Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.csce.gov

MASS GRAVES AND OTHER

ATROCITIES IN BOSNIA

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND

COOPERATION IN EUROPE

ONE HUNDRED FOURTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

Printed for the use of the

Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe

DECEMBER 6, 1995

[CSCE 104-1-]

 
MASS GRAVES AND OTHER ATROCITIES IN

BOSNIA

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1995

COMMISSION ON SECURITY AND COOPERATION IN EUROPE,

WASHINGTON, DC

 The Commission met at 2:06 p.m., in room 628 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, Honorable Christopher H. Smith, chairman of the

Commission, presiding.

 Commission members present: Hon. Christopher H. Smith, Chairman; Hon. Steny. D. Hoyer; and Hon. John Edward Porter.

 House members present: Hon. Bill Zeliff; Hon. Benjamin Gilman;

and Hon. James Moran.

 Witnesses present: Ivan Lupis, David Rohde, and Barbara Wolf.

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN CHRSTOPHER H. SMITH

 Chairman SMITH. The Commission will come to order. The conflict

in the former Yugoslavia, and in Bosnia in particular, has been a constant issue of the U.S. foreign policy agenda during the past 4 years. In

these past few weeks, the working-out of a peace agreement with its

accompanying commitment for NATO forces has been the leading issue

on that agenda.

 Today's hearing on Bosnia, however, is about a gruesome and solemn subject matter: namely, the atrocities against children, against

women, and against men. These indescribable atrocities are the realities which warranted giving Bosnia such a place of prominence in our

foreign policy.

 While the international community deals with the formalities of exchanging territories among the warring parties and populations, the

reality of Bosnia has been a land in which people-innocent civilianshave been raped, tortured, expelled from their homes, and executed by

thugs. Documenting the war crimes, bringing the evidence before the

War Crimes Tribunal, and pursuing justice through the tribunal are

the foundation stones for reconciliation and a genuine peace.

 The Helsinki Commission has an obligation, among other things, to

document the violation of human rights. The role is vital, in and of

itself. We owe it to the victims, and it is our hope that the attention

given to the violations in Bosnia may deter future violations. Making

the details a part of the official record of the Commission also helps

those of us who must consider diplomatic and military responses to

stay grounded in the reality of the situation that we are facing.

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 We have today three expert witnesses who have spent time in Bosnia

and who have met the real victims of this war or their surviving family

members and documented their almost incomprehensible ordeals. We

will first hear from Ivan Lupis, a researcher from Human Rights Watch/

Helsinki, who will describe how and why the U.N.-declared safe haven

of Srebrenica failed to deter militants and generally what happened

thereafter.

 We will then hear from David Rohde of the Christian Science Monitor, who was able to visit the sites of the alleged mass graves in eastern

Bosnia and confirm their existence. He also had the unfortunate experience of being caught by the Serb militants and held by them for about

10 days. Mr. Rohde, therefore, has not only firsthand experience with

the victims, but also with the perpetrators of crimes against humanity.

 Finally, we will have testimony presented by Barbara Wolf, a forensic pathologist from Albany, New York, who has visited many mass

grave sites in Bosnia and neighboring Croatia under the auspices of

AmeriCares in order to help identify the remains. Press reports about

this effort indicate the importance of this work for those families who

may suspect, but do not know, the actual fate of their loved ones, not to

mention for the possible prosecution, at the International Tribunal in

the Hague, of those who created and filled these graves with victims.

 I want to welcome our panelists to the Commission and thank them

for the great work that they have done in documenting these heinous

acts which have been perpetrated against civilians. I would also, at this

point, like to yield to my very good friend, the ranking member of the

Commission, Mr. Hoyer.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. STENY H. HOYER

 Mr. HOYER. Thank you very much, Chairman Smith. I want to

thank you for having these hearings. They are very important and they

are very timely. It is a sad task before us today, but one that must be

undertaken: the examination of testimony about genocide, mass graves,

rape, executions- unspeakable and unacceptable atrocities.

 The past 4 years in Bosnia have seen the recurrence of a European

nightmare that we all thought had ended 50 years ago. We have before

us a distinguished panel of witnesses, all who have seen firsthand the

results of unbridled ethnic hatred. Mr. Rohde himself was captured by

the Bosnian Serb militants for daring to bare to the world the gruesome

killing fields of Srebrenica, where as many as possibly 8,000 Muslim

men were summarily executed following the overrunning of that safe

haven.

 Those killing fields were not limited, of course, to Srebrenica and

Zepa, but are found throughout Croatian and Bosnian territory overrun

by the militants. On October 16, 1995, a USA Today article detailed the

exhumation of a mass grave in the recently liberated Krajina region of

Croatia-a site of much of Dr. Wolf's work, as we will hear shortly from

her testimony.

 According to that article, dozens of family members gathered in the

morgue of Split Clinical Hospital to try to identify remains of loved

ones, including watches, crucifixes, and pieces of clothing found with

the bodies. The article reveals, and I quote, "A BMW car key found on

Body Number 28 was given to a woman who claims her husband, hotel
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manager Mate Steko, age 33, had a similar car. The woman, who was

Bozana Steko, 32 years of age, races home to see if the car starts. It

does."

 Mr. Chairman, this tragic story and hundreds like it will be retold

in the weeks, months, and perhaps years ahead. We must listen to the

painful testimony. We must record with the utmost care and attention.

We must continue to investigate, and we must bring to justice those

responsible for these crimes.

 Fifty years after the cry, "Never again," rang out from the death

camps of Europe, we are again exhuming bodies from mass graves in

Europe and recording atrocities committed against innocent people simply

because of their ethnic or national background.

 Mr. Chairman, we as members of the international community, not

just as Americans, not just as members of Congress who are this Commission, but as members of the international community, must recommit ourselves to that haunting phrase. We must redouble our efforts to

ensure that the goal of justice before vengeance enshrined in Nuremberg

is, in fact, achieved.

 Justice before vengeance. Now, many of us traveled throughout Europe and heard about things that needed to be redressed that occurred

50 years ago, 100 years ago, and 200, 300, 400 years and centuries ago.

But those who feel aggrieved saw their grievances never redressed.

Therefore, the cycle of vengeance and terror and atrocities and killings

go on.

 We have witnessed the conclusion of the long-awaited and strenuously-achieved peace agreement among the parties to the conflict in the

former Yugoslavia. Plans to implement that agreement are underway.

However, Mr. Chairman, I'm convinced that a lasting resolution of this

conflict requires breaking the cycle of violence and vengeance that has

racked this region, not just in this century, but as I said, in centuries

past.

 This goal can only be achieved through the administration of justice

by an impartial International Tribunal, which is already moving forward with its work. The United States, Mr. Chairman- and I hope our

Commission is in the forefront of urging it to do so- must continue to

take the lead in strongly supporting the efforts of the War Crimes Tribunal. We must undertake this effort because where there is not justice, vengeance will most certainly reside and flourish and continue.

 The people of the former Yugoslavia must have both the satisfaction

and the deterring example of justice now. If not, we can be virtually

assured that there will be more violence, more killings, and more atrocities. Mr. Chairman, we cannot allow this to happen.

 This hearing, I think, is an important element in continuing to educate us as members of Congress, the American public, and the international community on what, in fact, has happened. I want to congratulate all three witnesses for the work that they have undertaken; in

some cases, the risks that they have taken as well, for a better understanding of what's going on, and as to what has happened in the region,

and hopefully a heightening of the consciousness of the world that we

will never again stand idly by while hundreds of thousands of people are

killed and millions of people are displaced from their homes.

 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Hoyer. Mr. Lupis, would you

proceed?
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STATEMENT OF IVAN LUPIS, RESEARCHER, HUMAN RIGHTS

WATCH/HELSINKI

 Mr. LUPIS. Sure. Thank you for holding this hearing and inviting

me to testify. My name is Ivan Lupis. I am a researcher at the Helsinki

Division of Human Rights Watch, formerly known as Helsinki Watch.

The following testimony is based on an investigation carried out by

myself and a consultant from July 31 to August 23, 1995.

 It describes the events leading up to, during, and immediately after

the fall of the U.N.-designated safe area of Srebrenica, including gross

violations of humanitarian law, as has been typical of Serbian military

conduct to date. The fall of the town of Srebrenica and its environs to

Serb forces in early July 1995 made a mockery of the international

community's professed commitment to safeguard regions it declared to

be safe areas.

 U.N. peacekeeping officials were unwilling to heed requests for support from their own forces stationed within the enclave, thus allowing

Serb forces easily to overrun it and, without interference from U.N.

soldiers, to carry out systematic mass executions of hundreds, possibly

thousands, of civilian men and boys, and to terrorize, rape, beat, execute, rob, and otherwise abuse civilians being deported from the area.

 The recent Dayton peace plan and the guarded optimism that has

accompanied this apparent progress should not obscure the fact that no

peace agreement will be stable without justice for human rights abuses.

The atrocities described in this testimony, like the many others that

have preceded them in the former Yugoslavia, require of the international community, and specifically the United States, a commitment to

repatriation for victims and accountability for the perpetrators.

 Before the war, approximately 37,000 people, 72 percent Muslim and

25 percent Serbs, lived in the Srebrenica municipality. When Bosnian

Serb forces began their brutal campaign of ethnic cleansing with the

help of the Yugoslav People's Army in eastern Bosnia in 1992, most

areas quickly fell under Serb control. Most of the non-Serb men either

fled, were put into detention centers, or were indiscriminately killed.

 Thousands of mostly Muslim refugees from other areas of eastern

Bosnia flocked to places like Zepa, Gorazde, and Srebrenica, where territorial defense units succeeded in fending off Serb attacks. As a result

of this sudden demographic shift, Srebrenica's population swelled to an

estimated 55,000 to 60,000 people and remained under siege for more

than 3 years.

