1. On April 10, 1941 Croatia declares its independence with the help of Nazi Germany.

2. The Ustasha Party in Croatia conducts a campaign of ethnic genocide against ethnic Serbs in Croatia from 1941-1945.

3. The Ustasha campaign kills 150,000 Serbs who comprise 4% of the total population of Croatia.

4. The communist Party rules The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 1945-1990.

5. The state of Croatia declares its independence on the 25th of June 1991.

6. On the 19th of December 1991, a group of Yugoslavian minority members declare an independent state within Croatia.

7. The government of Croatia adopts the symbols the Ustasha regime of World War II after independence.

8. After the January 1992 ceasefire agreement between Yugoslavia and Croatia the Federal Army of Yugoslavia (JNA) officially leaves Croatia but agrees that the JNA will leave Croatia but without its weapons.

9. The government of Croatia conducts a program of organized ethnic cleansing against its own ethnic Serbian population.

10. The government of Germany aides the government of Croatia

11. Before "Operation Storm" the German government supplies weapons and troops in violation of the arms embargo.

12. During "Operation Storm" The Croatian government conducts an organized campaign of ethnic cleansing of Croatian citizens of Serbian Descent in the rebelling territories.

13. On the 14th of December 1995 the signing of the Dayton accords ends the state of war between Croatia and The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

14. Croatian citizens continue to flee Croatia for Serbia

15. During the Yugoslavian Wars 1991-1995 the government of Croatia and Germany conduct a propaganda campaign against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

16. The economic sanctions against Serbia incite the Yugoslavian economy to Collapse resulting in tremendous economic damages.

B. Legal Claims:

1. Croatia is a member of the U.N. (The Republic of Croatia was admitted as a Member of the United Nations by General Assembly resolution A/RES/46/238 of 22 May 1992) and according to Chapter VI, article 33 of the UN Charter, the parties to any dispute, the continuance of which is likely to endanger the maintenance of international peace and security, shall first of all, seek a solution by negotiation, enquiry, mediation, conciliation, arbitration, judicial settlement, resort to regional agencies or arrangements, or other peaceful means of their own choice.

2. Chapter VI, article 34 of the UN Charter, the Security council may investigate any dispute, or any situation which might lead to international friction or give rise to a dispute, in order to determine whether the continuance of the dispute or situation is likely to endanger the maintenance of international peace and security.

3. Croatia is a party of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide since 1992, which defines genocide as any act committed with the idea of destroying in whole or in part a national, ethnic, racial or religious group. This includes such acts as:
A. Killing members of the group
B. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group
C. Deliberately inflicting conditions calculated to physically destroy the group (the whole group or even part of the group)
D. Forcefully transferring children of the group to another group

4. Croatia violated articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which state:

Article Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty."

Article 5. No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Article 9. No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

Article 12. No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honor and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

Article 19. Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

5. Despite the UN mediated a cease-fire in January 1992, hostilities resumed the next year when Croatia fought to regain a third of the territory lost the previous year. A second cease-fire was enacted in May 1993, followed by a joint declaration the next January between Croatia and Yugoslavia. However, in September 1993, the Croatian Army led an offensive against the Serb-held Republic of Krajina.

6. Despite the third cease-fire signed by Croatia and Serb rebels in March 1994, the fighting in Bosnia once again tempted the Croatian army to violate the agreement. The agreement was that both sides would withdraw their fighters away from a 600-mile confrontation line running down the middle of the country.

7. Republic of Croatia violates articles 1, 2 and 4 of the Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief.

Article 1

1. Everyone shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. This right shall include freedom to have a religion or whatever belief of his choice, and freedom, either individually or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in worship, observance, practice and teaching.

2. No one shall be subject to coercion which would impair his freedom to have a religion or belief of his choice.

3. Freedom to manifest one's religion or belief may be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary to protect public safety, order, health or morals or the fundamental rights and freedoms of others.

Article 2

1. No one shall be subject to discrimination by any State, institution, group of persons, or person on the grounds of religion or other belief.

2. For the purposes of the present Declaration, the expression "intolerance and discrimination based on religion or belief" means any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on religion or belief and having as its purpose or as its effect nullification or impairment of the recognition, enjoyment or exercise of human rights and fundamental freedoms on an equal basis.

Article 4

1. All States shall take effective measures to prevent and eliminate discrimination on the grounds of religion or belief in the recognition, exercise and enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms in all fields of civil, economic, political, social and cultural life.

2. All States shall make all efforts to enact or rescind legislation where necessary to prohibit any such discrimination, and to take all appropriate measures to combat intolerance on the grounds of religion or other beliefs in this matter.

8. Croatia has violated the following articles from the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights:

Article 2 

1. Each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes to respect and to ensure to all individuals within its territory and subject to its jurisdiction the rights recognized in the present Covenant, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.

2. Where not already provided for by existing legislative or other measures, each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes to take the necessary steps, in accordance with its constitutional processes and with the provisions of the present Covenant, to adopt such laws or other measures as may be necessary to give effect to the rights recognized in the present Covenant.

3. Each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes:

(a) To ensure that any person whose rights or freedoms as herein recognized are violated shall have an effective remedy, notwithstanding that the violation has been committed by persons acting in an official capacity;

(b) To ensure that any person claiming such a remedy shall have his right thereto determined by competent judicial, administrative or legislative authorities, or by any other competent authority provided for by the legal system of the State, and to develop the possibilities of judicial remedy;

(c) To ensure that the competent authorities shall enforce such remedies when granted.

Article 11

No one shall be imprisoned merely on the ground of inability to fulfill a contractual obligation.

9. Croatia had violated the following sub-articles, in article two from the Charter of the United Nations:

The Organization and its Members, in pursuit of the Purposes stated in Article 1, shall act in accordance with the following Principles.

1. The Organization is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its Members.

2. All Members, in order to ensure to all of them the rights and benefits resulting from membership, shall fulfill in good faith the obligations assumed by them in accordance with the present Charter.

(China and Portugal pledge: Premier Wen Jiabao said Thursday that China is willing to expand its economic and trade cooperation with Portugal. "China pays great attention to economic and trade ties with Portugal and is ready to upgrade cooperation in this aspect to a higher level," Wen told Portugal President Jorge Sampaio, who is in China for a week-long state visit).

3. All Members shall settle their international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not endangered.

10. The violation of the UN charter:

Article 55, Chapter 9:

* With a view to the creation of conditions of stability and well-being which are necessary for peaceful and friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, the United Nations shall promote:

* higher standards of living, full employment, and conditions of economic and social progress and development;

· solutions of international economic, social, health, and related problems; and international cultural and educational cooperation; and

· universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion.

1. Military equipment to replace that was stolen by the Croats during the war:
a) 400 tanks;
b) 40 aircrafts;
c) 300 guns

2. Economic incentives to jumpstart the Serbian economy:
a) Return all that was spent on fleeing refugees plus 10% interest;
b) $11,895,005,241 billion worth of mental damage;
c) $40.36 billion in economic damage;
d) $6,578,652,203 billion for the settlement of refugees and other expenditures for refugees;
e) $13,987,245,000 billion compensation to various industries;
f) $3,354,652,010 billion in medical damages includes psychological bills;

3. An apology from Croatia for Tudjman’s government's atrocities;

4. Exclusive news coverage to publicize the Serbian side of the conflict from the very European NEWS stations that lined up against Serbia.

