ZAGREB/THE HAGUE, Dec 4 (Hina) - The key witness for the prosecution in the trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic before the UN war crimes tribunal said on Wednesday that the armed conflicts in Plitvice and Borovo Selo
in the spring of 1991 had been instigated by Serbs.
ZAGREB/THE HAGUE, Dec 4 (Hina) - The key witness for the prosecution
in the trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic before
the UN war crimes tribunal said on Wednesday that the armed
conflicts in Plitvice and Borovo Selo in the spring of 1991 had been
instigated by Serbs. #L#
During the cross-examination of protected witness C-061, who has
been testifying for ten days in the part of the trial referring to
war crimes in Croatia, Milosevic tried to prove that the former
Croatian authorities were responsible for the outbreak of the
conflict in Croatia.
Milosevic accused the Croatian police of having entered and opened
fire in Borovo Selo on May 2, 1991.
"I learned of that from Vojislav Seselj who was in Knin at the time.
He told me that two of his people were killed there," the witness
said.
The witness said that people from Borovo Selo had told him that "the
Croatian police came in buses and were not in combat disposition".
"They even wondered how they could be so stupid to come in buses.
They let them enter the village deeper and then opened fire on
them," the witness said.
It can be concluded from the testimony of witness C-061 that in the
1990s he held high posts in the Croatian Serb rebel authorities. The
witness is testifying with his face hidden and voice electronically
distorted.
The Croatian police intervention in Plitvice of March 30, 1991 came
after Serbian forces, controlled by the then Knin police chief
Milan Martic and the Serbian Intelligence Service, had been
deployed in the region, the witness said.
"I do not know whom Martic deployed there, but the forces were in the
woods in combat disposition. The Serb forces fired a rifle grenade
at a bus with special Croatian police forces aboard, after which the
exchange of fire started," the witness said.
"A man from the Serbian Intelligence Service was there and he
exerted influence on Martic so that he would not set up a police
station in Plitvice but deploy forces there for combat," the
witness said.
Milosevic also asked the witness about the events from August of
1990, aiming to make him say that the reason for the rebellion of the
police from the Knin station was the introduction of new police
insignia and uniforms.
"Why were Croatian Serbs sensitive about the Croatian checker-
board coat-of-arms?" asked Milosevic.
"The coat-of-arms of the Socialist Republic of Croatia
incorporated a small checker-board coat-of-arms as well, but the
new checker-board coat-of-arms did not include the red star. The
majority of Serbs said that this was the re-introduction of Ustasha
symbols. This was interpreted as reminiscent of the Ustasha-led
Independent State of Croatia," the witness said.
(hina) rml