 On April 16, 1993, the U.N. Security Council adopted Resolution

819, declaring Srebrenica a safe area; and a cease-fire was signed on

April 17. But in July 1995, there were numerous indications that Bosnian

Serb forces were planning a summer offensive against Srebrenica. Access to U.N. convoys was increasingly restricted by Bosnian Serb forces,

so that by late February and early March 1995, only one convoy per

month was being allowed into the area to feed the approximately 39,000

people left in the enclave.

 A U.N. official in Tuzla told us that this was a deliberate tactic used

by the Serbs to weaken the population of the enclave in order to prepare

the area for a final offensive. The incremental denial of food, water,

electricity, and proper medical supplies by the Serbs over a long period

of time should actually have been viewed as the true preparatory stages
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of the July assault on the enclave and should have served as a warning

signal to the international community that the so-called U.N. safe area

of Srebrenica was in danger.

 Prior to the offensive, Bosnian Serb forces also hampered peacekeeping effectiveness as well as troop rotations into the enclave. Two rotations of Dutch troops stationed in the enclave had been allowed to leave,

but the Bosnian Serbs refused their replacements' entry. Thus, the entire pocket, civilians and UNPROFOR troops alike, were psychologically and physically exhausted weeks prior to the offensive.

 Just 2 days before the attack, Bosnian Serb forces allowed 1 convoy

carrying 100,000 liters of diesel fuel, an unprecedented amount, into

the pocket. This fuel was then recaptured when the safe area fell. Given

the embargo of the Bosnian Serbs, as well as their refusal to allow fuel

into the enclave on previous occasions, this sudden influx of fuel should

have been suspicious to the Dutch U.N. soldiers. Without the fuel,

Bosnian Serb forces would not have been able later to bus tens of thousands of Muslims to Bosnian Government-controlled territory.

 By July 5, approximately 5,000 Serb troops had surrounded the enclave with 50 artillery pieces and 15 to 20 battle vehicles and launched

a full-scale offensive on Srebrenica at 3:15 a.m. on July 6. The shelling

was too heavy to count the number of detonations, but U.N. estimates

were in the thousands. Serb troops began taking control of U.N. observation posts one by one, and by the time the offensive was over, 55 U.N.

troops had been taken hostage.

 Dutch soldiers within the enclave requested close air support from

the U.N. commanders, but the date of the request remains disputed.

U.N. officials interviewed by us deny that Dutch troops in the safe area

requested close air support before July 10. Other evidence, however,

suggests that Dutch troops in the enclave acted sooner and believe that

close air support might have dissuaded Serb forces from pressing their

offensive.

 According to the Dutch, close air support was requested on July 6.

That request and subsequent ones were repeatedly turned down by the

commander of U.N. peace forces in former Yugoslavia, Bernard Janvier.

On July 10, according to UNHCR estimates, approximately 30,000 people

began to evacuate Srebrenica and move back to the northern part of the

enclave toward the U.N. base in Potocari, a village located halfway

between Srebrenica and Bratunac.

 Finally, on July 11, 2 days after Serbian forces had driven through

Srebrenica, four fighter planes took part in an attack which resulted in

the destruction of one Serb tank. Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladic

threatened to fire on the Dutch compound and the civilian population of

Srebrenica and to execute Dutch peacekeeping hostages if more air

strikes were carried out.

 The air strikes were not repeated and the U.N. effort to save the

U.N. safe area of Srebrenica shifted to damage control. Now, due to my

limited amount of time, I have to skip over what happened with the

women, children, and elderly people in Potocari and move on to the

massacres because this is the focus of this testimony. If there are any

questions about what the Serbs had done in the Potocari compound,

questions could be raised after.

 As Srebrenica was falling, the overwhelming majority of militaryaged men and boys and a smattering of women and children gathered

in separate locations in order to make the journey through Bosnian
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Serb-held areas to reach Bosnian Government-controlled territory. The

majority of the persons in this group of 12,000 to 15,000 trekkers were

civilians. Men and boys interviewed by us stated that only between

3,000 to 4,000 of them were armed. After the U.N. failed to defend the

safe area of Srebrenica, the enclave's military-aged men no longer trusted

the UNPROFOR troops, nor did they believe their safety would be guaranteed by them. They formed a column which stretched for approximately ten kilometers and walked in a vulnerable formation because

they had been warned of a mined terrain.

 During the trek, the column was exposed to numerous attacks and

ambushes by Serbian forces, during which violations of humanitarian

law were committed. A displaced person I interviewed vividly described

the horrific ordeal which the men and boys experienced. He mentioned:

 "After about three kilometers, we encountered our first ambush at a

stream. The center of our column was hit by anti-aircraft machine guns

and mortars. Around 200 people died just from that. The Cetniks"-which

is a term used by many to describe nationalist Serbs-"then came down

from the hills, and about 2,000 men from the middle of the column got

caught in the line of fire. The people at the front and back of the column

scattered everywhere. I was in the middle and saw how the Serbs were

shooting everyone and slaughtering us with bayonets.

 "Furthermore, during the nighttime and during the ambushes, Serb

soldiers in civilian clothing managed to infiltrate the column, spreading disinformation and confusion, giving wrong directions, injecting men

with what was believed to have been hallucinatory drugs, drawing groups

and individuals away from the column, and opening fire on and executing people from within the column."

 As the ambushes and infiltrating Serbs continued to pick away at

the column, men and boys tried desperately to regroup after the ambush. The column eventually became smaller and smaller in number,

and smaller groups were left behind and separated from the rest. Many

men and boys surrendered, and several witnesses told us that they saw

unarmed men shot in the process of surrendering.

 We conducted interviews with a witness to a massacre in the Nova

Kasaba/Konjevic Polje area and with four other persons who were sent

to mass executions at two sites in the Karakaj area, a town north of

Zvornik on the Bosnian- Serbian border. Mass summary executions

were also carried out at at least two locations in the Bratunac area, and

evidence points to the existence of two sites in the Kravice area as well.

 The systematic nature of the operation, already described in the offensive, and the attack designed to break up the escaping column of

men can be further adumbrated during the round-up phase of the dispersed trekkers. Serb forces strategically positioned themselves along

major roads and rivers over which the men would have to cross in order

to reach Bosnian Government territory. Serb forces apparently tried to

capture as many men as possible before they could cross so that they

could be detained at sites around Nova Kasaba and Konjevic Polje.

 As described in our reports, Serb forces communicated orders and

instructions to the men by megaphones on how and where to surrender

before they could reach the two roads. According to a displaced person,

large massacres were carried out in this area. He recounted:
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 "The place was full of Cetniks so we hid in some high grass and

waited. Muslims were coming down on the main road from everywhere

giving themselves up. The Cetniks picked out Muslims who they either

knew about or knew, interrogated them, and then made them dig pits

which would be used as mass graves.

 "During our first day there, the Cetniks killed approximately 500

people. They would just line them up and shoot them into the pits. The

approximately 100 men whom they interrogated and who had dug the

mass graves then had to fill them in. At the end of the day, they were

ordered to dig a pit for themselves and line up in front of it. Then with

M53 machine guns, they were shot into the mass graves.

 "At dawn, it was still the same. A bulldozer arrived and dug up a pit

which seemed to be about 30 meters long and about 15 meters wide, and

they buried about 400 men alive. The men were encircled by Cetniks.

Whoever tried to escape was shot. After that, they packed down the

earth so it almost looked as good as new."

 In this area, many men and boys described the appearance of Bosnian

Serb General Ratko Mladic, who oversaw parts of the operation being

carried out. Moreover, they reported seeing Serb soldiers dressed in U.N.

garb driving around in white U.N. armored personnel carriers.

 The fact that four of the survivors were detained in and transited

through the Nova Kasaba/Konjevic Polje area and were then bused to

Karakaj via Bratunac further suggests that the campaign carried out

by the Serb forces was systematic in nature.

 A number of citizens of Bratunac and its surrounding villages told

about the violent deaths of a large number of men from Srebrenica. The

villagers' accounts were consistent in many details, including the place

and the method of execution. One woman, a resident of Serbia proper,

reportedly said that she had just been to visit her brother-in-law, who

was a Bosnian Serb soldier.

 "He and his friends are quite open about what is going on," the woman

exclaimed. "They are killing Muslim soldiers. They said they killed 1,600

yesterday alone and estimated in all they had killed about 4,000. They

said they were in a big hurry so they were shooting most of them."

 In the Karakaj area, men were ordered to get out of the trucks in

groups of five or ten and line up in front of the Serb soldiers who fired on

them. Four survivors disclosed details which indicate that the mass

executions were well-planned and systematically carried out. For example, all noted that for extended periods of time, trucks pulled up to

the sites and dropped off loads of prisoners. Firing squads would execute

several groups and were then ordered to walk among the corpses to

make sure everyone was dead. The presence of bulldozers, which pushed

the dead bodies onto tractor-trailers, indicated that the Serb authorities

had prepared for a large number of persons to be executed at the sites.

 One of two survivors of a mass execution carried out on a meadow

recounted:

 "There were 12 of us in a small truck. We were driven for about 2 to

3 minutes, and when the truck stopped, we were ordered to get out. I

saw grass underneath my blindfold. My cousin, Haris, took my hand.

He said, 'They're going to execute us.' As soon as he said that, I heard

gunfire from the right side. Haris was hit and fell toward me, and I fell

with him.
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 "Someone was ordering them to finish us off individually. This process continued all day. During the day, I also heard trucks continuously driving up to another area about 100 meters away and gunshots

which would follow shortly thereafter. There must have been two execution sites right next to each other. I also heard a bulldozer working

in the background and became horrified. My worst nightmare was that

I would be buried alive.

 "I kept hearing people gasping and asking for water so they wouldn't

die thirsty. Others kept on repeating, 'Kill me. Just finish me off.' Later

I woke up. I wasn't sure whether I blacked out or fell asleep, and it was

drizzling. It was nighttime, and I saw light beams from a bulldozer's

headlights. I still heard the same noises as before-trucks driving up,

people getting out, and gunshots. I also remember distinctly an older

voice calling, 'Don't kill us. We didn't do anything to you,' followed by

gunfire.