Tanks, aircraft, armored vehicles, and guns:

Serbian military losses included around 8,000 dead and between 15,000 and 25,000 were wounded. Over 200 tanks and up to 200 other armored vehicles, 100 guns and 20 aircraft that were shot down and lost during the siege.

Verification: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Vukovar

II. Opening Speech:

Outline

VII. Economic damages
A. Media Bias ruins economic reputation of Serbia because of smear campaign directed against it.
B. Sanctions imposed by the United Nations but aided heavily by the smear campaign leave the Serbian economy in shambles.
C. Most of the Croat Serb refugees who escaped Croatia because of crimes committed by Croatian military units take refuge in Serbia which in turn causes the Serbian government to pick up the cost in an already deteriorating situation.
D. Weapons handed over by JNA amount to billions of dollars in expenses.

Evidence

Part I Genocide

A. Definition of Genocide

Genocide: The systematic and planned extermination of an entire national, racial, political, or ethnic group.

It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves. Source: http://www.answers.com/genocide&r=67

B. Genocide Convention:

Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide

Article I: The Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish.

Article II: In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

No Genocide within Yugoslavia

It has already been seen how acts of ‘ethnic cleansing’, such as displacement from homes and rape of women, can have genocidal consequences as defined under Article II. But the perpetrators of those acts of ‘ethnic cleansing’ will not be found culpable under the Convention without the genocidal intent to destroy that given ethnic group.

Actions brought under the Convention for acts of genocide in the Former Yugoslavia will inevitably fail, because evidence of specific genocidal intent cannot be established. This would be so even where the evidence clearly suggests that acts of genocide were perpetrated. Source: Authorized by: Archie Zariski, Managing Editor, E Law. Disclaimer & Copyright Notice © 2003 Murdoch University

Rwanda began trials of persons accused of participating in the 1994 genocide in December 1996. Over 120,000 people have been accused of various crimes during the genocide. Many of the person who were senior government official during the genocide and are allegedly high-level perpetrators are on trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha, Tanzania. Verification: Rwanda's Organic Law No. 08/96 on Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity in English 2. Arusha Trials sets a Standard for Category 1 Genocide

The victims of the Armenian Genocide perpetrated by Ottoman Empire, were about 1.5 million Armenians were massacred by the Turkish soldiers and gangsters. The world turned its head while a nation was being exterminated. Their memories will serve as a reminder of what prejudice can do if not confronted. During the Armenian genocide, the true Armenian heroes and heroines gave their lives to save Armenia and its people. Thus Armenia survived and still survives! Verification: Genocide 1915.info, American Genocide.

In its draft recommendation, this report amply mentions the case of population transfers that followed the Second World War and the forced movements imposed by the Stalinian regime. It mentions also the genocide perpetrated by the Nazis against Jews and Romans as well as the genocide of Ukrainians. However, the draft recommendation deliberately omits to cite the first genocide of the XXth century, i.e. the Armenian genocide, though performed by, and on the territory of the member state of the Council of Europe, Turkey. Verification: Council of Europe Defames Armenia and Offends Armenians.

The Holocaust was the systematic annihilation of six million Jews by the Nazi regime during World War 2. In 1933 approximately nine million Jews lived in the 21 countries of Europe that would be occupied by Germany during the war. By 1945 two out of every three European Jews had been killed. The European Jews were the primary victims of the Holocaust. But Jews were not the only group singled out for persecution by Hitler’s Nazi regime. As many as one-half million Gypsies, at least 250,000 mentally or physically disabled persons, and more than three million Soviet prisoners-of-war also fell victim to Nazi genocide. Jehovah’s Witnesses, homosexuals, Social Democrats, Communists, partisans, trade unionists, Polish intelligentsia and other undesirables were also victims of the hate and aggression carried out by the Nazis. While it is impossible to ascertain the exact number of Jewish victims, statistics indicate that the total was over 5,830,000. Six million is the round figure accepted by most authorities. The number of children killed during the Holocaust is not fathomable and full statistics for the tragic fate of children who died will never be known. Some estimates range as high as 1.5 million murdered children. This figure includes more than 1.2 million Jewish children, tens of thousands of Gypsy children and thousands of institutionalized handicapped children who were murdered under Nazi rule in Germany and occupied Europe.

Persons accused of offences set out in Article 1 of this organic law and committed   during the period between 1 October 1990 and 1994 shall, on the basis of their acts   of participation, be classified into one of the following categories :

Category 1. 

a) Person whose criminal acts or whose acts of criminal participation place them among the planners, organizers, instigators, supervisors and leaders of the crime of genocide or of a crime against humanity: 

c) Notorious murderers who by virtue of the zeal or excessive malice   with which they committed atrocities, distinguished themselves in their areas of residence or where they passed;

d) Persons who committed acts of sexual torture;

Part II The Ustashi Past of the Croatian Republic:

A. Survivors of a World War II death camp have been mourning the victims of Croatia's Nazi puppet regime

"Sixty years ago, this was the scene of some of the worst atrocities of World War II. The Jasenovac death camp came to be known as "the Auschwitz of the Balkans". Even the Nazis were shocked by what happened here. Today's survivors glance at the point on the river where so many of their friends and colleagues were brutally murdered. To their left is the huge concrete monument, shaped into the petals of an opening flower, in honour of the dead. Some people have tears in their eyes. Many carry flowers. Everyone has their own memories. "I was arrested because my parents were partisans fighting the fascist regime," says 69-year old Serb Slavko Milanovic. "My mother had to hide me in bed sheets every morning because Ustasha were separating children and taking them away." Many of the children were murdered." Source: BBC News Edition, on the 25th of April 2005. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4479837.stm

CROATIAN PRESIDENT FRANJO TUDJMAN APPEARS TO BE TRYING TO RE-CAST HISTORY. SINCE HE TOOK OFFICE IN 1990, HUNDREDS OF MONUMENTS TO THE ANTI-FASCIST PARTISANS HAVE BEEN DESTROYED. BUT STREETS AND A PART OF THE CROATIAN MILITARY HAVE BEEN NAMED IN HONOR OF USTASHI OFFICIALS. Source: Voice of America, 28th of October 1996. http://www.hri.org/news/agencies/voa/1996/96-10-28.voa.html#04

C. Hundreds of thousands killed in Jasenovac by Croats

Between its establishment in 1941 and its evacuation in April 1945, tens of thousands of people were murdered at Jasenovac. Among the victims were approximately 20,000 Jews, most of whom were murdered before August 1942. The Croat authorities murdered at least 250,000 Serb residents of Croatia and Bosnia during 1941-1943; tens of thousands of these victims were killed or died at Jasenovac. Source: Holocaust Encyclopedia, The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/index.php?ModuleId=10005449&Type=normal+article,

