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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2284777.stm BBC World | Europe Fiday, 27 September, 2002, 11:04 GMT 12:04 UK Milosevic says Srebrenica 'made-up' PHOTO: Milosevic has derided the court's authority Former Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic has said that the massacre of more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica in 1995 war was a plot hatched to make the world hate Serbs. Mr Milosevic accused French spies and the Bosnian Muslim government of the time of engineering the killings. "I want the truth to be revealed for this insane crime," he said, speaking as he finished a blistering three-hour opening statement in his own defence at his trial on war crimes charges at the Hague tribunal. Involvement at Srebrenica is one of a list of 61 charges the former Yugoslav president faces in the second stage of his war crimes trial which opened on Thursday, dealing with the 1991-1995 wars in Bosnia and Croatia. Bosnian Serb General Radislav Krstic was convicted of genocide by the tribunal last year for his role in the Srebrenica killings. Karadzic 'innocent' Mr Milosevic alleged that representatives of the Bosnian Muslim government and the French Secret Service conceived the plan surrounding Srebrenica in July 1995. Just days later the town, which had been a designated UN safe haven, was abandoned by Dutch troops and overrun by Bosnian Serb forces. Thousands of men and boys were executed in Europe's worst atrocity in its post-World War II history. Mr Milosevic said the French and Muslims decided "genocide committed by the Serbs will be made up... as a pretext for military intervention" in Bosnia. He said the killings had been carried out by a mercenary unit, rather than regular Bosnian Serb soldiers. He denied the involvement of Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic and his general, Ratko Mladic, both of whom are indicted alongside Mr Milosevic over Srebrenica. "President Karadzic swore to me he didn't know a thing about this," he said. "I am convinced the military honour of Mladic and Krstic would not allow them to execute civilians," he said. Star witnesses On Friday, the tribunal began hearing testimony from the prosecution's first witness in the case against Mr Milosevic, who is giving testimony anonymously and in closed session. Next week, the court is due to hear from the current Croatian President, Stjepan Mesic, whom Mr Milosevic has accused of responsibility for fuelling Croatian nationalism and causing the break-up of the Yugoslav federation. "The truth is quite opposite to what you are claiming," the former Yugoslav president told prosecutors on Friday. "It was the Serbs who were persecuted, in danger, under threat and killed," he said. The prosecution is also set to call US negotiator Richard Holbrooke, architect of the Bosnian peace accords, as one of its witnesses. Lawyer Geoffrey Nice opened the case for the prosecution on Thursday. He argued that Mr Milosevic had been involved in a plan to carve out an ethnically pure Serb state on the territory of the former Yugoslavia. Genocide, the most serious war crime, tops the 61 counts that Mr Milosevic faces for ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and Croatia. Other charges include the murder, torture and deportation of non-Serbs. The BBC's Tim Franks in The Hague says that the charge of genocide - an attempt to exterminate an entire people - will be the hardest to prove. In the Kosovo phase of the trial, which closed on 11 September, the prosecution failed to produce any one single devastating witness close to Mr Milosevic, and the defendant showed himself to be a pugnacious cross-examiner. --------------------------- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: [email protected] EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.bacIlu Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
