Judge Marinkovic Takes The Witness Stand

The Honorable Judge Danica Marenkovic took the stand, as a defense witness, at the trial of Slobodan Milosevic on Wednesday. Mrs. Marenkovic is an ethnic Macedonian, she was elected to her judgeship in 1984 by the Kosovo assembly. She worked at the district court in Pristina, and was the investigating judge who investigated the alleged massacre at Racak on January 15, 1999.

She began her testimony by answering questions about the status of Albanian and other non-Serbian judges in Kosovo. The indictment against Milosevic alleges that judges were dismissed because of their ethnicity.

Judge Marenkovic explained that the claims contained in the indictment were untrue. She said that no judges were dismissed, as that would have been illegal. The only way that a judge could lose their judgeship was to commit a crime, quit, or retire. She said that nobody in the judiciary was discriminated against because of his or her ethnicity. She pointed out that Albanian judges even sat on the Serbian Supreme Court and on the Constitutional Court, during the time covered by the indictment.

She testified that the KLA was legally classified as a terrorist organization, and that it was formed as early as 1992. She said that the Serbian authorities did not take any large-scale action against the KLA until March of 1998 when they killed Adem Jasari and his men. She said that Jasari had been accused of murder, and when the police tried to arrest him, he and his henchmen opened fire against the police. The police returned fire, killing Jasari and some of his men.

The witness described the KLA-s operations. She said that they carried out ambushes and hit-and-run attacks against police and civilians, as well as refugees from Bosnia and Croatia that were housed in Kosovo refugee camps.

On January 15, 1999 at about 9 AM, Judge Marenkovic received a report that the police had clashed with the KLA in Racak early that morning. She took a crime scene technician, Ismet Sufa (an ethnic Turk), to Racak with her in order to carry out an investigation.

Slobodan Milosevic played a video tape of the police operation in court today. On that tape one could see the police entering Racak on the morning of January 15th. The OSCE-s orange vans could clearly be seen on that tape as they watched the police operation from a hill overlooking the village. It was clear from the tape that the police were under fire. It would have been impossible for them to round up villagers and march them up to the ravine, let alone do it without the OSCE or the media seeing them.

Judge Marenkovic first arrived in Racak at approximately 2 PM on the 15th. She did not see evidence of shelling. None of the houses had damage that would indicate mortar fire. This is important because the indictment alleges that the Yugoslav army shelled Racak. She said that there was no evidence the army was anywhere near Racak.

When her team was about to go looking for people who might have been killed in the fighting they came under automatic weapons fire, and had to leave the village.

When her team attempted to return on the morning of the 16th of January, they were fired on again. She testified that her team was being fired on at the same time as William Walker was up at the ravine proclaiming that a massacre had happened.

Judge Marenkovic said that Walker-s conduct was improper. The KVM was supposed to be in Kosovo to monitor the work of the army and police, not to investigate crime scenes independently and draw conclusions.

She attempted to return to Racak together with her team again on the 17th of January. Again she was fired on. A video tape of the incident was played for the tribunal. The video depicted her and her colleagues hiding behind a car as automatic weapons fire was directed against them.

She testified that Gen. Drewienkiewicz, the British General in charge of planning for the OSCE-KVM in Kosovo, tried to obstruct her from carrying out an investigation in Racak.

On January 18th, Gen. DZ told her that she could not take members of her investigating team to Racak. He also said that she could not take the police, because the villagers (who he claimed were unarmed) would open fire against the investigators if the police were present. At one point Gen. DZ even threatened to report Judge Marenkovic to the Hague Tribunal if she attempted to carry out an investigation with her staff.

In spite of Gen. DZ-s belligerence, Judge Marenkovic went to Racak and was able to carry out an investigation on January 18th.

When she got to Racak she found trenches and bunkers that had been built by the KLA. These bunkers and trenches were video taped and the tape was played at the tribunal today. It was clear that the trenches had been used, they were littered with shell casings, and in one case a rifle tripod was left in a machine-gun nest that had been fortified with sandbags.