We saw no sign of [guerrillas] but there were plenty of ownerless horses and cattle, not to mention innumerable geese. At Crkveni Bok, an unhappy place where, under the leadership of an Ustase lieutenant-colonel, some 500 country folk from fifteen to twenty years had met their end, all murdered, the women raped and then tortured, the children killed. I saw in the River Sava a woman's corpse with the eyes gouged out and a stick shoved into the sexual parts. This woman was at most twenty years old when she fell into the hands of these monsters. Anywhere in a corner, the pigs are gorging themselves on an unburied human being. All the houses were looted. The "lucky" inhabitants were consigned to one of the fearsome boxcar trains; many of these involuntary "passengers" cut their veins on the journey. Source: Report by the German Plenipotentiary General in Serbia and Croatia, General Edmund Glaise von Horstenau. Glaise von Horstenau, Gen. Edmund. En General in Zweilicht: Die Erinnerungen von Edmund Glaise von Horstenau, (Peter Broucek, ed.); vol 3, p 168.
http://www.pavelicpapers.com/documents/jasenovac/ja0010.html

E. Serbian Krajina A country without its people.

At the head of the movement for secession of Croatia from Yugoslavia - the Croat Democratic Community (HDZ) - came the retired General Franjo Tudjman, a Croat nationalist of conviction. He was creating political prerequisites, with the nationalists in Croatia and those abroad - the descendants of the Ustashi movement, for the achievement of secessionist aims and chauvinist anti-Serbian targets. Tudjman made also political and other preparations for such an action, he asked for and obtained support from abroad, most of all the support of Germany and of Vatican, therefore, those same centers which at the time have helped Ante Pavelic create his monstrous, genocidal and Fascist NDH in 1941. Franjo Tudjman who is now proclaimed "father of the Croat nation", was building his program of the new Croat state on the nationalistic and chauvinistic traditions of the "first father of the nation" Ante Starcevic and his successor Josip Frank. It is the question here of the rascist concept of the ethnically "clean Croat state". Source: The Center for Peace in the Balkans. http://www.balkanpeace.org/wcs/wct/wcts/wcts01.shtml

Demonstrations in Zagreb only bolster the point. Unfurling slogans from the fascist Independent State of Croatia of World War II, demonstrators pelted the US embassy with eggs. It is worth noting that the current authorities failed to condemn the actions of the demonstrators who greeted passersby with a "Sieg Heil" and a Nazi salute. Source: April, 2000. The Center for Peace in the Balkans. http://www.balkanpeace.org/cib/cro/cro14.shtml

Part III The Ustashi Connection to the Nazi Regime

A. Germany invades Yugoslavia and proclaims Croatia’s independence.

After a revolution by junior military officers overthrew a Yugoslav government which had signed the Axis Tripartite Pact, Nazi Germany invaded Yugoslavia on Orthodox Easter, April 6, 1941. On April 10, Slavko Kvaternik arrived in Zagreb to proclaim the Independent State of Croatia (NDH) in the name of his master, Poglavnik Ante Pavelic. Source: The Pavelic Papers, http://www.pavelicpapers.com/documents/isc/

"Our Great Poglavnik, the hero of the Croatian People, the savior of freedom in our most difficult days, when we trembled in fear before Yugoslavia was erased from the map and our thousand year old state of Croatia emerged with an unbreakable force precisely because of the supernatural wisdom he exhibited from the start of his reign. He invested a superhuman effort to ensure the development of political and cultural life in the NDH. Aside from all of that our sworn enemies with their assaults dared to cause disorder in some parts of our country.

Our Croatian sons, our proud and brave army, completely loyal to the Poglavnik, guarantee a beautiful destiny for the NDH. According to a high order from our Great Poglavnik, the Croatian army divided its knightly duties. Some stand in service for the defense of the state, while others are participating in the Crusade war against Bolsheviks. The great leader of the German Reich assigned units from all allies of the peacemaking Axis to the glorious units of the German army, but not because he fears the lack of power of the German army, but to show the full solidarity of all great and small allies, that they are united and equally devoted to establishing peace and liberty for every nation on the European continent ." Source: "Glasnik Biskupije Djakovacko Srijemske," 1941, No. 18, 154-155. Quoted in Novak, Viktor. Magnum Crimen, p. 569 (First Edition, Zagreb). Translated by Sinisa Djuric. Date: : September 24, 1941. Added: February 6, 2004. http://www.pavelicpapers.com/documents/vatican/va0013.html

On April 30, 1941 - just twenty days after the formation of the Independent State of Croatia - Ustase Poglavnik Ante Pavelic signed the "Aryan Decrees." These infamous documents (located here and here) gave a precise legal definition for who was a Jew and who was an "Aryan." Far from being the result of Nazi "pressure" on the new state, these decrees were in reality more narrow and restrictive for Jews than those in Nazi Germany. The following table is reproduced from Holocaust scholar Raul Hilberg's monumental The Destruction of the European Jews.

GERMAN AND CROATIAN DEFINITIONS OF "JEW"

German Croatian
1. A person who had at least three Jewish grandparents
2. A person who had two Jewish grandparents and who
(a) belonged to the Jewish community on September 15, 1935, or joined it on a subsequent date, or
(b) was married to a three-quarter or full Jew on September 15, 1935, or married one on a subsequent date, or
(c) was the offspring of an extramarital relationship with a three-quarter or full Jew, and was born out of wedlock after July 31, 1936

The slaughter of the Orthodox Serbs undertaken the Ustasha leaders and led by the Poglavnik (head of state) of Croatia, Ante Pavelic, reminds one of the religious wars of bloodiest memory. "A third must become Catholic, a third must leave the country, and a third must die!" This last point of their program was accomplished. When prominent Ustasha leaders claimed that they slaughtered a million Serbs (including babies, children, women and the elderly), that is, in my opinion, a boastful exaggeration. On the basis of the reports submitted to me, I believe that the number of defenseless victims slaughtered to be three quarters of a million.

When I once again brought up the truth about the terrible atrocities around me in Croatia, Adolf Hitler said to me: "I have also told the Poglavnik that one cannot exterminate such a minority: it is simply too large!"  Source: Neubacher, Dr. Hermann. Special Assignment in the Southeast, p. 18-30. Added: October 2002. http://www.pavelicpapers.com/documents/jasenovac/ja0006.html

Many Serbs still carry memories of the massacres their parents and relatives suffered at the hands of the Croats' pro-Nazi Ustashe government during World War II, and fearful of another pogrom, they left en masse. After inhabiting Krajina for 500 years, the Serbs are now virtually gone from there. Source: Fedrako, Kevin. Time. " New Victims, New Victors." Aug. 21, 1995.

Part IV Crimes Committed at Independence:

A. Croatia: Impunity for war crimes and crimes against humanity must end.

Crimes committed in the town of Sisak were chosen in the report as examples of a widespread pattern of violations committed against the civilian population allegedly by members of the Croatian Army and police forces during the armed conflict. On 17 September 1991, 19-year-old Ljubica Solar was in the flat of her boyfriend, a former soldier of the Yugoslav People's Army, when she was killed by a bullet fired from outside the building. Ljubica's mother has repeatedly demanded that the Croatian authorities thoroughly investigate the killing and bring the perpetrators to justice. Reportedly, in 2001 a former member of a special police unit stated to the investigating judge in Sisak that former members of his unit had killed Ljubica Solar. The Croatian authorities are reportedly still investigating this crime and so far, to Amnesty International's knowledge, no one has been indicted. Source: Amnesty International Press Release. 13 December 2004. http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGEUR640062004?open&of=ENG-332

