PROSECUTOR TRIES TO PROVE HV'S CONTROL OVER HVO IN BLASKIC TRIAL

THE HAGUE, April 14 (Hina) - Prosecutors of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) on Wednesday conducted a cross-examination of General Tihomir Blaskic with the aim to prove that the Bosnian Croat army, the Croatian Defence Council (HVO), had been under the effective control of the Croatian Army (HV) in mid-1992, complementing their thesis that an inter- national conflict had been led in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Blaskic has been indicted by the ICTY for crimes his troops had committed during Croat-Moslem conflicts in the Lasva River Valley (central Bosnia) in 1993. To prove accusations of breeches of Geneva conventions, it is necessary to first prove that an inter- national conflict had existed. Is it true that the commander of the South Front, General Janko Bobetko, had on April 22, 1992, given General Ante Rosa an order on HVO stationery, and not even a month later, on HV stationery, prosecutor Gregory Kehoe, asked Blaskic, showing him commands the Stabilisation Force (SFOR) had confiscated last year in Herzegovina. General Bobetko was a member of which army, Kehoe wanted to know. "As far as I know, General Bobetko is a Croatian Army general", Blaskic said. He said he believed General Rosa had been a member of the HVO in mid- 1992, when he met him. Blaskic's defence attorney Anto Nobilo said the defence counsel did not contest the fact that the HV had during that period entered Bosnia-Herzegovina to prevent the progress of the Yugoslav People's Army. "We do not see anything contentious in what the prosecutor is presenting, because it is important for the indictment to ascertain the relationship between the HVO and HV in the Croat-Moslem conflicts, and whether the HV had commanded over the HVO, and the prosecution does not have that kind of evidence," Nobilo said. "In May and June 1992, the HVO did not exist except on paper and the HV, naturally, helped local Croats to organise their own armed forces, and until they were organised, Bobetko was commander," Nobilo said. A day earlier, Kehoe asked Blaskic to say whether he had been one of those who were to participate in carrying out the political goal of uniting with Croatia. Kehoe recalled conclusions of a meeting of the Herzegovina and Travnik regional community in 1991 on the realisation of "Croatia's age-long dream". "I do not feel like it was. I came to work and provide expert assistance to organise the defence of my municipality, and for me this is a political document," Blaskic said. He said he did not know whether Herzeg-Bosna's leaders had in 1992 met Croatian officials. Blaskic also said he did not know whether there had been HV troops in Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1992. "I arrived in the Kiseljak municipality. I did not see HV forces there. They may have been in Bosnia-Herzegovina, but I had no such information". (hina) lml jn