Her investigators also found weapons and KLA documents in the village itself. There were KLA uniforms, a large quantity of weapons, duty rosters, etc- and all of that was itemized and video taped. That videotape was also played at the tribunal today.

The topic of the bodies and the forensic investigation was broached at the end of the hearing today. The witness testified that 40 dead bodies, which had been placed in the mosque by the time she reached the village, were transported to the Institute of Forensics in Pristina.

She explained the composition of the forensic team that autopsied the bodies. The best experts from Serbia and Belarus were called in, and a team from Finland (led by Helena Ranta) joined the investigation later on.

She said that the forensic investigation revealed that the victims had been killed by gunfire that came from a long distance. That is where things ended on Wednesday. Judge Marinkovic will continue her testimony on Thursday.

Well, nothing like that ever happened in the 8+ years since IFOR/SFOR arrived.

Really? Well aint that something. Funny, I remember at Eagle Base, those photos were given over to the Russian liaisons, two full bird colonels who took it to Uglavich, beside the half finished electric generator complex with the small 30 man US post beside it, and then went to brief the quarreling Serbs. Within a week the Serb military put an end to the quarrel between Pavolich (?sp) and the other serbs and the serbs were quickly also asking us for train and assist.

For a fact, the Bosnian islamics had a Ukrainian freighter (except it was Egyptian with a Ukrainian flag) arrive in June 1997 with 11 T-55s that they were unloading for them, as Clinton was handing them M60A3s. Further, for your FACT, there were 4 armed stand-offs with the Bosnian muslims in 1997 alone and 2 in 1996 some of which include fire. In the British sector they busted a Muslim base doing dry fire exercises on SFOR aircraft flying overhead. They got busted and the British were ordered to confiscate their equipment. The II Corp's commander told his men you give it up over your dead bodies. Thus started the first stand off. We were ordered to go in on the SE side of Tuzla to hit a Muslim post there that had similar equipment.

Seems you know a lot without knowing a lot. The Muslims were pulling mines out of their internal minefields and claiming them as the "stored" stuff while moving the good ones out to the border for their offensive (that thankfully didn't happen). The mud was so fresh on them they were still moist.

In 1996, the Muslims moved troops "settlers" into a border village that was abandoned in Serbska Republic. To defend themselves, these "settlers" brought in RPGs, 50 cal machineguns and 82mm mortors, every day home defense. Anyways, eventually they got forced to retreat, so they gathered up a huge force of militants and civilians and headed back, while the serbs called out their militia. US/Russian forces got put in the valley in between to keep both sides apart, while the two sides exchanged fire over their heads (this happened a month before we deployed in). We used black hawks and rotor wash to eventually displace the Muslim crowd and militants.

Apparently a lot of things happened of which you don't know.

Mark,

In a thread with Paratrooper_501 statement l have pointed towards weak points and inconsistencies in the story showing that it is a well crafted FABRICATION:

I have asked Paratrooper to explain glaring inconsistencies but he fled and evaded to answer the questions.

The most obvious is his claim that he saw no armed KLA on site. Yet, I have posted a photo of KLA terrorist in Walker's entourage.

This detail alone discredits Paratrooper_501 as an eyewitness.

But this is not the only flaw in his story.

I have pointed to more interesting details in #332.

Here it is, to save you a mouseclick:

>>>>>>DTA, what the evidence is consistent on--whether it be from villagers or observers, and as corroborated by the forensic study when applicable--is that Serb forces arrived at the village that morning, killed some villagers there, rounded up male survivors & took them that afternoon up the ravine where they were murdered by the Serbs.>>>>>

No the evidence is not consistent. You forgot that we have the eyewitness testimony Paratrooper_501 submitted to ICTY. I take this to be accurate for the purpose of having one firm point in the liquid story. And You trust him.