 "I waited for about 4 or 5 minutes after all the Serbs had left to make

sure that it wasn't some kind of trick. When I finally decided to get up,

I couldn't. My whole body was numb. It took me a few minutes to get

adjusted, but when I got up, I saw corpses littering a meadow about 150

meters by 100 meters. Suddenly I heard someone ask, 'Are you wounded?'

I answered that I wasn't. It was a 60-year- old man.

 "I tried to make my way over to him without stepping on the dead. It

was impossible, so I tried at least not to step on the chest and torsos,

but onto the arms and hands instead. We saw two other wounded men

both in their thirties. They were both shot in the legs and one was shot

in the hip. We checked to see if they could move, and they realized there

was no way we could help them. They realized this, too, and told us to

run away as quickly as possible.

 "Before we left, the man who was wounded in the legs told me he was

cold, and asked me to take a shirt or something off one of the dead

bodies so that he could cover himself. The last thing I heard them say

was, 'Run, brothers, save yourselves.' "

 The July 1995 attack on the U.N.-declared safe area of Srebrenica by

Serb forces was planned well in advance, and abuses perpetrated after

the fall of the enclave were systematic and well-organized. According to

the UNHCR, up to 8,000 men, including boys as young as 12 years old,

remain missing; and many are believed to have been killed or executed.

 Although the U.N. member states and U.N. officials have been ready

to condemn war crimes and crimes against humanity in the former

Yugoslavia, little has been done to prevent or stop such abuses from

taking place. Between August and October 1995, while the United States

carried out active negotiations with Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic,

systematic ethnic cleansing continued to be carried out against tens of

thousands of non-Serbs in northwestern Bosnia.

 Two thousand men, civilians who had never engaged in armed resistance, disappeared as their families were expelled into Bosnian Government-controlled territory. Numerous witnesses reported seeing Serbianbased special forces of Arkan operating in the area. Arkan is the nom-deguerre of Zeljko Raznatovic, a suspected war criminal from Serbia.

 Moreover, we also obtained several testimonies and photographic

evidence pointing to a mass execution of approximately 150 civilians,

which took place in the end of September 1995.
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 Human Rights Watch/Helsinki would like to use this opportunity to

call on the international community, and especially the U.S. Government, to insist on immediate international access to all detainees from

the Srebrenica safe area and demand that their safety and well-being

are ensured, and insist that the Bosnian Serb authorities provide immediate access to the sites of reported massacres during the Srebrenica

offensive. The fate of the missing and disappeared must be disclosed.

 Furthermore, if relevant, the United States and the international

community must disclose all available information, including the intelligence, that implicates Serbia in supplying, assisting, or directing

Bosnian Serb troops, and also strengthen the mechanisms for monitoring external support to Bosnian Serb forces.

 Finally, the international community and the United States must

ensure that the Dayton peace agreement guarantees the right to repatriation of survivors of ethnic cleansing and that the full protection of

all returnees and minority groups is actively carried out. Ladies and

gentlemen, thank you for listening.

 Chairman SMITH. Mr. Lupis, thank you for that very moving testimony and your call, which I do believe will go heeded. Access is extremely important. That it be immediate is crucial to the kind of documentation that will be needed to get convictions in the War Crimes

Tribunal. So I want to thank you for your good work and your fine

testimony this afternoon.

Mr. LUPIS. Thank you.

Chairman SMITH. I'd like to ask Mr. Rohde if you would present

your comments at this point.

STATEMENT OF DAVID ROHDE,

CORRESPONDENT, CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR

 Mr. ROHDE. Thank you for inviting me here. I want to say at the

start that I am just here to present the evidence I found at the sites; as

far as policy matters go, I will not be discussing them. I'm just here

basically to present evidence. I'm here as a journalist to present what's

public information, and that's all.

 I would just like to make a short statement, and then I'll step over to

the side to use the different visuals. Basically, over the course of a 3-

month investigation, the Christian Science Monitor was able to visit

four of six possible mass graves identified by U.S. intelligence around

Srebrenica; was able to find nine credible survivors of mass executions;

and found the combined evidence, those eyewitness accounts, and also

the evidence that was found on the ground at these sites that indicates

that at least 2,000 to 3,000 civilians were summarily executed by the

Bosnian Serbs in around a week after the July 11 fall of Srebrenica.

 The evidence also indicates that Ratko Mladic was present at least at

four of the execution sites hours before the shooting began, and there's

also evidence that forces from Serbia-whether they were regular military or irregulars is unclear-were involved in the attack. According to

experts I've spoken to in the region, President Slobodan Milosevic of

Serbia, due to the size of this attack and even the size of the operation

involved in the executions, probably knew that these executions were

going on, but apparently did nothing to stop them. I just want to step

over to the side now.

 Chairman SMITH. While you're walking over, Mr. Hoyer and I are

very pleased that you were released.
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 Mr. ROHDE. So am I.

 Chairman SMITH. As you know, this Commission is probably one of

the most bipartisan groups in the House and acted in that way, as we

always do, asking for your release. I'm just very happy that you're out

unscathed.

 Mr. ROHDE. I am, too, and I'd like to thank the U.S. Government

for the efforts they made to get me out. I appreciate it. Hopefully, the

evidence I found will lead to justice being done in this whole issue.

 I'll just start chronologically and try to keep this short. If you want

to interrupt me for questions, that's fine. The first thing I did was in

August. It was August 16. It was about 10 days after these two satellite

photos were released by the U.S. Government. [See Exhibits 1 and 2.] I

was allowed into Bosnian Serb territory to do regular reporting and

luckily was not, as is usually the case, given an escort. You have to

have a Bosnian Serb guide travel with you and control where you go. I

didn't have that, and I was able to go to these sites.

 I first went to the lower photograph, and I was able to find these two

documents here on the bottom right. [See Exhibit 3]. One of them is an

elementary school diploma that belongs to a young man named Smajic

Murat. It's an old diploma. The first place I went was this grave, this

area right here. I found these two documents here on my right. The

first document I found was this piece of paper here, notes from a town

meeting that was held inside the Srebrenica enclave. It's dated hereyou can make out the numbers-14.03.1995, which would be March 14,

1995. The meeting took place in Potocari, a village inside Srebrenica

where the U.N. base was.

 I later found people who thought they had attended this meeting.

The town meeting was about how to get some retarded children some

help from international aid agencies and about civil defense. I found the

notes right here. This was a pit that had been dug but not filled in. The

paper was sitting right on the edge. I don't know if possibly one of the

victims maybe threw it out of his pocket. It's not clear to me.

 Farther down here closer to the large area of fresh digging, I found

the diploma, again, that belonged to Murat Smajic. I was able then to

go to refugee camps and find, unfortunately, Smajic Murat's brother.

It's actually Murat Smajic. The names are reversed there. His brother

told me that he, Murat Smajic, his brother, and father had all been

walking together among this group of 10,000 military-aged men that

Mr. Lupis talked about.

 There was an ambush, and they were separated. At this point, Murat

Smajic is still missing. The reaction of his family members was that

they assumed he was dead. Again, the importance of the evidence is

that it linked Muslims from Srebrenica to these sites.

 There was one other thing I found here. These bottom graves are

about 100 to 200 yards from this area, and walking in this area, I found

here, sticking out of this area, was a decomposed human leg. I found

that.

 The key thing about this site is the size of these graves. The descriptions given by the survivors, especially the man that Human Rights

Watch spoke to, all fit the size of these pits. This was along this paved

road right here.
11

 The road was crucial for Muslims to cross if they wanted to make it

to Muslim-held central Bosnia, and it seems it was here that the Bosnian

Serb forces set up. They had APCs patrolling this road and another

road in the area, and they set up basically a killing ground where any

Muslims trying to cross this area would be caught and rounded up.

 And one last crucial bit of evidence: there was another photograph

that the United States did not release publicly of a soccer field that was

about a half-mile away. I went to that soccer field. There are two men

who were survivors of other executions that were taken to the soccer

field. They, without my telling them, accurately described every detail

of this field. There's no doubt in my mind they were there. Everything

from the size of the field, the buildings around it, to the kind of trees

that surround it- there's no question in my mind that they're telling

the truth.

 What they told me was that Ratko Mladic addressed as many as

1,000 to 2,000 prisoners at that field and told them that they would not

be harmed, that they were going to be exchanged for prisoners, and

they'd be returned to their families. Those men were then taken awayhere's Srebrenica.

 This is the area I was talking about, what you could call the killing

ground. It was just crucial that anyone who wanted to make it into

government territory had to cross through this area, and the main column of men moved up through here. There are other survivors I spoke

to who talked of massacres in this area. In this area, there are other

graves. There's a grave here and another grave here that have been

identified by U.S. intelligence, and again, these are the two that I visited in August.

 The men that were gathered at this soccer field were then taken-and

Mr. Lupis referred to this-to Bratunac by bus and held there overnight.

This is important because it indicates premeditation. They were then

held there overnight and then taken farther north, if you can see the

smaller map, up to the Karakaj area.

 Once they arrived in Karakaj, they said they were held in a school in

the Karakaj area. I visited the Nova Kasaba site in August. I was able

to find nine survivors in September, and then on October 29 went back

and was able to get to the Karakaj area, which appears to be one of the

larger sites. This is where the men were taken. It was the evening of

Friday, July 14, according to the survivors, when the executions were

carried out at two sites there.

 I was able to visit both sites around Karakaj and found evidence of

executions at both places. The most damning evidence was near a village called Sahanici. Everything about this site fits the description that

survivors gave. The account that Mr. Lupis read-the young man who

talked about two execution sites, firing going on about 100 yards away,

and digging going on at both sites- well, I found two areas here and here

of fresh digging. This is just a graphic that the Monitor put together.