During the 1991 conflict tens of Serbian civilians were killed or "disappeared" in the Sisak region. In many cases the alleged perpetrators of these human rights violations were members of the Croatian Army and police. Dusan Komosar, a 64-year-old ethnic Serb, went missing on 19 October 1991, when armed men reportedly entered his apartment in Sisak, beat him and abducted him. His fate and whereabouts remain unknown to date. His wife Milja, who was present when Dusan Komosar was abducted, had reportedly informed the police of the abduction immediately after it took place, naming those responsible, whom she was able to identify.(6) Reportedly, no serious investigation into the events was launched at the time. Source: CROATIA: Briefing to the United Nations Committee against Torture 32nd Session, May 2004. http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGEUR640012004?open&of=ENG-HRV

Amnesty International believes that the failure of the Croatian authorities to thoroughly investigate massive human rights violations, including acts of torture, cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, which took place during the 1991-1995 armed conflict, constitutes a violation of Articles 2, 12 and 13 of the Convention against Torture. To the extent that the lack of investigation and prosecution of these acts leaves the victims without any form of redress, it constitutes a violation of Article 14 of the Convention against Torture. Moreover, the failure of the Croatian authorities to investigate cases of "disappearances"(7) with a view to disclose to the relatives of the missing the truth about the fate and whereabouts of their loved ones, may amount to a violation of the relatives' right to be free from inhuman and degrading treatment. Source: CROATIA: Briefing to the United Nations Committee against Torture 32nd Session, May 2004. http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGEUR640012004?open&of=ENG-HRV

The trial of six members of the Croatian security forces for crimes committed against Croatian Serb civilians in the Pakracka Poljana area in 1991 and 1992 ended in May. The Zagreb County Court acquitted four of the defendants and sentenced the remaining two to prison terms of up to 20 months for minor offences. One of the defendants, Miro Bajramovic, had confessed in a Croatian newspaper in 1997 to killing more than 70 Serbs. However the indictment contained only one charge of murder and one of attempted murder, as well as crimes of illegal detention and extortion. Source: Amnesty International USA http://www.amnestyusa.org/countries/croatia/document.do?id=30342328268F7EEA802568E400729EE7

In May 2001 the ICTY indicted General Rahim Ademi, commander of the Medak Pocket troops, with unlawful killing of at least 38 Serb civilians and the destruction of hundreds of buildings. Late in 2002 the ICTY charged Bobetko with "command responsibility" for the attack. Source: War crimes tribunal drops charges against Croatian general by Keith Lee and Paul Mitchell reporters published by the committee of the fourth National.

The assault began at dawn on Aug. 4 with a bombardment of the Krajina Serbs' capital, Knin. When more than 100,000 Croatian troops attacked, the Serb army of some 50,000 men seemed simply to melt away. Croatians shelled cities and towns, harassed civilians and engaged in an orgy of looting and burning of Serb homes. Source: Fedrako, Kevin. Time. " New Victims, New Victors." Aug. 21, 1995.

"The Croatian government is far from blameless or democratic, and it has severely discriminated against Serbs living in Croatia." Said one U.S. Diplomat
Source: Walsh, James. Time. " Yugoslavia the Flash of War." Sep. 30, 1991.

The turning point came when Croatian militia units laid siege to Yugoslav army garrisons in the republic and cut off power, water and food supplies."Source: Walsh, James. Time. " Yugoslavia the Flash of War." Sep. 30, 1991.

The Serbs have constructed their own version of reality to justify their aggression. "There is no ethnic cleansing," said Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, "but ethnic shifting. We are doing it to protect people." They have conjured up a phantom Islamic jihad from which they are saving Europe. ( "This is not a civil war," insists Prijedor police chief Drljaca. "It's a religious war." The operative lie is that Bosnia's Muslim leader, Alija Izetbegovic, is bent on creating a Muslim fundamentalist state. Never mind that Bosnia's Muslims are not fundamentalist, indeed are among the more secular followers of the Prophet Muhammad. Croatian President Franjo Tudjman, who shares the Serb ambition to carve up Bosnia, parrots the charge that "there are tendencies to create an Islamic state."

Part V Climate of fear in Croatia:

A. Fleeing en masses from fear

Memories of Croatian atrocities such as the one in Glina are the reason the Serbs in Croatia (the Jews are now nearly extinct there) are fleeing en masse from such a "democracy." According to the Red Cross figures as of August 14, more than, 50,000 refugees, mostly Serbian women, children, and the elderly, had escaped from their homes in Croatia. Source: New York Times on Saturday, August 17, 1991 Think Before You Say "Poor Croatia". Written by Bob Djurdjevic (president of Annex Research, a computer consulting company in Phoenix) http://www.truthinmedia.org/truthinmedia/Columns/ny8-17-91.html

B. Ethnic cleansing, rape, concentration camps

Tens of thousands of women were raped, some of them more than a hundred times, while their sons and husbands were beaten and tortured in concentration camps like Omarska and Manjaca. Millions lost their homes due to a process called "ethnic cleansing." Verification: http://balkansnet.org/ethnicl.html (1992)

"Since 1991, the Croatian authorities have blown up or razed 10,000 houses, mostly of Serbs, but also houses of Croats," said Ivan Zvonimir Cicak. Note that by expelling 280,000 Serbs the Nazi Croats expelled all Serbs that they had under their control as early as 1993. Today, Croatia is the most ethnically pure state in Europe. Verification: David Binder, New York Times, Wednesday, December 8, 1993.

In 1992, after the European Community had repeatedly tried and failed to negotiate a peace, the United Nations was able to administer a truce between the two sides and sent in a peacekeeping force, UNPROFOR. At the time the agreement went into place the Serbs held roughly 30% of the former Yugoslav Republic of Croatia, and the UN agreement froze this status quo, which also left many Croatians as refugees from their homes in the Republic of Serbian Krajina as part of Serbian ethnic cleansing. There were reports of homes being looted and burned, as well as other atrocities committed against Croat civilians. Verification: GlobalSecurity.org. last modified: 27-04-2005 19:16:17 Zulu

With the escalating chaos, many of those who fled from other republics had no choice but to remain in Serbia and Montenegro. By the end of 1999 nearly 50,000 people had found refuge in those republics, with no realistic possibility of returning home. In April 2001, the Serbian Commissariat for Refugees, in cooperation with the UNHCR, again carried out a registration of refugees and others who had fled to Serbia because of the war. The first analyses of the data from July 2001 register 451,980 persons in Serbia. Of that population, 377,731 have refugee status, while 72,249 do not meet all the necessary conditions to acquire this status under international law. Although it is in some cases possible to return, the majority of refugees and IDPs (60.6% of those from Croatia and 59.8% of those from Bosnia-Herzegovina) have opted for integration in The State Union of Serbia and Montenegro. Source: Office of Media Relations, Serbian Government. http://www.arhiva.serbia.sr.gov.yu/cms/view.php?id=1017

A. Refugee Returns

Between 300,000 and 350,000 Croatian Serbs left their homes during the 1991-95 war in Croatia, mostly for Serbia and Montenegro, and Bosnia. The total number of returns registered by the Croatian government as of July 2003 was 102,504. The actual number of returnees is significantly lower because, after a short stay in Croatia, many depart again for Serbia and Montenegro or Bosnia. Source: Human Rights Watch, January 2004. http://hrw.org/english/docs/2003/12/31/croati7021.htm

