07-04-2013, 11:29 AM
[FONT=Courier New][size=12] Page 32727
1 Tuesday, 14 September 2004
2 [Open session]
3 [The accused entered court]
4 --- Upon commencing at 9.08 a.m.
5 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Kay.
6 MR. KAY: Thank you. Your Honour, before I call the first
7 witness, who is Mr. Roland Keith, there is another matter that I would
8 like to raise at the end of his testimony - the witness is here and
9 available and should be heard first - and that deals with the matter of
10 the accused's appeal on the issue of his right to represent himself.
11 As the Trial Chamber knows, we lodged before the Trial Chamber an
12 application for a certificate for leave to appeal that decision. Leave
13 was given last Friday, and we would be making an application after this
14 witness is finished testimony on the issue of the suspension of the
15 proceedings until the appeal is heard by the Appeals Chamber.
16 I gave notice to the Prosecution of this matter slightly earlier
17 this morning, and I --
18 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you, Mr. Kay. Let us hear the witness
19 first and then we'll deal with that matter afterwards.
20 MR. KAY: I was raising it to put the Trial Chamber on notice as
21 well.
22 If we could have Mr. Keith, please.
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: He's not coming from Canada, is he?
24 MR. KAY: He had arrived. I don't know whether he -- ah, here he
25 is.
Page 32728
1 [The witness entered court]
2 JUDGE ROBINSON: Let the witness make the declaration.
3 THE WITNESS: I solemnly declare that I will speak the truth, the
4 whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
5 JUDGE ROBINSON: You may sit.
6 WITNESS: ROLAND KEITH
7 Examined by Mr. Kay:
8 Q. Your name is Roland Keith; is that right?
9 A. That is correct.
10 Q. And you're a citizen of Canada?
11 A. That is correct.
12 Q. If we could just have a brief resume of your background,
13 Mr. Keith. You were an army officer in the Canadian army; is that right?
14 A. That is correct.
15 Q. For what period of time?
16 A. I was a military officer in the Canadian army for 32 years.
17 Q. And finishing your service when?
18 A. I finished my service -- it was broken service, actually. I
19 finished initially in the year 1982. I then took what I call a
20 sabbatical. I was back at grad school, studying history. I returned to
21 the army for a further four years in the year 1987 to 1991.
22 Q. And your rank at retirement was captain; is that right?
23 A. That is correct.
24 Q. And you became a member of the Kosovo monitoring force in 1999?
25 A. Yes, I did.
Page 32729
1 Q. What we call the KVM?
2 A. That is correct.
3 Q. When were you first recruited to take part in that mission?
4 A. The background to my service with the Kosovo Verification Mission
5 was in the summer of 1998 when the first indication that it would be
6 constituted, and I subsequently applied to participate, and in the late
7 fall of 1998, my government and -- contacted me and said is that they --
8 they furthered -- they forwarded, rather, my resume and my application,
9 and I was notified in -- shortly after New Year's 1999 that I -- that they
10 would like me to serve with the OSCE, Kosovo Verification Mission.
11 Q. And did you arrive in Kosovo in the first week of February, 1999?
12 A. That is correct.
13 Q. And you undertook a period of training for some four days on about
14 the 9th of February?
15 A. That is correct.
16 Q. And did you go down to Pristina on the 12th of February for a
17 period of two days?
18 A. I believe that is correct, yes.
19 Q. And the purpose of that was for what?
20 A. The purpose of that was to assign me to a role within the Pristina
21 Regional Centre and the Pristina Coordination Centre of the Kosovo
22 Verification Mission, which was done in that short period of time.
23 Q. Before this period, had you ever spent any period of your service
24 in the Balkans?
25 A. No. This was my initial participation with the Balkans.
Page 32730
1 Q. Had your previous military experience had you undertaken observer
2 duties in other countries?
3 A. Yes, I had. In the mid-1970s I had served a double tour as a
4 United Nations military observer in the Sinai -- the Suez Canal, the
5 Sinai, throughout the United Nations truce supervisory organisation area,
6 including the state of Lebanon.
7 Q. And in your previous military history have you spent a previous
8 period in the Suez area, right at the start of your military career?
9 A. Yes. I was very, very proud as a young man to have served with
10 the Canadian Armoured Reconnaissance Squadron as one of the initial units
11 under General Burns in what was then the United Nations Emergency Force 1,
12 and a very interesting and challenging experience.
13 Q. Right. Now let's turn to Kosovo. When you arrived here in The
14 Hague, you brought with you some documents, and the first one I'd like to
15 put before the Court, which will serve as a familiarisation process, is a
16 general map of the Kosovo area centred upon Pristina.
17 MR. KAY: And if copies of that can be handed out and one put
18 before the witness.
19 THE INTERPRETER: Could the speakers please pause between question
20 and answer. Thank you.
21 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Kay, you have seen the notification? Pause
22 between question and answer. And I say the same to the witness, for the
23 benefit of the interpreters.
24 MR. KAY: Yes. Thank you.
25 Q. It's what I discussed with you yesterday. We must be careful
Page 32731
1 about not running our questions and answers together, and the mistake is
2 entirely mine in not doing that which I told you not to do.
3 If we could look at this map, then, and we see Pristina in the
4 middle of the map. We see an area, a town to the left, Kosovo Polje. We
5 see, slightly above that, Obilic. And we see to the left Glogovac. And
6 if you could confirm this: The testimony that you're to give largely
7 concerns that area to the west of Pristina; is that right?
8 A. That is correct.
9 Q. I'd like you now to take us through your tour of duty, which I
10 believe commenced after you had had your familiarisation process in
11 Pristina, with going to Glogovac; is that correct?
12 A. Yes, that is correct.
13 Q. And if you could inform the Court what the circumstances were at
14 this time in the middle of February when you arrived in Glogovac. What
15 did you see?
16 A. My initial recollections of arriving in Glogovac in this time
17 frame, in the middle of February of 1999, this was a small Serbian --
18 sorry, a small Yugoslavian town inhabited by, I believe, some 6 to 7.000
19 inhabitants. It was predominantly Albanian, and to the best of my
20 knowledge, it was -- it was, I believe, entirely Albanian at this time.
21 The surrounding area consisted of a number of small villages. To my --
22 best of my knowledge, all of these were entirely Albanian.
23 The town had a -- a small MUP, paramilitary station in an old
24 industrial site or a former industrial site, and routine patrols and the
25 replacement of MUP personnel occurred on a daily basis, and there were
Page 32732
1 frequent patrols after the hours of darkness into and out of Glogovac to
2 visit this MUP site.
3 The general area both to the -- in the surrounding villages, to
4 the north-east, the east, and to the south, and to the south of Komorane.
5 If you see Komorane, it's a small community on the crossroads on the
6 Pristina to Pec road. And the surrounding -- the villages from Lopusnik
7 and all down the valley to the south there were all, as well, additional
8 Albanian inhabited small communities. In all of these communities there
9 was what I refer to as the home guard. They were local UCK members,
10 referred to as terrorists by the authorities, who had a presence in all of
11 these villages, and they maintained static armed checkpoints on the routes
12 in and out of their villages. There was no -- there was no harassment or
13 incursion of Serbian or Yugoslavian authorities or forces into any of
14 these villages at this time. To my knowledge, they stayed, as I've
15 previously stated, to the route in and out of Glogovac and patrolling the
16 main road which I've previously referred to as well, the Pristina-Pec
17 highway, and the road going down to Orahovac and down to the -- down to
18 the Prizren area from the north.
19 So this was my -- my general impression of the Glogovac area.
20 There were some incidents that had occurred as recently as the day before
21 I arrived when an individual was fatally murdered just south of Glogovac.
22 I did not participate in the investigation nor in the follow-up to that
23 particular incident, but to the best of my knowledge, it was a local
24 attack by one side or another or retribution.
25 Q. The period you spent at Glogovac was how long?
Page 32733
1 A. I don't have the precise dates in front of me at the moment,
2 Mr. Kay, but I -- I believe I was there for about one week.
3 Q. In your previous answer which I can see on the LiveNote
4 transcript, you said the MUP was in a paramilitary building. Is that what
5 you meant?
6 A. In Glogovac itself?
7 Q. Yes.
8 A. Yes. I believe I stated that the MUP team in Glogovac occupied a
9 military -- had a military presence in a former industrial building which
10 was fortified, of course.
11 Q. Yes. In terms of what you saw in that week of -- of Glogovac, did
12 you come across any abuses of power by the local MUP or the VJ or any
13 other body to be associated with the Serbian authorities?
14 A. No. During that -- that week that I was in Glogovac, as I've
15 previously stated, the -- the VJ had a very limited presence. There were
16 some armoured infantry fighting vehicle movement into and out of Glogovac,
17 small numbers of vehicles, platoon size. There -- but basically the VJ
18 were staying in their barracks, and other than some movement on the
19 principal roads, the MUP, again as previously stated, had routine patrols
20 on the roads into and out of their -- their patrol sites, and they manned
21 checkpoints along the major highway, again referring to the Pristina-Pec
22 highway, and these -- within the Glogovac area of responsibility, these
23 would number probably one or two a day along the main road or on the road
24 into Glogovac where they would set up temporary checkpoint, and they would
25 examine all personnel transiting that particular checkpoint.
Page 32734
1 I observed a number of these operations in progress. It was not
2 my observation that there was any abuse or -- or harm, physical harm, that
3 is, done to any of the inhabitants transiting those checkpoints. We did,
4 however, in conversing with the predominantly Albanian population of the
5 area, ask them if they were having any difficulty in moving through the
6 area, transiting the area, or being harassed. They stated in some cases
7 they thought they had in that -- in that their -- some of their documents,
8 they claimed, were taken from them. In some cases, they claimed that some
9 individuals were detained for a short period of time, perhaps maybe
10 overnight, but I did not see personally any maltreatment or physical or
11 harmful harassment to the inhabitants trying to participate in their
12 lawful -- lawful business.
13 Again, the -- the -- the local -- what I referred to as the local
14 home guard of the UCK, or the terrorists, did again stay within their
15 villages at this time in this area, to my knowledge.
16 Q. You've described there the UCK/KLA as having a home guard network
17 in the villages in the surrounding area. What level of strength are we
18 looking at in terms of KLA forces that you were able to observe at this
19 time in this area?
20 A. These were local forces, in my estimation. They would be in half
21 a dozen -- strength of half a dozen young men. Sometimes -- sometimes
22 there were more, but they appeared to me to be local inhabitants and not
23 part of any main force UCK offensive group.
24 Q. After that we -- did you then establish a field office in Kosovo
25 Polje?
Page 32735
1 A. That is correct. I was -- I had gone to -- I'd been assigned to
2 Glogovac with the understanding that I would take over the direction of
3 that field office. That did -- did not happen. And after the short
4 period of time, approximately one week, I was requested to assume
5 responsibility to form a field office under the direction of the Pristina
6 Coordination Centre and Regional Centre at Kosovo Polje. This was a new
7 team that did not exist until the time that I was appointed.
8 Q. You brought to the Tribunal with you some -- some notes from your
9 records at the time; is that correct?
10 A. That is correct.
11 Q. And these notes came from what source?
12 A. The notes were -- were put together by myself, and they are weekly
13 summaries, I believe the ones you're referring to, that were based on the
14 daily reports that were put together by myself and my team of verifiers
15 and submitted to the Pristina Coordination Centre on a daily basis. The
16 weekly reports were -- were put together by myself to -- to give a summary
17 of what those daily reports consisted of and to provide me personally with
18 a record of what my participation in the Kosovo Verification Mission was.
19 Q. Now, it would probably help to consider your evidence with those
20 notes before us.
21 MR. KAY: So, Your Honours, if the map we produced could be the
22 next exhibit, which would D246.
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, that's admitted.
24 MR. KAY: And if the notes of the witness can now be produced and
25 put before the parties.
Page 32736
1 Q. Whilst that's going on, Mr. Keith, on your left-hand side is a
2 very detailed map which is your personal property again; is that right?
3 A. That is correct.
4 Q. Which is a map of the general area and was your operations map at
5 the time; is that right?
6 A. That is correct, Mr. Kay.
7 Q. You're familiar with that map, and if you need to direct our
8 attention to anything on the map, please do so as it's on an ELMO and
9 we're able to look at it on the video screens if necessary. We've got the
10 general map and then we've got the more detailed map which may help your
11 testimony.
12 Just looking at the first note, then, which is headed 28th of
13 February, 1999, Weekly Summary Number 1, it states you established your
14 field office in Kosovo Polje on the 22nd of February, 1999; is that right?
