Special Hearings — Armed Forces Hearings — 1997-10-09

MR DU PLESSIS: Yes du Plessis from the Pretoria bar.

MR GOOSEN: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: If you all could move to the far microphone so that Mr Goosen can have a sense that he's not speaking to a brick wall.

MR DU PLESSIS: I beg your pardon Mr Chairman.
 Mr Chairman, Mr Goosen and I have reached an agreement that we would deal with Major Crafford's evidence very shortly by way of me asking him a few questions, most of the questions I wanted to ask and the evidence we wanted to present to the Commission have already been presented by other witnesses and I don't deem it necessary to go into the details of that again.   Before I go on to ask just a few questions I want to place on record right from the outset that we are prepared to answer any questions the Commission wants to ask us and that we, from our point of view, do not want to place any restrictions on any questions.  We don't have any objections to any questions pertaining to any matters the Committee members want to ask Major Crafford and he's available to answer any questions.  We  offer our full cooperation.
 Now Major Crafford, you heard the evidence of the former witness, especially regarding the counter-revolutionary strategy followed by the government and the security forces from in the 1980's and specifically during the time when you were at the security branch. Do you agree broadly speaking with what Major Williamson testified and what Major Oosthuizen testified?

MAJ CRAFFORD: That is correct.

MR DU PLESSIS: Major Crafford there is one aspect regarding the counter-revolutionary strategy which has not come out in evidence here today and that we consider important enough to put it before the Commission which has already been placed before the Commission in amnesty applications and we think it is very important in the light of the evidence here today, and this regards the execution of the counter-revolutionary strategy, and the question of whether it has been done by way of orders to the people on the ground, did it reach the people on the ground in the shape of orders.  In 1987 you joined the Security Branch in Northern Transvaal, is that correct?

MAJ CRAFFORD: That's correct.

MR DU PLESSIS: Major Crafford, evidence was led by General Cronje and Captain Hechter in front of the Amnesty Committee regarding a specific order which Brigadier Viktor who was in command of the Counter Insurgency Unit had given to Captain Hechter.  This evidence was confirmed by Captain van Jaarsveld who was also in the Special Branch, and I'm not going to repeat this because it has been done before the Amnesty Committee and the evidence by Brigadier Cronje and Brigadier Viktor concerning the order given by Viktor to Hechter was that early in 1986 - and I wish to emphasise that specific time period with reference to the documentation we've been provided,  early in 1986 Captain Hechter was contacted by Brigadier Viktor and he, Brigadier Viktor's son and Captain van Jaarsveld were called into his office and he called them that the Security Police were not doing their job, not bringing their part and that something had to be done about it. The evidence was that it didn't matter how it was done or what was done but he said Pretoria is burning and South Africa is burning.  He said all steps had to be taken to control the situation and also said that an act must be answered with a particular act.
 In other words the evidence was that Viktor said that if a policeman's house was attacked, the person who did the attack, his house had to be attacked as well. If someone's house was petrol-bombed the bombers house also had to be bombed. 
 And then the evidence was that at that stage there came a change in the actions of the Security Police from reactive to proactive. In other words the Security Police started acting in terms of the counter-revolutionary strategy. This was the evidence in broad terms.  For the purposes of the Committee, I'm placing that on record.
 Now what I want to ask, in 1987 when you started working under Brigadier Cronje, what did Cronje tell you about Viktor's order?

MAJ CRAFFORD: Brigadier Cronje told me that an order had been issued by Viktor in broad terms. He explained this order to me as Advocate Du Plessis explained it here to the Committee.  It boiled down to this.  Members of the Security Police did get instructions from time to time, more specifically regarding the elimination of high profile activists.

MR DU PLESSIS: Did you understand that all illegal actions were sanctioned by this instruction or order of Viktor?

MAJ CRAFFORD: Yes that is correct.

MR DU PLESSIS: Major Crafford, if we look at actions outside the legal system performed or executed by members of the Security Services, I want to give you four examples.  As I understand the evidence of several people before the Amnesty Committee, there were interrogations which were illegal, there were detentions for periods which had not been in terms of security regulations, there were petrol bomb attacks which would include assaults, there were assaults and then there were eliminations. Can you think of any other examples?

MAJ CRAFFORD: Not at this stage.

MR DU PLESSIS: You've read the documentation and a lot was said today about the words neutralise, eliminate with particular meanings and there were cases where it was said that certain leaders of the liberation movements had to be eliminated.  In terms of the kind of operations that we looked at which fell outside legal actions, is there any, do any of these actions, interrogations, bomb attacks, detentions, could any of these actions also be termed neutralising or to eliminate or was the elimination, in other words the killing of activists, would you consider, neutralise or eliminate, killing to be the only illegal action?

MAJ CRAFFORD: Elimination as set out in this document and that had only one meaning and that was to kill. I want to agree with Mr Williamson, if you look at the compilers of these documents, if they wanted to give any other meaning to the word elimination they would have used another word.  I think personally that elimination in this context means to kill.

MR DU PLESSIS: You heard evidence that this word could be ambiguous, that it could mean something else, but if you look at the other actions of the Security Police, other illegal actions, in the light of your knowledge of the situation as Security policemen and your knowledge of the concepts used by them, would you say that illegal interrogations could be considered as any forms of elimination or neutralising?

MAJ CRAFFORD: No.

MR DU PLESSIS: Assaults?

MAJ CRAFFORD: No.

MR DU PLESSIS: Petrol bomb attacks?

MAJ CRAFFORD: No, there maybe some possibility that people could be killed in a petrol bomb attack.

MR DU PLESSIS: Any form of detention?

MAJ CRAFFORD: No Mr Chairperson.

MR DU PLESSIS: These types of illegal detentions, not in terms of the emergency regulations, what periods of time are we talking about, were people held for longer than a year?

MAJ CRAFFORD: As far as I know these detentions were never longer than two weeks.

MR DU PLESSIS: So if we look at the kind of illegal actions performed by the Security Police, your evidence is that the only reasonable interpretation that could be given to eliminate and neutralise would be the killing of people?

MAJ CRAFFORD: That is correct?

MR DU PLESSIS: You've read through these documents. Did you want to say anything else to this Commission in this regard?