Paratrooper_501 wrote:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPTION

. I spoke to NAME DELETED [the same one I had spoke to the night before] a UCK military policeman. (The UCK have military policemen who also fight but are utilized to enforce certain orders or laws of the UCK. They are used to guard premises occupied by the UCK high command and othe sentry duties. They wear armbands with the initials PU on them which is Albanian equivalent of MP. They also dress completely in black uniforms and wear black berets.) NAME DELETED told me that thee had been no civilians hurt in Petrova as he had rounded them up the day before and sent them to a safer place. He told me that he had heard through another source that the police had taken a group of people into the mountains near Racak and slit their throats. Apparently a boy had seen that and got away. I asked if he knew about a group of men being shot. He said he did not know that.

About 20 minutes later, Femi returned. At that point he did not know any more than the night before. A short time later, a UCK policeman came in with a list of manes of civilians who had been killed. At that time there was about 20 names. Another soldier came in and gave Femi another piece of paper with additional civilian casualties, about 15 names. Femi appeared distraught at the sight of the names he received.

I will pause here:

For numerically challenged this means that around 35 names (20 + 15) were provided by KLA MP (UCK PU) BEFORE information about people killed in a gully CAME IN. When 23 (number of dead in a gully) is added to known number of 35 we get 58 dead civilians according to KLA. This is around 13 more than official ICTY toll.

Paratrooper_501 continues:

"...Reports came in at that stage that there had been some sort of mass killing at Racak.Between 0800-0830 I told Femi that it was important that we go and check Racak to ascertain what happened."

To recapitulate:

KLA knew 'from other source' that group of people was killed with their throats slit because it was reported by an eyewitness. yet, they did not go to investigate.

KLA provided the names of 35 dead civilians BEFORE the infopmation of massacre came from Racak around 800. When the number of 23 people killed is added, it makes 58 people.

There was a false eye witness who witnessed people being killed and their throats slit. We know that this was not true. Something is not matching, and this is key detail. Source here are UCK Police and KDOM.

Vilagers were in a gully at 4AM, and were advised by 'someone' not to move corpses. Yet the corpses were moved.

Then, we have a two opposing accounts from the same eyewitness who escape the killing (Remi Shabani). In one account, Shabani claims that he had heard police walke-talkie conversation between police marching them to execution and police waiting to execute them. According to him, there were 29 people. Shabani run in hale of bullets, one bullet hitting his belt. In another account, by his mother, Shabani has SEEN the police and escaped before they started shooting. Shabani was 34. His father also escaped. We do not know what happened with 4 more people (29 minus Rami Shabani minus his father - 23 killed = 4)

These are not insignifficant details.

First of all, Serbs did not have a motive to kill civilians, KLA had. Serbs were watched 24/7 since October 1998 Activation order. CUI BONO seems to be forgotten in Racak case.

Yet, Serbs seemingly acted like madmen, KLA did not go to investigate slit throats killing, families did not go to investigate if there are survivors of 3PM shooting but chatted with OSCE observers instead, OSCE did not hear walkie talkie converstion of 29 people going to be killed and so on.

We also know that fierce battle between POlice and KLA erupted when police came to take the bodies from Racak for post mortem investigation. My memory is weak at this point, but if I remember correctly, 17 Serbian police were killed. it seems that KLA was very interested to PREVENT post mortem, as well as CSI RECONSTRUCTION a year later.

In other words, the conclusion is drawn from "Serb police was in the village, they did it."

We also know that OSCE wanted to sack Walker as nuisance in March becasuse of all these discrepancies. But the bombing started anyway and thousands were killed as a consequence.

When KLA officials were warned that NATO air strikes against Yugoslavia would trigger retaliatory violence by Serb forces in Kosovo, the Chicago Tribune reported one KLA leader as saying: "We don’t care. 400,000 Kosovars can be sacrificed for our independence."

