THE HAGUE, April 8 (Hina) - Protected witness B104 took the witness stand in the trial of Slobodan Milosevic Tuesday. As a member of the Yugoslav Army (VJ) helicopter squadron, he testified about VJ operations in Bosnia from
1993.
THE HAGUE, April 8 (Hina) - Protected witness B104 took the witness
stand in the trial of Slobodan Milosevic Tuesday. As a member of the
Yugoslav Army (VJ) helicopter squadron, he testified about VJ
operations in Bosnia from 1993. #L#
The witness told the trial chamber of the U.N. war crimes tribunal
in The Hague that a centre for operations commanded by Franko
Simatovic Frenki, a senior official of the Serbian National
Security Service (SDB), was located in Bajina Basta. The witness
named all the units under Simatovic's command and described how
troops moved out of Bajina Basta across the Drina River to
operations in the wider Srebrenica area.
Before moving into action in Bosnia, the VJ soldiers were ordered to
remove army signs from their uniforms and replace them with
Republika Srpska army signs, while VJ signs were removed from
helicopters and serial numbers made smaller, the witness said.
Cross-examining the witness, Milosevic tried to confuse him by
citing unmatching information from his deposition and testimony,
and diminish his credibility in general.
The prosecutor questioned the witness a lot about the role of Frenki
Simatovic, who is currently in custody in Belgrade and against whom
the tribunal is completing an indictment, too.
The testimony of the protected witness in the Bosnian part of
Milosevic's trial, which took place for the most part behind closed
doors, continues tomorrow.
(hina) lml sb