Ratko Mladic's trial continued with the cross-examination of defense witness Dusan Pavlovic, author of an expert report on the losses suffered by the BH Army's 28th Division as it tried to break out of Srebrenica in the summer of 1995. ProsecutorJonathan MacDonald recalled the witness's theory that many of the men who were part of the column moving towards Tuzla were killed in combat or in some other circumstances. Their bodies were then collected in the clean-up operation andburied in mass graves. 'This is not a theory', Pavlovic said, noting that his report was based on witness reports and documents.

The prosecutor then brought up the Overview of individuals known to have been killed in the breakthrough and other controversial cases, attached to the witness's expert report. The persons on the list are divided into four main categories: persons whose remains were found in two different places, persons whose deaths were witnessed by other people in the column, persons killed by shells and those whose 'complete bodies' were exhumed from secondary mass graves. According to Pavlovic, the examples show that those people died in the fighting, rather than at execution sites.

The prosecutor also showed documents and statements indicating that Pavlovic's conclusions on the manner and place of death of some of the people on his list were wrong. For instance, the witness claims that the body of Mustafa Mehic was found at two different sites, at Tisova Kosa and the Cancarski Put mass grave. In actual fact, his remains were exhumed from the secondary grave at Cancarski put which is linked with the primary grave in Branjevo, the prosecutor stated. This is corroborated by a letter sent by the International Commission for Missing Persons (ICMP), accompanied by photos explaining how a segment of Mehic's jaw was 'mistakenly' placed among the remains found at Tisova Kosa.

The prosecutor also highlighted the case of Nizam Salkic, whose remains were exhumed from two secondary mass graves. Pavlovic retorted that four names, including Salkic's, were included on the list 'by mistake'. He tried to justify it by saying he had very little time to finish the report and that there was a lot of 'confusion'.He even said that a computer virus might be to blame.

In the end Pavlovic stated that the list he was shown today was not the final list he had given the defense lawyer Branko Lukic. Things got even more complicated when Lukic said he was unaware of any short version of the list he had shown in court. After checking with his team, Lukic confirmed that the defense did in fact have two lists of different lengths. The shorter one was shown to the witness in the course of the examination. The judges ordered the witness to check upon returning to his hotel if he had a third, edited version of the allegedly controversial cases, and if so, to send it to the Registry forthwith.

As the hearing drew to a close, the prosecutor highlighted several other names from the 'controversial list' who had allegedly died in the breakthrough. According to the prosecution's evidence, they were killed in mass executions in the Srebrenica and Zvornik area in the summer of 1995.

Dusan Pavlovic's cross-examination will continue tomorrow morning.

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