ZAGREB/THE HAGUE, Oct 29 (Hina) - A former counter-intelligence member of the ex-Yugoslav army (JNA) on Tuesday testified about the close collaboration of Croatian Serb units with the Serbian State Security service (SDB) and the JNA
in the military campaign on Croatian territories.
ZAGREB/THE HAGUE, Oct 29 (Hina) - A former counter-intelligence
member of the ex-Yugoslav army (JNA) on Tuesday testified about the
close collaboration of Croatian Serb units with the Serbian State
Security service (SDB) and the JNA in the military campaign on
Croatian territories. #L#
Slobodan Lazarevic spoke in the Croatian part of the trial against
former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic at the UN war crimes
tribunal in The Hague.
Croatian Serb troops received money and equipment from Serbia on a
regular basis, the witness said, adding that he had seen then SDB
head Jovica Stanisic and his aide Frank Simatovic in Serb-
controlled Croatian areas on several occasions.
Those troops carried out operations under the command of JNA
officers who had come from Serbia, said Lazarevic, who had been sent
to a Serb-controlled area to work as a liaison officer between the
Kordun Corps and the UN.
Lazarevic said one of his tasks was to recruit members of the UN or
the European Community Monitoring Mission, or obstruct their
work.
"I'm not saying everyone could be bought, but some could be," said
the witness.
Protected witness C-036 should also have testified today. The
prosecution has requested the trial chamber to let him be examined
in the presence of his attorney given that he might be indicted for
war crimes.
When the indictments against Milosevic for crimes committed in
Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina were issued last year, the Hague
tribunal's prosecution confirmed that 15 persons who were
mentioned in the indictments as participants in the joint criminal
enterprise, which had been aimed at ensuring ethnically clean areas
in Croatia, were under investigation.
Among them were Croatian rebel Serb leaders Milan Babic, Milan
Martic, and Goran Hadzic, senior Serbian Interior Ministry
officials Stanisic and Simatovic, the head of the Yugoslav Counter-
Intelligence Service (KOS) Aleksandar Vasiljevic, and
paramilitary unit leaders Radovan Stojicic and Zeljko Raznatovic
aka Arkan.
Witness C-036 is believed to have direct knowledge into Milosevic's
influence on rebel Serb leaders in Croatia's Knin.
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