Christopher Lawrence, witness at the Radovan Karadzic trial

After a three-day break because Radovan Karadzic had a cold, his trial resumed today with the prosecution continuing its case about the events in Srebrenica in July 1995. The prosecution called Australian forensic pathologist Christopher Lawrence, who led the forensic team which did the post mortems of the remains of the victims exhumed from the Srebrenica mass graves in 1998. Dr Lorens has already testified in all three Srebrenica trials. The transcript of his evidence at the trial of Radislav Krstic, former VRS Drina Corps commander, was admitted into evidence today.

From May to October 1998, Dr Lorens and the members of his team carried out the post mortems of the remains of the victims exhumed from the eight mass graves in the Srebrenica area. The post mortems showed that all the victims were men and died of gunshot wounds. A number of victims exhumed from the grave at the Cancarski Put 3 site had been blindfolded and had ligatures on their wrists, which indicates, as the witness explained, that they had been executed.

In his cross-examination, Karadzic tried to prove that when the witness carried out the post mortems he was unaware of the fact that the ‘fighters habitually’ wear ribbons on their arms in order to distinguish friends from foes in combat. The witness was likewise unaware of the ‘religious custom’ whereby people wore such ribbons around their heads or in some cases, as Karadzic explained, wound around their waists. He illustrated his claims with the video recordings of unidentified ‘Islamic fighters’ with ‘multicolored ribbons around their heads’. He claimed they belonged to the BH Army. According to Karadzic, the video had been seized in the ‘Muslim army’ HQ, and was attached to a publication which explains, as he said, ‘what really happened in Srebrenica’.

Karadzic claimed that the victims exhumed from the Srebrenica mass graves had been Muslim fighters killed in skirmishes. The witness dismissed the claim, saying that the blindfolds and ligatures indicated those people had been executed. Furthermore, as the witness said, there were quite a few of the old men with visible disabilities and young boys. ‘If they were indeed fighters, then why did some people go to such lengths to cover up their graves,’ the witness asked Karadzic.

Karadzic also argued that the pathology reports showed some victims had been wearing several layers of clothing, which would, according to him, be evidence that they had been buried in wintertime, not in the summer when the Serb forces overran Srebrenica. In his re-examination, prosecutor Mitchell showed the witness some photographs taken at the time when Srebrenica fell: they depict men wearing vests, sweaters and jackets over their sweatshirts despite the fact that it was summertime.

After Christopher Lorens completed his evidence, the prosecution called American expert for the Ottoman cultural heritage, Andras Riedlmayer. He testified about the destruction of the cultural heritage in BH and in Kosovo at six trials before the Tribunal, between 2002 and 2010.

In the first part of his examination-in-chief, Riedlmayer used photographs to explain the methodology he used in his expert report about the destruction of the cultural and religious facilities in 22 municipalities in BH.

The American expert will continue his evidence tomorrow.