15 A. That is correct.
16 JUDGE KWON: Before moving on, Mr. Kay, why don't we make sure the
17 ELMO is operating properly or not.
18 MR. KAY: We did a test earlier, Your Honour, and it was. Shall
19 we see?
20 JUDGE ROBINSON: We're not getting any signal.
21 JUDGE KWON: We can proceed.
22 MR. KAY: Are you getting something on your monitors now, Your
23 Honours?
24 JUDGE ROBINSON: No. But proceed, Mr. Kay.
25 MR. KAY: We just had a flash then and then it went.
Page 32737
1 JUDGE ROBINSON: There we are.
2 MR. KAY: We have the picture there. Thank you.
3 Q. Kosovo Polje, if you can tell us there what the situation was that
4 you found at that stage when you arrived on the 22nd of February.
5 Describe the type of place it was.
6 A. Kosovo Polje, of course, is a very historic site. The town -- I
7 can't recall the estimates of the population, but I would estimate 10 to
8 15.000; a major -- a major site.
9 It was -- in asking questions of the various authorities and
10 people who I had the opportunity to associate with, I understood the
11 ethnic distribution within Kosovo Polje, the town itself, to be
12 approximately 70 per cent Serbian and perhaps 20 per cent Albanian and 10
13 per cent of others, including Turks, Roma, and various other ethnic
14 minorities.
15 The -- now, would you like me to go on about the --
16 Q. Yes.
17 A. -- area of responsibility?
18 The area of responsibility that I was assigned ran from Pristina,
19 the western -- the western ends of Pristina going south, including the
20 Pristina airport, which was -- which was a military site and was -- we
21 were not allowed to go into the Pristina airport site itself without a VJ
22 escort.
23 The area again going down just to the west of the main south
24 highway down -- proceeding to the -- sorry, to the south and then to the
25 west and then up, including the principal town of Obilic and the very
Page 32738
1 large coal mining site of Belacevac - sorry if I do not pronounce the
2 names that well - and the area then actually exceeded right to the north,
3 up to the Mitrovica highway and a number of small villages. Is that
4 shown?
5 Q. If the map can be brought down the ELMO.
6 A. Thank you. And then as you see from my Chinagraph markings here,
7 going up through the wooded and the high grounds going from south to north
8 to the west of the Belacevac mine site and the Obilic power station and up
9 towards the Mitrovica highway, and actually beyond my Chinagraph markings
10 here to a number of small villages around Hamidija and to the north and to
11 the north of the Grabovac and Obilic road.
12 So this was the general area of my responsibility, then back to
13 the Pristina highway and north.
14 The -- to describe it, the -- the area south of the Pristina-Pec
15 highway, a number of agricultural villages, numerous villages, had been
16 there for many years, I assume. These villages were primarily occupied by
17 Serbs. I believe there were other smaller numbers of ethnic authorities
18 in some of them as well. However, in the -- in the Grabovac - and I'll
19 mention Donji Grabovac a little later - but at Grabovac area, again I
20 believe these villages had -- had been ethnically -- an ethnic mix prior
21 to the troubles of the summer of 1998. However, on my arrival in February
22 1999, I believe that these were, in my opinion, entirely occupied by
23 Serbian peoples. And the village of Donji Grabovac was totally deserted,
24 unoccupied.
25 And the small villages that I've referred to in the north and off
Page 32739
1 the major routes were -- had suffered damage in the troubles and the
2 fighting of the summer of 1998, and the peoples residing in these villages
3 to this -- at this time, to the best of my knowledge, were almost entirely
4 Albanian. And in all of these villages there was what I referred to
5 earlier as a home guard element of the UCK.
6 We were -- we were allowed in and out of all of these villages but
7 only after we showed our credentials. And each and every time the UCK
8 sentries made a point of writing down all our credential information and
9 communicating with some -- with superiors which I could not observe before
10 they would let us proceed. However, they did not obstruct us other than
11 going through this procedure.
12 The MUP, again, similar to the Glogovac area, the MUP patrolled
13 all the routes in and around Kosovo Polje, the main roads. Of course
14 there was a police station in Kosovo Polje, another police station in
15 Obilic. I went to these police stations and introduced myself to the
16 local police chiefs and worked with them throughout my stay in the Kosovo
17 Polje area up till the evacuation of the Kosovo Verification Mission.
18 They -- I was received hospitably, professionally, and at all times they
19 cooperated with me and all of my requests. I was not -- I was not
20 obstructed from carrying out any of my duties or responsibilities by them.
21 Q. If I can just --
22 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Kay. Mr. Kay, I remember the witness mentioned
23 the place which is called Grabovac, which is different from Glogovac.
24 MR. KAY: Yes.
25 JUDGE KWON: If you could help me to find --
Page 32740
1 MR. KAY: In between Glogovac and Pristina would be Grabovac and
2 Donji Grabovac --
3 Q. Perhaps you could find it on the more detailed map which we
4 anticipated may be needed. And I wonder if the scale can come up a bit.
5 We've lost it totally.
6 MR. NICE: I don't know if Your Honours will be assisted by having
7 a look at Exhibit 83 if you've got it with you.
8 JUDGE KWON: But in that map Grabovac is near in Pec, which should
9 be different from the location.
10 MR. NICE: I think if you look at -- look --
11 MR. KAY: The witness is pointing to the part on the map where
12 Grabovac is.
13 THE WITNESS: This.
14 MR. KAY:
15 Q. And Donji Grabovac, which is of importance in a part of your
16 testimony, is just to the north-west.
17 A. That is -- that is correct.
18 Q. If you just keep your pointer on Grabovac, and if we can go back
19 now to have a smaller scale, we can see where it is in relation to
20 Pristina perhaps. If the technical booth can do that.
21 JUDGE KWON: Yes. I found it in Exhibit 83.
22 MR. KAY:
23 Q. We can see Obilic on the right-hand side --
24 MR. NICE: I'm glad. If it can be found as Donji Grabovac --
25 JUDGE KWON: It appears --
Page 32741
1 MR. NICE: Grabovac itself is not marked.
2 JUDGE KWON: On page 6, yes.
3 MR. NICE: Yes. The map otherwise is quite helpful.
4 MR. KAY:
5 Q. And would I be right if you drew a line, say, between Glogovac and
6 Obilic it would cross-intersect over Grabovac and Donji Grabovac roughly?
7 A. That is correct. I believe it's off the map here, Glogovac, now,
8 but it would be just to the south of the Grabovac area, directly on an
9 east -- east-west line, that is correct.
10 MR. KAY: Yes. I hope that assists the Trial Chamber.
11 JUDGE ROBINSON: What is the distance from Pristina?
12 THE WITNESS: This map is a 1:50.000, so each of these squares is
13 one kilometre. We are looking at a distance of about -- in Donji Grabovac
14 we're looking at a distance of 9 or 10 kilometres from Pristina and of
15 course Glogovac would be something like 17 or 18 kilometres, as I recall.
16 MR. KAY: Yes.
17 Q. In relation to the KLA in that area, you've described the home
18 guard but it's the overall situation within the region that you're dealing
19 with. Are you able to give evidence about that?
20 A. Yes. Yes, I believe so. Am I being -- am I being heard?
21 Q. Yes.
22 A. Thank you.
23 MR. KAY: If the other microphone could be switched on so the
24 witness can speak across to me. Thank you. Yes.
25 Q. So if you could tell us about the overall strength. You've
Page 32742
1 mentioned the home guard in the villages, but was there a force behind
2 them elsewhere?
3 A. Yes, there was. In the area just west of Donji Grabovac -- I'm
4 not sure is this ELMO still projected or --
5 Q. We're off at the moment. If we could go on again. Yes.
6 A. In the -- in the area just to the west of Grabovac and Donji
7 Grabovac, we see a wooded rolling series of hills. I believe this is the
8 south-western end of the Drenica valley. When we proceeded into the
9 wooded rolling hills here and directly west of Donji Grabovac, we
10 encountered a local force of the UCK, and I had a number of meetings, as
11 did my deputy, almost on a daily basis, with this force. In my
12 estimation, what I saw when I was visiting and discussing security matters
13 with the UCK local commander would be a force about platoon size. That
14 would be about 35 armed personnel. They would have assault rifles, light
15 machine-guns, rocket propelled grenades. And in all our discussions with
16 the local commander and his deputies, they were not -- they were unable to
17 give us any assurances on -- on what they could or could not do without
18 reference to superior command, and this was seldom forthcoming.
19 They also -- they also were unable or -- or unwilling to answer
20 any queries about individuals from the authorities' side or the government
21 side who had disappeared, been abducted, or killed or injured. So
22 basically they were friendly, hospitable, but generally did not cooperate
23 in a meaningful manner for -- to enable me to carry out my
24 responsibilities as a verifier of the agreement.
25 Q. We'll just summarise those responsibilities now. They were to
Page 32743
1 monitor the cease-fire between the parties and to record incidents that
2 took place. And did you have a role as well in attempting to pacify the
3 area?
4 A. Yes, I did. The -- again, as you previously mentioned, Mr. Kay,
5 upon my arrival and my introduction in consultation with the MUP police
6 chiefs and local police chiefs, they claimed that -- that the area within
7 both Kosovo Polje and the Obilic police area, that the major concern was
8 this Donji Grabovac area. Again, just for the -- for the -- perhaps the
9 enlightenment of the Court or the assistance of the Court, the Bjelovac
10 mine, which covers almost -- a great deal of the area between Kosovo Polje
11 and Obilic and its power station, this is a vast coal mine that produced
12 the coal that fuelled the Obilic power station which not only provided
13 power to most of Kosovo but also to other parts of Yugoslavia, and with
14 the troubles and with the agreement that we were trying to verify, of
15 course the authorities were trying to facilitate the movement of mine
16 workers into and out of the mine on a regular shift basis. I believe they
17 operated around the clock, 24 hours. And because of the importance of
18 Donji Grabovac to the authorities and hence to myself and my team was that
19 that was an area where there was daily movement in and out of workers.
20 Not only were the MUP trying to maintain security and protect the -- the
21 mine operation and facilitate the comings and goings of the mine workers,
22 but the -- there was also a mine police force. This was a paramilitary
23 police force that was organised and hired, I assume, by the mining company
24 or the power company, and they also had a hierarchy of police,
25 non-commissioned officers, and police chiefs. I also dealt with these
Page 32744
1 people.
2 It was these -- it was this force that was primarily challenged,
3 in my opinion, with providing security to the mine and hence the mine site
4 which was right near the village of Grabovac. And this was a problem to
5 the authorities because they were suffering -- from all reports and
6 physical evidence that I saw, they were suffering almost daily harassing
7 attacks, sniping attacks. Prior to my arrival, an engineer had been
8 abducted, presumably -- to my knowledge he was never seen again.
9 Presumably he was murdered or disappeared. And mine guards --
10 JUDGE ROBINSON: Attacks from whom?
11 THE WITNESS: Allegedly from the UCK.
12 JUDGE ROBINSON: Was that the only presence of the UCK in that
13 area?
14 THE WITNESS: No, I think as I previously described, Your Honour,
15 the UCK were -- occupied all of the small villages outside of the beaten
16 track with their what I referred to as home guard forces, and in the
17 wooded area to the west of Donji Grabovac there appeared to be, to my
18 military estimate, a platoon or elements of a company size UCK force which
19 was perhaps local but perhaps it was more than the home guard element that
20 I described earlier.
21 JUDGE ROBINSON: I'm trying to arrive at a number for the size of
22 the UCK force in that area.
23 THE WITNESS: I mentioned -- I mentioned in my previous testimony,
24 Your Honour, that the force that I witnessed when I visited was
25 approximately platoon size. That would be about 35 personnel, armed
Page 32745
1 personnel, and more heavily armed than the -- what I referred to as the
2 local UCK home guard in the various villages that I -- I visited.
3 JUDGE ROBINSON: You encountered one force of platoon size, but
4 there are others?
5 THE WITNESS: Yes. I would -- again I'm trying to portray what I
6 actually saw. If you see -- as a former soldier, if you see a platoon,
7 there's obviously a company; and if you see a company, there's obviously a
8 battalion. I say this because military forces do not operate in
9 isolation, they operate with mutual support. And it would be my estimate
10 that this was a small element of a larger element further to the west and
11 to the north.
12 JUDGE ROBINSON: So you assume that the UCK had such a
13 sophisticated command structure?
14 THE WITNESS: They certainly had a command structure over and
15 above what I -- whom I met or what I witnessed, yes.