Estimates vary widely, but it is safe to assume that approximately half of Croatia's Serb population in 1991 are now living outside the country as refugees.22 Although around 35,000 Serbs have returned to Croatia since 1996, an equal number have departed, most notably from Eastern Slavonia. Although the Croatian government's 1998 Program for Return has had some success in facilitating organized return to Croatia, most Serbs continue to return at their own initiative, through so-called "spontaneous" means. Lack of documentation proving citizenship continues to impede the return of Serbs.23 Although almost all are eligible for citizenship either by birth or naturalization, many refugee Serbs failed to obtain Croatian citizenship documents following Croatia's independence in 1991. Frequently lacking documents, Serb refugees often find it difficult to prove that they are eligible for citizenship, especially if they obtained citizenship by naturalization. Croatia's citizenship law, which follows a jus sanguinis model where citizenship is determined by descent rather than residence, makes it more difficult for long-term Serb residents to obtain citizenship by naturalization than it does for ethnic Croats with no history of residence in Croatia. Source: Human Rights Watch. http://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/croatia2/Electweb-04.htm

Besides the incidents around Kostajnica, Amnesty International has also received other reports of violent harassment. For example, there are regular reports of explosives being used against Croatian Serbs (including many who fled and then returned) or their property in the former Sector North. The victims have been maimed or even killed, yet the authorities appear to have done little to apprehend the perpetrators. Source: Human Rights Monitoring in Croatia http://web.amnesty.org/library/pdf/EUR640031997ENGLISH/$File/EUR6400397.pdf

D. Discriminative laws that strip Croatians of Serbian descent from much of what they own.

Many of the homes owned by displaced persons who wish to return are occupied, some under the provision of the law on Temporary Taking over and Administration of Specified Property which came into force in September 1995. This law makes it possible for the authorities to place "abandoned" private property under temporary public administration and to give that property to others. The OSCE has noted its concern that the unclarity of this law may be used to postpone or avoid the decision on return of property to the legitimate owner and, in effect, facilitate the continued displacement of Croatian Serbs. Furthermore, many other homes were destroyed and the laws regarding eligibility for compensation and credit for rebuilding their homes are highly discriminatory. Source: Human Rights Monitoring in Croatia http://web.amnesty.org/library/pdf/EUR640031997ENGLISH/$File/EUR6400397.pdf

E. Refugees too scared to return

Some refugees in Banja Luka clearly do not wish to go back, in part because so much has changed. Human Rights Watch spoke to a woman of mixed family originally from Rijeka. A psychologist by training, the woman had a strong attachment to Croatia, noting that until 1991 "Serbs from Croatia felt like Croatia was our country....[but then] Serbs became a minority in the constitution."229 She and her husband and children moved first to Hrvatska Kostajnica and then to Bosanska Kostajnica, until Serbs occupied Hrvatska Kostajnica in September 1991, at which point they returned to Hrvatska Kostajnica until Operation Storm in August 1995 when she and her family fled to Banja Luka. She told Human Rights Watch "it took me three years to forget Rijeka." Since moving to Banja Luka she has been able to find work as an instructor. She concluded by saying: "I don’t want to go back. Here I have a good job." Source: Human Rights Watch http://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/croatia/Crosrb99-05.htm

The following are news articles found that prove that thousands of refugees were fleeing from Croatia:

G. Statistics of fleeing refugees

Refugees (country of origin): 99,170 (Bosnia) 188,656 (Croatia) Source: http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/yi.html

The wars have produced several million refugees who have been in such a status for the whole of the decade. The first refugees who arrived on the territory of Serbia and Montenegro (FR Yugoslavia) came from the former Yugoslav republics and their number kept increasing as the armed conflicts intensified. Some of those who had been expelled have returned to the places from where they had fled, but the number of displaced people has remained high until the present day. It is estimated that, at one point, there were over 2.5m refugees and displaced people in Yugoslavia. According to the data of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), there were 646 000 refugees (618 000 in Serbia and 28 000 in Montenegro) were left by mid-1996. Before that, all had lived in the republics of the former Yugoslavia: Croatia; Bosnia and Herzegovina; and Slovenia. In December 1999, there were still 503 300 registered refugees in Serbia and 23 200 in Montenegro. At the same time, by April 2000 there were 180 000 internally displaced people from Kosovo and Metohija registered in Serbia and about 31 500 in Montenegro. Source: Drenka Vulkovic, South East Europe Review. http://www.boeckler.de/pdf/South-East_Europe_Review-2001-04-p009.pdf#search='Number%20of%20Refugees%20in%20Serbia

I. Refugees registered in Serbia.

Within Serbia, there are 408 registered collective centers, accommodating 30,056 people. Of this number, 20,949 are refugees, while 9,107 are IDPs from Kosovo-Metohija. About 10,000 live in unregistered collective centers, while still others live with their relatives or friends, in their own houses and apartments or in rental housing. The greatest numbers of refugees are housed in Vojvodina, Belgrade and in the municipalities of Loznica and Sabac. Although repatriation is seen as the best permanent solution to the refugee problem, The State Union of Serbia and Montenegro respects the decision of the majority of refugees who have decided to make Yugoslavia their home. Source: Office of Media Relations, Serbian Government.
http://www.arhiva.serbia.sr.gov.yu/cms/view.php?id=1017

As early as 1994 the Serbian Government and the Serbian Commissariat for Refugees began preparations for a program for the permanent settlement of refugees in The State Union of Serbia and Montenegro. So far, the program has been highly successful. Refugees have shown great interest in taking up permanent residence in The State Union of Serbia and Montenegro. Furthermore, Serbian municipalities are prepared to provide residential buildings and arable land, as well as employment for members of refugee families. The limited funds available to the Serbian Government and the UNHCR are the single main obstacle slowing construction in these housing projects. Source: Office of Media Relations, Serbian Government.
http://www.arhiva.serbia.sr.gov.yu/cms/view.php?id=1017

A murderous ethnic conflict in the former Yugoslavia has forced over 1.5 million refugees to flee to Serbia and Montenegro. Verification: "Refugees: A comprehensive European strategy" Statement by Mrs. Sadako Ogata, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, to the German UN Association and the German Association for Foreign Policy. Bonn, 21 June 1994 Source: http://www.unhcr.ch/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/home/opendoc.htm?tbl=ADMIN&id=3ae68fc78&page=admin

No Genocide within Yugoslavia

Evidence: It has already been seen how acts of ‘ethnic cleansing’, such as displacement from homes and rape of women, can have genocidal consequences as defined under Article II. But the perpetrators of those acts of ‘ethnic cleansing’ will not be found culpable under the Convention without the genocidal intent to destroy that given ethnic group.

Actions brought under the Convention for acts of genocide in the Former Yugoslavia will inevitably fail, because evidence of specific genocidal intent cannot be established. This would be so even where the evidence clearly suggests that acts of genocide were perpetrated. Source: Authorized by: Archie Zariski, Managing Editor, E Law. Disclaimer & Copyright Notice © 2003 Murdoch University

This constitutes a further act by Belgrade to rectify politically biased sentences passed during the Milosevic regime. The European Union now expects Serbia to complete the review of the remaining cases as rapidly as possible, in order to correct the injustices of the Milosevic era. Verification: statement by European Commission President Romano Prodi, April 2001.

