23. 04. 2013

Anniversary of NATO's attack on RTS building

Beograd, April 23, 2013 (B92, Tanjug) - Families and colleagues of RTS employees who died in a NATO air strike on this day in 1999 have paid their respects at the memorial in Belgrade entitled "Why?"

16 employees of the public broadcaster RTS were killed in the attack in the early hours of April 23, 1999.

"Someone who had to protect them, did not. At 02:06 hours a NATO missile interrupted their lives. There's just the eternal sadness and memories. Today, as we have done all these years, we wonder: why?" said Miroslav Medić, who spoke on behalf of the victims' families.

"Why was it necessary that these 16 wonderful people lose their lives? We are yet to receive an answer," he stated.

"Innocent people were killed by the greatest military power, which the world to this day does not dare to judge. To the deadly missile, a human target was planted by those in need of a tragedy in the political confrontation with the world. Together they killed them. Now they hide the truth," said Dejan Gligorijević, who spoke on behalf of RTS, and who is the outlet's entertainment program editor-in-chief.

"We don't need Amnesty International and the International Federation of Journalists to tell us that the bombing of civilian targets is a war crime and that the bombing of RTS opened an era of attacks on the media in war zones around the world. What we do not know, what our society still owes the families and the public is an answer to the question who in the former government saw it as important that someone should die in the RTS building," he was quoted as saying.

The NATO air strike killed 16 RTS employees: Jelica Munitlak (28), makeup artist; Ksenija Banković (28), video mixer; Darko Stiomenovski (26), technician; Nebojša Stojanović (27), technician; Dragorad Dragojević (27), security guard; Dragan Tasić (31), electrician; Aleksandar Deletić (31), cameraman; Slaviša Stevanović (32), technician; Siniša Medić (32), designer; Ivan Stukalo (34), technician; Dejan Marković (39) security guard; Milan Joksimović (47), security guard; Branislav Jovanović (50), technician; Milan Janković (59), precision mechanic; Tomislav Mitrović (61), director of program; and Slodan Jontić (54), fitter.

Former RTS director Dragoljub Milanović is the only person who faced criminal responsibility in the case. In 2002 he was sentenced to ten years in prison because he did not respectan order of the federal government to relocate personnel and equipment from the RTS facilities in Aberdareva in Hilandarska streets. Milanović's sentence expired last year.

The government of Serbia has formed at the beginning of this year an international commission that is considering the facts obtained in the investigation into the killings of journalists Dada Vujasinović, Slavko Ćuruvija and Milan Pantić, and its mandate has been extended to include the deaths of media employees in the 1999 bombing. The commission, in addition to representatives of the Serbian security services, prosecutors and representatives of the media, also includes international investigators.

Speaking about the fact that after so many years the only person convicted of this crime has been Dragoljub Milanović, President of the Commission Veran Matić said that he was having a hard time believing it.

"We have only had jurisdiction in this case for the last two weeks and are collecting the entire documentation from the trial of Milanović, and the documentation from other sources so that we can find a basis for some further prosecution. Note that in one year the statute of limitations will be in force in this case. The mission and mandate of the commission are much more than that. Even if the statute of limitations is in effect, we will not leave unresolved the issues concerning those who failed to do what was necessary, and that was to relocate RTS, but also those who carried out the bombing," said Matić.

He added that the commission had just begun to collect documents in order to shed the light in this case.

"The documentation that we have already is very extensive, but very well known to the public. Most of the documentation and the most compelling part of it was produced by the victims' families and fellow journalists who have dealt with it. We are now trying to penetrate where they failed in the past 14 years and to get new information, answers to the obvious questions concerning the chain of command and the chain that was responsible for the evacuation of RTS," said Matić.

Human Rights Watch said in 2000 that there was no justification for the bombing of the television station.

"For the first time in the history of warfare a media company was hit that was previously declared a legitimate target... Despite the war propaganda of the media, there was no military justification for the bombing of the RTS building. NATO did not warn the civilians. The building is located in a densely populated urban core. It was staffed 24 hours a day. This was a totally unnecessary attack," said the organization.

NATO officials claimed that the attack was justified, and a special committee of the Hague Tribunal, which was investigating the case, did not suggest to the prosecutor to pursue it.

Žanka Stojanović, the mother of one of the victims and the representative of the victims' families, has asked repeatedly the Serbian Public Prosecutor to prosecute all those responsible, including the former Supreme Council of Defense.

Miroslav Medić, whose brother Siniša was among the victims, said today that the families each year mark March 24, the beginning of the NATO bombing, and April 23, when their loved ones were killed in the hope that such crimes will never happen again.

"The deaths of 16 people brought misery on their families," said Medić after placing a wreath at the memorial, adding that the question remained "why it had to happen."

Žanka Stojanović and the Center for Euro-Atlantic Studies have urged that the state representatives, who have set up the commission, to give a public response regarding the request for an extension of the indictment. The request was supported by NUNS, the Independent Society of Journalists of Vojvodina, the Association of Independent Electronic Media, and the Humanitarian Law Center.

As stated in the announcement of the families and the Center for Euro-Atlantic Studies, so far only former RTS Director Dragoljub Milanović was found guilty "more leniently than should have been done" for the the deaths of 16 media workers. They also said that there had been no action since the request for the extension of the indictment was submitted in April 2009, until the day the commission was formed.

NATO's war against Serbia and the then Federal Republic of Yugoslavia lasted for 78 days and caused the deaths of at least 2,500 people, injuring a further 12,500.