he was aware of the official Order banning paramilitaries, which stated that where found they were to be arrested, disarmed and disbanded, and, if so, why he didn't arrest these men. They arrested some, Mr. Peraj said, but within three days at most orders came from Belgrade to release them.

In addition to these forces, a unit came from the Republika Srpska and volunteers came from Russia. A VJ commander assigned the Russians to combat units, stating 'we have plenty of people to loot in the city,' supporting the prosecution's contention that looting was not only common practice but was done with the knowledge of superiors.

Civilian Massacres

While the witness testified that the VJ commanders did not order violence or rapes and that he never saw a liquidation order, he also said that all forces (army, police, special units and paramilitaries) took part in the massacre of civilians in Meja. The massacre, described by Human Rights Watch as 'one of the more notorious mass killings in Kosovo,' took place April 27, 1999, shortly after five policemen were killed in a KLA ambush. Another massacre occurred in the village of Korenice that same day.

Mr. Peraj told the Court he was present at a meeting just prior to the massacres where an army officer, a friend of one of the dead policemen, said that 'at least one hundred heads would roll and all houses in the village be burned.' Another soldier warned that 'the Valley of Carragojs [where the policemen were killed] will pay dearly for this. . . . Korenica, too, will pay dearly.' That turned out to be the case, he testified. In addition, a telegram was received from someone higher on the chain of command, which, per normal practice, was converted into an order and distributed to all commanders in the field. While it did not order ethnic cleansing per se, according to the witness it said, 'the terrain should be cleansed of all people not loyal to Serbia.'

Though there were no KLA in the area, the Serbian forces, under the command of General Vladimir Lazorevic, initiated an all-out assault on at least a dozen villages in the Djakova region near the Albanian border, forcing the civilian populations to flee. During the forced exodus many men were separated from women, children and elderly. Mr. Peraj testified that he saw twenty bodies shot at close range. He also saw a report filed the next day announcing to the Pristina Corps Headquarters that 68 terrorists had been killed in Meja and 74 in Korenica. Under questioning, he testified, 'He [the major who wrote the report] wrote that as a pretext. He knew very well there were no terrorists in that area. All Albanians were called terrorists. I saw the bodies myself.' When Milosevic asked whether the operation was against the KLA, Mr. Peraj responded, 'There was no KLA in that area. On the 27th and 28th [of April], not a single member of the army or police were killed, nor anyone from the KLA and no one was wounded.' It was no fight, he said, but a systematic coordinated attack on a civilian population. In the days following the assault, the VJ and MUP were looking for road moving equipment to dispose of the bodies, according to the witness? statement. He also said that he saw body parts visible under tarpaulin coverings on trucks.

It has been said that if Milosevic is convicted it will be on the basis of insider testimony. While Mr. Peraj's testimony does not implicate Milosevic directly, it does implicate a number of his subordinates as well as individuals in the field. It supports the prosecution's allegations of a planned, highly coordinated campaign to remove the Albanian population from Kosovo, in which terrorism and murder were tolerated and, quite possibly, ordered. And Mr. Peraj is only the first, and possibly most remote, of the prosecution's insider witnesses.