 The survivors all described driving 2 or 3 minutes. Two or 3 minutes

away, I found a school that exactly fit the descriptions of the survivors.

I actually have a sketch that one of them drew for me of the layout of

the school. This is a notebook I used at the time. I found this school. It's

a distinctive school in that it has a room added to the side and a concrete playground just outside of it.
12

 The prisoners were taken to that room and blindfolded there and

then loaded onto trucks in the parking lot. There's a house next to it

where they described a woman watching them. This is also the school

where Ratko Mladic was seen addressing the troops. A young boy actually watched me take pictures of this school, the same house, and later

on, when my film was developed by the Bosnian Serb police, they told

me that this school was a military installation and that I should not

have been taking pictures of it. It appeared to be beat up and not being

used. Again, the fact they say themselves it's a military installation

adds credibility to the survivors' accounts.

 One of the survivors from there also told me that the men who were

taken here were the elderly men who went to the U.N. in Srebrenica

and asked for help, but were instead marched away by the Bosnian

Serb soldiers. The U.N.-the peacekeepers-did nothing to stop them.

 In this area, along with the fresh digging, I found shoes, socks, and

different civilian clothes spread across the areas of fresh digging. There's

a railroad track separating the two. The survivors described its being

adjacent to a railroad track. And the most damning evidence I found

was here in the woods, about 50 feet away. It was a pile of clothing. I

found at least 100 civilian jackets there.

 Inside the pockets of the jackets I found two IDs. One had a Muslim

name on it, and one was from Srebrenica. I think the most chilling

evidence was in that pile: I also found three canes and one crutch, and

that corroborates the account of a survivor who said he was taken there

along with the old men from Potocari. This is a man who can barely

walk. He badly damaged his leg in an accident.

 Also, survivors described being forced to take their jackets off before

they were executed at the school. So all together, it paints a grim picture. There were tracks of heavy vehicles repeatedly coming up to the

area. Just everything about this site exactly fits what the describers

told me. Again, Ratko Mladic, the Bosnian Serb military commander,

was seen at this school by these three survivors who described everything to me accurately. He spoke to prisoners and told them they would

not be harmed. His car pulled up right here near the railroad tracks,

and he watched these executions carried out. Again, everything else

these survivors told me matched perfectly to what I found. I have a

couple of other things. and then I will just sit back down.

 I'm sorry. One thing I forgot to mention was that I was able to get

pictures, but my film was seized. I took pictures of that area, the mass

grave there. It appears large enough. According to U.S. intelligence

analysts, the two graves at Nova Kasaba are large enough to hold approximately 600 bodies.

 The grave I found near Karakaj was slightly larger. I would guess it

can hold 800 bodies, and I was able to carry out these items I found in

the jackets. I told my Bosnian Serb captors that these were my handkerchiefs and combs. You're free to look at these. Unfortunately, they're

not very damning evidence, but it was all I was able to bring out. They

took everything else from me.

 There are just a couple last points I wanted to make. There is evidence that at least one of the six sites that the United States knows

about is one I have not visited, that the Bosnian Serbs are digging it up.

U.S. intelligence said this last month. They have aerial photos of back-
13

hoes being in the area digging it up, taking out some kind of material,

which could be bodies, and there's a possibility the Bosnian Serbs are

pouring acid onto the bodies and destroying evidence.

 According to the current peace deal, human rights investigators and

especially investigators from the War Crimes Tribunal have access to

all these areas, and U.S. troops have the right to use force to go into

these areas. One last thing I'd like to say about being held by the Bosnian

Serbs: some of my Serb captors were very kind to me, some were not.

One night I was not allowed to sleep, and they were convinced I was a

spy. Others were very supportive.

 It was very clear to me from the prisoners and the guards I talked to

that most Serbs don't believe that these massacres happened. They believe the line of the Bosnian Serb authorities that these are soldiers

that were killed. Again, I saw no evidence of any fighting going on in

these areas, and especially the site in Karakaj is 10 to 15 miles from the

main escape route Muslims would have used from Srebrenica. So there's

no explanation for these graves existing in that area.

 I think it's crucial that what happened there be proven one way or

another. The Bosnian Serbs may be right, and these may be soldiers,

but the evidence indicates otherwise. With the peace agreement, there

are guarantees that more investigations can go on, and I hope that the

evidence I found will hopefully lead us to find out exactly what happened in Srebrenica.

 Chairman SMITH. Mr. Rohde, thank you very much for your testimony and for your obvious bravery in going out to those areas, recovering that information, and then making it known at great risk to yourself, as the situation certainly proved when you were arrested.

 I'd like just tp note that Mr. Zeliff has joined our panel; fellow Commissioner Mr. Porter; chairman of the International Relations Committee Ben Gilman; and Mr. Moran. I'd like to ask our third and final

witness, Dr. Wolf, if she would present her testimony before we go to

questions.

 STATEMENT OF DR. BARBARA C. WOLF,

FORENSIC PATHOLOGIST

 Dr. WOLF. Thank you, Mr. Smith. It's certainly an honor to be

asked to be here with you today and to share with you the observations

of my colleagues and myself when we visited certain towns in Bosnia

and Croatia 2 months ago. More specifically, I want to share with you

our experience in working with our civilian physician colleagues from

those nations at the sites of a series of mass human graves.

 I think we can probably put the lights down a little bit. Yes, that's

great. Thank you.

 Between October 8 and 13, 1995, I joined a group of American physician-scientists on a trip to Croatia and Bosnia under the sponsorship of

AmeriCares. [See Slide 1.] AmeriCares is an international humanitarian aid group based in New Canaan, Connecticut. It is a private, nonprofit disaster relief organization providing immediate response to emergency medical needs, and also supporting long-term health care

programs around the world.

 The group with whom I traveled consisted of several other forensic

specialists: Dr. Michael Baden, the co- director of the Forensic Sciences

Unit of the New York State Police; Dr. Henry Lee, the chief criminalist
14

for the Connecticut State Police; Dr. Moses Schanfield, a DNA specialist from Denver; and Dr. David Rowe, a Professor of Pediatrics from the

University of Connecticut.

 We went to Croatia and Bosnia to work with and lend our support to

the forensic team from the Split Clinical Hospital in Split, Croatia. While

there, we assisted in the excavation of bodies at mass graves, assisted

in autopsies, and then worked with the Croatian forensic team in meeting with families to assist them in identifying the bodies.

 We also worked with the Croatian scientists in their DNA laboratory, which they had set up a year ago with some guidance from Dr. Lee

to deal with those cases that could not be identified by traditional means.

[See Slide 2.]

 We visited three newly-found mass graves which contained the bodies of Croatians killed in 1991 and 1992. Two of the graves, one containing 34 bodies and the other, 3, were located near Kupres, Bosnia. The

third mass grave we visited was in Petrinja, Croatia, a 2-hour helicopter flight from Kupres. The purpose of this visit was to assist in the

identification of those bodies found in the mass graves being uncovered

in areas previously controlled by opposing armies.

 Our goal was to identify the dead and thereby help heal the living. In

many instances, these were families who, for the past 2 or 3 years, had

been holding out the hope that their loved ones might still be alive.

Some had been told that their relatives had been taken prisoner. Our

task was to help identify these bodies, to allow the families some kind of

closure.

 My purpose in sharing these experiences today is not to make any

comments or give opinions regarding the peace process. Likewise, I'm

not here to seek penalties for anyone or to assess blame for these deaths.

This was not the goal of the trip. We did not examine these bodies for

evidence of torture or even for specific causes of death. This was a policy

decision made prior to our journey. Our job was purely to work toward

the identification of these bodies and to return them to their families for

proper burial.

 In case I sound unmoved by this experience, let me say that despite

a decade in forensic pathology and dealing with death, there were many

sights that I was unprepared for. In one instance, there was the body of

an 82-year-old blind woman in one of the mass graves. Also, we were

being assisted by a soldier who, while excavating one of the graves, had

found the body of his missing civilian brother.

 The entire trip was a very moving one, and one that I think certainly

most people in this country could not truly comprehend or understand,

and that one who has never lived through the experience of war could

envision. My purpose today is to give a clinical perception of the problems of the people of Bosnia and Croatia in the aftermath of war.

 The peace process is really just a beginning of some of the work to be

done for these people. At this point, there are many thousands of soldiers and civilians still missing. As peace arrives in the region, more

and more of these graves will be found. It is quite probable that this

identification will be going on for many years, as we are still identifying

soldiers from the Vietnam era. The sheer number of the missing and

the lack of resources dictates a long road for this process. [See Slide 3.]

 I'd now like to show you some of the sights from these visits. This

shot was taken on the first day of the trip as we approached Kupres,

Bosnia, which is a town in southwestern Bosnia that had been captured
15

by the Serbs from the Croatians in 1992. The front lines had recently

pulled back from this area, and several mass graves had been discovered.

 One of the graves containing 34 bodies had been excavated the previous week. It is my understanding from media reports that the 34 had

been ordered executed while their relatives watched. [See Slide 4.] As

we came to the town of Kupres, it was apparent that all of the region,

all the houses, had been shelled, with the buildings being essentially in

ruin. [See Slide 5.]

 Although some of the people appeared to be attempting to get back to

their homes, basically all the structures had been destroyed. This is the

mayor of Kupres talking with Dr. Lee and Dr. Schanfield. [See Slide 6.]

We found that the people of Kupres, as well as the people in all the areas

that we visited, were very hospitable and extremely grateful for our

help. Such was the appreciation of the mayor of Kupres that we were

served a luncheon of lamb and local wines in the middle of a war zone.

 This is the site of the grave that had been excavated the week prior

to our arrival at the edge of Kupres. [See Slide 7.]This was the grave

that had contained 34 bodies. A family member of one of the deceased

had marked the grave with this cross. The bodies had been excavated,

preliminarily autopsied at the site, and then moved to the Split Clinical

Hospital where we would later work with the forensic team on these

bodies.