16 MR. KAY:
17 Q. I think you referred as well to decisions being unable to be taken
18 by the local commander and so that matters were referred elsewhere; is
19 that right?
20 A. That is correct, and that's another supporting element of my
21 assessment that this was a smaller element of a larger force. The local
22 commander was never able to answer any of my queries or any of my
23 questions without reference to higher authority.
24 Q. Where you indicated the KLA/UCK were regionally centred from what
25 you could -- you could see, was the VJ or MUP presence outside that area?
Page 32746
1 A. The -- no. As I've tried to state several times, the -- the VJ
2 stayed either within their barracks area or camp areas other than for --
3 for patrolling the major routes or moving to conduct small exercises. And
4 the MUP, as well, occupied various observation posts overlooking some of
5 the highways. And of course they -- as I've previously mentioned, they --
6 on a daily basis they established checkpoints on the major highway
7 primarily but also on some of the rural areas, the rural roads, to provide
8 security to personnel and inhabitants moving along those corridors.
9 Q. You mentioned sniping attacks that were taking place which
10 affected the mine workers. Are you able to give any idea of responses
11 that there were to those sniping attacks, how the local authorities
12 attempted to deal with it?
13 A. The local authorities, again primarily the mine police, complained
14 to me on a daily basis that -- that they were being harassed and -- and
15 sniped at. I was shown evidence of new bullet holes in some of the mine
16 security buildings personally, and these -- I can attest that these were
17 not there the day or so before when I had looked at that same building.
18 So the rounds had been fired from west or north of the site.
19 Again, if you -- refer you to my weekly summaries of my daily
20 reports, and I don't for a minute think that the harassment was coming
21 from -- entirely from one side. The -- in discussions with the UCK
22 commander in this area, he, of course, complained that the mine police
23 were sniping at his forces and he was -- would respond. In discussing
24 with the mine police, of course I received entirely the other story. They
25 said that their -- their movement of personnel workers and security
Page 32747
1 personnel were being harassed and sniped at, and they then would respond
2 to ensure their safety.
3 In some cases, in my -- excuse me. I believe -- I believe there
4 are several quotes in my documents that I wrote at that time where I give
5 greater credibility to one side or the other based on my personal
6 judgement, and I think in the Grabovac area, given the situation that I
7 have tried to describe in the mine police to maintain security to their
8 workers that probably - and this is my assessment - that they probably,
9 during the hours of darkness were -- were somewhat nervous and probably
10 initiated a number of the gunfire accounts which, of course, would
11 probably elicit a response from the UCK side.
12 So I think -- I think there was a two-way stream here given the
13 general insecurity and the importance of this site to maintain the
14 operation of the mine and the power plant.
15 Q. Yes. Also in this region, and we can see that on your first
16 weekly summary of 28th of February, is somewhere known as the chicken
17 farm, which was a site of local economic importance; is that right?
18 A. Excuse me. No. The chicken farm was an unoccupied former
19 agricultural site, and I can point it on the big man here, to the ELMO, I
20 guess, to find it. It is -- it is the area shown on this map around the
21 crossroads of Krivovo --
22 MR. KAY: We're not picking it up. If the map could be moved,
23 please. We're on screen with it but if you can put the part where Mr.
24 Keith has the wand.
25 A. You see the Pristina-Pec highway.
Page 32748
1 Q. Yes?
2 A. Again running west from Pristina through Kosovo Polje, and it goes
3 through a small -- a small -- on my map it's known as Krivovo. And this
4 is again on the road going to the crossroads for Glogovac, and there are a
5 number of agricultural buildings on my map. I am circling the area with
6 the pointer at this time. The highway is just to the north and you see a
7 series of buildings there. This was -- this was not in operation as an
8 agricultural site when I was there. It was occupied by a VJ company team,
9 varied. There would always be a platoon of tanks, perhaps a company of
10 tanks - a company of tanks would be ten tanks, a platoon three tanks - in
11 this area. Certainly a platoon or more of infantry fighting vehicles.
12 And -- but they generally stayed in that area other than, as I've stated
13 earlier, moving out for small exercises or to conduct route patrols along
14 the main routes, primarily from there towards the Pristina air field,
15 which was -- is right within about three to four kilometres from that
16 site.
17 Q. Right.
18 A. Which was a heavily militarised area.
19 Q. Was that part of the security for the air field?
20 A. Well, it would be -- it would be addition to -- in addition to the
21 security at the air field, but it was a crucially military important area
22 because of its location right on the highway. It could facilitate a rapid
23 response to any major emergency in that area.
24 Q. The chicken farm, as it was called, was that subject to any
25 hostilities?
Page 32749
1 A. The chicken farm per se I -- I know of no attacks on the chicken
2 farm. However, I was witness to an attack on a police patrol just -- just
3 approximately 1.000 or 1.500 metres to the -- no, less than that, I'm
4 sorry. Probably about 200 metres to the west of the -- of what we refer
5 to as the chicken farm. Again, the Pristina-Pec highway comes out of the
6 open agricultural area and goes into a re-entry to get into the higher
7 ground, and there, as you approach the -- what we referred to as the
8 chicken farm, is what in military terms I would know as a D file.
9 Consequently a dangerous area if your opponents controlled the ground to
10 either side.
11 Q. And what did you witness there?
12 A. I believe it was on the 27th of February, if I recall correctly.
13 It's in my notes, I believe. At that site one of my patrols was -- had
14 proceeded to the west and was returning. It was towards last light, this
15 being February; the days were short. He encountered a major military
16 operation with a large amount of fire, including tanks, although I don't
17 know -- the tanks were not firing their main armament but their
18 machine-guns, and infantry fighting vehicles that had responded to what
19 was clear to me an attack on the police patrol that took place a few
20 minutes before this. And what my patrol was witnessing was the response
21 and retaliation to this attack. And I myself was proceeding on -- on
22 other business, about to leave Kosovo Polje, when I received his call.
23 The sound of heavy gunfire was obvious because it was transmitted when his
24 radio was transmitting. I immediately proceeded to the area and was there
25 within three or four minutes.
Page 32750
1 The -- when I arrived, the firing was beginning to subside but
2 there was still -- it had -- it had been going on for some time, and the
3 MUP estimated platoon, again about 35 armed paramilitary police, had
4 assaulted across the road under the support of a platoon, three T55 tanks.
5 And when I asked the local police commander if he could tell me what had
6 occurred, he said yes. He was cooperative, and although there was a great
7 deal of tension as one of his police NCOs had been fatally injured,
8 another critically injured, and I -- I observed the fatal casualty, and I
9 was witness to the evacuation of the critically injured police
10 non-commissioned officer, and the -- it was clear to me that there had
11 been an attack from the north of the D-file, in my estimation with the use
12 of light machine-gun or similar weapon that had been used to make this
13 attack. It was clear to me that -- that the force that had attacked had
14 been opposed to the government, and I assumed that they were UCK.
15 Q. I think in your report you used the phrase: "It appears to be a
16 clear case the KLA provocation."
17 A. That is correct, Mr. Kay. It -- it was -- this was no accident
18 where the MUP or the VJ had moved out and -- and challenged any of the
19 outlying areas. This was a clear case that the -- the terrorists,
20 insurgents from outside were coming in to harass the authorities,
21 obviously, in my estimation, to provoke a response.
22 Q. Thank you. You referred slightly earlier in your testimony to the
23 cooperation that you received from the local MUP police chiefs, and you've
24 referred to their involvement --
25 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Kay. Sorry. Can I ask the witness, what
Page 32751
1 indicated to you that it was a KLA provocation? By that, I gather you
2 mean that the KLA initiated the attack.
3 THE WITNESS: It was -- my assigned role as a verifier was to
4 verify the -- the situation in accordance with the agreement of October
5 1998 of which the authorities, meaning the MUP and the VJ, would withdraw
6 from confrontation but maintain security in their -- along their routes
7 and in their -- in their -- the main sites, and they would not -- they
8 would not move into the hinterland, if I may use that term, that was
9 occupied primarily by the Albanian Yugoslavs. And -- and again, as I've
10 tried to describe and I certainly witnessed during my -- my few months in
11 Kosovo, the -- they generally did.
12 Conversely, it also was part of the agreement to my understanding
13 that the KLA or UCK would stay in the hinterland and would not harass,
14 interfere, or conduct military operations where the government authorities
15 held sway. And it appeared to me in this occasion and on several others
16 that I witnessed or observed that the UCK were not abiding by the
17 agreement, and they were conducting military attacks. In my military
18 assessment, given their strengths and the strengths of the authorities,
19 they were trying to -- trying to provoke a response. And being a military
20 man, the responsibility to defend your forces, to defend your assigned
21 responsibilities, if you are attacked, you naturally, given the authority,
22 you respond.
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: When you arrived at the scene, the attack was
24 already in -- taking place?
25 THE WITNESS: The -- the -- by the time I arrived there, I would
Page 32752
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12 Blank page inserted to ensure the pagination between the English and
13 French transcripts correspond
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
Page 32753
1 assume it would be ten minutes after the attack had been initiated, and
2 the perpetrators of the attack had withdrawn because they -- there was no
3 -- there was no fire coming from - sorry - the attack position in that
4 ten minutes when I arrived there. The fire was all going from the MUP and
5 the VJ side into the -- the -- the high ground where the attack had been
6 committed from.
7 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Kay.
8 MR. KAY:
9 Q. And the significance of the attack is that it's 200 metres from
10 the military installation at the chicken farm?
11 A. I believe that is significant, but it's also significant that the
12 attack was on a routine police patrol on the main highway from Pristina to
13 Pec, a highway travelled not only by the local inhabitants but also by
14 NGOs. International Committee of the Red Cross and other NGOs used this
15 road frequently as did the Kosovo Verification Mission.
16 Q. It's the Pec to Pristina highway?
17 A. That is correct.
18 Q. Carrying a great deal of traffic?
19 A. It's one of the major routes in Kosovo.
20 Q. And the chicken farm itself was -- was how far from the road?
21 A. The chicken farm, as you can see from the map, was just a matter
22 of metres, 50 metres to a hundred metres south of the road.
23 Q. You turned off the road into the chicken farm military
24 installation?
25 A. Who did? I'm sorry.
Page 32754
1 Q. No. If you were to drive along, you'd turn off the road and drive
2 into it.
3 A. Correct. You -- anybody transiting that road can observe the --
4 what we knew as the chicken farm, yes.
5 Q. You described the higher ground at this particular site. Was that
6 to the north of the road?
7 A. The -- there was high ground primarily to the north but also some
8 high ground to the south, and the attack allegedly had come from the
9 north. And by looking at the fatality and the injured, the damage -- and
10 one armoured jeep was destroyed in this attack, another one was damaged,
11 the -- it was quickly clear to me the attack had come from the north.
12 Q. Back on the other matter I wanted to deal with, which was the
13 cooperation you received from the local police commanders.
14 A. Could --
15 Q. You had dealings with several; is that right? Perhaps if you
16 could name those individuals and where they were based, if you're able to
17 remember this length of time.
18 A. I would be -- I would be really -- I'd be pleased to do that but
19 perhaps if I may just momentarily -- when we're talking about the security
20 of the Pristina to Pec highway, I had observed a previous UCK attack when
21 I had arrived in Glogovac at the Lopusnik observation point, which is on
22 this same highway just further to the west.
23 Q. Towards Komorane?
24 A. Beyond Komorane.
25 Q. Beyond Komorane towards Lopusnik?
Page 32755
1 A. Yes, and I believe five kilometres to the west of Komorane.
2 Q. Still in the Drenica region?
3 A. Yes.
4 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Kay, all those names appear on this map book so
5 if you can check during the adjournment, we will be more assisted by using
6 this.
7 MR. KAY: Yes.
8 THE WITNESS: I'm pointing to Lopusnik site now. Again, as the
9 highway moves west there is a high ground to the south of the highway,
10 approximately 800 metres south of the highway. The MUP had established a
11 section observation post - a section being approximately ten personnel -
12 and in early -- in early February while I was doing an introductory patrol
13 from Glogovac, the sound of heavy gunfire came from the Lopusnik area. We
14 immediately responded, as did a MUP reinforcement element of platoon size
15 - again two armoured Land Rovers, approximately 25 to 30 armed personnel
16 - when we -- they evacuated a wounded policeman from the observation site
17 maintained by the section with a corporal in charge. When we asked what
18 had happened, they explained that one of their personnel had gone from the
19 fortified observation post to a well to fetch water, which would be
20 approximately 20 to 30 metres distance from their site, and he was fired
21 upon from the east by a sniper and was wounded. Not critically, to my
22 knowledge, but was wounded. And they responded with a fusillade of
23 automatic fire in their defence and their responding reaction force also
24 swept the area looking for the sniper and no sniper was found. But again,
25 it was -- there was a clear police location that was fired on from the --
Page 32756
1 from the west -- sorry, from the east, which is indicative of the type of
2 incidents that took place periodically along this route.