Perhaps Serbian police killed the men in a gully. Perhaps. But guilt is not proven BEYOND REASONABLE DOUBT.

332 posted on 11/19/2004 4:21:01 PM EST by DTA (proud pajamista)

To: ehoxha; mking2; eniapmot; Gael; oilfieldtrash; Balto_Boy

RACAK story continues on FR

Racak reports written by the proponents of NATO aggression are even more important. The beauty is that those people can not be accused of being Serb apologists like decent people can -their track record of being rabidly anti-Serb is impeccable.

Here is for example what Alex J. Bellamy from School of Political Science and International Studies , The University of Queensland, Australia wrote in "The Kosovo Verification Mission". He used OSCE, HRW and other skunk sources to conclude:

"However, at 3 p.m. villagers heard shots coming from the direction where the bodies were later found. [i.e. gully - comment DTA]

The men shot in the gully were "taken away by blue-uniformed MUP officers."

At about 4 a.m. villagers discovered the bodies of 45 people scattered on a hillside, 25 together in a small gorge

The KVM's spokesman, Berend Borchardt was amongst this first inspection team [i.e. January 16 -DTA comment]

William Walker arrived at Racak at around midday

Compare this with an IWPR article published February 1, 1999 two weeks after alleged massacre .Gordana Igric claims that :

[E.B., a 40-year-old woman said that] Her 12-year-old son Halim was killed next to her, as they ran together through a courtyard towards a nearby forest

[Speaking of Serbian police, witness E.B. said] : “There were over 40 of them, in blue police uniforms” They fired as soon as we got out of the hideout into the courtyard.

Twenty-three bodies were found early the next morning on the slope of the hill Kodrie Bebushit , outside the village. They had bullet wounds shot through, and traces of torture.

"They [i.e. police- comment DTA] took all of us out into the courtyard and separated us children. They took long wooden planks prepared for making a fire and began to beat the men, who screamed. ”

"But the next morning , the bodies were found on the hill, the body of my father, and the bodies of Sadik, and Jashar and Raif, and Shukrija and Sali and Fatmir and Nexhat.”

During the night the locals who survived got out of hideouts that the police had not reached and began to search for the wounded and the dead with torch-lights. “It was four o’clock in the morning when we came across the body of Bajrushi, Nusret's son,” a visibly distressed 50-year-old S.A. recalls. “Then, one after another, there lay all my relatives. I wanted to cover the dead in accordance with our custom, but someone decided that we should not touch anything until the verifiers have arrived. So we did not touch. We only stood there next to them, waiting for the morning.”

Bloopers and bad directing shows throughout the modified script:

Villagers have heard shots in the gully at 3PM yet it took them 12 hours after police departure to find the bodies (at 4 AM)

The number of the corpses found in the gully is 23, 24 and 25. It seems that different copies of the script were in circullation.

Prior to execution alleged victims were beaten with a heavy object (blunt force injury) and tortured, yet post mortem did not find blunt force injuries. In another IWPR article, Igric quotes a witness who claim that victims were beaten over face and bled. Hovever, there is no traces of bleeding from beating on the garments of the dead found in the gully.

It gets even more interesting - there is allegedly an eyewitness account of execution in the gully

"For six hours, Rame Shabani lay motionless, his face pressed to the dirt, while Serb police and army units shot and mutilated 25 men on a hillside above the Albanian village of Racak. He escaped by throwing himself into a ravine when they opened fire.'...'I heard their screams as they were being massacred. They were begging for their lives,'' Shabani said, sitting cross-legged on the floor of a spartan room decorated only with a photograph of the victims' coffins blanketed with Albanian flags. When they were finished they sang a nationalist song: ``Who is saying, who is lying Serbia is small? Serbia is not small. Serbia is not small.''

Yet, Rame Shabani did not come to alert search party who were searching for the dead with torchlights.

311 posted on 11/18/2004 1:04:34 PM EST by DTA (proud pajamista)

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