THE HAGUE/ZAGREB, Sept 15 (Hina) - Weapons and military equipment were dispatched in mass quantities to Serbs in Croatia and Bosnia in the 1990s through the Serbian Emigrants Association, a protected witness in the trial of former
Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic told the Hague war crimes tribunal on Monday.
THE HAGUE/ZAGREB, Sept 15 (Hina) - Weapons and military equipment
were dispatched in mass quantities to Serbs in Croatia and Bosnia in
the 1990s through the Serbian Emigrants Association, a protected
witness in the trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan
Milosevic told the Hague war crimes tribunal on Monday. #L#
A former official with the Association, witness B-179 described how
he led convoys of the association's trucks with weapons and
ammunition for several towns in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In 1992 alone, 1,200 trucks with military equipment for Serb rebels
were dispatched from a Yugoslav People's Army barracks in Bubanj
potok near Belgrade.
The operation was carried out in secrecy, under the guise of
humanitarian aid, and was led by people from the Serbian Interior
Ministry's State Security Service (SDB) and Association president
Brane Crncevic, said the witness. Only a small number of people knew
about the operation, including Milosevic, whom the SDB regularly
informed about the dispatches, he added.
The weapons were picked up by persons selected by the Serbian
Interior Ministry, the witness said, adding that arms and equipment
also came from Territorial Defence and Interior Ministry
warehouses.
The witness said he led the first convoys for Knin in Croatia and
Pale in Bosnia. He also led a convoy of eight tons of Republic of
Serb Krajina dinars for Knin, returning back with sacks of
different foreign currencies.
The deliveries continued undisturbed even during Belgrade's 1992
embargo towards Bosnian Serbs, said the witness.
The prosecution entered documents about the deliveries, and the
witness said that many were burned after the war.
Milosevic said the entire testimony was false, insisting the
Serbian Emigrants Association "sent only humanitarian aid to
endangered Serbs". He did not dispute the witness' claims about
routes by which weaponry was dispatched from Serbia.
Milosevic was puzzled by claims that "eminent writer and my friend
Brane Crncevic" was involved in the weaponry deliveries. When the
witness said that he once drove Crncevic to Milosevic's residency,
the defendant said Crncevic was never at his house.
The witness went on to say that he and his family were exposed to
death threats since March, when he accepted to cooperate with the
tribunal's investigators.
(hina) ha