dr. sc. Merisa Karović-Babić
Institute for Research on Crime Against
humanity and international law
University of Sarajevo
On February 5, 1994, a few minutes in the afternoon, a 120 mm mortar shell was fired from the position of the Sarajevo-Romanian Corps (SRK) from the direction of Mrković, which exploded on the asphalt surface inside the Markale green market at the moment when several hundred people were present in the market. citizens. According to data from the Clinical Center, the State Hospital and the French Battalion Hospital in Sarajevo, as well as burial societies in Sarajevo, 67 civilians were killed and 139 wounded from the explosive and explosive effects of the shell, while the result of the injuries, while being treated in Hamburg, was death performed for one more person. So, it was a total of 68 killed civilians.
The shelling of the Markala market caused violent reactions from both the national and international public, and after a few hours an extraordinary session of the Presidency of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina was held, when the victims were honored and it was decided to send urgent messages to the UN Security Council and the European Union and the presidents of the countries who could influence the punishment of this and the prevention of further crimes.
The President of the Presidency, Alija Izetbegović, sent a letter to the Presidents of 17 countries, the President of the European Union, the CSCE, the Secretary General of the UN and the Secretary General of NATO, while Prime Minister Haris Silajdžić sent a letter to the President of the UN Security Council, in which, in addition to among other things, he criticizes the avoidance of fulfilling obligations defined in numerous resolutions, and "calls for the application of all necessary measures, including through the use of air power".
Immediately after the massacre, the statesmen of many countries spoke out in public and condemned the crime. On that occasion, Belgian Foreign Minister Willy Claes called for NATO airstrikes against "Serbian positions" around the city. Despite the likelihood that "Serbs may try to pay homage to UN troops on the ground," Claes points out that there is "no other way" to stop attacks on civilians. The Secretary General of the UN, Boutros Ghali, sent a letter to the Secretary General of NATO, in which, mentioning Resolution 824, paragraph 10 of Resolution 836, as well as the NATO meeting of January 10 and 11, 1994, he invites him to "as soon as possible as soon as possible'' made a decision regarding the air attacks on artillery and mortar positions of the VRS in and around Sarajevo, for the shelling of civilian targets in the city, but noting that the aforementioned NATO action was supposed to follow a "request from the United Nations ''. The motive of the letter was to formalize the disputed line of use of airstrikes, that is, to confirm the chain of command in this particular situation as well. The hierarchy of command on the issue of authorization of airstrikes originally referred to the decision of the UN Secretary General, his special representative Akashi, the commander of UNPROFOR in Zagreb, the commander of UNPROFOR in Bosnia and Herzegovina and ultimately the commander of NATO's southern wing. Therefore, they wanted to confirm that the decision by which the United Nations has primacy in the decision on the use of airstrikes remains in force, making NATO the last in the chain of command.
The day before the Markale massacre, on February 4, 1995, three shells fired from the SRK position in Lukavica near Energoinvest killed nine and wounded 18 civilians in the Sarajevo settlement of Dobrinja who were in line for humanitarian aid or on improvised market. The newly appointed commander of UNPROFOR for Bosnia and Herzegovina, General Michael Rose, made a public statement immediately after this massacre, pointing out that the shells were fired from "Bosnian Serb positions", after which NATO jets flew over Sarajevo, which was a kind of threat to the air attacks on VRS positions. Although the double key rules were in force, according to which the authority for airstrikes was in the hands of the United Nations, a clear identification of the perpetrators of the crime could lead to military intervention.
Since the publication of the results of the investigation - which unequivocally establishes that, the day before the massacre in Markale, all three shells on Dobrinja were fired from the SRK position in Lukavica near Energoinvest - triggered an avalanche of reactions on the issue of military intervention and concrete actions by NATO, commander Michael Rose of UNPROFOR in Bosnia and Herzegovina was quite restrained, and this time he decided for a more "neutral" statement, pointing out that it is "impossible to determine who fired the missile". One of the measures he took in order to prevent military intervention was the drafting of a "memorandum for British eyes only", with which he tried to convince British Defense Minister Malcolm Rifkind to give up possible and lukewarm support for US and NATO initiatives. about airstrikes, warning him of the danger to UNPROFOR soldiers. Rose believed that the dangers to the forces of UNPROFOR and all the humanitarian organizations that were at that moment and operating in the territory of the Republic of Serbia were multiple.
In response to NATO's threats to bomb the VRS positions, SRK commander Stanislav Galić, on the basis of a previous order from the General Staff of the VRS, ordered that all units of the SRK use "blackmail and pressure in order to stop the airstrikes". ', and if it happens to them, the forces of UNPROFOR and all foreign humanitarian organizations that were in the territory of the RS at that moment should be "attacked (not killed), captured and held as hostages, until NATO stops airstrikes''. The fear for the lives of troops on the ground, as well as the taking of United Nations officials as hostages, were very clear reasons why the representatives of the UNPROFOR forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina felt more comfortable claiming that "it may never be known who actually fired the deadly grenade." ..'', and that the accuracy of the hit was ''the random luck of whoever was shooting'' or that the investigations into the shelling were 'inadequate at this stage'. With this statement, the representatives of UNPROFOR tried to dispute all previous and future investigations into this crime, and hinted that it is impossible to ever get relevant results of the investigation. Radovan Karadžić knew how to appreciate this kind of indecisiveness, and as a guest on the Serbian Radio-Television Special Show, he stated: "We are satisfied that we have the United Nations, with which we arrange all these affairs."
