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War crimes trial of Milosevic-era intelligence chief to start Monday

16.03.2008

THE HAGUE, March 16, 2008 (AFP) - The former head of the Serbian intelligence services Jovica Stanisic, a key figure in understanding the role of Serbia in the 1990s Balkan wars, will go on trial before the UN war crimes court here Monday.
Stanisic and one of his former deputies, Franko Simatovic, are facing charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity for allegedly directing Serbian special forces who committed atrocities during the wars in Bosnia and Croatia.
The case is the first since the trial of late Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic which can show the extent of Serbia's involvement in the 1991-95 war in Croatia and the Bosnian war 1992-95.
The case against Milosevic ended without a judgement when the former president died suddenly in March 2006 just weeks before the trial was due to end.
Prosecutors hope the trial will show there was a "joint criminal enterprise" of Serbian politicians, including Milosevic, aimed at "the forcible and permanent removal of the majority of non-Serbs, principally Croats, Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats, from large areas of Croatia and Bosnia".
Stanisic and Simatovic have both pleaded not guilty to the charges against them.
Stanisic, 57, climbed up through the ranks of Yugoslav intelligence, known as the DB, starting under the communist leader Josip Broz Tito, serving as its head from 1991 to 1998.
For seven years he was one of the most important officials implementing the policies of Milosevic who was then president of Serbia.
Simatovic, 57, was a member of the DB intelligence services between 1978 and 2001 and directed the special forces division. He is also known by his nom-de-guerre Frenki.
Because of the many links their case has with the Milosevic trial the judges have ruled that the parties can have access to part of the testimony from the trial of the former strongman, which had been confidential up to now.
In 2005 the indictment against Stanisic and Simatovic was amended to include charges related to the 1995 Srebrenica massacre of some 8,000 Bosnian Muslims after video footage allegedly showing Serb special forces involved in killings there surfaced in the Milosevic trial.
Stanisic, who was seen as a moderate among the Serb officials in the 1990s, is accused of organising the Croatian Serb troops who rebelled against Croatia's declaration of independence in 1991 and coordinating the Serb forces in Bosnia.
He was sidelined in 1998, a move which political observers attribute to Milosevic's wife Mira Markovic.
Tribunal observers believe that Stanisic's trial could also shed light on the sometimes murky role of Western governments in the Balkan wars.
As the former chief of intelligence Stanisic was aware of the contacts between Milosevic and Western governments including possible negotiations -- which have always been denied -- in cases like the captive French pilots.
Two French airmen, Frederic Chiffot and Jose-Manuel Souvignet, were taken prisoner after their plane was downed in the Republika Srpska, the self-proclaimed Bosnian Serb state in Bosnia. They were released in August of 1995 just two days before the signing of the Dayton peace accords which ended the wars in Bosnia and Croatia.
There have been many rumours of a French deal with the Bosnian Serbs to release the pilots but Paris has always denied it.
Stanisic and Simatovic were transferred to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in March 2003. They were allowed to await the start of their trial on provisional release in Serbia but reported back to the UN detention unit here in February.
Stanisic's defence lawyers have tried several times to avoid a trial, arguing that their client is ill. According to the authorities in Belgrade and the Serb media, he has stomach cancer.

Source: http://www.haaba.com/news/2008/03/15/7-106034/war-crimes-trial-of-milosevicera-intelligence-chief-to-start-monday.html

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