Karadzic: Victims, Not Collateral Damage

While questioning the protected witness, a former homicide inspector with the Safety Services Center in Sarajevo, Radovan Karadzic said that changes were made at the location of the explosion that tampered with the investigation.
 
“I think that the activities undertaken by my crew at the crime scene were in line with the law. No one has said we did anything contrary to the standards. The only change made to the crime scene was the removal of injured people and dead bodies. Everything else remained the same,” witness KDZ 485 said.

He added that people who were near explosion locations always tried to help injured people by taking them to hospitals without waiting for investigation teams to arrive.
 
The witness described the investigation into the explosion at a flea market in Bascarsija on December 22, 1994. Two projectiles were fired one after the other from Mount Trebevic, which was, the Prosecution alleges, controlled by the Republika Srpska Army, VRS.

The indictment against Karadzic alleges that two people were killed and seven were wounded on that day.

Radovan Karadzic, former Republika Srpska President and Supreme Commander of its armed forces, is on trial before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia for genocide and other crimes committed in Bosnia and Herzegovina from 1992 to 1995.
 
The Prosecution considers Karadzic responsible for the shelling and sniping campaign against Sarajevo with the aim of “killing, mutilating, wounding and terrorising the civilian population”. The indictment further alleges that the campaign resulted in the death and wounding of thousands of civilians.
 
The witness then spoke about his participation in an investigation into an incident that happened at Markale open-air market in Sarajevo on August 28, 1995, saying that bodies of injured and killed people were also taken to hospital right after the explosion.
 
“We arrived at 12:15. I could see that policemen had secured the location by making sure nobody could access the explosion point from any direction.

“Upon our arrival to the main street, we could see many victims’ personal things scattered around, a lot of blood, pieces of glass, rubble. We noticed immediately that there were no bodies of dead people or injured people at the crime scene,” the witness explained.
 
The indictment alleges that a mine-thrower grenade exploded in front of the entrance to the Markale market in Mula-Mustafe Baseskije Street in Sarajevo on August 28, 1995. 43 people were killed and 75 were wounded. The Prosecution alleges that this grenade was fired from Trebevic as well.
 
The witness said that civilians in Sarajevo were not victims of military activities, adding they did not go to the areas in which they assumed they could be killed or wounded.
 
“Most victims of the incidents in which I was involved were not killed in military operations. Sarajevo is not a big city, so whenever big battles were taking place, people knew about them. They learnt how to live in such conditions. Whenever they noticed military activities of any kind, they did not go out or visit the places where they could be exposed to fire.

“As far as the investigations [into shelling incidents] in which I was involved, they were not collateral damage, but victims,” KDZ 485 said.
 
During the course of cross-examination the Trial Chamber warned the indictee several times, telling him not to examine the witness about the directions from which the projectiles had come, because, as explained by KDZ 485, he was not involved in those things.
 
At this hearing the Trial Chamber announced that the trial of Radovan Karadzic would be suspended for one month, starting from mid November, in order to enable the Defence to “review the evidence and prepare itself”.
 
The Chamber said that, when making its decision about the duration of the suspension period, it considered “the significant number of violations by the Prosecution” related to the disclosure of documents, adding that, nevertheless, the indictee “has not suffered any damage” as a result.
 
The trial is due to continue on November 4.

A.A.