 The make-up of those in this grave cut across many lines: soldier

and civilian, man and woman, adult and child, although there was a

predominance of young males because of the soldiers. While we were

not looking for specific causes of death, it was apparent that most of

these people had died from multiple wounds, including gunshots and

bayoneting. A conclusive determination of cause of death would also

have been difficult because many of the bodies had been bulldozed and

attempts had been made to burn the bodies.

 This was a makeshift autopsy table at the edge of the mass grave in

Kupres that had been used by the Split forensic team to conduct some of

the initial examinations of the bodies. [See Slide 8.] It should be noted

that while both traditional forensic pathology methods as well as DNA

technology was available, the primary process used in the identification

was largely direct visual examination by the families.

 Most of these people came from towns that had been largely destroyed,

so in most cases no dental or other medical records existed to work

with. In many cases, we actually had to show family members a remnant of clothing to see if they could recognize it. [See Slide 9.]

 While we were visiting this first mass grave site in Kupres, word

came that another grave, which was later found to contain the bodies of

three soldiers, had been pinpointed by Serb officials during a recent

prisoner exchange. We went to that site, changed into scrub suits at

the scene, and assisted in the excavation of these bodies.

 I should take the opportunity to note that these bodies were not in

any way extensively autopsied as we would do in this country. I recently participated in the recovery of one body in a criminal case in

upstate New York where the removal of the body alone took 12 hours

and the autopsy another day. This kind of precision was not available

in Bosnia and Croatia simply because of the enormity of the numbers.
16

 As I mentioned earlier, our visit was greatly noted and appreciated.

There was a great deal of media attention given to our visit. An article

appeared the next day following our visit to Kupres in the local paper,

showing us at the grave site assisting in the excavation. [See Slide 10.]

 Later that afternoon, we were taken by military helicopter to Petrinja,

a town in north-central Croatia over the border from Bosnia where another large mass grave had been discovered. [See Slide 11.] At Petrinja,

we arrived in a cornfield in the recently liberated region where local

soldiers had identified another mass grave site. Although we did not

stay for the entire excavation, it was later determined that the site

contained nearly 100 bodies. [See Slide 12.]

 I was told that the location of the grave had been determined by two

Croatian soldiers who had been Serb prisoners of war and who had been

forced to help collect and bury the bodies at the site. [See Slide 13.]

When we arrived, a forensic team from Zagreb, the nearest forensic

center located to the north of Petrinja, was working to excavate the

bodies. Again, the make-up of the bodies in the grave included soldiers

and civilians of all ages and both sexes.

 Our timing was good. We were told that before our arrival, a dog had

been blown up at the site by a landmine, and media reports noted that

just hours before, three anti- tank grenades were recovered at the site,

presumably put there to prevent anyone from excavating the bodies.

The bodies in this grave were also from 1991. They were in very bad

shape, both because of decomposition and because of the burial process,

and consisted predominantly of skeletonized remains or partial skeletons.

 Because teeth tend to be relatively resistant to decomposition, they

were our most useful tool in identifying these bodies. Although dental

records were essentially nonexistent, sometimes members of a family

might remember, for example, a characteristic front tooth of a loved

one and could recognize the person that way. In one case, a dentist who

had worked on several of the missing people came to the autopsy room

and was able to identify his own dental work on some of the bodies. [See

Slide 14.]

 This is closer to the first layer of the mass of bodies in this grave.

You can see the outline of several of the bodies in the top layer at the

upper center of the slide. The two things that really struck me as we

first encountered this grave was the jumbled fashion in which these

bodies were stacked one on top of the other, and the stench of almost

100 bodies with 4 years of decay. It seemed, at least to me, reminiscent

of movies of the World War II concentration camps with layers and

layers of bodies jumbled in a grave.

 The following day, we returned to the Clinical Hospital in Split,

Croatia, to work with their forensic team on the 34 bodies recovered the

previous week in Kupres. Officials had notified members of the families

in this town who were missing relatives that they could come to Split

and attempt to identify their missing loved ones.

 This slide shows the large refrigerated truck where the bodies were

kept prior to examination at the medical center. [See Slide 15.] The

truck is that long white structure across the middle of the slide. This is

looking inside this trailer, this refrigerated truck, showing rows and

rows of bodies in body bags. [See Slide 16.]
17

 If this were the United States, this would have been a month's work

for me. At Split, this turned out to be essentially a morning or a day's

work. This is not because of lack of caring of the forensic team or lack of

sophisitication. It was just that given the enormous number of people to

identify as many people as possible without specifically autopsying each

body.

 This is the autopsy room in the Clinical Hospital in Split. [See Slide

17.] There were probably five or six bodies at a time on tables in this

room. These are the members of our team, myself on the right; Dr. Lee

and Dr. Baden in the middle working with Dr. Simun Andelinovic, who

was the chief forensic pathologist in Split, preparing to identify one of

the bodies. [See Slide 18.]

 We arranged the bodies on tables in the autopsy room in a way we

hoped would be the least grotesque to family members. [See Slide 19.]

This is the body of a dead Croatian soldier. [See Slide 20.] His helmet is

on his chest, and although it really doesn't show well here, there's a

large bullet hole in the helmet. This is a shot of the same soldier showing substantial facial trauma. [See Slide 21.]

 As I mentioned, in many of these cases, identification came down to

a family member just recognizing a piece of jewelry or a piece of clothing. In this case, the wife of this Croatian soldier who's shown here feet

first was able to identify her husband just by recognizing his Nike socks.

[See Slide 22, 23.]

 While we were examining these decomposing bodies from several

years earlier, we were also reminded of the continued ongoing violence

nearby. The adjacent autopsy room was the site of the autopsies of soldiers being killed in the current fighting. This was a soldier who had

been killed the day before with multiple shrapnel wounds. [See Slide

24.]

 As a forensic pathologist, I'm used to families coming to an autopsy

room to examine or identify their relatives, but having five or six bodies

on tables and dozens of families rotating through an autopsy room was

an experience I wasn't prepared for. It was much more difficult because

of the language barrier. Dr. Andelinovic, who is in the center of the

photograph, tried to serve as an interpreter for us, but with six bodies

and many families, it was essentially impossible. [See Slide 25.]

 We showed families whatever we could find to help in the identification process-frequently, teeth of the deceased. The thing that was most

difficult was that because of the language barrier, we couldn't offer any

comfort to the family members. [See Slide 26.] Despite the grisly nature

of the bodies before them, the family members wanted very much to

spend time with their identified loved ones.

 I should note that the mission in this case was largely a success.

Before the end of the day, 27 of the 34 bodies in the first mass grave,

and all 3 of the soldiers from the second grave, were identified. DNA

testing is continuing on the remaining bodies yet unidentified.

 The people in Bosnia and Croatia have been through one of the worst

wars of the century with cruelty and man's inhumanity to man reminiscent of World War II. I would appeal to this Commission and to all

the governments of the world to understand the plight of these people

and to help make the resources available to them that will be needed

probably for years to come in working with and identifying these victims. Thank you.
18

 Chairman SMITH. Dr. Wolf, thank you for that very disturbing testimony. You have reminded us what kind of atrocities we are actually

talking about when we see it in black and white and in color. I'd like to

begin the questioning and then yield to my colleagues for any questions

they might have.

 Mr. Rohde, you mentioned earlier that, when you were held by the

Bosnian Serbs, some of your guards with whom you had contact were

obviously more decent than others. They weren't into intimidation. They

even gave you a heads- up that things might turn out well for you.

We've heard over and over that all of the Bosnian Serbs are not acting

with the same kind of impunity in this war, and that there are some

who really believe that these atrocities are not taking place. Now, Hitler

had his SS, he had his storm troopers, and he had people who committed atrocities as a matter of course. General Mladic-and Mr. Lupis, you

might want to speak to this as well-must have a very elite group or

corps of people who are given to these kinds of atrocities, who will follow

orders to the letter, dotting the i's and crossing the t's, and doing the

kinds of terrible things that we see here. Is there evidence that those

people are being identified? I know there have been a few names handed

down, including Mladic, in terms of indictments. Are we gathering evidence that indicates there is a core group of Bosnian Serbs that committed the bulk of these atrocities? Mr. Lupis, would you want to start on

that?

 MR LUPIS. Yes. As a matter of fact, during this investigation, we've

been trying to piece together a chain of command linking the soldiers in

the field who committed these crimes and continue up the ladder until

we get to Mladic. In this case, for the Srebrenica offensive, most of the

hard work has been cut out for us because General Mladic was witnessed, was seen at many of these massacre sites. The real problem

now is to try to get the chain established between the infantrymen and

Mladic. Human Rights Watch, in the last few days, has been successful

in obtaining information, names of Bosnian Serb commanders who operated during this offensive and who gave the orders to the men. The

harder thing right now is to establish precisely who from Serbia properwhat military people from Serbia proper, what soldiers from Serbia

proper-were involved, because there's strong evidence to support that

troops from Serbia proper were also used in this offensive. We collected

many testimonies. People said they'd seen Serbian troops in Serbian

uniforms, distinguishable mainly by accents. The Serbian accent is very

different from the Bosnian accent. Also, the U.N. reports that Mazowiecki

published also collected testimonies of people seeing Serbian troops involved in this offensive. So right now, we have a pretty good picture of

who's involved from the Bosnian Serb side. The more difficult question

now is to see if we can determine who was involved in Serbia proper.

 Chairman SMITH. Mr. Rohde?

 Mr. ROHDE. I heard the same thing from survivors regarding Serbian

accents and that kind of thing. And experts I've talked with over thereU.N. officials, various military officials-feel that President Milosevic of

Serbia has one of the best intelligence organizations in the former Yugoslavia. He has very close ties. Serbians are able to slip into Bosnian

Serb territory, so it's very possible that he knew these executions were

going on but did nothing to stop them.
19

 Chairman SMITH. Given the allegations of mass executions which

have been spoken about today-and we've heard about previously-was

there any attempt by the United Nations, particularly as related to the

safe haven Srebrenica, to investigate those mass executions as they

were occurring?