3 Now, to respond to your query, Mr. Kay, on the cooperation with
4 the local police chiefs, again I mentioned they were cooperative to me
5 personally and to my verifiers. The police chief in Kosovo Polje was an
6 individual by the name of Dragan Miric. He and his police commanders and
7 deputy commanders -- developed a working relationship with him and his
8 staff, and they -- they cooperated with all the requests that I gave them,
9 to the best of my knowledge.
10 The other individual who I found cooperative and helpful to enable
11 me to carry out my task was Bozidar Spasic, who was the police chief in
12 Obilic and his area of responsibility, and he and his staff were
13 cooperative. The -- the mine police as well were cooperative, and I
14 mentioned that earlier. When we sought their information on what their
15 problems were and what their troubles were, they -- I'm not -- I'm not for
16 a minute saying that I was told the whole truth and nothing but the truth,
17 but they were cooperative and did reply to my queries, I thought,
18 relatively well.
19 MR. KAY:
20 Q. Thank you. Let's just look at the next page, then, in your weekly
21 summaries. You've given a lot of the general evidence that covers this
22 period now. The next one is the 7th of March, 1999, in which you describe
23 the area remaining generally calm, sniping Grabovac area, regular nightly
24 sniping at Glavotina, and you refer to the chicken farm and movement of
25 tanks and vehicles. You describe there the good contacts with the police
Page 32757
1 chiefs. "Humanitarian issues increased during the week with the
2 increasing incidents of attacks on the MUP and consequent retaliation
3 against KLA positions to our north. These resulted in the movement of an
4 estimated group of 100 plus IDPs" - internally displaced persons - "to our
5 northern area of responsibility from the north." And: One of our patrols
6 escorted 70 former villagers from Donji Grabovac from Pristina station.
7 We'll look at that issue separately, but what I've read out there
8 from the situation of the week ending the 7th of March is a summary of
9 that week. What did you mean by "humanitarian issues increased during the
10 week with the increasing attacks on the MUP?"
11 A. I -- my meaning in this report was that the -- the retaliation by
12 the MUP to the increasing incidents of sniping and other attacks resulted
13 in a -- the normal disruption of the movement of the -- the civil
14 population. As the tensions rose, the contact and the movement became
15 more difficult. And in visiting these series of villages, many of them of
16 which I've listed in this report, Mr. Kay, to the north, north of Obilic
17 but also north along the -- towards the Mitrovica highway, they were
18 individuals who required medical treatment or other treatment, and their
19 ability to attain foodstuffs and the normal paraphernalia of a civil
20 society was disrupted, hence they were in contact with them. During this
21 period, there were always concerns that somebody couldn't get there or
22 somebody couldn't be taken out to receive what they thought were necessary
23 treatments. And the NGOs, who they were reliant on for providing some
24 assistance, were -- were unable, with the growing instability, of
25 attending to these people. So they -- when we encountered them, they
Page 32758
1 always had concerns.
2 Q. You referred to the "consequent retaliation against KLA positions
3 to our north." If you are able then to describe what was going on between
4 the two parties here, being the MUP and the KLA, what was the pattern of
5 events?
6 A. I believe that the -- we've talked about several incidents, but to
7 the north there was -- as the month of March moved on, there were
8 increasing reports of -- of UCK attacks. Policemen were being abducted,
9 were being murdered. Other people were being abducted and murdered. And
10 the -- then out of Pristina and out of the various other military camps
11 the VJ moved to support the MUP in counter-terrorist operations. They
12 would move north, and this was further north than my area of
13 responsibility, I just saw the forces on the move and of course heard the
14 consequent radio reports of military and MUP activity.
15 These forces then moved in away from the major routes and the
16 highway in an attempt to cleanse the area and re-secure the area where the
17 UCK were conducting what I have referred to as a mid-level insurrection.
18 I -- I would -- I would describe the situation that I've tried to portray
19 here this morning as generally a low-level insurrection, but by the early
20 part of March, the middle of March, this had -- had grown to what I would
21 describe as a mid-level insurrection where there were -- major forces were
22 now attacking the authorities and the authorities were responding. The VJ
23 went into action in conjunction with the MUP in major military operations
24 up to the battle group level. By "battle group," I mean a force of six or
25 so hundred military personnel, including all arms, supported tanks,
Page 32759
1 mechanised infantry, the MUP in wheeled armoured vehicles, all of it
2 supported by artillery. And they were -- in my military assessment, they
3 were conducting counter-guerilla operations to secure their major routes
4 and their control of the area.
5 Q. This report for this week refers to Donji Grabovac. If you could
6 tell us briefly what your interest was in Donji Grabovac. What happened?
7 A. Well, Donji Grabovac, as I've -- as I wrote about after my
8 experience in -- in Yugoslavia and in Kosovo, had been a village that had
9 been evacuated in the summer of 1998 when the troubles of that time. And
10 again, as I've tried to stress in my testimony, the importance of this
11 particular site because of the mine and the operation of the mine
12 supporting the Obilic power plant, the villagers of Donji Grabovac,
13 predominantly Albanian, to my understanding had generally moved into
14 Pristina but they still retained a cohesiveness, and they were anxious to
15 return to their village and resume their normal life.
16 I had the opportunity to meet with them and their village leaders
17 on several occasions in Pristina, meetings that were arranged, and I told
18 them that I would try with the best of my ability to facilitate their
19 return to their village. These meetings had taken place over a number of
20 weeks commencing shortly after my arrival in Kosovo Polje up until, if I
21 recall correctly, a day or so before we were evacuated on the 20th of
22 March, 1999.
23 The cooperation with the authorities was good, in my estimation.
24 The police chiefs said they would -- they would help facilitate security.
25 They even offered to provide small arms to the villagers to enable them to
Page 32760
1 protect their homes if they were to re-inhabit them.
2 I helped facilitate a visit back to their homes by bus, or several
3 buses, of a number of them so they could see their homes and see what
4 damage or what existed of their homes, considering they had not been
5 occupied for some months. This visit was carried out. It generally went,
6 the visit itself, of the -- of a village delegation generally went well.
7 There were some -- there was some verbal harassment by the mine guards
8 allegedly of the personnel when they returned under escort from my
9 verifiers. They had the opportunity to spend some hours in the village,
10 and then, under escort of my verifiers, they returned to the -- the main
11 highway and returned back to Pristina.
12 The -- I was trying to facilitate this re-occupation of Donji
13 Grabovac, because I believed that if we could have achieved a small
14 accomplishment of restoring normality and putting people back in their
15 homes at such a -- in a critical area that had caused so much disruption
16 over the last number of months, we might have some hope of re-established
17 stability throughout the province of Kosovo. And of course the fact that
18 all my negotiations and whatever endeavours others made to help facilitate
19 this particular operation, it appeared to me after that that powers higher
20 than mine had no -- no real interest in rebuilding stability in Kosovo but
21 probably had other political agendas of which this would not play a role
22 whatsoever.
23 Q. And just -- did the resettlement of Donji Grabovac take place?
24 A. The resettlement did not take place. As I said, the meetings were
25 taking place, I believe, up 'til, I believe, the 18th of March. After
Page 32761
1 that, we had facilitated the return of the delegations to Donji Grabovac,
2 and of course with the -- the order to evacuate Kosovo in preparation for
3 the NATO war, there was -- that was the end of that particular programme.
4 Q. Evacuation of KVM 20th of March.
5 A. That is correct.
6 MR. KAY: If we take the morning --
7 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Kay, just before that. The villagers who wished
8 to return to Donji -- Kosovo Polje, were they of Serb ethnicity?
9 A. The majority of them were Albanian ethnics, to my understanding,
10 and I don't know if there were any Serbs amongst them or not.
11 JUDGE KWON: You said that they had been evacuated in the summer
12 of 1998.
13 THE WITNESS: Yes, that was my understanding.
14 JUDGE KWON: Do you know why?
15 THE WITNESS: Well, because of the fighting that was taking place
16 at that time, which was the -- the precursor to what I've tried to
17 describe today in that this was such a critical site because of the mine
18 operation and the very close presence of UCK in the -- to the -- a few
19 thousand metres to the west.
20 JUDGE KWON: Thank you.
21 MR. KAY: If we take the break now, Your Honour.
22 JUDGE ROBINSON: Time for the adjournment. Mr. Keith, we're going
23 to adjourn now for 20 minutes.
24 --- Recess taken at 10.34 a.m.
25 --- On resuming at 10.56 a.m.
Page 32762
1 JUDGE ROBINSON: Please continue, Mr. Kay.
2 MR. KAY: Thank you, Your Honour.
3 Q. I'm on the last session with you now, Mr. Keith. If we just turn
4 to the 14th of March, in your bundle of reports, weekly summary number 3.
5 And there again you cite what the activity was at that time; is that
6 right?
7 A. Which activity are you referring to, Mr. Kay?
8 Q. Just generally the situation report for the week.
9 A. Yes. That relates to the situation as I reported it at that time.
10 Q. You deal at the end of it with the -- with one of your verifiers
11 being sick on leave in Germany. So that we have an idea of your
12 resources, can you tell the Court how many people you had working under
13 you in your region of Kosovo Polje.
14 A. Yes, I can. My team consisted of myself and eight other
15 verifiers. These were from a variety of nations representing the OSCE. I
16 was the only Canadian in my team, and the rest of the team represented
17 verifiers from countries such as France, Norway, Germany, the United
18 States, and several others that don't pop into my mind momentarily.
19 We were supported by 13 interpreters. These interpreters were, to
20 my recollection were eight -- sorry, seven Albanian Yugoslavs. One
21 identified herself as a Turk, and four were Serbian. They provided the
22 translation and were always present when I or my patrols were attempting
23 to conduct our verification role.
24 And in addition to this, I -- the office and the location where I
25 resided in Kosovo Polje was the Herzegovina Motel. This was a building
Page 32763
1 that had been leased by the United States State Department to support the
2 United -- formerly support the United States diplomatic mission. They had
3 been evacuated from Kosovo early in February, during the Rambouillet
4 negotiations, and took up residence in Skopje in Macedonia, and hence the
5 building was available, and it was given to me to use as a site to reside
6 and to operate my responsibilities within the Kosovo Polje area of
7 responsibility.
8 Q. Thank you.
9 A. I should just add to that, Mr. Kay, that because of this I did not
10 have to hire security personnel. Most of the field stations hired local
11 personnel to provide 24-hour security to prevent theft or other
12 disruptions. The security personnel at the Herzegovina Motel were
13 employees of the United States State Department.
14 Q. Just moving on to the next page, 9th of March, which is an
15 incident report; is that right?
16 A. That is correct.
17 Q. There had been a murder during the night, and as a result of that
18 murder, an investigating judge appeared at the scene; is that right?
19 A. That is correct, Mr. Kay.
20 Q. If you could just briefly say what you found there, what the
21 situation was as you saw it.
22 A. This was one of a number of instances where fatalities occurred.
23 As I've said in my commentary, in articles, and in comments, in my
24 judgement many, if not the majority, of these murders were criminal in
25 nature and not necessarily political.
Page 32764
1 In this particular incident, as I've reported and have this one
2 document, in early hours of the morning a police commander - not the
3 police chief but one of their subordinate commanders - came to my office
4 in Kosovo Polje and stated, because I had asked them to keep me informed
5 of any -- any troubles or problems that would be of interest to the
6 Verification Mission and my field office, and said that there had been a
7 murder of a male and that the investigating judge would be there and if I
8 would like to go and have a look and observe the scene I would be welcome
9 to do so. I -- I did that.
10 I arrived at the scene about the same time as the investigating
11 judge. There were a number of MUP policemen who were in the area
12 conducting their police work, and I observed, as I have reported here, a
13 vehicle and who had been a male in the back seat who had been fatally
14 injured by a number of bullet wounds from automatic machine pistol, and
15 the casings of a number of rounds, allegedly 33 rounds from the machine
16 pistol were in the area. The individual had sustained gunshot wounds from
17 the groin to the head and was obviously very dead.
18 Q. And the -- from what you were able to see of the activities the
19 investigating judge?
20 ...
