Milosevic Says Chirac Agreed to Mladic Immunity

It wasn’t particularly relevant to the Milosevic trial, but it had the potential to cause a stir in international relations. When former Yugoslav President Zoran Lilic returned to the stand to complete his cross examination for what was expected to be a few short questions about authenticating documents, Milosevic began to discuss recently revealed transcripts of Lilic’s telephone calls in December 1995. He wanted to show through the malleable Lilic that he, Milosevic, was the peacemaker, looked to by international negotiators because of his dedication to a peaceful resolution of the wars, while Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic, the military and political leader of the Republika Srpska respectively, were obstructionist. Perhaps he also wanted to show that he could not so easily control them, as the Prosecution and a broader public have claimed.

What he revealed in the process was a deal in which French President Jacques Chirac allegedly agreed not to hand over Mladic to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY or Tribunal) in exchange for the return of two French pilots. The French pilots had been shot down over Bosnia on August 30, 1995 and were held for months by General Mladic, guarded by an elite unit of Bosnian Serb forces.

It was December 1995 and the lead up to the signing of the Dayton Accords in Paris to end the wars in Bosnia and Croatia. Everything had been agreed, but Chirac wanted to know the fate of his pilots. In court, Milosevic asked Lilic, “Do you know that Chirac called me in Dayton a number of times to insist I see that the pilots were found?” Lilic responded, “Yes. He even stated the French would put an ultimatum on the agreement.” As was clear from the transcripts, Milosevic was desperate that nothing go wrong in Paris. In response to Milosevic's importuning that the pilots be turned over, Mladic played ignorant but eventually revealed that he had the pilots and that he would surrender them if he received a guarantee he would not be turned over to the Tribunal. Milosevic, Perisic, Lilic and Chirac were all willing to give him that assurance. Based on statements made in court by Lilic and Milosevic and the transcripts revealed today, Lilic and Milosevic even offered to provide a written guarantee.

In a December 10, 1995 telephone intercept, Lilic informs Perisic, “I’ll write this letter with the header of FRY to guarantee him he will not be delivered to anyone from the Tribunal. He has got the guarantee by CHIRAC and Slobodan, I don’t know what other things. . . You and I are going there to give it to him.” Later in the conversation, Lilic directs Perisic, “Explain it to him in a nice way that he has the guarantee of FRY at the paper with the FRY header, sealed and signed by me. .” Perisic: “OK.” Lilic: “Signed by me and you, that he would not be extradited anywhere. He has the guarantee that he will get the same thing from Slobodan and CHIRAC. Accordingly, he has to deliver these men to us. . . .”

Before the deal involving the French pilots was concluded and they were released on December 12, 1995, Karadzic tried to get into the act. In a telephone call to Lilic, he explains that he has received a letter. Karadzic: “This is what it says . . . that’s the deputy . . . it is my honour to inform you that Russia will welcome the question of the person presiding at the international court on the former . . . Yugoslavia . . . about the completion of final procedures regarding . . . general MLADIC.” In court, Lilic said he warned Karadzic “not to spoil the arrangement with Mladic.”

Milosevic concluded in court, “He [Mladic] says the only problem is the Tribunal. . . . We promise we won’t surrender him. Anyway, we didn’t’ surrender anyone to this illegal Tribunal. I say, ‘write it down: we won’t surrender him if he gives us the pilots.’ . . . The story had a happy ending. The pilots were released.” And Chirac and Milosevic signed the Dayton Accords in Paris.

This is not the first finger pointing at France for allegedly undermining the ICTY by interfering with the arrest of Mladic and other suspects. The War Crimes Tribunal indicted Mladic in November 1995 for genocide and other crimes involved in the massacre of between 7,000 and 10,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica. Mladic, who like Radovan Karadzic has been spotted in areas of Bosnia still patrolled by NATO troops, as well as more recently in Serbia and Montenegro, remains free eight years later. With today's testimony and the release of the transcripts, France's previous denials that President Chirac offered any deals to persons indicted by the Tribunal deserve renewed skepticism.