UNDERSTANDING
THE GOLDSTONE REPORT

The Prosecutor's Gullibility and Rashness
. . . international actors in Bosnia were biased towards one side if not indifferent. What was surprising, however, was the tendency of the International Criminal Tribunal in the Hague, and especially its prosecutor Richard Goldstone, to incorrectly apply and breach the very rules that it had instituted. From November 1993 when eleven judges were appointed and the Tribunal began to work, up to 30 January 1996 (two years and two months later), the Prosecutor's office carefully collected all available data related to war crimes on the territory of former Yugoslavia, in particular in Bosnia and Herzegovina. During this time absolutely no-one marked General Djordje Djukic and Colonel Aleksa Krsmanovic as suspected war criminals, even though all sides, including the Muslim authorities in Sarajevo assisted in the collection of data and the compilation of a list of suspects. This fact should have prescribed at the very least restraint and great caution on the part of Prosecutor Richard Goldstone . . . the ambitious Richard Goldstone decided on 7 February to instigate proceedings against General Djordje Djukic and Colonel Aleksa Krsmanovic, thereby validating the lawlessness of the Muslims and their alleged suspicion of the two for being war criminals. He then sent his experts to Sarajevo to investigate this long awaited case.

During talks with CSCE representatives in Vienna, Goldstone clearly stated that proof against Djukic and Krsmanovic "was serious enough to call for an investigation"(1). Hence Christian Chartier, spokesman of The Hague Tribunal announced that Goldstone "had concluded that there were adequate grounds to take the Bosnian charges seriously and carry out an investigation into the possible guilt of the suspects for acts under the jurisdiction of the International Tribunal"(2). 

. . . at the request of Prosecutor Richard Goldstone, General Djordje Djukic and Colonel Aleksa Krsmanovic were transferred to the International Tribunal prison in The Hague as suspects. This implied that in accordance with Rule 2 of the Tribunal "the Prosecutor possesses reliable information which tends to show that they may have committed a crime over which the Tribunal has jurisdiction". It is hardly necessary to say that the most important component of this sentence is the reliability of the information regarding alleged crimes committed by the suspects.

The Prosecutor's Violation of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence
To his great regret, Richard Goldstone very quickly realized that the information he had received from Sarajevo was not at all reliable, and that the thirty or so officials sent to The Hague by the US Ministry of Justice at its own expense had not discovered anything of importance in the meantime. Only then did he realize that at the very beginning of the case he had made an unforgivable mistake and seriously violated the Tribunal's Rules of Procedure and Evidence. --end of quotes fromCavoski -read more at link--

iii) The Bombing of the RTS (Serbian TV and Radio Station) in Belgrade on 23/4/99

 

here]

has tended to assume that the NATO and NATO countries’ press statements are generally reliable and that explanations have been honestly given. . .

there is simply no evidence of the necessary crime base for charges of genocide or crimes against humanity [on the part of NATO or its officials] . . .

NATO has admitted that mistakes did occur during the bombing campaign; errors of judgment may also have occurred. . .

. . . the committee is of the opinion that neither an in-depth investigation related to the bombing campaign as a whole nor investigations related to specific incidents are justified. . . On the basis of information available, the committee recommends that no investigation be commenced by the OTP [= Office of the Prosecutor] in relation to the NATO bombing campaign or incidents occurring during the campaign. [see Final Report here]

"there was not sufficient evidence against individuals to warrant further investigation" [see Herman & Peterson quoted below]

In the indictment of Milosevic, Arbour used evidence about events that took place only six weeks earlier from a war zone, provided by an interested party (NATO), unverified by Tribunal personnel, and in conflict with her claim that she would never proceed on the basis of “uncorroborated” evidence. But neither she nor Del Ponte [Arbour's successor] could even "open an investigation" into NATO’s conduct during the war, after a year, with overwhelming evidence in the public domain pertaining to NATO actions that had killed many more than the numbers presented in the initial indictment of Milosevic (May 22, 1999). That indictment and the charge of "crimes against humanity" were based on an alleged 385 killings for which Milosevic is said to have borne “command responsibility;” but the OTP Report found that the 500 deaths attributable to NATO’s actions were too few to rate--"there is simply no evidence of the necessary crime base for charges of genocide or crimes against humanity." (49) (It should also be noted that the first chief prosecutor of the ICTY, the sainted Richard Goldstone, vigorously defended the Tribunal’s handling of the NATO charges in a debate with John Laughland, saying that the Tribunal simply “held that there was not sufficient evidence against individuals to warrant further investigation,” when as we have indicated there was no serious initial investigation and the 500 deaths conceded by the OTP exceeded the total charged to Milosevic.) (50)
[Prof Edward Herman, emeritus, University of Pennsylvania Wharton School [here], & David Peterson. Herman is a notorious "leftist."]