1 Tuesday, 14 September 2004
2 [Open session]
3 [The accused entered court]
4 --- Upon commencing at 9.08 a.m.
5 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Kay.
6 MR. KAY: Thank you. Your Honour, before I call the first
7 witness, who is Mr. Roland Keith, there is another matter that I would
8 like to raise at the end of his testimony - the witness is here and
9 available and should be heard first - and that deals with the matter of
10 the accused's appeal on the issue of his right to represent himself.
11 As the Trial Chamber knows, we lodged before the Trial Chamber an
12 application for a certificate for leave to appeal that decision. Leave
13 was given last Friday, and we would be making an application after this
14 witness is finished testimony on the issue of the suspension of the
15 proceedings until the appeal is heard by the Appeals Chamber.
16 I gave notice to the Prosecution of this matter slightly earlier
17 this morning, and I --
18 JUDGE ROBINSON: Thank you, Mr. Kay. Let us hear the witness
19 first and then we'll deal with that matter afterwards.
20 MR. KAY: I was raising it to put the Trial Chamber on notice as
21 well.
22 If we could have Mr. Keith, please.
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: He's not coming from Canada, is he?
24 MR. KAY: He had arrived. I don't know whether he -- ah, here he
25 is.
Page 32728
1 [The witness entered court]
2 JUDGE ROBINSON: Let the witness make the declaration.
3 THE WITNESS: I solemnly declare that I will speak the truth, the
4 whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
5 JUDGE ROBINSON: You may sit.
6 WITNESS: ROLAND KEITH
7 Examined by Mr. Kay:
8 Q. Your name is Roland Keith; is that right?
9 A. That is correct.
10 Q. And you're a citizen of Canada?
11 A. That is correct.
12 Q. If we could just have a brief resume of your background,
13 Mr. Keith. You were an army officer in the Canadian army; is that right?
14 A. That is correct.
15 Q. For what period of time?
16 A. I was a military officer in the Canadian army for 32 years.
17 Q. And finishing your service when?
18 A. I finished my service -- it was broken service, actually. I
19 finished initially in the year 1982. I then took what I call a
20 sabbatical. I was back at grad school, studying history. I returned to
21 the army for a further four years in the year 1987 to 1991.
22 Q. And your rank at retirement was captain; is that right?
23 A. That is correct.
24 Q. And you became a member of the Kosovo monitoring force in 1999?
25 A. Yes, I did.
Page 32729
1 Q. What we call the KVM?
2 A. That is correct.
3 Q. When were you first recruited to take part in that mission?
4 A. The background to my service with the Kosovo Verification Mission
5 was in the summer of 1998 when the first indication that it would be
6 constituted, and I subsequently applied to participate, and in the late
7 fall of 1998, my government and -- contacted me and said is that they --
8 they furthered -- they forwarded, rather, my resume and my application,
9 and I was notified in -- shortly after New Year's 1999 that I -- that they
10 would like me to serve with the OSCE, Kosovo Verification Mission.
11 Q. And did you arrive in Kosovo in the first week of February, 1999?
12 A. That is correct.
13 Q. And you undertook a period of training for some four days on about
14 the 9th of February?
15 A. That is correct.
16 Q. And did you go down to Pristina on the 12th of February for a
17 period of two days?
18 A. I believe that is correct, yes.
19 Q. And the purpose of that was for what?
20 A. The purpose of that was to assign me to a role within the Pristina
21 Regional Centre and the Pristina Coordination Centre of the Kosovo
22 Verification Mission, which was done in that short period of time.
23 Q. Before this period, had you ever spent any period of your service
24 in the Balkans?
25 A. No. This was my initial participation with the Balkans.
Page 32730
1 Q. Had your previous military experience had you undertaken observer
2 duties in other countries?
3 A. Yes, I had. In the mid-1970s I had served a double tour as a
4 United Nations military observer in the Sinai -- the Suez Canal, the
5 Sinai, throughout the United Nations truce supervisory organisation area,
6 including the state of Lebanon.
7 Q. And in your previous military history have you spent a previous
8 period in the Suez area, right at the start of your military career?
9 A. Yes. I was very, very proud as a young man to have served with
10 the Canadian Armoured Reconnaissance Squadron as one of the initial units
11 under General Burns in what was then the United Nations Emergency Force 1,
12 and a very interesting and challenging experience.
13 Q. Right. Now let's turn to Kosovo. When you arrived here in The
14 Hague, you brought with you some documents, and the first one I'd like to
15 put before the Court, which will serve as a familiarisation process, is a
16 general map of the Kosovo area centred upon Pristina.
17 MR. KAY: And if copies of that can be handed out and one put
18 before the witness.
19 THE INTERPRETER: Could the speakers please pause between question
20 and answer. Thank you.
21 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Kay, you have seen the notification? Pause
22 between question and answer. And I say the same to the witness, for the
23 benefit of the interpreters.
24 MR. KAY: Yes. Thank you.
25 Q. It's what I discussed with you yesterday. We must be careful
Page 32731
1 about not running our questions and answers together, and the mistake is
2 entirely mine in not doing that which I told you not to do.
3 If we could look at this map, then, and we see Pristina in the
4 middle of the map. We see an area, a town to the left, Kosovo Polje. We
5 see, slightly above that, Obilic. And we see to the left Glogovac. And
6 if you could confirm this: The testimony that you're to give largely
7 concerns that area to the west of Pristina; is that right?
8 A. That is correct.
9 Q. I'd like you now to take us through your tour of duty, which I
10 believe commenced after you had had your familiarisation process in
11 Pristina, with going to Glogovac; is that correct?
12 A. Yes, that is correct.
13 Q. And if you could inform the Court what the circumstances were at
14 this time in the middle of February when you arrived in Glogovac. What
15 did you see?
16 A. My initial recollections of arriving in Glogovac in this time
17 frame, in the middle of February of 1999, this was a small Serbian --
18 sorry, a small Yugoslavian town inhabited by, I believe, some 6 to 7.000
19 inhabitants. It was predominantly Albanian, and to the best of my
20 knowledge, it was -- it was, I believe, entirely Albanian at this time.
21 The surrounding area consisted of a number of small villages. To my --
22 best of my knowledge, all of these were entirely Albanian.
23 The town had a -- a small MUP, paramilitary station in an old
24 industrial site or a former industrial site, and routine patrols and the
25 replacement of MUP personnel occurred on a daily basis, and there were
Page 32732
1 frequent patrols after the hours of darkness into and out of Glogovac to
2 visit this MUP site.
3 The general area both to the -- in the surrounding villages, to
4 the north-east, the east, and to the south, and to the south of Komorane.
5 If you see Komorane, it's a small community on the crossroads on the
6 Pristina to Pec road. And the surrounding -- the villages from Lopusnik
7 and all down the valley to the south there were all, as well, additional
8 Albanian inhabited small communities. In all of these communities there
9 was what I refer to as the home guard. They were local UCK members,
10 referred to as terrorists by the authorities, who had a presence in all of
11 these villages, and they maintained static armed checkpoints on the routes
12 in and out of their villages. There was no -- there was no harassment or
13 incursion of Serbian or Yugoslavian authorities or forces into any of
14 these villages at this time. To my knowledge, they stayed, as I've
15 previously stated, to the route in and out of Glogovac and patrolling the
16 main road which I've previously referred to as well, the Pristina-Pec
17 highway, and the road going down to Orahovac and down to the -- down to
18 the Prizren area from the north.
19 So this was my -- my general impression of the Glogovac area.
20 There were some incidents that had occurred as recently as the day before
21 I arrived when an individual was fatally murdered just south of Glogovac.
22 I did not participate in the investigation nor in the follow-up to that
23 particular incident, but to the best of my knowledge, it was a local
24 attack by one side or another or retribution.
25 Q. The period you spent at Glogovac was how long?
Page 32733
1 A. I don't have the precise dates in front of me at the moment,
2 Mr. Kay, but I -- I believe I was there for about one week.
3 Q. In your previous answer which I can see on the LiveNote
4 transcript, you said the MUP was in a paramilitary building. Is that what
5 you meant?
6 A. In Glogovac itself?
7 Q. Yes.
8 A. Yes. I believe I stated that the MUP team in Glogovac occupied a
9 military -- had a military presence in a former industrial building which
10 was fortified, of course.
11 Q. Yes. In terms of what you saw in that week of -- of Glogovac, did
12 you come across any abuses of power by the local MUP or the VJ or any
13 other body to be associated with the Serbian authorities?
14 A. No. During that -- that week that I was in Glogovac, as I've
15 previously stated, the -- the VJ had a very limited presence. There were
16 some armoured infantry fighting vehicle movement into and out of Glogovac,
17 small numbers of vehicles, platoon size. There -- but basically the VJ
18 were staying in their barracks, and other than some movement on the
19 principal roads, the MUP, again as previously stated, had routine patrols
20 on the roads into and out of their -- their patrol sites, and they manned
21 checkpoints along the major highway, again referring to the Pristina-Pec
22 highway, and these -- within the Glogovac area of responsibility, these
23 would number probably one or two a day along the main road or on the road
24 into Glogovac where they would set up temporary checkpoint, and they would
25 examine all personnel transiting that particular checkpoint.
Page 32734
1 I observed a number of these operations in progress. It was not
2 my observation that there was any abuse or -- or harm, physical harm, that
3 is, done to any of the inhabitants transiting those checkpoints. We did,
4 however, in conversing with the predominantly Albanian population of the
5 area, ask them if they were having any difficulty in moving through the
6 area, transiting the area, or being harassed. They stated in some cases
7 they thought they had in that -- in that their -- some of their documents,
8 they claimed, were taken from them. In some cases, they claimed that some
9 individuals were detained for a short period of time, perhaps maybe
10 overnight, but I did not see personally any maltreatment or physical or
11 harmful harassment to the inhabitants trying to participate in their
12 lawful -- lawful business.
13 Again, the -- the -- the local -- what I referred to as the local
14 home guard of the UCK, or the terrorists, did again stay within their
15 villages at this time in this area, to my knowledge.
16 Q. You've described there the UCK/KLA as having a home guard network
17 in the villages in the surrounding area. What level of strength are we
18 looking at in terms of KLA forces that you were able to observe at this
19 time in this area?
20 A. These were local forces, in my estimation. They would be in half
21 a dozen -- strength of half a dozen young men. Sometimes -- sometimes
22 there were more, but they appeared to me to be local inhabitants and not
23 part of any main force UCK offensive group.
24 Q. After that we -- did you then establish a field office in Kosovo
25 Polje?
Page 32735
1 A. That is correct. I was -- I had gone to -- I'd been assigned to
2 Glogovac with the understanding that I would take over the direction of
3 that field office. That did -- did not happen. And after the short
4 period of time, approximately one week, I was requested to assume
5 responsibility to form a field office under the direction of the Pristina
6 Coordination Centre and Regional Centre at Kosovo Polje. This was a new
7 team that did not exist until the time that I was appointed.
8 Q. You brought to the Tribunal with you some -- some notes from your
9 records at the time; is that correct?
10 A. That is correct.
11 Q. And these notes came from what source?
12 A. The notes were -- were put together by myself, and they are weekly
13 summaries, I believe the ones you're referring to, that were based on the
14 daily reports that were put together by myself and my team of verifiers
15 and submitted to the Pristina Coordination Centre on a daily basis. The
16 weekly reports were -- were put together by myself to -- to give a summary
17 of what those daily reports consisted of and to provide me personally with
18 a record of what my participation in the Kosovo Verification Mission was.
19 Q. Now, it would probably help to consider your evidence with those
20 notes before us.
21 MR. KAY: So, Your Honours, if the map we produced could be the
22 next exhibit, which would D246.
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, that's admitted.
24 MR. KAY: And if the notes of the witness can now be produced and
25 put before the parties.
Page 32736
1 Q. Whilst that's going on, Mr. Keith, on your left-hand side is a
2 very detailed map which is your personal property again; is that right?
3 A. That is correct.
4 Q. Which is a map of the general area and was your operations map at
5 the time; is that right?
6 A. That is correct, Mr. Kay.
7 Q. You're familiar with that map, and if you need to direct our
8 attention to anything on the map, please do so as it's on an ELMO and
9 we're able to look at it on the video screens if necessary. We've got the
10 general map and then we've got the more detailed map which may help your
11 testimony.
12 Just looking at the first note, then, which is headed 28th of
13 February, 1999, Weekly Summary Number 1, it states you established your
14 field office in Kosovo Polje on the 22nd of February, 1999; is that right?
