The Krajina is the border region between Croatia and Bosnia and, together with Slavonija (along the border between Croatia and Serbia), it made up the self-proclaimed Serb Republic of Krajina (1991-95).
Nitpicks:
The defence lawyer appears to want to drum up patriotic support for Gotovina at home, not that that will do him any good anyway since Gotovina is already under arrest in The Hague... words like that might have had a "useful" effect when Croatia was being asked to surrender Gotovina in 2005.
On the other hand, I'm inclined to lend some credence to the claim that the ICTY's prosecutors maybe haven't been able to assemble a watertight case against Gotovina and are desperate. Milosevic gave Del Ponte a run for her money during the trial, and he was running his own defence.
As for "his words were interpreted as saying that he'll prove that the Croats are a genocidal nation", I can't search the Croatian online press for the original interview text or a sample of the reactions. Maybe that is an accurate description of the Croatian press commentary going ballistic over the interview. Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
I can't search the Croatian online press for the original interview text or a sample of the reactions.
Here is Brammertz's interview with Vecernji list, and here is the defence lawier's reaction. Google Translate is your friend.
The interview is long, and most of it is in general terms (not specifically about Croatia). Here is the part on Gotovina (with my admittedly amateurish attempts to improve upon Google Translate):
That's it.
Brammertz comes closest to suggest something wrong with Croatia in general when he speaks about helping the "Croatian public" to "better understand what happened in 1995" -- implying that the Gotovina-supporting 90% has the wrong idea of what happened. (My cynical self contends that a not insignificant part of that 90% did know very well what happened, but condoned it.) Indeed the lawyer's sputtering response was triggered by this passage only -- and there I find all that was referenced to you, with all the bombast and attempt to drum up patriotic support:
Now his take on the evidence:
Something asked for for 18 months doesn't appear to be all that "new evidence".
Gotovina's lawyer's reaction is completely justified. The headline of Brammertz's interview is "SOMEONE HAS CONCEALED KEY EVIDENCE AGAINST GOTOVINA." In the interview, Brammertz himself states in the interview: "It seems to us unlikely that key documents that pertain to a major military operation might simply disappear. We have reason to believe that some people hid documents deliberately." One can completely understand the reaction of Gotovina's lawyer to this type of allegation by a prosecutor. It implies that the accused is guilty but that there is a cover-up preventing the prosecution from proving it. Gotovina's lawyer was completely right to attack Brammertz for making this type of assertion.
Furthermore, Gotovina's lawyer's response was hardly "sputtering" or an attempt to "drum up patriotic support." It is an attempt to defend his client's public reputation. Remember, it was Brammertz who first went public with the allegation that "someone is hiding evidence against Gotovina." The whole purpose of a trial is to either prove that the accused is a war criminal, or else to acquit the accused and give him his reputation back. Brammertz wants to have it both ways: he will try to convict him, but if he cannot convict him then he will try to make sure that he does not get his reputation back (i.e. he was guilty but the evidence of his guilt was concealed from us).
There is a passage of Gotovina's lawyer's response which you failed to translate and which is completely on point:
Misetic states: "We have it on videotape. Carla Del Ponte in front of the Security Council giving a report three months before the start of trial in the Gotovina case, saying, 'We have all the evidence necessary to convict Gotovina.' So let me pose the question: What changed from the time when the Prosecution before trial was claiming that it had 'all the necessary evidence', to now during the trial Mr. Brammertz putting out stories about how 'critical evidence' against Gotovina is being withheld? The Prosecution is playing a game in order to prepare the foundation for Gotovina's eventual acquittal. When that time comes, they will say 'of course he was guilty, but you see we couldn't prove it because 'critical evidence' was withheld from us.' But with this story the Prosecution is desperately avoiding the fundamental question: what was the Prosecution's evidentiary basis for indicting him in the first place?"
http://www.icty.org/x/cases/gotovina/trans/en/080408ED.htm
There is a tape introduced with the witness 6 of the prosecution that shows 'Knin bombarded all over'. The defensor asked for the original copy of the prosecution where, instead of the sirens and bombarding you can hear birds singing. And later he has shown that instead of the town bombarded in many places, the serbian colonel that provided the proof recorded the image putting himself in the center of the smoke of the Tvik factory (which was producing weapons) recording towards outside so it appeared that everything around is covered with smoke.
There were various proofs of this kind during the trial, the school that was hit because it was closed with army troops inside, one projectile beside the hospital, beside which lied the weapon the serbian side was shooting from. I believe all of these things can be found in different transcripts from the trial. So, if the prosecution does not find strong evidence in photographic material that would show that the civil points were deliberately aimed, the written affirmation from Gotovina's soldiers that they did it, would be a nice solution for the prosecutor. Besides, why would someone prefer artillery diaries to photographic evidence that is taken a lot during the war?
There are these kind of proofs that particular houses were being destroyed, not by artillery but by perticulars (war vultures going around those houses committing robbery, burning the houses or killing) but they can not prove that Gotovina had the control of them.
That or, more to the point, the shameful spectacle of the Saddam trial. Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
In this case "new" means "in addition to that used in the indictment", clearly. Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
Which leads to the question: how does Brammertz know this evidence is "crucial against Gotovina," if no one has ever seen it and no one knows if it ever existed?
Brammertz is just creating excuses here.
This is not to imply that what you say isn't true, but do you have a link to document that ruling of the Tribunal? Most economists teach a theoretical framework that has been shown to be fundamentally useless. -- James K. Galbraith
http://www.icty.org/x/cases/gotovina/tord/en/080916.pdf
The Trial Chamber issued an order to Croatia to intensify its search. Within the Order, the Chamber noted at paragraph 13 that, "Based on the submissions of the Prosecution and Croatia, the Chamber is not in a position to draw any conclusion as to whether the requested documents do exist. In particular, the Chamber considers that the aforementioned general statements of Croatia in the report dated 14 July 2008 are not sufficient, without further facts or documents to substantiate them, to establish that they do not exist."
Accordingly, there is no proof one way or the other whether such documents exist. Croatia has not proven that the documents don't exist, but Brammertz hasn't convinced the Court that they do exist, either. Accordingly, it is reckless of Brammertz (or else intentionally misleading) to suggest that people are "hiding incriminating evidence against Gotovina" when Brammertz cannnot even prove to the Court that the documents exist in the first place.
