Mladic's diaries and their impact

05/08/2010

Diaries attributed to Bosnian Serb warlord Ratko Mladic provide details about arms and fuel procurements and meetings with Serbian military officials. The documents, experts say, clearly demonstrate Serbia's involvement in the BiH conflict.

By Biljana Pekusic for Southeast European Times in Belgrade -- 05/08/10

Mladic's war diaries give unprecedented evidence to ICTY prosecutors. [Getty Images]

As prosecutors at The Hague war crimes tribunal pore over recently discovered diaries allegedly penned by top war crimes indictee Ratko Mladic, historians are debating the find's significance.

For many, it is compelling evidence of Serbia's deep involvement in the violence and atrocities that ripped apart Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH).

"It is clear from the diaries that the [Republika Srpska] Army was created on the basis of a plan designed in the cabinet of then Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic, and carried out by the Yugoslav People's Army, which had by then started to fall apart," said Dusan Janjic, the head of the Forum for Ethnic Relations.

The documents, if authentic, show how Serbia almost entirely funded the Bosnian Serb military forces. They record details concerning the procurement of arms and fuel, as well as salaries for officers and soldiers, he said.

Historian Mile Bjelajac, who has been examining war documents in Bosnia and Croatia for years and has examined earlier diaries written by Mladic, agrees that the new find is strongly incriminating. "The money, war booty from Bosnia, almost always leads to some big names in Serbia, from criminals to politicians," he said.

The diaries, dating from between June 1991 and November 1996, were uncovered during a search at the home of Mladic's wife. Police used a special camera that captures objects through walls, wood and ferroconcrete.

Behind a wall, the investigators found more than 3,500 pages, sound recordings and other evidence. They were handed over to the UN war crimes tribunal earlier this year, with excerpts released to the public last month.

Mladic meticulously wrote down the names of those he met with and described their discussions, experts say. Audio tapes record his phone conversations with Serbian military commanders and politicians. Mladic also detailed meetings with former Serbian security chief Jovica Stanisic, now on trial at The Hague, and other Serbian officers.

Among other things, the diaries reportedly provide evidence of a secret agreement between Serbs and Croats on how to divide BiH and expel Muslims from certain areas.

Conspicuously missing is any mention of the July 1995 genocide at Srebrenica, which took place under Mladic's command. Serbia was acquitted by the International Court of Justice in 2007 of charges that it organised the atrocity.

The evidence in the diaries, however, will still be used at the trial of Radovan Karadzic, the former RS president, who faces genocide charges at The Hague.

Historian Nikola Samardzic believes that while Mladic logs demonstrate the direct involvement of Serbia in the BiH war, their importance is more historical than legal.

"The diaries contain information that Mladic was in constant connection with then-Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic and the top Serbian military leadership. He is, as is well known, very arbitrary and certainly many decisions were made himself. But if from his diary, we can see that the overall strategy was planned by the Serbian military and state, then it is very strong evidence that Serbia waged war in Bosnia," Samardzic said.

"I think it still will not have major consequences for Serbia, because politically the emphasis is now on 'burying the war axe' and restoring calm," he added.

Deputy Prosecutor for War Crimes Bruno Vekaric told SETimes that the Mladic diaries certainly contain much operational information about the war in BiH. "However, personally I think there is nothing in these diaries that was not more or less already known," he added.

Asked if they provide new grounds for implicating Serbia, he said The Hague tribunal can only judge individuals, not an entire country.

"If the diaries have new evidence against some individuals, and if the court at The Hague follows up with that assessment, they could prosecuted for it. But that is up to the court at The Hague," he said.