15 A. That is correct.
16 JUDGE KWON: Before moving on, Mr. Kay, why don't we make sure the
17 ELMO is operating properly or not.
18 MR. KAY: We did a test earlier, Your Honour, and it was. Shall
19 we see?
20 JUDGE ROBINSON: We're not getting any signal.
21 JUDGE KWON: We can proceed.
22 MR. KAY: Are you getting something on your monitors now, Your
23 Honours?
24 JUDGE ROBINSON: No. But proceed, Mr. Kay.
25 MR. KAY: We just had a flash then and then it went.
Page 32737
1 JUDGE ROBINSON: There we are.
2 MR. KAY: We have the picture there. Thank you.
3 Q. Kosovo Polje, if you can tell us there what the situation was that
4 you found at that stage when you arrived on the 22nd of February.
5 Describe the type of place it was.
6 A. Kosovo Polje, of course, is a very historic site. The town -- I
7 can't recall the estimates of the population, but I would estimate 10 to
8 15.000; a major -- a major site.
9 It was -- in asking questions of the various authorities and
10 people who I had the opportunity to associate with, I understood the
11 ethnic distribution within Kosovo Polje, the town itself, to be
12 approximately 70 per cent Serbian and perhaps 20 per cent Albanian and 10
13 per cent of others, including Turks, Roma, and various other ethnic
14 minorities.
15 The -- now, would you like me to go on about the --
16 Q. Yes.
17 A. -- area of responsibility?
18 The area of responsibility that I was assigned ran from Pristina,
19 the western -- the western ends of Pristina going south, including the
20 Pristina airport, which was -- which was a military site and was -- we
21 were not allowed to go into the Pristina airport site itself without a VJ
22 escort.
23 The area again going down just to the west of the main south
24 highway down -- proceeding to the -- sorry, to the south and then to the
25 west and then up, including the principal town of Obilic and the very
Page 32738
1 large coal mining site of Belacevac - sorry if I do not pronounce the
2 names that well - and the area then actually exceeded right to the north,
3 up to the Mitrovica highway and a number of small villages. Is that
4 shown?
5 Q. If the map can be brought down the ELMO.
6 A. Thank you. And then as you see from my Chinagraph markings here,
7 going up through the wooded and the high grounds going from south to north
8 to the west of the Belacevac mine site and the Obilic power station and up
9 towards the Mitrovica highway, and actually beyond my Chinagraph markings
10 here to a number of small villages around Hamidija and to the north and to
11 the north of the Grabovac and Obilic road.
12 So this was the general area of my responsibility, then back to
13 the Pristina highway and north.
14 The -- to describe it, the -- the area south of the Pristina-Pec
15 highway, a number of agricultural villages, numerous villages, had been
16 there for many years, I assume. These villages were primarily occupied by
17 Serbs. I believe there were other smaller numbers of ethnic authorities
18 in some of them as well. However, in the -- in the Grabovac - and I'll
19 mention Donji Grabovac a little later - but at Grabovac area, again I
20 believe these villages had -- had been ethnically -- an ethnic mix prior
21 to the troubles of the summer of 1998. However, on my arrival in February
22 1999, I believe that these were, in my opinion, entirely occupied by
23 Serbian peoples. And the village of Donji Grabovac was totally deserted,
24 unoccupied.
25 And the small villages that I've referred to in the north and off
Page 32739
1 the major routes were -- had suffered damage in the troubles and the
2 fighting of the summer of 1998, and the peoples residing in these villages
3 to this -- at this time, to the best of my knowledge, were almost entirely
4 Albanian. And in all of these villages there was what I referred to
5 earlier as a home guard element of the UCK.
6 We were -- we were allowed in and out of all of these villages but
7 only after we showed our credentials. And each and every time the UCK
8 sentries made a point of writing down all our credential information and
9 communicating with some -- with superiors which I could not observe before
10 they would let us proceed. However, they did not obstruct us other than
11 going through this procedure.
12 The MUP, again, similar to the Glogovac area, the MUP patrolled
13 all the routes in and around Kosovo Polje, the main roads. Of course
14 there was a police station in Kosovo Polje, another police station in
15 Obilic. I went to these police stations and introduced myself to the
16 local police chiefs and worked with them throughout my stay in the Kosovo
17 Polje area up till the evacuation of the Kosovo Verification Mission.
18 They -- I was received hospitably, professionally, and at all times they
19 cooperated with me and all of my requests. I was not -- I was not
20 obstructed from carrying out any of my duties or responsibilities by them.
21 Q. If I can just --
22 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Kay. Mr. Kay, I remember the witness mentioned
23 the place which is called Grabovac, which is different from Glogovac.
24 MR. KAY: Yes.
25 JUDGE KWON: If you could help me to find --
Page 32740
1 MR. KAY: In between Glogovac and Pristina would be Grabovac and
2 Donji Grabovac --
3 Q. Perhaps you could find it on the more detailed map which we
4 anticipated may be needed. And I wonder if the scale can come up a bit.
5 We've lost it totally.
6 MR. NICE: I don't know if Your Honours will be assisted by having
7 a look at Exhibit 83 if you've got it with you.
8 JUDGE KWON: But in that map Grabovac is near in Pec, which should
9 be different from the location.
10 MR. NICE: I think if you look at -- look --
11 MR. KAY: The witness is pointing to the part on the map where
12 Grabovac is.
13 THE WITNESS: This.
14 MR. KAY:
15 Q. And Donji Grabovac, which is of importance in a part of your
16 testimony, is just to the north-west.
17 A. That is -- that is correct.
18 Q. If you just keep your pointer on Grabovac, and if we can go back
19 now to have a smaller scale, we can see where it is in relation to
20 Pristina perhaps. If the technical booth can do that.
21 JUDGE KWON: Yes. I found it in Exhibit 83.
22 MR. KAY:
23 Q. We can see Obilic on the right-hand side --
24 MR. NICE: I'm glad. If it can be found as Donji Grabovac --
25 JUDGE KWON: It appears --
Page 32741
1 MR. NICE: Grabovac itself is not marked.
2 JUDGE KWON: On page 6, yes.
3 MR. NICE: Yes. The map otherwise is quite helpful.
4 MR. KAY:
5 Q. And would I be right if you drew a line, say, between Glogovac and
6 Obilic it would cross-intersect over Grabovac and Donji Grabovac roughly?
7 A. That is correct. I believe it's off the map here, Glogovac, now,
8 but it would be just to the south of the Grabovac area, directly on an
9 east -- east-west line, that is correct.
10 MR. KAY: Yes. I hope that assists the Trial Chamber.
11 JUDGE ROBINSON: What is the distance from Pristina?
12 THE WITNESS: This map is a 1:50.000, so each of these squares is
13 one kilometre. We are looking at a distance of about -- in Donji Grabovac
14 we're looking at a distance of 9 or 10 kilometres from Pristina and of
15 course Glogovac would be something like 17 or 18 kilometres, as I recall.
16 MR. KAY: Yes.
17 Q. In relation to the KLA in that area, you've described the home
18 guard but it's the overall situation within the region that you're dealing
19 with. Are you able to give evidence about that?
20 A. Yes. Yes, I believe so. Am I being -- am I being heard?
21 Q. Yes.
22 A. Thank you.
23 MR. KAY: If the other microphone could be switched on so the
24 witness can speak across to me. Thank you. Yes.
25 Q. So if you could tell us about the overall strength. You've
Page 32742
1 mentioned the home guard in the villages, but was there a force behind
2 them elsewhere?
3 A. Yes, there was. In the area just west of Donji Grabovac -- I'm
4 not sure is this ELMO still projected or --
5 Q. We're off at the moment. If we could go on again. Yes.
6 A. In the -- in the area just to the west of Grabovac and Donji
7 Grabovac, we see a wooded rolling series of hills. I believe this is the
8 south-western end of the Drenica valley. When we proceeded into the
9 wooded rolling hills here and directly west of Donji Grabovac, we
10 encountered a local force of the UCK, and I had a number of meetings, as
11 did my deputy, almost on a daily basis, with this force. In my
12 estimation, what I saw when I was visiting and discussing security matters
13 with the UCK local commander would be a force about platoon size. That
14 would be about 35 armed personnel. They would have assault rifles, light
15 machine-guns, rocket propelled grenades. And in all our discussions with
16 the local commander and his deputies, they were not -- they were unable to
17 give us any assurances on -- on what they could or could not do without
18 reference to superior command, and this was seldom forthcoming.
19 They also -- they also were unable or -- or unwilling to answer
20 any queries about individuals from the authorities' side or the government
21 side who had disappeared, been abducted, or killed or injured. So
22 basically they were friendly, hospitable, but generally did not cooperate
23 in a meaningful manner for -- to enable me to carry out my
24 responsibilities as a verifier of the agreement.
25 Q. We'll just summarise those responsibilities now. They were to
Page 32743
1 monitor the cease-fire between the parties and to record incidents that
2 took place. And did you have a role as well in attempting to pacify the
3 area?
4 A. Yes, I did. The -- again, as you previously mentioned, Mr. Kay,
5 upon my arrival and my introduction in consultation with the MUP police
6 chiefs and local police chiefs, they claimed that -- that the area within
7 both Kosovo Polje and the Obilic police area, that the major concern was
8 this Donji Grabovac area. Again, just for the -- for the -- perhaps the
9 enlightenment of the Court or the assistance of the Court, the Bjelovac
10 mine, which covers almost -- a great deal of the area between Kosovo Polje
11 and Obilic and its power station, this is a vast coal mine that produced
12 the coal that fuelled the Obilic power station which not only provided
13 power to most of Kosovo but also to other parts of Yugoslavia, and with
14 the troubles and with the agreement that we were trying to verify, of
15 course the authorities were trying to facilitate the movement of mine
16 workers into and out of the mine on a regular shift basis. I believe they
17 operated around the clock, 24 hours. And because of the importance of
18 Donji Grabovac to the authorities and hence to myself and my team was that
19 that was an area where there was daily movement in and out of workers.
20 Not only were the MUP trying to maintain security and protect the -- the
21 mine operation and facilitate the comings and goings of the mine workers,
22 but the -- there was also a mine police force. This was a paramilitary
23 police force that was organised and hired, I assume, by the mining company
24 or the power company, and they also had a hierarchy of police,
25 non-commissioned officers, and police chiefs. I also dealt with these
Page 32744
1 people.
2 It was these -- it was this force that was primarily challenged,
3 in my opinion, with providing security to the mine and hence the mine site
4 which was right near the village of Grabovac. And this was a problem to
5 the authorities because they were suffering -- from all reports and
6 physical evidence that I saw, they were suffering almost daily harassing
7 attacks, sniping attacks. Prior to my arrival, an engineer had been
8 abducted, presumably -- to my knowledge he was never seen again.
9 Presumably he was murdered or disappeared. And mine guards --
10 JUDGE ROBINSON: Attacks from whom?
11 THE WITNESS: Allegedly from the UCK.
12 JUDGE ROBINSON: Was that the only presence of the UCK in that
13 area?
14 THE WITNESS: No, I think as I previously described, Your Honour,
15 the UCK were -- occupied all of the small villages outside of the beaten
16 track with their what I referred to as home guard forces, and in the
17 wooded area to the west of Donji Grabovac there appeared to be, to my
18 military estimate, a platoon or elements of a company size UCK force which
19 was perhaps local but perhaps it was more than the home guard element that
20 I described earlier.
21 JUDGE ROBINSON: I'm trying to arrive at a number for the size of
22 the UCK force in that area.
23 THE WITNESS: I mentioned -- I mentioned in my previous testimony,
24 Your Honour, that the force that I witnessed when I visited was
25 approximately platoon size. That would be about 35 personnel, armed
Page 32745
1 personnel, and more heavily armed than the -- what I referred to as the
2 local UCK home guard in the various villages that I -- I visited.
3 JUDGE ROBINSON: You encountered one force of platoon size, but
4 there are others?
5 THE WITNESS: Yes. I would -- again I'm trying to portray what I
6 actually saw. If you see -- as a former soldier, if you see a platoon,
7 there's obviously a company; and if you see a company, there's obviously a
8 battalion. I say this because military forces do not operate in
9 isolation, they operate with mutual support. And it would be my estimate
10 that this was a small element of a larger element further to the west and
11 to the north.
12 JUDGE ROBINSON: So you assume that the UCK had such a
13 sophisticated command structure?
14 THE WITNESS: They certainly had a command structure over and
15 above what I -- whom I met or what I witnessed, yes.
