JOVIC SAYS JNA NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR OVCARA AND DUBROVNIK

THE HAGUE/ZAGREB, Nov 18 (Hina) - Borisav Jovic, one of the closest associates of former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic, told judges at the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague on Tuesday that the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) was not responsible for the massacre at the Ovcara farm near Vukovar and the shelling of Dubrovnik in 1991. #L# Jovic, a member of the presidency of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY) from 1989 until its disintegration in 1992 and the leader of the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) until 1995, was subpoenaed as a witness for the prosecution in the trial of Milosevic. Jovic was cited in the Milosevic indictment as one of the participants in "a joint criminal enterprise". Responding to the statement by the prosecutor that the Ovcara massacre was committed while he was on the SFRY presidency, to which the JNA was subordinated, Jovic said that "no one in the JNA ordered or participated in the massacre." Asked if he accepted the fact that the JNA shelled Dubrovnik in 1991, Jovic said he did not, adding that the JNA leadership had informed the presidency that the military was not shelling Dubrovnik and that only two shells had been fired "by mistake" on Dubrovnik's Old Town. The prosecutors then showed footage of the attack on Dubrovnik and its consequences, but Jovic stuck to his statement, saying he doubted the footage could be of help in establishing the truth. "The presidency was firmly against Dubrovnik being touched at all," he said. Along with his testimony, the prosecution also introduced into the evidence file Jovic's 40-page written statement based on his diaries "The Last Days of the SFRY" and "A Book about Milosevic". Jovic confirmed that Milosevic had been "the chief political figure in Serbia for more than a decade, with absolute authority and crucial influence on all decisions and events." Jovic said in the statement that he had had more than 100 meetings with Milosevic, and that strategic decisions had been discussed at meetings of six men -- Jovic, Milosevic, Montenegrin member of the SFRY presidency Branko Kostic, Montenegrin president Momir Bulatovic, and JNA generals Veljko Kadijevic and Blagoje Adzic. Jovic said that "by decision of the presidency, paramilitary forces were placed under JNA control" and deployed in war zones under JNA command. Speaking of Serbian paramilitary leader Zeljko Raznatovic Arkan, Jovic said that Arkan had connections with the Serbian police and the JNA and that he had become "a state within a state". Milosevic has often based his defence on shifting the responsibility for war crimes from the JNA and the Bosnian Serb army onto paramilitary forces. Asked by the prosecutors, Jovic explained his statements about "liberated territories" in Croatia, saying that those areas were "under the authority of regular local bodies of the Serb people." Asked about the expulsions of Croats from those areas and the destruction and burning of their property, Jovic said that no one on the presidency had supported such acts, and that he personally had called for the deployment of the UN and "a political settlement after the Serb people were defended by force." In response to questions about the Milosevic-Tudjman meeting in Karadjordjevo and their deal to partition Bosnia-Herzegovina, Jovic said he could not answer these questions because the accused had never informed him about the matter. Jovic also testified about frequent contacts between the accused and Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, peace talks in Geneva and The Hague, and the rejection of the Vance plan in Knin. The prosecution will complete the examination-in-chief tomorrow, after which Milosevic will have six hours to cross-examine his former close associate, whom he relieved of all his duties in 1995 because of his book "The Last Days of the SFRY". Jovic said in the courtroom today it had never been explained to him why he had been dismissed. (hina) vm sb