 Mr. LUPIS. Well, the role of the United Nations is problematic in

the fact that the United Nations Dutch battalion in Srebrenica was in a

very difficult situation: undermanned and unable to protect the enclave

from this attack.

 The problem that Human Rights Watch has with the United Nations' role is that even if they were helpless in stopping this from happening, there was crucial information which was not released in a timely

fashion. The Dutch peacekeepers witnessed some of these atrocities taking place, and instead of radioing it out real-time, these allegations and

stories started coming out a few days after the fall of Srebrenica.

 Now, Mazowiecki, the U.N. human rights rapporteur, had written

up a report based on testimonies taken from people investigating the

role of the U.N. troops there; and it has caused waves in Holland. The

Dutch Government has apparently suppressed information, a list of

men who were turned over to the Serbs.

 If you would like to read about this more in detail, it's in our report,

but right now, the U.N. is really trying to feel out what it can do to

explain this lack of action taken by it, and as a result of the Srebrenica

debacle, Mr. Mazowiecki resigned his post in, I think, late August, early

September.

 Mr. ROHDE. There's just one thing. I also went to Holland and spoke

to some of the peacekeepers who were in the enclave themselves, and

they spoke of being very frustrated about being outmanned, outgunned,

and almost being given an impossible mission to do. And the specific

thing was that there was a list of, I believe, 142 men - 239, sorry-who

were inside the U.N. enclave and ordered by the Dutch to leave.

 As they left, they were separated from their families and taken away.

All of those men are missing, and one of the survivors that I spoke to

said he was also at Potocari, which leads me to believe that those men

may very well be in the grave that I found near the village of Cajnice.

 Chairman SMITH. Let me ask one final question before yielding to

Mr. Hoyer. Mr. Lupis, I think this issue will especially apply to you as

a researcher for a human rights organization. Mr. Rohde and Dr. Wolf,

you also may want to go back to some of the places that you have visited. Do you believe that you will have access, unfettered access, to the

sites where suspected mass graves and other kind of atrocities may

have been held by all three sides?

 Mr. ROHDE. I believe, according to the peace agreement, journalists

do not have unfettered access to Bosnian Serb territory.

 Mr. LUPIS. Yes, and this would be a good opportunity to call the

Serbs' bluff and promise access to these graves under the Dayton peace

agreement. I believe IFOR, the Implementation Force, has unrestricted

access to any place in Bosnia-Herzegovina. This would be a good opportunity to bring human rights groups, as well as forensic experts, along

with IFOR troops, to the massacre sites.

 I believe eastern Bosnia, where Srebrenica is, falls under U.S. jurisdiction, so a timely action would be to deliver a forensic team and a

human rights team to be escorted to these sites by U.S. troops as soon

as the Dayton peace agreement is signed.
20

 One thing I think David said before, which may be dangerous, is

that when he was captured, his maps of the sites were confiscated from

him and, as well, his pictures were developed. Something like this should

be done in a hurry; otherwise, the Bosnian Serbs would be able to dig up

these graves and remove the bodies. I believe they've started in one

place already.

 Chairman SMITH. If I could follow up, is there something that should

be coordinated with Justice Goldstone and his prosecutors, or is it something that would be done independently? How would you work that? Dr.

Wolf, how did you work yours?

 Dr. WOLF. Well, our trip was under the auspices of AmeriCares and

in collaboration with the Split Medical Center. There are several forensic teams in place, a team in Split, a team in Zagreb. They have all of

the knowledge and techniques, including DNA technology, to do the

identification process, but basically we are talking about just a few forensic pathologists and dentists.

 So I think we would need both the resources, in terms of monetary

resources, as well as assistance from other forensic experts. They are

certainly very appreciative of any forensic help in that regard.

 Chairman SMITH. Mr. Lupis, how does your information make its

way to Justice Goldstone? Do you work with him, or do you feed them

information?

 Mr. LUPIS. No, we work independently. They have their own investigators, and we have ours. But we work in a parallel fashion. Whatever we uncover or discover we send immediately to them just to help

them build the cases for the indictments. But it's a solid system.

 So far, everything we've published since 1991-1992 about the war

has been handed over to the International Criminal Tribunal, so it's

effective. I think they could do a good job if they fully carried it out.

 Mr. ROHDE. I just want to state that I don't work in a parallel

fashion with the War Crimes Tribunal. I just try to get the information

public and give it to the public. It would be good, though, if this proposed trip you've talked about would include journalists so they could

also go, and we don't have unfettered access; but I'm sure that there are

journalists who would volunteer to go along if there were adequate security guarantees.

 Chairman SMITH. I yield to the distinguished chairman of the International Committee, Mr. Gilman.

 Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Mr. Smith. I just wanted to commend

you and Senator D'Amato and members of the Commission for conducting this hearing at this time. It's very timely, and I hope that the evidence unearthed by our investigators will get to the proper hands, the

tribunal that's examining the war crimes. Many of us in the Congress

are very much concerned about further pursuit of those war crimes,

that they not get buried in all of the paperwork that's going on in trying

to give some peace to that area. Thank you, Mr. Smith. I regret I'm

being called to another meeting.

 Chairman SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Hoyer.

 Mr. HOYER. Thank you very much. I want to thank all three of you

for your testimony, but much more important than that, I want to

thank you for the work you're doing. In three different areas, you are

critical players, making sure that the cycle of vengeance and lack of

justice and redress of atrocities that I talked about will not occur.
21

 Let me ask a few questions. Dr. Wolf, you indicated that there were,

in fact, pathologists on the ground in Bosnia who are competent and

capable of doing good forensic work.

 Dr. WOLF. Very much so, and I think this was really an example of

science crossing political lines. The techniques that we use in the United

States were very much the same techniques that they were using there,

including the DNA laboratory in Split .

 Mr. HOYER. The problem, I take it then, is the volume of work to be

done and the scarcity of numbers there to do the work?

 Dr. WOLF. The volume of people to be identified, and the lack of

available information which aids in identification. The forensic teams

have done a tremendous amount of work in gathering whatever information is available about the missing persons. They have a data bank

and have gathered whatever dental or other medical information about

these missing persons, but in many cases, because the entire towns are

destroyed, there is very little to use.

 Traditionally with identification of a decomposed body, we work with

dental records, that sort of thing. In many cases, those records aren't

available there. So that puts a greater need for DNA techniques.

 The laboratory in Split has been up and running for about a year and

they're now expanding beyond traditional DNA, hopefully into the more

sophisticated mitochondrial DNA techniques. I think that's going to

become very important in this process. In that way, samples from relatives can be used to identify some of these missing people when other

methods of identification aren't available. Croatian scientists have come

to this country and spent time working with the technologies. Our DNA

experts, Dr. Lee, Dr. Schanfield, and others, have looked at their work

and the technology. The capabilities are certainly there. It's resources

and people that are needed.

 Mr. HOYER. Doctor, you have reflected upon the identification of

individuals who have been killed. Obviously your job is not so much

about identification, but to determine why they were killed, particularly in trying to make some connection with a criminal act, in this

case, a war crime.

 Are you confident that we're going to be providing the kind of forensics work that will be needed in the Hague?

 Dr. WOLF. As you said, usually as a forensics pathologist, my work

is in dealing with a criminal situation. In this case, with this particular trip, the specific decision had been made not to look for evidence of

atrocities, although I think, obviously, the mass graves themselves and

the people in those graves, in some part, speak for themselves. We didn't

specifically examine the bodies for torture or even cause of death. This

trip was purely for identification.

 Mr. HOYER. Identification.

 Dr. WOLF. It's work that certainly-looking for---

 Mr. HOYER. Do you see the other happening?

 Dr. WOLF. As far as our work goes, we made this trip. We don't

have specific plans to go back. It's certainly being documented by the

team that we worked with from Split; but, at this point, they're overwhelmed with just attempting to provide the families some closure. As

I mentioned, we're still identifying our remains being sent back from

Vietnam.

 Mr. HOYER. Vietnam?
22

 Dr. WOLF. And I think the feeling in Split was that the people are

well-aware of what's going on with atrocities in that country and they're

attempting to give the families the ability to go on and just the overwhelming numbers of missing people have-each body is not being autopsied for evidence of torture or atrocities.

 Mr. HOYER. I understand.

 Dr. WOLF. We're only doing this for the purpose of the families.

 Mr. HOYER. Thank you. Mr. Rohde, you mentioned on a couple of

occasions the gravesites which you had identified, took pictures of, and

talked to survivors. You mentioned on a number of occasions determining whether these were civilians or whether they were soldiers-that the

Serbs were claiming that these were soldiers.

 Now, I wanted to follow up at that time and did not. That may or

may not be relevant. Obviously you can't kill soldiers that have been

captured and are unarmed and are no longer combatants. It is a war

crime to murder them and put them in a mass grave as much as it is

any other individual. At that point in time, they're essentially subject

to the same protections that civilians are, as I understand it.

 Was there a contention that these soldiers were killed in battle? Is

that the defense?

 Mr. ROHDE. That is the Bosnian Serbs' explanation. They say these

were all soldiers killed in combat, and for sanitary reasons, the bodies

were collected from the areas and put in these mass graves. But again,

the evidence I found contradicts that in terms of civilian clothes, and all

the evidence I found has buttressed the accounts of the nine survivors

who say civilians were executed.

 Mr. HOYER. OK.

 Mr. ROHDE. It's also important to point out that I believe only a

third of the men who fled the enclave were armed. So the idea of combat

going on is also difficult to prove from that.

 Mr. HOYER. Congresswoman Sheila Jackson-Lee is leaving because

she has another meeting to which I've also got to go on Bosnia and on

the peace agreement. But I appreciate her being here.

 Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Thank you. Appreciate your testimony.