16 MR. KAY:
17 Q. I think you referred as well to decisions being unable to be taken
18 by the local commander and so that matters were referred elsewhere; is
19 that right?
20 A. That is correct, and that's another supporting element of my
21 assessment that this was a smaller element of a larger force. The local
22 commander was never able to answer any of my queries or any of my
23 questions without reference to higher authority.
24 Q. Where you indicated the KLA/UCK were regionally centred from what
25 you could -- you could see, was the VJ or MUP presence outside that area?
Page 32746
1 A. The -- no. As I've tried to state several times, the -- the VJ
2 stayed either within their barracks area or camp areas other than for --
3 for patrolling the major routes or moving to conduct small exercises. And
4 the MUP, as well, occupied various observation posts overlooking some of
5 the highways. And of course they -- as I've previously mentioned, they --
6 on a daily basis they established checkpoints on the major highway
7 primarily but also on some of the rural areas, the rural roads, to provide
8 security to personnel and inhabitants moving along those corridors.
9 Q. You mentioned sniping attacks that were taking place which
10 affected the mine workers. Are you able to give any idea of responses
11 that there were to those sniping attacks, how the local authorities
12 attempted to deal with it?
13 A. The local authorities, again primarily the mine police, complained
14 to me on a daily basis that -- that they were being harassed and -- and
15 sniped at. I was shown evidence of new bullet holes in some of the mine
16 security buildings personally, and these -- I can attest that these were
17 not there the day or so before when I had looked at that same building.
18 So the rounds had been fired from west or north of the site.
19 Again, if you -- refer you to my weekly summaries of my daily
20 reports, and I don't for a minute think that the harassment was coming
21 from -- entirely from one side. The -- in discussions with the UCK
22 commander in this area, he, of course, complained that the mine police
23 were sniping at his forces and he was -- would respond. In discussing
24 with the mine police, of course I received entirely the other story. They
25 said that their -- their movement of personnel workers and security
Page 32747
1 personnel were being harassed and sniped at, and they then would respond
2 to ensure their safety.
3 In some cases, in my -- excuse me. I believe -- I believe there
4 are several quotes in my documents that I wrote at that time where I give
5 greater credibility to one side or the other based on my personal
6 judgement, and I think in the Grabovac area, given the situation that I
7 have tried to describe in the mine police to maintain security to their
8 workers that probably - and this is my assessment - that they probably,
9 during the hours of darkness were -- were somewhat nervous and probably
10 initiated a number of the gunfire accounts which, of course, would
11 probably elicit a response from the UCK side.
12 So I think -- I think there was a two-way stream here given the
13 general insecurity and the importance of this site to maintain the
14 operation of the mine and the power plant.
15 Q. Yes. Also in this region, and we can see that on your first
16 weekly summary of 28th of February, is somewhere known as the chicken
17 farm, which was a site of local economic importance; is that right?
18 A. Excuse me. No. The chicken farm was an unoccupied former
19 agricultural site, and I can point it on the big man here, to the ELMO, I
20 guess, to find it. It is -- it is the area shown on this map around the
21 crossroads of Krivovo --
22 MR. KAY: We're not picking it up. If the map could be moved,
23 please. We're on screen with it but if you can put the part where Mr.
24 Keith has the wand.
25 A. You see the Pristina-Pec highway.
Page 32748
1 Q. Yes?
2 A. Again running west from Pristina through Kosovo Polje, and it goes
3 through a small -- a small -- on my map it's known as Krivovo. And this
4 is again on the road going to the crossroads for Glogovac, and there are a
5 number of agricultural buildings on my map. I am circling the area with
6 the pointer at this time. The highway is just to the north and you see a
7 series of buildings there. This was -- this was not in operation as an
8 agricultural site when I was there. It was occupied by a VJ company team,
9 varied. There would always be a platoon of tanks, perhaps a company of
10 tanks - a company of tanks would be ten tanks, a platoon three tanks - in
11 this area. Certainly a platoon or more of infantry fighting vehicles.
12 And -- but they generally stayed in that area other than, as I've stated
13 earlier, moving out for small exercises or to conduct route patrols along
14 the main routes, primarily from there towards the Pristina air field,
15 which was -- is right within about three to four kilometres from that
16 site.
17 Q. Right.
18 A. Which was a heavily militarised area.
19 Q. Was that part of the security for the air field?
20 A. Well, it would be -- it would be addition to -- in addition to the
21 security at the air field, but it was a crucially military important area
22 because of its location right on the highway. It could facilitate a rapid
23 response to any major emergency in that area.
24 Q. The chicken farm, as it was called, was that subject to any
25 hostilities?
Page 32749
1 A. The chicken farm per se I -- I know of no attacks on the chicken
2 farm. However, I was witness to an attack on a police patrol just -- just
3 approximately 1.000 or 1.500 metres to the -- no, less than that, I'm
4 sorry. Probably about 200 metres to the west of the -- of what we refer
5 to as the chicken farm. Again, the Pristina-Pec highway comes out of the
6 open agricultural area and goes into a re-entry to get into the higher
7 ground, and there, as you approach the -- what we referred to as the
8 chicken farm, is what in military terms I would know as a D file.
9 Consequently a dangerous area if your opponents controlled the ground to
10 either side.
11 Q. And what did you witness there?
12 A. I believe it was on the 27th of February, if I recall correctly.
13 It's in my notes, I believe. At that site one of my patrols was -- had
14 proceeded to the west and was returning. It was towards last light, this
15 being February; the days were short. He encountered a major military
16 operation with a large amount of fire, including tanks, although I don't
17 know -- the tanks were not firing their main armament but their
18 machine-guns, and infantry fighting vehicles that had responded to what
19 was clear to me an attack on the police patrol that took place a few
20 minutes before this. And what my patrol was witnessing was the response
21 and retaliation to this attack. And I myself was proceeding on -- on
22 other business, about to leave Kosovo Polje, when I received his call.
23 The sound of heavy gunfire was obvious because it was transmitted when his
24 radio was transmitting. I immediately proceeded to the area and was there
25 within three or four minutes.
Page 32750
1 The -- when I arrived, the firing was beginning to subside but
2 there was still -- it had -- it had been going on for some time, and the
3 MUP estimated platoon, again about 35 armed paramilitary police, had
4 assaulted across the road under the support of a platoon, three T55 tanks.
5 And when I asked the local police commander if he could tell me what had
6 occurred, he said yes. He was cooperative, and although there was a great
7 deal of tension as one of his police NCOs had been fatally injured,
8 another critically injured, and I -- I observed the fatal casualty, and I
9 was witness to the evacuation of the critically injured police
10 non-commissioned officer, and the -- it was clear to me that there had
11 been an attack from the north of the D-file, in my estimation with the use
12 of light machine-gun or similar weapon that had been used to make this
13 attack. It was clear to me that -- that the force that had attacked had
14 been opposed to the government, and I assumed that they were UCK.
15 Q. I think in your report you used the phrase: "It appears to be a
16 clear case the KLA provocation."
17 A. That is correct, Mr. Kay. It -- it was -- this was no accident
18 where the MUP or the VJ had moved out and -- and challenged any of the
19 outlying areas. This was a clear case that the -- the terrorists,
20 insurgents from outside were coming in to harass the authorities,
21 obviously, in my estimation, to provoke a response.
22 Q. Thank you. You referred slightly earlier in your testimony to the
23 cooperation that you received from the local MUP police chiefs, and you've
24 referred to their involvement --
25 JUDGE ROBINSON: Mr. Kay. Sorry. Can I ask the witness, what
Page 32751
1 indicated to you that it was a KLA provocation? By that, I gather you
2 mean that the KLA initiated the attack.
3 THE WITNESS: It was -- my assigned role as a verifier was to
4 verify the -- the situation in accordance with the agreement of October
5 1998 of which the authorities, meaning the MUP and the VJ, would withdraw
6 from confrontation but maintain security in their -- along their routes
7 and in their -- in their -- the main sites, and they would not -- they
8 would not move into the hinterland, if I may use that term, that was
9 occupied primarily by the Albanian Yugoslavs. And -- and again, as I've
10 tried to describe and I certainly witnessed during my -- my few months in
11 Kosovo, the -- they generally did.
12 Conversely, it also was part of the agreement to my understanding
13 that the KLA or UCK would stay in the hinterland and would not harass,
14 interfere, or conduct military operations where the government authorities
15 held sway. And it appeared to me in this occasion and on several others
16 that I witnessed or observed that the UCK were not abiding by the
17 agreement, and they were conducting military attacks. In my military
18 assessment, given their strengths and the strengths of the authorities,
19 they were trying to -- trying to provoke a response. And being a military
20 man, the responsibility to defend your forces, to defend your assigned
21 responsibilities, if you are attacked, you naturally, given the authority,
22 you respond.
23 JUDGE ROBINSON: When you arrived at the scene, the attack was
24 already in -- taking place?
25 THE WITNESS: The -- the -- by the time I arrived there, I would
Page 32752
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Page 32753
1 assume it would be ten minutes after the attack had been initiated, and
2 the perpetrators of the attack had withdrawn because they -- there was no
3 -- there was no fire coming from - sorry - the attack position in that
4 ten minutes when I arrived there. The fire was all going from the MUP and
5 the VJ side into the -- the -- the high ground where the attack had been
6 committed from.
7 JUDGE ROBINSON: Yes, Mr. Kay.
8 MR. KAY:
9 Q. And the significance of the attack is that it's 200 metres from
10 the military installation at the chicken farm?
11 A. I believe that is significant, but it's also significant that the
12 attack was on a routine police patrol on the main highway from Pristina to
13 Pec, a highway travelled not only by the local inhabitants but also by
14 NGOs. International Committee of the Red Cross and other NGOs used this
15 road frequently as did the Kosovo Verification Mission.
16 Q. It's the Pec to Pristina highway?
17 A. That is correct.
18 Q. Carrying a great deal of traffic?
19 A. It's one of the major routes in Kosovo.
20 Q. And the chicken farm itself was -- was how far from the road?
21 A. The chicken farm, as you can see from the map, was just a matter
22 of metres, 50 metres to a hundred metres south of the road.
23 Q. You turned off the road into the chicken farm military
24 installation?
25 A. Who did? I'm sorry.
Page 32754
1 Q. No. If you were to drive along, you'd turn off the road and drive
2 into it.
3 A. Correct. You -- anybody transiting that road can observe the --
4 what we knew as the chicken farm, yes.
5 Q. You described the higher ground at this particular site. Was that
6 to the north of the road?
7 A. The -- there was high ground primarily to the north but also some
8 high ground to the south, and the attack allegedly had come from the
9 north. And by looking at the fatality and the injured, the damage -- and
10 one armoured jeep was destroyed in this attack, another one was damaged,
11 the -- it was quickly clear to me the attack had come from the north.
12 Q. Back on the other matter I wanted to deal with, which was the
13 cooperation you received from the local police commanders.
14 A. Could --
15 Q. You had dealings with several; is that right? Perhaps if you
16 could name those individuals and where they were based, if you're able to
17 remember this length of time.
18 A. I would be -- I would be really -- I'd be pleased to do that but
19 perhaps if I may just momentarily -- when we're talking about the security
20 of the Pristina to Pec highway, I had observed a previous UCK attack when
21 I had arrived in Glogovac at the Lopusnik observation point, which is on
22 this same highway just further to the west.
23 Q. Towards Komorane?
24 A. Beyond Komorane.
25 Q. Beyond Komorane towards Lopusnik?
Page 32755
1 A. Yes, and I believe five kilometres to the west of Komorane.
2 Q. Still in the Drenica region?
3 A. Yes.
4 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Kay, all those names appear on this map book so
5 if you can check during the adjournment, we will be more assisted by using
6 this.
7 MR. KAY: Yes.
8 THE WITNESS: I'm pointing to Lopusnik site now. Again, as the
9 highway moves west there is a high ground to the south of the highway,
10 approximately 800 metres south of the highway. The MUP had established a
11 section observation post - a section being approximately ten personnel -
12 and in early -- in early February while I was doing an introductory patrol
13 from Glogovac, the sound of heavy gunfire came from the Lopusnik area. We
14 immediately responded, as did a MUP reinforcement element of platoon size
15 - again two armoured Land Rovers, approximately 25 to 30 armed personnel
16 - when we -- they evacuated a wounded policeman from the observation site
17 maintained by the section with a corporal in charge. When we asked what
18 had happened, they explained that one of their personnel had gone from the
19 fortified observation post to a well to fetch water, which would be
20 approximately 20 to 30 metres distance from their site, and he was fired
21 upon from the east by a sniper and was wounded. Not critically, to my
22 knowledge, but was wounded. And they responded with a fusillade of
23 automatic fire in their defence and their responding reaction force also
24 swept the area looking for the sniper and no sniper was found. But again,
25 it was -- there was a clear police location that was fired on from the --
Page 32756
1 from the west -- sorry, from the east, which is indicative of the type of
2 incidents that took place periodically along this route.