For reasons of ignorance, lack of knowledge, corruption and bribery, conscious manipulation, or simple and innocent unawareness, many of the news reports are of poor quality, biased, unbalanced and stereotypical. Verification: Allen, Tim and Seaton, Jean (eds.): The Media of Conflict, Zed Books, London: 1999

The CBC is reporting that he had told a Vancouver newspaper that the war crimes case against Milosevic was being exaggerated by "biased media." Keith is a retired Canadian military officer who served as a UN observer in Kosovo in the late 1990s and testified at the request of Milosevic at The Hague late last year. Verification: Edward S. Herman; July 07, 2005

All this can never again be explained by the German partiality towards the Croatian side and by all kinds of anti-Serbian conspiracies, since the world opinion is biased against Serbia and the Army. Verification: December 9, 1991 Vreme News Digest Agency No 11 Veljko Kadijevic, a Loser by Stojan Cerovic

a. The news coverage of Kosovo is a showcase of biased media reporting. This is true both for international coverage of Kosovo, but also for coverage within Yugoslavia. As a result, the conflict is not stopped, but made even worse - and media who participate in fan club / cheerleaders practice must bear a share of responsibility for prolonged tragedy of both Albanians and Serbs…

b. For reasons of ignorance, lack of knowledge, corruption and bribery, conscious manipulation, or simple and innocent unawareness, many of the news reports are of poor quality, biased, unbalanced and stereotypical. Verification: Allen, Tim and Seaton, Jean (eds.): The Media of Conflict, Zed Books, London: 1999

The CBC is reporting that he had told a Vancouver newspaper that the war crimes case against Milosevic was being exaggerated by "biased media." Keith is a retired Canadian military officer who served as a UN observer in Kosovo in the late 1990s and testified at the request of Milosevic at The Hague late last year. Verification: Edward S. Herman; July 07, 2005

Furthermore, the nationality conflict is not so clear cut; the lines are not so neatly drawn. Not all Serbs in Croatia were against the independence movements. Though I have no reliable numbers, I am told by Croatian colleagues (quoting Croatian news sources, which tend to be biased) that out of approximately 15% of the Serbian nationals living in Croatia, reportedly only one- fifth fought with Serbs against Croats. The remaining four-fifths were in favor of an independent Croatian state. Verification: Posted:12/24/96, 1996 DePaul University All Right Reserved.

H. Germany covers up Croatian murders"

In Zagreb, President Franjo Tudjman, a nationalist and anti-Semitic, thanked Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel for all their support [after operation storm] Tudjman had a lot to be thankful for. In addition to inventing Croatia five years ago (as it did under Hitler, the only other time the place was called independent), Germany ran the public relations blitz which accompanied the battle plan. A contingent from the German interior ministry, two units from Bonn's foreign affairs department and German media specialists believed to be BND espionage agents stage managed a highly successful effort to minimized negative Croatian press. Verification: Germany covers up Croatian murders, Germany Alert, 11 August 1995

The approach of the West's media to the Yugoslavian conflict has been biased since its outbreak in 1991. Verification: R. O Tuathail, Ireland, Milosevic trial: Is he persuading anyone?

I think Milosevic is finally having the chance to defend himself justly, after years of NATO encouraged media against him considering nothing from his point of view. Verification: Andrea Bloomfield, Northern Ireland, Milosevic trial: Is he persuading anyone?

Mr. Lane's, a rebuttal of journalist Peter Brock's, charges of media bias against the Serbs, reads more like a personal vendetta. Is it because Mr. Brock's article in Foreign Policy, "Dateline Yugoslavia: The Partisan Press," is professional and persuasive? (A condensed version appeared in Forum on March 20, 1994.) How could any reasonable person deny that there is media bias against the Serbs in the coverage of the Bosnia civil war? The Serbian voice is suppressed. Because Mr. Brock, a political editor for the El Paso Herald-Post, supposedly used some information from broadcasts on Belgrade television, Mr. Lane suggests that this information is "invented." Mr. Lane claims Belgrade television is a propaganda tool of Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic. However, the crucial thing to consider is the information. Is it true or false? Mr. Brock's numerous examples of blatant media blunders are far more convincing than Mr. Lane's handful of objections .

Perhaps Mr. Lane would feel more comfortable receiving information from the Bosnian Muslim government or the media in Zagreb, Croatia, which have been described as among the least free in Europe. It is disturbing that an editor such as Charles Lane would write, referring to Foreign Policy's position of giving editorial space to the Serbian side: "This concept of even-handedness is of questionable value in dealing with the starkest moral drama in Europe since 1945." What is of questionable value is a rebuttal feeble on fact, high on personal attack and devoid of logic. There is suffering on all sides in civil wars. Mr. Lane would have us believe that only Muslims are victims of aggression and ethnic cleansing.

And since Mr. Lane brought up 1945, he should have said the Serbs in Croatia and Bosnia were the victims of a huge holocaust by Croats and Muslims. When World War II ended, so many Serbs had been brutally murdered that they no longer were the majority ethnic group in Bosnia. No one has suggested that Serb war crimes were the figment of media bias, as Mr. Lane asserts. What Mr. Brock objects to - as every American should - are Croat and Muslim war crimes being blamed on Serbs, Serb war dead becoming Croat or Muslim war dead in our media and war crimes against Scrbs that go unreported.

The sanctions include an oil embargo, financial restrictions and a visa ban on people seen as helping Milosevic, an indicted war crimes suspect whom the EU wants to see ousted. Verification: EU offers carrot to Yugoslavian voters, September 19, 2000.

Yugoslavia's funds were frozen in 1992 when the country faced sanctions over the wars in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia. The funds that were frozen belong to former Yugoslav banks and companies, state agencies and services. The decision on unfreezing the funds does not refer to the assets of former Yugoslavia's diplomatic missions, former National Bank of Yugoslavia or to some private funds that are still under sanctions. America welcomed the unfreezing of these funds describing it as an important step in normalizing relations with all former Yugoslavia's successors. Verification: US Unfreezes Part of Former Yugoslavia's Funds, Invest-in-serbia February 26, 2003.

The president, who last week said he was giving serious consideration to air strikes and a lifting of an embargo that prohibits the sale of arms to Bosnia, said it was "clear that the United States and our allies need to move forward with a stronger policy." His policy would be announced "in the next several days," he said. The U.N. resolution was put into effect after Serbian leadership in Bosnia refused to accept a U.N.-sponsored peace plan. Washington - As he deliberated over more drastic steps, President Clinton Monday ordered a tightening of the economic sanctions against Serbia in hopes of forcing the Balkan state to halt its warfare in Bosnia. The new steps implement a U.N. resolution, adopted Sunday, that calls for U.N. members to freeze Serbian assets abroad and move even further to cut off trade between Serbia and the outside world. The measures are expected to do little to halt the Serbian military machine, but are likely to further damage an economy that already is suffering from hyperinflation, a 40 percent one-year decline in industrial production, high unemployment and shortages of key industrial goods and fuel, officials said. Clinton said he would consult Congress this week on further steps to halt the fighting that already has left 135,000 missing or dead in the former Yugoslavia in the past year. Verification: Clinton Urges Stiffer Sanctions Against Serbia to Curb Warfare, By Paul Richter, Los Angeles Times, April 27, 1993

Washington - Acting to cement peace in the Balkans, President Clinton has suspended U.S. sanctions imposed three years ago against Serbia and Montenegro. The president said Thursday the economic and military sanctions had achieved their purpose of bringing the Serbs to the negotiating table to forge a peace agreement. But Clinton warned that they could be reimposed at anytime if the Serbs repudiate the agreement Serbia reached in Dayton, Ohio, in November.