 Mr. HOYER. Mr. Rohde, you've testified, we've seen pictures of the

Dutch commanding general, as I recall, raising a glass of wine or champagne with Ratko Mladic. I had an opportunity to take that picture-it

was on the front page of the Washington Post-before the House of Representatives.

 I had a 1-minute observation, as scathing as I could possibly muster,

about raising a glass with a war criminal and a murderer, Ratko Mladic.

Why do you think Mladic addressed these folks? Why do you think he

was onsite?

 Mr. ROHDE. I was told that at that meeting or one of the meetings

with the Dutch commander, the initial meetings, Ratko Mladic had a

pig brought into a hotel room. He had a soldier cut the pig's throat and

told the Dutch, "you have to be able to watch this before we can talk."

He then told the Dutch he would shell the compound if they resisted

any efforts his troops made to take away the men at the site.

 So he was there. It was negotiations. There are questions about the

Dutch conduct, but to be fair, talking to the Dutch people---
23

 Mr. HOYER. I'm not so much questioning the Dutch conduct. I was

just offended by that picture and offended by the action of that general.

That aside, however, you referred in your comments about his addressing those who subsequently became the victims.

 Mr. ROHDE. Yes.

 Mr. HOYER. And represented to them they were going to be released.

 Mr. ROHDE. Consistently on at least four different locations.

 Mr. HOYER. Now, I'm wondering whether or not you had discussions with folks who were there or who have analyzed that situation in

trying to establish this chain of command and the connection between

Mladic and Milosevic, and those who actually inflicted the death blows

or death shots or however the death was brought.

 Mr. ROHDE. He was only seen at the one site that I visited. According to one survivor, he got out of the car and watched as the executions

were going on. At other locations, he spoke to prisoners a few hours

before the shooting started. Again, everything else that survivor told

me matched perfectly in terms of the description of the site and everything I found.

 Mr. HOYER. And we have the names of those people? You talked to

one witness who saw Mladic observing the killing go on?

 Mr. ROHDE. Yes. Others put him at the site addressing prisoners

hours before they were executed.

 Mr. HOYER. Mr. Lupis, how many witnesses do we have that fall in

that category in number?

 Mr. LUPIS. How many witnesses who have seen Mladic?

 Mr. HOYER. Yes.

 Mr. LUPIS. I believe we talked to about six survivors of the massacres, I think of which four had witnessed Mladic at different sites. Two

of them saw Mladic in the Karakaj area and two other ones had witnessed him in the Nova Kasaba area; he was addressing the civilians,

telling them that they would be taken care of and they would be exchanged. And then after he left, they were massacred.

 Up in the Karakaj area, he was apparently watching the massacres

as they took place.

 Mr. HOYER. Mr. Lupis, do you know what kind of protections are

being accorded to those whom I would perceive to be critical witnesses,

as a result of the critical nature of the testimony they could provide, I

would think, in great danger if they're in the area? Do we know what

protections are being accorded to them?

 Mr. LUPIS. At the moment, the Bosnian Government is taking all

measures to make sure their safety is guaranteed. They have already

been relocated to private homes, unknown to the public; and some of

them are still in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Others might have left, but at

the moment, I think they're quite safe. And also, once the Dayton peace

plan is signed, they'll fall into the-they'll be in the American sector up

north.

 Mr. ROHDE. Just one thing to add. My Bosnian Serb captors were

very eager to know the names of the survivors I had talked to, which is

alarming in a sense; but I made up fake Muslim names and did not

name any of them. But the Bosnian Serb police were extremely interested to know who they were and where they were now.
24

 Mr. HOYER. My suspicion would be that they would be very interested because I would imagine they would get pretty good rewards, in

one way or another, maybe not monetarily, but career-wise if they could

identify and silence these witnesses.

 Chairman SMITH. Would the gentleman yield?

 Mr. HOYER. Yes.

 Chairman SMITH. If the gentleman will recall, that's one of the

issues that was raised in previous hearings by some of our witnesses,

that there was not enough money allocated for witness protection. We

ourselves raised that with Justice Goldstone and offered our support to

try to get that amount of money boosted so that if anyone does come

forward with information, again, they're not liable to be killed or in any

way harmed. It's an excellent point. Thank you for yielding.

 Mr. HOYER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Last question, and I've

already taken more time than I should have and I apologize to Mr.

Porter who's waiting patiently to ask his questions. I would like all

three of you to comment from your perspectives, which obviously are

different, some more long-term than others.

 I made the observation in my statement-and I think generally you

have also implied this, if not said it directly- that the importance of the

war crimes tribunal is that justice has to be obtained so we don't have

a continuing cycle of vengeance and violence. Could you comment on

the importance of bringing to justice those who have perpetrated the

acts which you have witnessed and investigated?

 Mr. LUPIS. I think that is the fundamental principle which must be

carried out to the end. Many of these atrocities which have been committed during this war have come about as a result of unhealed wounds

from World War II when nationalists slaughtered various ethnic groups.

When Tito came into power, he just basically suppressed any talk or

any doings of resolving these issues.

 Many people we talked to, especially Serbs, often refer to crimes committed against them. The Muslims of eastern Bosnia have suffered many

massacres by the Serbs over the years, and nothing has been addressed.

And the Croats as well have suffered. So by bringing these war criminals to justice, I think it will help resolve some of these feelings of

complete loss and frustration and people will be able to start the healing

process.

 Right now, the American-backed federation between the Bosnian

Muslims and the Croats is at a very critical juncture, because these

issues have not been resolved. There are still war criminals on both

sides, more so on the Croat side, that have not been removed from positions of power. And as long as they remain---

 Mr. HOYER. May I stop you 1 second, Mr. Lupis?

 Mr. LUPIS. Sure.

 Mr. HOYER. When you say "both sides," you're talking about the

federation, so you're talking about Croats and Bosnian Muslims?

 Mr. LUPIS. I'm talking about both sides in the federation, the Croats

and the Muslims. There are still leaders who are war criminals who are

in positions of power who have not been removed and there can't be any

repatriation, any healing, while these people are still there. So that's

the most fundamental issue. For the Dayton peace agreement to be

successful, this is the first issue that has to be addressed.
25

 Mr. ROHDE. I can't really comment on the importance issue. I can

just tell you the evidence I had just speaking to survivors from Srebrenica

and going to some military bases around that were filled with soldiers

who had made it through the woods. There are many Muslims calling

for revenge for what happened-many Muslims saying "My father and

my brother are dead," and they are going to carry out justice of their

own if justice is not carried out by someone else.

 One of the more chilling stories survivors told of these mass executions was that the Serbs would line up these Muslims and would call

them Bovia, which is a slur for Muslims who fought with Fascist forces

allied with Germany in World War II. It was very clear that the rationalization in the heads of these execution squads was that they were

carrying out revenge for World War II, 50 years later. The Serbs did

suffer a tremendous amount in World War II. So again, there's anecdotal evidence of the possibility of what you're talking about.

 Dr. WOLF. I think the basis of my trip, my experience in Bosnia and

Croatia, was really not to address the question that you're asking. I

was dealing with individual families whose immediate concern was really whether their husband or their son was alive or dead. Were they

being held prisoner somewhere and might be released? So I think that

for the people that I was dealing with, that was the immediate issue. To

answer the question that you're asking, I think, clearly what we have

seen is that it will happen again, it can happen again. But my own

experience there was not to look at that question.

 Mr. HOYER. Thank you, Dr. Wolf. Again, thank all three of you and

thank you, Mr. Chairman.

 Chairman SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Hoyer. Mr. Porter.

 Mr. PORTER. Mr. Chairman, let me thank you for holding this hearing and for the focus that you've made on the situation in Bosnia. I

think it has been very helpful. I am very sorry I didn't get here until

perhaps halfway through Mr. Rohde's presentation and didn't hear Mr.

Lupis. I want to ask one thing.

 First, how were you allowed in? I guess you got in, Mr. Rohde, and

then were arrested or held?

 Mr. ROHDE. Yes. Throughout the war, the Bosnian Serbs have limited access to their territory to both human rights groups and journalists. The first time I was in was in August when I went to Nova Kasaba.

I was in reporting another story and without their permission went to

these graves.

 The second time I went in, I had changed the date on a Bosnian Serb

press accreditation and used that to get through checkpoints. It got me

into this area. Again, the Bosnian Serbs had denied access to anyone to

the Srebrenica area for 3 months, and I felt that action was warranted

to see what had really happened there.

 Mr. PORTER. Mr. Lupis, did you go in there also? I didn't hear any

of your testimony unfortunately.

 Mr. LUPIS. Unfortunately, Human Rights Watch, and I think other

human rights groups, have consistently been denied access to Bosnian

Serb-controlled territories. So our job basically, the best we could do,

was to travel to the Tuzla area where many of these refugees were

crossing over. The people who trekked through the mountains crossed

over into Tuzla where most of the men, elderly, women, and children

were bused to.
26

 From there, we basically went to the refugee camps and attempted

to interview people, trying to get their accounts. It was a traumatic

experience because many of these people had just crossed over and they

were still in shock about what had happened.

 The one important thing is, I think, in order for something like the

Dayton peace plan to work, is that all territories in Bosnia-Herzegovina

should be accessible to human rights groups, to IFOR troops, in order

to be able to find out exactly what happened to everyone in the territories.

 At this moment, and during the history of the U.N. presence in Bosnia,

the majority of Western aid organizations and Western efforts have

been stationed in federation territory, which is held by Croats and Muslims. The Bosnian Serbs did not let many people into their territory and

that was the biggest problem.

 Mr. PORTER. Am I correct, because I wasn't here-are all the sites

that we are talking about sites where the perpetrators are Serb?

 Mr. ROHDE. In terms of Srebrenica, yes, the alleged perpetrators

would be Bosnian Serbs; and I just want to point out that President

Milosevic of Serbia, according to U.S. officials, has twice promised the

United States that there will be access to these graves since the peace

talks began in Dayton. He himself has promised that.