3 Now, to respond to your query, Mr. Kay, on the cooperation with
4 the local police chiefs, again I mentioned they were cooperative to me
5 personally and to my verifiers. The police chief in Kosovo Polje was an
6 individual by the name of Dragan Miric. He and his police commanders and
7 deputy commanders -- developed a working relationship with him and his
8 staff, and they -- they cooperated with all the requests that I gave them,
9 to the best of my knowledge.
10 The other individual who I found cooperative and helpful to enable
11 me to carry out my task was Bozidar Spasic, who was the police chief in
12 Obilic and his area of responsibility, and he and his staff were
13 cooperative. The -- the mine police as well were cooperative, and I
14 mentioned that earlier. When we sought their information on what their
15 problems were and what their troubles were, they -- I'm not -- I'm not for
16 a minute saying that I was told the whole truth and nothing but the truth,
17 but they were cooperative and did reply to my queries, I thought,
18 relatively well.
19 MR. KAY:
20 Q. Thank you. Let's just look at the next page, then, in your weekly
21 summaries. You've given a lot of the general evidence that covers this
22 period now. The next one is the 7th of March, 1999, in which you describe
23 the area remaining generally calm, sniping Grabovac area, regular nightly
24 sniping at Glavotina, and you refer to the chicken farm and movement of
25 tanks and vehicles. You describe there the good contacts with the police
Page 32757
1 chiefs. "Humanitarian issues increased during the week with the
2 increasing incidents of attacks on the MUP and consequent retaliation
3 against KLA positions to our north. These resulted in the movement of an
4 estimated group of 100 plus IDPs" - internally displaced persons - "to our
5 northern area of responsibility from the north." And: One of our patrols
6 escorted 70 former villagers from Donji Grabovac from Pristina station.
7 We'll look at that issue separately, but what I've read out there
8 from the situation of the week ending the 7th of March is a summary of
9 that week. What did you mean by "humanitarian issues increased during the
10 week with the increasing attacks on the MUP?"
11 A. I -- my meaning in this report was that the -- the retaliation by
12 the MUP to the increasing incidents of sniping and other attacks resulted
13 in a -- the normal disruption of the movement of the -- the civil
14 population. As the tensions rose, the contact and the movement became
15 more difficult. And in visiting these series of villages, many of them of
16 which I've listed in this report, Mr. Kay, to the north, north of Obilic
17 but also north along the -- towards the Mitrovica highway, they were
18 individuals who required medical treatment or other treatment, and their
19 ability to attain foodstuffs and the normal paraphernalia of a civil
20 society was disrupted, hence they were in contact with them. During this
21 period, there were always concerns that somebody couldn't get there or
22 somebody couldn't be taken out to receive what they thought were necessary
23 treatments. And the NGOs, who they were reliant on for providing some
24 assistance, were -- were unable, with the growing instability, of
25 attending to these people. So they -- when we encountered them, they
Page 32758
1 always had concerns.
2 Q. You referred to the "consequent retaliation against KLA positions
3 to our north." If you are able then to describe what was going on between
4 the two parties here, being the MUP and the KLA, what was the pattern of
5 events?
6 A. I believe that the -- we've talked about several incidents, but to
7 the north there was -- as the month of March moved on, there were
8 increasing reports of -- of UCK attacks. Policemen were being abducted,
9 were being murdered. Other people were being abducted and murdered. And
10 the -- then out of Pristina and out of the various other military camps
11 the VJ moved to support the MUP in counter-terrorist operations. They
12 would move north, and this was further north than my area of
13 responsibility, I just saw the forces on the move and of course heard the
14 consequent radio reports of military and MUP activity.
15 These forces then moved in away from the major routes and the
16 highway in an attempt to cleanse the area and re-secure the area where the
17 UCK were conducting what I have referred to as a mid-level insurrection.
18 I -- I would -- I would describe the situation that I've tried to portray
19 here this morning as generally a low-level insurrection, but by the early
20 part of March, the middle of March, this had -- had grown to what I would
21 describe as a mid-level insurrection where there were -- major forces were
22 now attacking the authorities and the authorities were responding. The VJ
23 went into action in conjunction with the MUP in major military operations
24 up to the battle group level. By "battle group," I mean a force of six or
25 so hundred military personnel, including all arms, supported tanks,
Page 32759
1 mechanised infantry, the MUP in wheeled armoured vehicles, all of it
2 supported by artillery. And they were -- in my military assessment, they
3 were conducting counter-guerilla operations to secure their major routes
4 and their control of the area.
5 Q. This report for this week refers to Donji Grabovac. If you could
6 tell us briefly what your interest was in Donji Grabovac. What happened?
7 A. Well, Donji Grabovac, as I've -- as I wrote about after my
8 experience in -- in Yugoslavia and in Kosovo, had been a village that had
9 been evacuated in the summer of 1998 when the troubles of that time. And
10 again, as I've tried to stress in my testimony, the importance of this
11 particular site because of the mine and the operation of the mine
12 supporting the Obilic power plant, the villagers of Donji Grabovac,
13 predominantly Albanian, to my understanding had generally moved into
14 Pristina but they still retained a cohesiveness, and they were anxious to
15 return to their village and resume their normal life.
16 I had the opportunity to meet with them and their village leaders
17 on several occasions in Pristina, meetings that were arranged, and I told
18 them that I would try with the best of my ability to facilitate their
19 return to their village. These meetings had taken place over a number of
20 weeks commencing shortly after my arrival in Kosovo Polje up until, if I
21 recall correctly, a day or so before we were evacuated on the 20th of
22 March, 1999.
23 The cooperation with the authorities was good, in my estimation.
24 The police chiefs said they would -- they would help facilitate security.
25 They even offered to provide small arms to the villagers to enable them to
Page 32760
1 protect their homes if they were to re-inhabit them.
2 I helped facilitate a visit back to their homes by bus, or several
3 buses, of a number of them so they could see their homes and see what
4 damage or what existed of their homes, considering they had not been
5 occupied for some months. This visit was carried out. It generally went,
6 the visit itself, of the -- of a village delegation generally went well.
7 There were some -- there was some verbal harassment by the mine guards
8 allegedly of the personnel when they returned under escort from my
9 verifiers. They had the opportunity to spend some hours in the village,
10 and then, under escort of my verifiers, they returned to the -- the main
11 highway and returned back to Pristina.
12 The -- I was trying to facilitate this re-occupation of Donji
13 Grabovac, because I believed that if we could have achieved a small
14 accomplishment of restoring normality and putting people back in their
15 homes at such a -- in a critical area that had caused so much disruption
16 over the last number of months, we might have some hope of re-established
17 stability throughout the province of Kosovo. And of course the fact that
18 all my negotiations and whatever endeavours others made to help facilitate
19 this particular operation, it appeared to me after that that powers higher
20 than mine had no -- no real interest in rebuilding stability in Kosovo but
21 probably had other political agendas of which this would not play a role
22 whatsoever.
23 Q. And just -- did the resettlement of Donji Grabovac take place?
24 A. The resettlement did not take place. As I said, the meetings were
25 taking place, I believe, up 'til, I believe, the 18th of March. After
Page 32761
1 that, we had facilitated the return of the delegations to Donji Grabovac,
2 and of course with the -- the order to evacuate Kosovo in preparation for
3 the NATO war, there was -- that was the end of that particular programme.
4 Q. Evacuation of KVM 20th of March.
5 A. That is correct.
6 MR. KAY: If we take the morning --
7 JUDGE KWON: Mr. Kay, just before that. The villagers who wished
8 to return to Donji -- Kosovo Polje, were they of Serb ethnicity?
9 A. The majority of them were Albanian ethnics, to my understanding,
10 and I don't know if there were any Serbs amongst them or not.
11 JUDGE KWON: You said that they had been evacuated in the summer
12 of 1998.
13 THE WITNESS: Yes, that was my understanding.
14 JUDGE KWON: Do you know why?
15 THE WITNESS: Well, because of the fighting that was taking place
16 at that time, which was the -- the precursor to what I've tried to
17 describe today in that this was such a critical site because of the mine
18 operation and the very close presence of UCK in the -- to the -- a few
19 thousand metres to the west.
20 JUDGE KWON: Thank you.
21 MR. KAY: If we take the break now, Your Honour.
22 JUDGE ROBINSON: Time for the adjournment. Mr. Keith, we're going
23 to adjourn now for 20 minutes.
24 --- Recess taken at 10.34 a.m.
25 --- On resuming at 10.56 a.m.
Page 32762
1 JUDGE ROBINSON: Please continue, Mr. Kay.
2 MR. KAY: Thank you, Your Honour.
3 Q. I'm on the last session with you now, Mr. Keith. If we just turn
4 to the 14th of March, in your bundle of reports, weekly summary number 3.
5 And there again you cite what the activity was at that time; is that
6 right?
7 A. Which activity are you referring to, Mr. Kay?
8 Q. Just generally the situation report for the week.
9 A. Yes. That relates to the situation as I reported it at that time.
10 Q. You deal at the end of it with the -- with one of your verifiers
11 being sick on leave in Germany. So that we have an idea of your
12 resources, can you tell the Court how many people you had working under
13 you in your region of Kosovo Polje.
14 A. Yes, I can. My team consisted of myself and eight other
15 verifiers. These were from a variety of nations representing the OSCE. I
16 was the only Canadian in my team, and the rest of the team represented
17 verifiers from countries such as France, Norway, Germany, the United
18 States, and several others that don't pop into my mind momentarily.
19 We were supported by 13 interpreters. These interpreters were, to
20 my recollection were eight -- sorry, seven Albanian Yugoslavs. One
21 identified herself as a Turk, and four were Serbian. They provided the
22 translation and were always present when I or my patrols were attempting
23 to conduct our verification role.
24 And in addition to this, I -- the office and the location where I
25 resided in Kosovo Polje was the Herzegovina Motel. This was a building
Page 32763
1 that had been leased by the United States State Department to support the
2 United -- formerly support the United States diplomatic mission. They had
3 been evacuated from Kosovo early in February, during the Rambouillet
4 negotiations, and took up residence in Skopje in Macedonia, and hence the
5 building was available, and it was given to me to use as a site to reside
6 and to operate my responsibilities within the Kosovo Polje area of
7 responsibility.
8 Q. Thank you.
9 A. I should just add to that, Mr. Kay, that because of this I did not
10 have to hire security personnel. Most of the field stations hired local
11 personnel to provide 24-hour security to prevent theft or other
12 disruptions. The security personnel at the Herzegovina Motel were
13 employees of the United States State Department.
14 Q. Just moving on to the next page, 9th of March, which is an
15 incident report; is that right?
16 A. That is correct.
17 Q. There had been a murder during the night, and as a result of that
18 murder, an investigating judge appeared at the scene; is that right?
19 A. That is correct, Mr. Kay.
20 Q. If you could just briefly say what you found there, what the
21 situation was as you saw it.
22 A. This was one of a number of instances where fatalities occurred.
23 As I've said in my commentary, in articles, and in comments, in my
24 judgement many, if not the majority, of these murders were criminal in
25 nature and not necessarily political.
Page 32764
1 In this particular incident, as I've reported and have this one
2 document, in early hours of the morning a police commander - not the
3 police chief but one of their subordinate commanders - came to my office
4 in Kosovo Polje and stated, because I had asked them to keep me informed
5 of any -- any troubles or problems that would be of interest to the
6 Verification Mission and my field office, and said that there had been a
7 murder of a male and that the investigating judge would be there and if I
8 would like to go and have a look and observe the scene I would be welcome
9 to do so. I -- I did that.
10 I arrived at the scene about the same time as the investigating
11 judge. There were a number of MUP policemen who were in the area
12 conducting their police work, and I observed, as I have reported here, a
13 vehicle and who had been a male in the back seat who had been fatally
14 injured by a number of bullet wounds from automatic machine pistol, and
15 the casings of a number of rounds, allegedly 33 rounds from the machine
16 pistol were in the area. The individual had sustained gunshot wounds from
17 the groin to the head and was obviously very dead.
18 Q. And the -- from what you were able to see of the activities the
19 investigating judge?
20 ...