Cutillero Testifies at Mladic Trial, Claims Bosniak Leaders Should Have Accepted Spring 1992 Deal

Mladic, the wartime commander of the Bosnian Serb Army, has been charged with genocide in Srebrenica, persecuting Bosniaks and Croats across Bosnia and Herzegovina, terrorizing civilians in Sarajevo with a campaign of artillery and sniper attacks and taking UN peacekeepers hostage.

Cutillero, who testified under a binding court order, said that in March 1992 representatives of all three ethnic communities in Bosnia and Herzegovina accepted creating three constituent units within the country’s borders.

“I think it’s a real tragedy that peace wasn’t reached based on the principles I arranged in March 1992. A comparison of a map created on the basis of these principles, from March 18, 1992, and a map that’s part of the Dayton Agreement, from November 1995, shows that after three and a half years of war, the result was almost the same. Countless lives could have been saved,” Cutillero said.

After the adoption of the constitutional principles, Bosnian Serbs, said Cutillero, wanted to continue negotiations on the division of territory, whereas Bosniaks began to waver.

“Shortly after all parties accepted the principles, I received word that President Izetbegovic publicly renounced his consent to them in statements made to Bosnian media. The Bosnian government officially rejected the principles in June 1992,” Cutillero said.

Cutillero said he believed that Izetbegovic, “despite his cordial manners,” lied and acted deceptively during the negotiations.
“All parties lied, but the Serbs lied the least,” he said.

Cutillero argued that if Izetbegovic had not renounced the agreement, “the Bosnian issue could have been resolved earlier, with minor losses to – mainly Muslim – life and territory,” Cutillero said.

“To be fair, President Izetbegovic and his advisers were encouraged to nullify the deal and to fight for a unified Bosnian state from well-meaning external factors, who thought they know best,” Cutillero said.

Cutillero said a Portuguese officer who served in UNPROFOR in Sarajevo told him he was convinced that a shell that killed 27 people in a bread queue on Vase Miskin street on May 27, 1992, was fired from Bosnian military positions. He said the officer participated in the investigation of the shelling.

While being cross-examined by prosecutor Alan Tieger, Cutillero said that the constitutional principles were broadly accepted from all sides, but weren’t conclusive and needed further negotiations.

Tieger extensively quoted speeches in which Bosnian Serb commander Radovan Karadzic expressed satisfaction at the collapse of Cutillero’s principles, such as “it’s over for Bosnia” and that the Bosniak rejection of the plan would be “fatal to them.”

Cutillero said Karadzic never made such statements.

“Muslims didn’t want to divide Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Serbs didn’t want Bosnia and Herzegovina at all, the Croats wanted to belong to Croatia,” he said, adding that the negotiations helped them reach principled decisions on a “tripartite Bosnia and Herzegovina.”

“The question was can we have a unified Bosnia or a Bosnia in three parts. My belief was that only a tripartite Bosnia could succeed, which was confirmed by the Dayton Agreement,” Cutillero said.

Cutillero was asked whether he was aware of Karadzic’s insistence on recognizing the situation on the ground, which included the application of Serb force through the occupation of territory and the persecution of non-Serbs. Cutillero said Karadzic had never expressed himself in that way to him.

Trial continues tomorrow, on December 10.