 Mr. PORTER. Well, I want to go off the factual side. It seems to me

that unless the world does something about this, that 50 years from

now it will be the same story again. It will be a Bosnian whose father or

grandfather was killed in a mass grave in 1992 or '3 or '4, putting

someone else in another mass grave.

 If we look at what has happened even in recent history to the Jews in

World War II, where most of the world, including our own country, did

not help and certainly didn't recognize even until almost the end of the

war what was happening, even though they apparently knew it. Looking at Cambodia recently where millions of people died and where one of

our members said today that they were in Cambodia and the first thing

that was said to them by a very perceptive Cambodian man was, "Where

were you? Where were you?"

 What's happened here in Bosnia, to a lesser extent what is happening to the Kurdish people at the hands of the Iraqis and Turks and

others, how much of this is on our own hands? How much have we a

responsibility for having allowed this to go on when we knew it was

going on or at least it seemed fairly evident fairly early?

 And now, from your testimony, from other testimony that we've heard,

it's clear that it was widespread, that it was repeated, that it was planned

or premeditated in some instances, it was decided at a high level. Let

me have your thoughts on that.

 Mr. ROHDE. I can just say that-I think Mr. Lupis can address this

better, but from seeing the Dutch peacekeepers on the ground here, the

reason that enclave fell was a lack of NATO air strikes to stop the

Bosnian Serb attack. There was no way the Dutch peacekeepers themselves could have stopped that, and that was according to sources I

spoke to for an article I wrote about it.

 You know, there was no political will there among the international

community, and also there was no will or not a strong enough push

from the United States to actually have those air strikes carried out.
27

 Mr. LUPIS. I'd like to answer your question in a more general sense.

I would like to comment that the whole experience of the war in the

former Yugoslavia, which started in 1991 until the present, the tragic

thing about it is that the West was right there. Everywhere, from the

media, from television shots to the United Nations to Western diplomats running in and out of the country. In Bosnia-Herzegovina, the

tragic thing is it's been happening in front of our eyes and we keep on

using the United Nations as the vehicle by which we pass resolutions

and we do nothing about them.

 This Srebrenica case is one of the greatest examples of having Western presence right in the middle of it-in the form of a United Nations

safe area, and it was overrun. Resolutions were passed, condemnations,

those who have committed crimes against humanity and that is proceeding, although my understanding is that the NATO forces will not

have authority to apprehend or arrest those accused of war crimes. So

that is taken off the table.

 What can we do in a broader sense about this, not just Bosnia, but

all of this genocide that goes on? What can we do to change the apparent

acceptance of it by the world? And I don't mean that in an accusatory

sense at all. I think that every American has been deeply disturbed

about what they have seen and understood about what has happened in

Bosnia.

 But what do we do beyond this? Do we pursue this judicial direction

only? Does Mr. Rohde write a book that reaches to our soul? Does the

U.S. Congress pass another resolution? What are your thoughts?

 Mr. LUPIS. Again, I think the most important thing is to stop passing the buck to the United Nations. The international community should

stop relying on this convenient bureaucratic machine to pass resolutions and not act. I believe NATO, now being the legitimate military

leader in this post-cold war era, should formulate a concise and clear

mission in order to try to bring these war criminals to trial. Now it's off

the table that IFOR can't apprehend these criminals. It's starting to

sound like another United Nations mission.

 The War Crimes Tribunal should be supported by all means so at

least these war criminals can be tried and accused and the people who

have lost families will be able to receive some kind of justice. Therefore,

this would set an example for other countries, other situations where

the International War Crimes Tribunal would have some formidable

stature.

 Mr. ROHDE. There is some talk, and I believe the United States

does support the formation of a permanent war crimes tribunal that

would exist permanently to address these kind of situations. I really

don't have an answer to that and don't feel qualified to comment on it,

but I can just tell you anecdotally that the power of deterrence is tough

to measure. My Bosnian Serb captors were very surprised to find me so

far into their territory and that I was able to get through their checkpoints. I think they were shocked when the United States publicly released these satellite photos.

 There's a case to be made in terms of deterrence. I think one of the

reasons they were convinced I was a spy was because they themselves

had to say only a spy could do such a thing. So I just think they were

very shook up by where they found me, by these photos, and just anecdotally, it seemed to have an effect on them and maybe made them

curtail some of their behavior.
28

 It appears that executions of this size have not occurred since these

things were made public in August.

 Mr. PORTER. It seems to me, and I thought this most strongly at

the time of the Nigerian Government's execution of the Agani 9, including Ken Saro-Wiwa, that if the world can react strongly and overwhelmingly at a situation like that one to cut off-and this does not necessarily

apply to Bosnia because it's a different situation-but to cut off all diplomatic, political, economic intercourse with such a society until the government is changed, if we could speak in a unified voice from Europe to

Asia to North America and South America and express our outrage in

such a way that the country is completely isolated. ..

 We did this, of course, over a much longer period of time in South

Africa, and it finally proved its worth. But if we could speak in that

voice about these kinds of horrible atrocities that shake all of us so

much that there would be a message to all others who would perpetrate

them.

 To the extent that we do not do that, to the extent that Shell Oil

Company says to the Nigerian Government, "Don't worry about the

World Bank. We'll make up the $100 million and the project will go

ahead. We don't care that you killed nine people. So what?" It seems

that is exactly the kind of thing that encourages this kind of conduct.

 I think we've reached-we should have reached long since, but we

have reached a level of information-sharing in a level of common humanity that we ought to learn how to speak in one voice; and perhaps

the United Nations isn't the place to do it, but somehow we have to all

rise up in such righteous indignation about these things that they can't

happen again; that everything is brought to bear to prevent them. And

unfortunately, the world has just not done that.

 We can talk all we want in the United States about our caring about

human rights; but we know today that our weapons supplied to the

Turkish Government are used to kill Kurds without trial, people who

simply disappear, whose homes are plowed under or they're driven from

them; and yet we don't put that at high enough priority.

 I don't know if you want to comment on that. It's more of a statement than a question, but feel free if you'd like.

 Mr. LUPIS. In terms of Bosnia, the Dayton peace plan seems to be

the perfect opportunity to reverse the trend of the last 4 years because

with Rwanda and Bosnia, I think, leaders around the world-nationalists who are thinking of carrying out some similar campaigns as have

been carried out in the aforementioned countries-are feeling pretty comfortable because so far, no international action has been taken up that

really changed the tide of these conflicts.

 Mr. Rohde and I had spoken earlier about, as soon as the Dayton

peace agreement is signed, immediately calling the Serbs' bluff and

bringing a forensic team with human rights people and journalists to

these grave sites. Exposing these graves sites would, I think, help start

turning the mechanisms for the International War Crimes Tribunal to

issue more indictments and just get the ball moving with the War Crimes

Tribunal in general.

 So the Dayton peace plan, I think, offers an opportunity where we

can reverse the last 4 years.

 Mr. PORTER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
29

 Chairman SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Porter. Before we conclude, I'd

like to ask one final question. Mr. Lupis, I noticed that you used the

word "calling their bluff" on two occasions, and I heartily agree. One of

the concerns that I have-and this has been picked up at least by my

staff and myself for months now-that there are some within the United

Nations and some who are part of this process in the international community who really don't want the War Crimes Tribunal to succeed all

that much.

 Perhaps a few indictments, some show cases, and that's it, put the

atrocities behind us and move on. I think that would be a travesty if

that were the case. That's why I think there are some at the United

Nations particularly who have made it very hard for Justice Goldstone

to proceed. From my perch as chairman of the International Operations

Subcommittee, we have tried to pressure the United Nations, over which

our committee has jurisdiction, as well as the administration, really to

be more aggressive, to make sure sufficient funds are allocated in a

timely fashion.

 You know very well how damning the Shell study was in terms of

what evidence was being lost. I met with administration officials earlier

this week who told me they don't have one shred of evidence on Milosevic

in terms of committing war crimes. I was astounded that this has not

been an ongoing fact-finding accumulative process, and I was very disappointed, frankly, when the administration official told me this.

 As a Commission we are in the process of putting together a letter

that will ask a number of serious questions about the War Crimes Tribunal as it relates to IFOR. I'd like to point out, the Dayton agreement

summary that was provided to us by the State Department contained a

paragraph that states, "The agreement gives IFOR, the peace Implementation Force, the authority and discretion to use military force to

prevent interference with the free movement of civilians, refugees, and

displaced persons, and to respond appropriately to violence against citizens, civilians. IFOR has the authority to arrest any indicted war criminals it encounters or who interfere with its mission, but it will not try

to track them down."

 A review of the text of the Dayton peace agreement, its annexes, and

its appendices, and the accompanying side letters failed to locate anywhere in these texts a provision or provisions conferring upon IFOR

"the authority to arrest any indicted war criminal it encounters." In

your read of the Dayton agreement, Mr. Lupis, have you found anything that confers this capability upon the IFOR to make these arrests?

Because we haven't found it.

 Mr. LUPIS. Actually I haven't read the fine print of the whole agreement. My colleague back in New York has done that and is issuing a

critique shortly. But what you just stated about IFOR not having the

authority to seek out and capture war criminals is disturbing, and I

think that's something that should be lobbied in order to change it before the London conference coming up in a week.

 Our organization is working actively to try to alert member states of

the United Nations, and the international community to try to put some

pressure on the relevant players at the London conference to reverse

this IFOR role, because of the Dayton agreement. If IFOR will have

this diminished role, it will start to look a lot like the United Nations

operation in former Yugoslavia.
30

 Chairman SMITH. I want to thank our very distinguished witnesses

for your outstanding testimony, for the good work you do on behalf of

humanity, the Bosnians in particular, and for taking the time to come

and present your testimony to the Commission. The hearing is adjourned.

[Whereupon at 3:48 p.m., the Commission adjourned.]
31