UN Peacekeeper Says Bosnian Forces Responsible for Markale Attack at Mladic Trial

Former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic has been charged with terrorizing the citizens of Sarajevo with a sustained shelling and sniping campaign. The indictment against him states that the mortar missile attack on the Markale Market in February 1994 was fired from Bosnian Serb positions. The attack killed dozens of civilians.
 
“The evidence suggested the Serbs couldn’t have done that,” British officer GRM-097 said at today’s hearing. He said UN peacekeepers believed “the Muslims were responsible” for the attack on the Markale Market.
 
GRM-097 said Bosnian Serb forces were blamed for the attack before the investigation was complete. He said UN peacekeepers headquarters received information which soon disputed this version of events.

GRM-097 said he was at the crime scene after the attack. He said the missile would have had to travel almost vertically because of the high buildings near the Markale Market. He said he concluded that the missile must have been fired from nearby.
 
GRM-097 also said it was “very unusual” that the market was hit by just one mortar missile, considering more than one missile was usually fired on a target.
 
GRM-097 said that the UN peacekeepers thought that the Mujahedin might have fired the missile, or that it was detonated from a street or even thrown from a nearby building.
 
Bosniak authorities in Sarajevo, according to GRM-097, staged incidents in order to blame them on the Bosnian Serb Army, with the aim of forcing an international intervention.

“In a number of cases, the missiles were fired from the city,” GRM-097 said.
 
The same strategy, GRM-097 said, was used to fire from civilian objects, including schools and hospitals and from the UN peacekeeping command, in order to force a Bosnian Serb response.
 
GRM-097 said that the government in Sarajevo “did not want to ease the suffering of civilians.”
 
“They wanted to milk the story of a city under siege. They wanted the people to suffer, because this meant more international coverage,” GRM-097 said.

Mladic has also been charged with genocide in Srebrenica, the persecution of the non-Serb population across several other municipalities and taking UN peacekeepers hostage. The trial will resume on Wednesday, October 21.