The New York Times
Wednesday, December 6, 2000
Serb on Trial For Genocide Of Albanians In Kosovo
By CARLOTTA GALL
BELGRADE, Serbia, Dec. 5 - A Serbian law student went on trial today in the northern Kosovo town of Mitrovica for genocide in the killings of 26 Albanian men during the NATO bombing campaign last year.
The case remains one of the most painful episodes for the Albanian residents of the bitterly divided town.
French gendarmes who investigated the case last year managed to trace the missing men to a mass grave and arrested six Serbian men. At the time it was celebrated as a case of swift and good investigative work that promised justice for the Albanian victims.
But the trial that began today appeared to fall short on several counts. Only one defendant appeared in court: Igor Simic, 24. The other five Serbs charged with him in the original indictment escaped from the United Nations-run prison in Mitrovica several months ago and remain at large, probably in Serbia. Mr. Simic had tried to escape with them but was caught.
None of the families of the victims attended the trial. The courthouse is in the northern, Serbian-dominated part of town, where few Kosovo Albanians dare to go. And Mr. Simic appeared before a panel consisting mainly of Albanian judges, a practice that has been severely criticized by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe as unfair in such highly charged trials of ethnic- related crimes.
The prosecutor in the trial, Michael Hartmann, is an American, and a Swedish judge, Christer Karphammer, is presiding. But the other four members of the judicial panel - one other judge and three citizens who deliberate with the others as lay judges - are Kosovo Albanians.
Courts in Kosovo are staffed almost entirely by the ethnic Albanians who make up most of the population. Serbs have been wary of taking part because they accuse the United Nations-led administration of being biased against them.
Those courts have begun to try Serbs for genocide and other war crimes, but after blatant evidence of ethnic bias, the United Nations administration has started to include judges from outside Kosovo in the system.
The European security organization, in a damning report released in October, contended that such serious cases should be tried by international panels of judges or a panel on which a majority of judges are from outside. Mr. Simic, like most of the Serbs being tried for war crimes, has been in custody nearly a year and a half awaiting trial, which raises serious concerns about human rights violations and about the efficiency and competence of the United Nations- run legal system in Kosovo.
Mr. Simic is accused of taking part in the killings of the 26 Albanian men, who were forced out of their apartments, with their families, by masked gunmen on April 14 of last year, at the height of the killings and expulsions of Kosovo Albanians by Serbs in Kosovo.
The men were separated from the women and children and made to lie face down in a line along an alley leading from the street. The families were then ordered to leave and never saw the men again.
The men were killed shortly afterward and buried in a mass grave 10 miles away. French investigators, through witnesses, traced the grave and found the bodies. Some had been shot, some stabbed.
The investigators arrested six Serbian men, including a father and son and Mr. Simic, all of whom lived in Popovic Street and were neighbors of the victims. All six men were local and were still living in Mitrovica, in the northern, Serbian-dominated side of the town.
Mr. Simic pleaded not guilty today. He testified that he had been aware of the events that occurred, but did not take part, said a United Nations official who attended the trial. The trial will continue on Wednesday, when the first witness, a Kosovo Albanian, will be called. It is expected to continue into January.
