MEMBER OF INVESTIGATIVE TEAM TAKES STAND AT MILOSEVIC TRIAL

THE HAGUE, Feb 20 (Hina) - The trial against former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic before the international war crimes tribunal in The Hague continued on Wednesday with the testimony of a Hague investigator, Stephen Spargo. Member of the Kosovo investigative team, Spargo worked on the analysis of 1,300 witness statements, based on which he drew maps marking the corridors along which civilians had been deported or moved around Kosovo. Before he took the stand, the trial chamber decided not to hear the testimony of the leader of the Kosovo investigation team, Kevin Curtis, assessing based on a summary of his statement, that it had no value for the judges, since it mostly consisted of Curtis's conclusions made on the basis of witness statements, a part of whom were not even on the scene. Asked whether he had anything to say about the way in which the prosecution's evidence process would be carried out, Milosevic said entering the statements of witnesses in written form was unacceptable, since it deprived him of the right to cross-examine. "Each witness must come here so they can be asked questions," Milosevic said, adding he could have brought not only 1,300 statements as the prosecution had, but "130,000 or 1,300,000 written statements by NATO victims". "The proceedings cannot be misused in such a way," he concluded. He also objected to locations of crimes being introduced in the proceedings "if they were truly committed, which I doubt for the majority number of cases," without previous proof that he had been either at those locations or had committed the crimes, or ordered someone to commit them. He accused the prosecution for showering the public with photographs of crimes. "Please sent these crimes to Clinton and explain to him that he committed them," Milosevic asserted. (hina) lml