"Before agreeing to sanctions suspension, we insisted on a credible reimposition mechanism to ensure no backsliding on the commitments made by the Serbs," the president said in a statement. Clinton said that if the NATO commander in Bosnia determines the Bosnian Serbs are not meeting their obligations under the peace agreement, "economic sanctions may again go into effect against Serbia." Clinton said the likelihood that sanctions would be lifted was one of the key factors leading Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic's agreement to make concessions at Dayton and sign a peace accord in Paris on Dec. 14. "Sanctions relief was clearly anticipated as a consequence of the accord," Clinton said. The economic sanctions promoted by the Clinton administration are credited with curtailing delivery of manufactured goods, gasoline and other imports to the two remnants of the former Yugoslavia. Allied warships blockaded Serbia and Montenegro in the Adriatic Sea to enforce a United Nations embargo. The United States observed an arms embargo on all sides of the Bosnian conflict imposed by the U.N. Security Council in Nov. 1991. Clinton noted that Security Council voted on Nov. 22, to provide sanctions relief. Verification: Clinton Suspends Sanctions Against Serbia and Montenegro, Associated Press, 1995.

1992 -- More trade sanctions are introduced over Yugoslavia's role in the war in Bosnia.

1995 -- Basic trade sanctions are lifted following the Dayton agreement, but Yugoslavia is still denied access to international finance.

1998 -- Belgrade's polices in Kosovo prompt the United Nations to impose an arms embargo against Yugoslavia. The EU and the United States ban new investments in Yugoslavia and freeze Yugoslavia's assets abroad. The EU also bans Yugoslav airline flights.

1999 -- The EU bans oil sales to Yugoslavia. The EU also imposes a visa ban for hundreds of Serbian politicians, army and police officers and businesspersons.

2000 -- Pressure from the Serbian opposition prompts the EU to temporarily suspend its ban on commercial flights. In July, the EU also exempts a "white list" of companies in Serbia from financial restrictions. In October, following opposition leader Vojislav Kostunica's inauguration as Yugoslavia's new president, the EU lifts sanctions it had imposed since 1998. Verification: Sanctions on Yugoslavia, cnn.com/SPECIALS/2000/yugo.crisis/story/sanctions/

Part VIII The economic war/ Economic Collapse in Serbia and Montenegro:

A. Inflation, unemployment and trade due to war

The severity of the crises can be easily detected by examining basic economic indicators during the period 1980-1990: average increase in social product (of social owned sector) was 0.6% (while for instance in the period 1966-1975 it was 5.8% and 1976-1980 it was 5.6% was followed with increase in employment for 1,9%. Productivity decreased at average rate of 1.2%, average decreasing rate in fixed investments was 5.5% (fixed investments dropped in 1989 to only 15-16% of the social product) while efficiency of capital investments was at the very low level (negative marginal capital coefficient in 1983, 1987, 1988). Further, average inflation rate was high (84%), as well as rate of unemployment (in 1990 15. 9% of total working capable labor force). What is more Tito's death coincided with the external indebtedness crisis. Huge foreign debt in 1980 reached 17.347 billion US dollars. A aggravating circumstance was that it was also the year when SFRY had to begin with paying off not only the interest, but also the great deal of the principal. As for the foreign trade, balance of payments deficit was sharply reduced thanks not only to increased export, but also to limited import, spending the foreign currency reserves and increase in short-term borrowing. Source: William Cowper and Nikolic, M, Cree Maginet, 2002.
http://www.creemaginet.com/ognjen_radonjic_pregled.htm

B. GDP per capita (in US dollars) since the arrival of refugees to Serbia and Montenegro.

Source: William Cowper and Nikolic, M, Cree Maginet, 2002. Bulletin G17 Institute No. 4, 2000, Bulletin G17 Institute No. 6, 2000, Bulletin G17 Institute No. 10, 2000, http://www.g17plus.org.yu/ http://www.creemaginet.com/ognjen_radonjic_pregled.htm

Since the arrival of refugees, recorded GDP in current prices declined from about 28.5 billion US dollars in 1990 to about 9 billion US dollars in 2000. The liabilities on both external and internal level increased rapidly. Yugoslavia 's external debt amounted over 12 billion dollars. About 4.5 billion dollars of old foreign currency savings should be added to this amount.

Debt due to interest on external debt was increasing about 600 million US dollars per year, and 130 million US dollars per year in case of liabilities towards the population. Cumulative trade deficit reproduced in balance of payments deficit in respective period was around 16 billion US dollars. Source: http://www.creemaginet.com/ognjen_radonjic_pregled.htm

NATO has destroyed much the infrastructure of the Yugoslav economy, putting hundreds of thousands of people out of work and creating widespread suffering for civilians, whose deaths have outnumbered military casualties by 4 to 1. GDP has declined by an estimated 25 percent. Source: http://www.agitprop.org.au/stopnato/19990711stoan.php

In 1995 Croatian government troops regained most of the regions of Croatia that Croatian Serb nationalists had controlled since 1991, which produced a flood of Serb refugees estimated at 646,000 into the FRY. This created additional economic strain and social unrest in Yugoslavia. Source: David Dyker, M.A., D.Phil, Professor of Economics, University of Sussex. Author of Yugoslavia and After,The Technology of Transition, and The European Economy, Robert M. Hayden, J.D., Ph.D, Director, Center for Russian and East European Studies, University of Pittsburgh. Author of Blueprints for a House Divided: The Constitutional Logic of the Yugoslav Conflicts,Social Courts in Theory and Practice: Yugoslav Workers’ Courts, and Imagined Communities and Real Victims: Self-Determination and Ethnic Cleansing in Yugoslavia, and Dennison Rusinow, B.A., M.A., Ph.D, Late Adjunct Professor of History, University of Pittsburgh. Author of The Yugoslav Experiment and other books. Editor of Yugoslavia- A Fractured Federalism. http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761579562_7/Serbia_and_Montenegro.html#s15

F. Refugee relief affected GDP

Nearly DM 140m was allocated from the federal and the republican budgets in the period 1997-2000 for the relief of refugees and displaced people. The share of these resources (without administrative costs) in this period was 1.6% of total government expenditure and accounted for 0.2% of GDP. Adding to this the costs of accommodation, health and social protection, and education, Yugoslavia spent more than 5% of its GDP each year on refugee relief. Source: Drenka Vulkovic, South East Europe Review. http://www.boeckler.de/pdf/South-East_Europe_Review-2001-04-p009.pdf#search='Number%20of%20Refugees%20in%20Serbia

Part IX Operation Storm:

A. Displacement and mass killing of Croatian Serb civilians

In the aftermath of the operations members of the Croatian Army and police murdered, tortured, and forcibly expelled Croatian Serb civilians who had remained in the area as well as members of the withdrawing Croatian Serb armed forces. Out of approximately 300,000 Croatian Serbs displaced during the 1991-95 war, only approximately 117,000 are officially registered as having returned. Source: Amnesty International news release published on 3rd August 2005 http://www.amnesty.org.uk/news/press/16330.shtml

According to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, some 200,000 Croatian refugees, mostly Croatian Serbs, are still displaced in neighboring countries and beyond. Many Croatian Serbs, especially those who formerly lived in urban areas, cannot return because they have lost their tenancy rights to socially owned apartments. Croatian Serbs continue to be the victim of discrimination in access to employment and other economic and social rights; some cases of violence and harassment against Croatian Serbs continue to be reported. Source: Amnesty International news release published on 3rd August 2005 http://www.amnesty.org.uk/news/press/16330.shtml

C. Fleeing even in early stages of operation storm

In only 48 hours since the start of Operation Storm occupied regions of northern Dalmatia, south and east Lika, Kordun and Banija were liberated. 30,000 Serb soldiers and 80,000 Serb civilians fled from Croatia. Source: http://www.hrt.hr/arhiv/tudjman/domovinski-eng.htm

The U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague says at least 150 Serb civilians were killed during and after Storm, Croatian human rights groups say they have identified over 600 victims, Serb authorities say around 2,500 people died. Verification: Key facts on Croatia's 1995 Operation Storm, August 5, 2005.

