Karadzic: Establishment of Serbs’ State within Reach

Brown made the mentioned conclusion after analysing a number of documents issued by the Republika Srpska Army, VRS, as well as VRS Commander Ratko Mladic’s detailed notes from his working meetings with other Serb leaders.

Karadzic, the then President of Republika Srpska, RS, is charged, among other things, with the persecution of non-Serb population throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina. The indictment alleges that he is charged with genocide committed in Srebrenica and seven other Bosnian municipalities, terrorising civilians in Sarajevo by shelling and sniping activities and taking international soldiers hostages in the period from 1992 to 1995.

Mladic is still awaiting his trial before The Hague Tribunal for crimes committed in Bosnia and Herzegovina to begin.

Calling on Mladic’s notes, expert Brown specified that, during a meeting held on June 6, 1992 Karadzic listed the strategic goals, which, in addition to the separation from the two other peoples, included the establishment of a corridor between the Bosnian Krajina and Eastern Bosnia and Serbia, removal of the border alongside the River Drina and division of Sarajevo.

“According to Mladic’s notes, Karadzic said that the establishment of a Serbs’ state without many internal enemies was within reach,” Brown said, adding that, besides Karadzic and Mladic, Momcilo Krajisnik and others participated in that discussion. The witness said that, on the following day they determined the VRS structure which was supposed to achieve those goals.

Brown said that the Bosnian Serbs Assembly adopted the six strategic goals on May 12, 1992 and officially established the VRS and appointed General Mladic as its Commander.

“That session crystallised the leadership’s goal to establish their own state. The six goals marked the territory claimed by them. Not too many people, whom they considered their adversaries, should have been present on that territory,” Brown said.

The expert said that, at that time, in May 1992, the JNA forces “formally withdrew from Bosnia and Herzegovina, but, in reality, it was transformed” into the VRS.

Quoting Mladic’s notes from the meeting of Serb leaders held on June 6, 1992, Brown said that Karadzic said: “We have to protect our territories using military means”, because “a state cannot be born and borders cannot be established without conducting a war”.

On that same day the Supreme Command issued Directive number one, ordering the corpses to begin operations for achievement of the strategic goals. “The Sarajevo-Romanija Corps was supposed to maintain the blockade of Sarajevo, while the First Krajina Corps was tasked with establishing a corridor leading to Eastern Bosnia, which, as Karadzic said at an Assembly session on May 12, should have unite the Serb territories in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia and merge them with Serbia,” Brown said.  

Karadzic and his legal counselor Peter Robinson filed several objections during Brown’s testimony, saying that the military expert’s testimony went beyond his area of expertise. The Trial Chamber rejected these objections.

The trial is due to continue on November 18.