THE HAGUE, Feb 27 (Hina) - A former member of the European Community Monitoring Mission (ECMM) in Croatia, Irish General Colm Mangan, testified at the trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic before the UN war crimes
tribunal at The Hague Thursday.
THE HAGUE, Feb 27 (Hina) - A former member of the European Community
Monitoring Mission (ECMM) in Croatia, Irish General Colm Mangan,
testified at the trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan
Milosevic before the UN war crimes tribunal at The Hague Thursday.
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Lieutenant General Morgan, who is today the Irish Armed Forces
Chief-of-Staff, was an ECMM member in the period between July 1991
and January 1992 with an office in Zagreb. In January 2001 he gave
the ICTY prosecution with a written testimony which has been
introduced as evidence according to regulation 92-bis.
The majority of his testimony referred to the former Yugoslav
People's Army's (JNA) attack on Dubrovnik in the autumn of 1991, and
the prosecution used the general as a military expert for this
attack.
Mangan was in Dubrovnik on Oct. 5-7 with a group of observers to see
firsthand the destruction of the city for which, as he said, there
was no military justification.
Dubrovnik was shelled randomly and indiscriminately to intimidate
the population and make them flee the city, the Irish general said.
The attacks on Dubrovnik from land, sea and air must have been
coordinated from the JNA General Staff in Belgrade, said Mongan and
confirmed he had personally witnessed some of the attacks. The
attack on Dubrovnik was commanded by General Pavel Strugar, the
witness said.
The Irish general also spoke about the preciseness of the 56 and 76
mm cannons which the Yugoslav Navy used to strike Dubrovnik.
He said the only military target was the old Napoleon fortress on
Srdj Hill where Croatian soldiers and the liaison centre were
located, but that it was downtown Dubrovnik and civil targets south
and north of the town that were shelled.
The organisation of Dubrovnik's defence was poor and chaotic and
homeland war soldiers exhausted and traumatised by the situation,
Mangan said.
The witness also spoke about numerous protest notes the ECMM had
sent to the JNA, but the army did not wish to have any contact with
the observers.
At the end of his testimony, the Irish general concluded that had
not been a battle between two warring factions, but the attack of a
powerful armed force on a handful of soldiers.
The Irish general said that, unfortunately, the ECMM did not manage
to stop conflicts in Croatia.
During the cross-examination, Milosevic attempted to refute the
argument that the aim of the JNA attack on Dubrovnik was to expel the
population, saying the JNA only asked that "non-regular forces"
leave the town and reacted to provocation.
General Mangan said it was legitimate to defend a city that had been
exposed to such attacks.
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