THE HAGUE/ZAGREB, April 28 (Hina) - During the 1990s, the Serbian State Security Service (SDB) organised the smuggling of large amounts of heroin into Croatia for the purposes of special warfare, protected witness registered as C-48
said on Monday at the trial of former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic before the international war crimes tribunal in The Hague.
THE HAGUE/ZAGREB, April 28 (Hina) - During the 1990s, the Serbian
State Security Service (SDB) organised the smuggling of large
amounts of heroin into Croatia for the purposes of special warfare,
protected witness registered as C-48 said on Monday at the trial of
former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic before the
international war crimes tribunal in The Hague. #L#
"The Serbian interior ministry's State Security Service smuggled
into Croatia large amounts of heroin through Orasje and Zeljko
Sobot in Zagreb, as a form of special warfare, with the aim of
weakening Croatian youth," said the protected witness for the
prosecution, who, in his own words, was a SDB associate in Novi Sad
from 1992 through 2000.
To support his claims, the witness said that 600 kilograms of pure
heroin had been found in the vault of the Commercial Bank in
Belgrade in 2001, left over from the SDB operation.
The Milosevic trial continued Monday after a ten-day Easter pause.
Witness C-48 was a director of the Royal casino in Novi Sad which was
owned by an SDB paid assassin, Veselin Vukotic.
C-48 said that after he had been recruited, he provided the SDB with
information about the contacts of two of his acquaintances, a St.
Rok parish priest in Petrovaradin, Marko Kljajic, who opposed the
persecution of Croats from Vojvodina, and Robert Coban, editor of
the "Nezavisni svet" political weekly.
"The goal is to have as many Croats as possible move out of Vojvodina
and to form a solid border with hard-line Serbs from the Krajina,"
the witness quoted the SDB head in Novi sad, Milovan Popivoda.
C-48 testified about meetings of Milosevic's associates from the
intelligence, political and criminal circles in Novi Sad, which
took place in the casino's restaurant. Milosevic was present at one
of these meetings, said the witness.
The witness also spoke about a meeting with Milosevic in March 1993,
when Milosevic commended his associates for carrying out ethnic
cleansing in Croatia's occupied areas and Vojvodina by saying that
"the main task has been accomplished and we should continue
subtly".
"Now let's see Croats ask me for Krajina when only Serbs are living
there," said Milosevic, according to the witness.
"All pressures must be endured to form a Serb state comprised of
Serbia, (the Bosnian Serb entity of) Republika Srpska, the
(occupied Croatian region of) Republic of Srpska Krajina and
Montenegro. The world will have to recognise the factual
situation," Milosevic said at the time.
The witness also confirmed that the SDB had had complete control
over Zeljko Raznatovic Arkan's troops, the Tigers, and other
paramilitary troops in Croatia, as well as that Vojislav Seselj's
volunteers had been trained and equipped at the "Bubanj Potok"
Yugoslav People's Army barracks near Belgrade.
(hina) lml sb