Given the fear that, as Lord Owen stated, "it was clear that something was being prepared in the Security Council and in the NATO pact", some currents in the UN, UNPROFOR commanders for Bosnia and Herzegovina, representatives of the International Commission for the former Yugoslavia, at any cost they tried to reach an agreement between the "warring parties" before NATO sets the Ultimatum, which would prevent military intervention. In order to realize the stated goal, the United Nations delegation - which consisted of Yasushi Akashi, General Jean Cot and Michael Rose - after visiting the crime scene, met with the members of the Presidency of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as the delegation of the self-proclaimed Republika Srpska in Pale, making proposals about ceasefire and withdrawal or regrouping of heavy weapons around Sarajevo, i.e. proposals that have been interpreted in different ways from the beginning. Unlike the United Nations delegation, David Owen and Thorvald Stoltenberg did not even visit the scene of the crime, the Markale market, but on the evening of February 6, 1994, in Zvornik, they met with Radovan Karadzic, whom they convinced to "continue the negotiations that were day began with Akashi and General Rose on the exclusion of heavy weapons as part of the general development'', which they ''considered their main task''. This reaction of Owen and Stoltenberg to the killing of Sarajevo civilians, as well as their persistent insistence on the peaceful concept of the division of Bosnia, caused indignation among the members of the Presidency of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Ivo Komšić, at the Presidency session held on February 7, called their actions insolent and rude . Furthermore, without any empathy for the victims of the shelling of Markal, Owen expressed "great concern for the feelings of the Bosnian Serbs", who were "angered by the constant use of the word 'ultimatum', as it was an emotionally charged word used by the Germans before the bombing of Belgrade in 1941 . years''.
At the same time, in Brussels, at the meeting of the Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the European Union, the option of a harsher policy, the setting of an ultimatum, which would "give the Serbs a few days to withdraw from the exclusion zone of about 20 or 30 km around Sarajevo", was postponed, which was supposed to be to be discussed at the NATO meeting scheduled for February 9, 1994. Owen boasted that he "managed to win for the UN two more crucial days of time for negotiations, which General Rose then used very effectively". The agreement, under the auspices of the United Nations, included: a ceasefire, the withdrawal of heavy weapons to a distance of 20 km, the deployment of UNPROFOR soldiers along the conflict line and the establishment of a joint commission to monitor the implementation of the agreement, but without any hint of punitive measures, in in case of non-compliance with its decisions. The epilogue of the two-day Rose "negotiations" was indeed "very effective" for the United Nations, which achieved its goal, managing to reach an agreement between the "warring parties" just a few hours before the decision of the NATO pact.
At the same time, the members of the NATO pact, led by Manfred Wörner, only agreed late at night to strongly condemn the "random attacks that once again hit the people of Sarajevo in recent days", pointing to the fact that the "Bosnian Serbs" bear the greatest responsibility for the siege of Sarajevo and the "tragic killing of civilians". Unlike the United Nations agreement, the Ultimatum of the NATO Pact still left open the possibility of bombing, if the conditions stated in the text of the document are not met within 10 days.
In the meantime, even before the signing of the Airport Agreement, all SRK units, according to the order of General Galić, were preparing to bring artillery from other positions towards Sarajevo, primarily "defective weapons", with which they should, during the night of 9/10. February 1994, to "possess appropriate firing positions around Sarajevo", which, if the agreement is signed, should be taken out "exclusively during the day and in clear weather to be as noticeable as possible by UNPROFOR and the Muslims". Therefore, according to this order, and in order to "prove" that the signed Agreement is respected, "the specified means, artillery tools (defective) would be moved away from Sarajevo again, while the existing tools would remain in vital positions".
The day after the signing of the Airport Agreement, Dragomir Milošević submitted to his superiors a proposal according to which he devised the idea of hiding as many weapons as possible, moving them from military positions and disguising them, and in their place defective weapons would be placed, which in practice represents the realization of such a plan to prove " cooperation" at UNPROFOR, while the combat readiness of the SRK would not be diminished. For example, weapons removed from Borija, Petovića, Lukavica and other military positions were disguised in nearby forests, and defective weapons from the Herzegovina Corps were placed in their place.
Between the lines that were under the control of the SRK and the Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, military observers from the United Nations, as well as French, Malaysian, and after February 17 (three days before the expiration of the Ultimatum) and Russian troops as part of the UN, were placed The arrival encouraged the leadership of the self-proclaimed Republika Srpska to continue with the policy of manipulations about regrouping and withdrawing heavy weapons, breaking the ceasefire, keeping the city under siege and further killing civilians. According to General Rose's testimony, some Russian officers refused to carry out his orders, under the pretext that they receive orders only from Moscow and that they have no intention of doing "anything against the Serbian brothers".
The flexible option of regrouping and withdrawing heavy weapons around Sarajevo, according to which the "regrouped" weapons were controlled at eight points of UNPROFOR, enabled the VRS to increasingly alienate weapons and put them into use in the following period, and members of UNPROFOR takes as hostages.
Namely, that the NATO ultimatum was not consistently implemented is confirmed by a series of SRK documents, in which unfavorable weather conditions, malfunctioning of tools or towing means for weapons, but also their hiding in nearby forests, houses or warehouses are cited as excuses for not withdrawing weapons. and less than 10 days after the expiration of the ultimatum, Lt. Col. Milan Ugrešić reported to the Command that "in the SRK zone, we have formed 22 'STRELA-2M' units, which were not placed under the control of the UN forces". Although they were aware of the fact that not all weapons were withdrawn or "put under control", the commanders of UNPROFOR and the envoy of the UN Secretary General send a very positive report to the UN Secretary General, concluding that it is not "absolutely necessary" '' to demand the use of NATO air forces, after which NATO Secretary General Manfred Wörner declares that, at this stage, no air strikes should be undertaken.
Source: Merisa Karović-Babić, Mass killings of civilians in Sarajevo during the siege 1992-1995, Sarajevo: Institute for Research of Crimes against Humanity and International Law of the University of Sarajevo, 2014, 141-175.