Chief Hague Prosecutor Serge Brammertz is in Belgrade on a two-day visit, where he will meet with top Serbian officials.
Brammertz will send his report to the UN Security Council at the end of this week, B92 has learned.
In mid-December, he will inform EU officials about Serbia’s cooperation with the Hague Tribunal.
Brammertz has already met with National Cooperation Council head Rasim Ljajić, War Crimes Prosecutor Vladimir VukÄević, and BIA chief SaÅ¡a Vukadinović, but stayed true to his previous visits when he also declined to talk to reporters after the meetings.
The discussion, it was reported, was about measures undertaken thus far to locate Ratko Mladić and Goran Hadžić.
VukÄević asked for assistance in Serbia’s ongoing investigation into the fate of some 300 Kosovo Serbs, who the prosecution believes were taken to camps in northern Albania after the 1999 war, where some of them had their vital organs removed to be sold in the black market.
Tomorrow, Brammertz will meet with President Boris Tadić, PM Mirko Cvetković and FM Vuk Jeremić.
And while Ljajić yesterday sounded a pessimistic note, VukÄević today told B92 ahead of the meeting with Brammertz that the cooperation with the Hague is complete, and that he expects a positive report, regardless of the fact that Mladić has not been apprehended.
Office of the National Council for Cooperation with the Hague Director DuÅ¡an Ignjatović said in a statement for Tanjug on Monday, after talks with Brammertz, that he expects a concrete and balanced report on Belgrade’s cooperation with the Hague which will reflect the actual situation at this time.
“Cooperation has never been better and I expect this will be evident in the report that will reflect the actual situation at this time. Furthermore, I also expect that the report will be very balanced and much more concrete than the one in June,” Ignjatović said.
Underscoring that he is satisfied with today’s talks with Brammertz, he said this was a regular meeting at which Hague court’s requests and the activities taken by the office were considered.
“Cooperation is at an enviable level and there are no major problems. Not all requests from The Hague have been met, but there are no controversial demands, all problems can be resolved,” Ignjatović said.
Regarding the regular six-month report on Serbia’s cooperation with the ICTY that Brammertz will present at the United Nations (UN) Security Council session in mid-December, Ignjatović said he is much more optimistic than his colleagues.
There is not a single reason for him to be pessimistic, he stressed.
“Serbia has the will and the intention to arrest the remaining two indictees of the ICTY who are still at large, Ratko Mladić and Goran Hadžić. Serbia has best demonstrated its determination to fulfill its international obligation with the arrest of ICTY indictee Radovan Karadžić,” Ignjatović pointed out.
Ahead of his arrival the Hague prosecutor said that he was “convinced of the resolve of the people in Belgrade and The Hague to bring the remaining fugivives to justice”, and spoke to commend the efforts of the Serbian War Crimes Prosecution.
Despite that, when he spoke for B92 TV on Sunday evening, Rasim Ljajić said he does not expect Brammertz to submit a positive report to the UN on Serbia’s cooperation.
This will come because Ratko Mladić is not in the Hague, the president of the National Cooperation Council said, but added that the report, due at the end of the month, “will not be entirely negative”, considering that in the last six months Serbia arrested Radovan Karadžić and established a full cooperation in all the other domains.
“Brammertz will likely not give a positive appraisal. That means that expectations from this visit are getting high. It will not bring anything special because Mladić is not in The Hague. We all see that. We know it will not happen today, or tomorrow, and likely not the day after or in the coming days,” Ljajić said.
“We have no clue that leads to Mladić, short of a miracle. He hid in Serbia until 2006, that is evident. We do not have any information from the first half of 2006 until today, but based on that, it can clearly be assumed that he is probably hiding in Serbia. At this time, there is no one who could say, Mladić is in Serbia, or Mladić is not in Serbia.”
Brammertz’s regular six-monthly report is believed to be crucial for the implementation of the SAA between the EU and Serbia.
But Ljajić insist the association deal will not be applied until Mladić is extradited.
“Without Mladić in The Hague, Holland will block our association with the EU, and we were told this two days ago by Dutch officials. The international community is no longer interested in our efforts, in our actions, in our exercises, in our activities. They are interested in concrete results, because we have shown our readiness and our political will,” he said.