The Hague "concluded that the Croatian Army carried out summary executions, indiscriminate shelling of civilian populations and 'ethnic cleansing' during a 1995 assault that was a turning point in the Balkan wars, according to tribunal documents." The Times' account stated that the tribunal was recommending the indictment of three Croatian generals. Source: David North, The US and ethnic cleansing--the case of Croatia. Published by the committee of the fourth National.

Part X Germany illegally aided Operation Storm financially:

The Croatian Embassy in the US reports, that the US, Germany and Austria each invested approximately one billion US dollars in Croatia between 1993-2000. Source: British MI6 agents named in Balkans By Paul Mitchell 27 October 2004 Over the last few weeks newspapers in Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina have exposed the identities of several British MI6 intelligence agents operating in the Balkans http://home.wanadoo.nl/ebad/content/archief_kroatie.html

Tudjman became a western ally in limiting Serbia's influence in the Balkans and received support from the US and Germany in the 1992-1995 civil war in Bosnia, enabling him to conquer large sections of northwest Bosnia, driving out hundreds of thousands of Serbs. The ICTY have indicted General Gotovina for "command responsibility" for war crimes carried out at this time. Source: http://home.wanadoo.nl/ebad/content/archief_kroatie.html

This information has received limited confirmation from the German government which, in a written parliamentary reply to Bundestag member Ulla Jelpke, dated 14 April, stated that "around 30 German citizens are active as advisers to the Croatian National Guard." Remarkably, however, this same parliamentary answer, from Foreign Office State minister Helmut Schafer, claims bizarrely for example that the German government has "no knowledge" either of former soldiers of the East German army fighting on the side of Croatia or of illegal weapons being delivered from Germany. Yet this flies in the face of evidence, presented before Schafer's reply by the German Interior Ministry, confirming assistance of the Black Legion and saying that this troop was under the command of a former East German officer. In the summer of 1991, Le Pen and the German Fascist MEP Harald Neubauer made a secret trip to Zagreb for talks with senior advisers to the Croatian leader Franjo Tudjman. Verification:Searchlight-July1992,London

The private consulting firm Military Professional Resources Inc. (MPRI) was the key in helping train the Croatian military. It should be noted that all firms that engage in such work must get a license from the State Department before being contracted by a foreign government for military consultation. Verification: GlobalSecurity.org. Last modified: 27-04-2005 19:16:17 Zulu

United Nations officials, Great Britain and France are among the stunned parties to that German-planned, U.S. backed Croatian blitzkrieg that has set off the largest human refugee catastrophe in Europe since World War II. Croatia used tanks and guns supplied by Germany (most of them from the former East German army) as it shelled refugees trying to flee its troops, most of who were trained by the German Bundeswehr. In Zagreb, President Franjo Tudjman, a nationalist and anti-Semitic, thanked Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel for all their support. Tudjman had a lot to be thankful for. In addition to inventing Croatia five years ago (as it did under Hitler, the only other time the place was called independent), Germany ran the public relations blitz which accompanied the battle plan. A contingent from the German interior ministry, two units from Bonn's foreign affairs department and German media specialists believed to be BND espionage agents stage managed a highly successful effort to minimized negative Croatian press. Verification: Germany covers up Croatian murders, Germany Alert, 11 August 1995

Part XI Operation Flash:

Apart from Krajina forces that initially resisted Croatian assault, Serb forces didn't react to those events, apart from number of cluster shells being fired on Zagreb, resulting in civillians being killed and injured. On that very same day Krajina leader Milan Martiæ publicly took responsibility for the shelling, and that statement is now basis for his war crimes indictment at ICTY. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Flash#Timeline

The outcome of the operation was not surprising, considering the huge disparity in numbers, equipment, training and, ultimately, morale between two opposing sides. However, it proved to be major boost for Croatian Army and it tested procedures and tactics that would be employed in Operation Storm with even more spectacular results. Among Serbs in RSK and Republic of Srpska Operation Flash caused huge demoralisation. SAO Western Slavonia was not only the first major part of Krajina to be erased from the maps; it also proved untennability of Greater Serbian project under new circumstances. Serbs from SAO Western Slavonia not only failed to get support from Serbia proper, but also from Republic of Srpska. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Flash#Timeline

Milosevic had no legal authority over the JNA during the course of the military operations in Croatia and Bosnia in 1991 and 1992. Source: http://www.iwpr.net/?apc_state=henitri200509&s=i&o=200510

According to Milosevic, he was "unaware of the fact that there existed a Serbian Police unit under the name [Red Berets]". He also stated that in "almost every town in Republika Srpska and Republika Srpska Krajina [parts of Bosnia and Croatia under Serbian control] there units that used to wear red berets and were also known under that name." Milosevic says this means that those crimes in Croatia and Bosnia that are attributed Frenki’s Red Berets were actually committed by local forces, which had nothing to do with Serbian secret police and him as the President of Serbia. Source: COMMENT: Milosevic and the Red Berets, tribunal update from the IWPR. By Mirko Klarin in The Hague, 2005.

The particular problem of applying general principles of international law relating to State responsibility for de facto organs or agents to the specific circumstance of rebel forces fighting a seemingly internal conflict against the recognized government of a State, but dependent on the support of a foreign Power in the continuation of that conflict, was considered by the International Court of Justice ("Court") in the Case Concerning Military and Paramilitary Activities in and Against Nicaragua, (Nicar. v U.S.) (Meritis), ("Nicaragua case"). According to the Court: The conflict between the contras' forces and those of the Government of Nicaragua is an armed conflict which is "not of an international character"... Source: www.icj-cij.com

B. United States participation, even if preponderant or decisive, in the financing, organizing, training, supplying and equipping of the contras, the selection of its military or paramilitary targets, and the planning of the whole of its operation, is still insufficient in itself, on the basis of the evidence in the possession of the Court, for the purposes of attributing to the United States the acts committed by the contras in the course of their military or paramilitary operations in Nicaragua. All forms of United States participation mentioned above, and even the general control by the respondent State over a force with a high degree of dependence on it, would not in themselves mean, without further evidence, that the United States directed or enforced the perpetration of the acts contrary to human rights and humanitarian law alleged by the applicant State. Such acts could well be committed by members of the contra without the control of the United States. For this conduct to give rise to legal responsibility of the United States, it would in principle have to be proved that that State had effective control of the military or paramilitary operations in the course of which the alleged violations were committed.  Source: http://www.icj-cij.org/icjwww/icases/inus/inusframe.htm,