A Puzzling Witness

With just over two weeks left to prove its case against Milosevic, the prosecution this week appeared to squander the precious little time it has left by calling on a witness who provided virtually no new evidence against the former Yugoslav president, and at times appeared to actually weaken their case.

The witness, who testified on January 13, was a Serb journalist named Nenad Zafirovic who worked for Radio B-92 in the early days of the war in Bosnia.

Zafirovic corroborated earlier evidence that notorious warlord Zeljko Raznatovic, better known as Arkan, took control over Bijeljina, where one of the first battles of the war in Bosnia was fought. He said that the head of Bijeljina’s crisis staff, Ljubica Savic, known as Mauzer, had asked Raznatovic and his men to come.

To support his contention that Arkan had control over Bijeljina, Zafirovic said that a Yugoslav National Army, JNA, officer told him that Arkan had arrested two soldiers. Raznatovic reportedly released them when confronted by the JNA, but no action was ever taken against him.

This account provided nothing new - the prosecution has already produced ample evidence showing Arkan and Serbian interior ministry police, MUP, participation in the massacres in Bijeljina.

On cross-examination, Milosevic claimed that in an earlier statement given to the prosecution, Zafirovic had said that Mauzer, not Arkan, had the greatest control over paramilitaries at Bijeljina. Because Mauzer was a local Serb, and thus not answerable to Milosevic’s MUP, the statement did little to further the defendant’s culpability for crimes in Bijeljina.

Neither journalists nor the public were given access to the statement, but based on the part of it that Milosevic read to the court, it appeared to contradict Zafirovic’s oral testimony.

Much of the rest of Zafirovic’s testimony about Bijeljina concerned the visit of Biljana Plavsic and Fikret Abdic, then members of the Bosnian presidency, whom he conceded went to the embattled town to calm the situation.

Zafirovic said the two presidency members met with Arkan, Mauzer, Goran Hadzic, president of the Serbian Autonomous Region of Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srem, and a JNA colonel.

Journalists were allowed to attend the beginning of the meeting, he said, but were then "chased out". Zafirovic, however, said he was able to remain for another half hour before being discovered.

During that time, he said that Abdic and Arkan had an argument. Raznatovic reportedly accused Abdic of receiving weapons from the Croats, and the latter countered that the Muslims didn’t have any weapons.

The conflict, Abdic said, was between unarmed Muslims and armed Serbs. He said that Plavsic tried to mediate the argument.

While Zafirovic’s account was interesting, it did not appear to bolster the prosecution’s case against Milosevic, and in fact contradicted previous testimony. Earlier in the trial, journalist Sead Omeragic, who was also present at the meeting, said that Plavsic did not try to mediate, but rather advocated on behalf of the Serbs, claiming that more Serbs than Muslims had been killed, and that Arkan had saved the Serbs from Muslim aggression by his intervention.

Zafirovic also testified about visiting Erdut, Arkan's training camp in Croatia. His testimony corroborated earlier evidence that Jovica Stanisic and Radovan Stojicic, known as Badza, the head and deputy head of MUP’s secret service respectively, visited Arkan's headquarters.

He also confirmed that he saw Dragan Vasilkovic, aka Captain Dragan, carrying out tactical manoeuvres with Arkan's Volunteer Guard – evidence that corroborated Vasilkovic’s own evidence, given earlier in the trial.

However, once again, neither of these facts was new to the court.

The prosecution went on to ask Zafirovic about Milosevic's influence over the Bosnian Serb leadership. Zafirovic attended the 1993 peace negotiations in Geneva. Although Milosevic was not an official member of any delegation, Zafirovic said that when Milosevic was present, "[He] was head of the delegation and everything depended on him." When Milosevic was not present, Zafirovic said that the delegation was in regular contact with him.

The delegation, which included Bosnian Serb president Radovan Karadzic, vice-president Nikola Koljevic, and the president of the Bosnian Serb assembly, Momcilo Krajisnik, reportedly referred to Milosevic as “Mr President” to his face, and “boss” or “big daddy” when talking about him, Zafirovic said.

While this may have strengthened the prosecution’s argument that Milosevic held sway over the Bosnian Serb leadership, it did not do so substantially.

On cross examination, Milosevic secured Zafirovic's agreement that his role was to use his influence to facilitate a resolution of the conflict, a role similar to that of Franjo Tudjman, the late president of Croatia, and Momir Bulatovic, the ex-president of Montenegro, who were also in attendance.

Zafirovic also told the court about the 30th session of the Bosnian Serb assembly, when delegates rejected the Vance-Owen Peace Plan even though Milosevic had travelled to Pale to lobby on its behalf.

Although journalists were not permitted to attend the second address Milosevic gave to the assembly, Zafirovic said he sneaked a tape recorder inside with one of the delegates. Afterwards, he aired a portion of the tape on B-92 radio in which Milosevic admitted that Serbia was involved in the war in Bosnia.

Once again, while this was interesting, it was not particularly helpful because the full official transcript of the Bosnian Serb assembly has already been introduced into evidence.

One aspect of Zafirovic’s testimony that was new was revealed under cross-examination when one of the amici read from Zafirovic’s written statement. In it, the witness claimed that Karadzic and Krajisnik sought to personally gain from the war in Bosnia, not only through previously known illegal financial transactions and money laundering, but also by offering to sell part of Bosnia to the Muslims. In a meeting with Bosnian prime minister Haris Silajdzic, Zafirovic said the Bosnian Serb leaders asked for between 1 million and 1.5 million deutschmarks for the land.

This testimony, however, did not appear relevant to the charges against Milosevic, and the prosecutor did not lead it.

Another bit of information revealed on cross-examination concerned Karadzic's and Plavsic's knowledge of "concentration camps".

Zafirovic said that he asked Karadzic about the camps in late 1993-early 1994. He said Karadzic denied knowing anything about them, but that he would look into it.

Milosevic said that he was pleased that the witness had confirmed his view that Karadzic knew nothing about the camps.

However, Zafirovic said that Karadzic knew about the camps by the beginning of 1994. Since many of the camps continued to operate throughout the war, this testimony would appear to show that Karadzic, at a minimum, neglected his duty to prevent the war crimes that were perpetrated by men under his control.

However, it fails to show any link to Milosevic, something that is critical for the prosecution to prove the former Yugoslav president’s guilt.

With so few days remaining in this case - and so little evidence supporting the genocide or complicity in genocide charges - Zafirovic seemed a puzzling choice to call as a witness, especially since the prosecution could have simply introduced his written testimony.

Perhaps the prosecution was also disappointed.

Judith Armatta is based in The Hague for the Coalition For International Justice (http://www.cij.org)