By Carol Holland (New York)

On April 23, 1999, US/NATO bombers destroyed the Serbian state television headquarters in downtown Belgrade, Radio Television Serbia, killing 16 civilian employees and wounding 19. In addition, between March 24, 1999 and June 10, 1999, US/NATO bombs destroyed more than ten private radio and television stations, and 36 TV transmitters. Transmitters at Iriski venac, Krnjaca, Mt Cer, Bukulja, Tornik, Crni vrh, Jasetrebac, Ovcar, Grmija and others were destroyed, so that the transmitter infrastructure for the entire territory of Serbia was severely damaged. The studios and transmitter located at the Business Centre USCE which housed TV stations BK TV, Pink, Kosava and SOS Channel, and several other radio stations, were bombed two times in six days. The transmitter of the TV station Palma was bombed and destroyed on April 28, and the satellite station "Yugoslavia" in the village of Prilike near Ivanjica was severely damaged.¹

These acts are violations of:

1. The Geneva Conventions of August 12, 1949, namely (a) willful killing; (c) willfully causing great suffering of serious injury to body and health; (d) extensive destruction and appropriation of property, not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly;

2. The United Nations Charter, Article 2, Clause 3, Article 2, Clause 4, Article 33, Clause 1, Article 37, Clause 1, Article 37, Clause 2, Article, Clause 39, Article 51, Article 79;

3. The NATO Charter, Article 1, Article 7²

The Bombing of Radio Television Serbia

 

Radio Television Serbia, (Radio Televizija Srbija) (RTS) was the largest radio and TV company in the Balkans, with 7,000 employees and state-of-the-art infrastructure which was made available to hundreds of foreign correspondents.³ It was well known that journalists and technical and support staff were always present inside, due to 24 hour broadcasting schedules.⁴

In mid-April, NATO Air Commander, David Wilby, announced that NATO was sick of the Serb propaganda televised to every household and warned that unless Serb Television broadcast three hours of US programming in the daytime and another three hours in the evening, the TV station would be blown-up. Even pro-war TV reporters phrased the announcement as an outlandish question. The idea didn’t go over. When Belgrade offered to accept the six hours in exchange for six minutes of Yugoslav news on Western networks, NATO backtracked, saying it had only meant it would bomb transmitters also used for military communications. NATO also explicitly assured the International Federation of Journalists it would not target media workers.⁵ Even so, against the wishes of other NATO leaders, General Wesley Clark gave orders to bomb.⁶

In the early morning hours of April 23, as RTS was airing a taped American interview with President Milosevic and former Pentagon official turned KHOU-TV defense analysts, Ron Hatchett, there was a thunderous explosion as cruise missiles slammed into the building causing a mile-high cloud of dust. What had been the four story headquarters of Serbian TV was turned into a 15 foot pile of cement, plastic, iron, and the dead and wounded. Among the dead were two men hanging upside-down from the wreckage. A young woman technician was burned alive in the make-up room. A young man could only be extracted from the tons of wreckage by amputating both of his legs. Thirteen other technicians and secretaries working the night shift were killed in their studios and taping rooms, or died in the hospital. At dawn a group of several hundred Yugoslav citizens stood silently bearing witness in front of the smoldering wreckage, at a loss for words.⁷

Six hours later U.S. Secretary of State for International Development, Clare Short, said RTS was a "legitimate target" a "propaganda machine" and "causing untold suffering to the people of Kosovo". In England Tony Blair said the attack was "entirely justified," and went on to assert that television is part of the apparatus which keeps a political leader in power, so camera operators, make-up ladies and janitors are therefore legitimate targets.⁸

RTS broadcasts had included a patriotic kind of propaganda, showing Yugoslav soldiers defending their country, President Milosevic meeting Russian envoys, the Kosovo Albanian leader Ibrahim Rugova, and others. For artistic expression they showed computer animations of the NATO cross logo turning into a swastika, and Madeleine Albright growing Dracula teeth in front of a burning building.⁹ Contrary to Pentagon reports, NATO programming could be seen on 21st UHF channel throughout the northern Serbia and Belgrade area. Other radio and TV stations which had carried some NATO broadcasts were housed in the Business Centre USCE, which NATO destroyed on April 22.¹⁰

However, RTS wasn’t bombed for its propaganda, but for exposing NATO’s propaganda, and for exposing the death and suffering caused by NATO. From the very beginning, when NATO was denying that one of their Stealth warplanes had been shot down, RTS was there with the videos of the wreckage. When NATO said that Pristina stadium was being used as a concentration camp, RTS showed it empty. NATO claimed Albanian leader, Ibrahim Rugova was in favor of their bombing campaign, and he appeared on RTS condemning the bombing.¹¹ On April 16, NATO displayed an alleged satellite photograph as "evidence" that Serbs had massacred ethnic Albanians and buried them in a mass grave at Izbica. RTS went to the small Albanian village of Izbica (population 70) and interviewed Albanian villagers, who said there had been no massacre and there were no mass graves. Furthermore, when RTS video shots of the land were compared to NATO’s alleged satellite photograph, buildings shown on the NATO photograph did not exist.¹² Another deep exposure into NATO, and motive for them to bomb RTS, was the RTS coverage of NATO’s repeated cluster bombing of a convoy of Albanian refugees on the Prizren-Djakovica road in early afternoon daylight of April 14. At least 75 people were killed; 100 wounded, mostly women children and elderly. RTS showed the horror on the ground, proved that it couldn’t have been a Serbian attack, proved that it couldn’t have been a mistake,¹³ and reported that the refugees were killed for going home. If the Albanian refugees returned to their villages, NATO would lose their basis and goal for the war, which was that a NATO occupation "NATO Peacekeepers" were needed to get the refugees home.

NATO’s destruction of Yugoslav media was done with the clear intent of covering up its unjust military campaign and silencing any opposition to its war drive, including ordering the board of directors of EUTELSAT to forbid broadcast of RTS satellite programs. Not only did NATO try to shut down the Serbian media, but it also tried to shut down the Serbian Minister of Information, Aleksander Vucic. The following excerpt from an article by Robert Fisk of The Independent reveals NATO’s attempted assassination:

"Two days before NATO bombed the Serb Television headquarters in Belgrade, CNN received a tip from its Atlanta headquarters that the building was to be destroyed. They were told to remove their facilities from the premises at once, which they did.

A day later, Serbian Information Minister Aleksander Vucic received a faxed invitation from the Larry King Live show in the U.S. to appear on CNN. They wanted him on the air at 2:30 in the morning of 23 April and asked him to arrive at Serb Television half an hour early for make-up.

Vucic was late — which was just as well for him since NATO missiles slammed into the building at six minutes past two. The first one exploded in the make-up room where a young Serb assistant was burned to death. CNN calls this all a coincidence, saying that the Larry King show, put out by the entertainment division, did not know of the news department’s instructions to it men to leave the Belgrade building."

References:

1. Serbia Info, Ministry of Information, Charges for the Hague Against the NATO Leaders, Serbia Info, serbia-info.com, June 29, 1999
2. Ibid
3. Ibid
4. Jovan Orlovic, Media War, INET, inet.co.yu, June 1, 1999
5. Philip Hammond, The War on TV, Broadcast Magazine, May 14, 1999
6. Robert Fisk, Kill Your TV, NATO’s Literal Interpretation The Independent,
April 24, 1999
7. Ibid
8. Hammond, The War on TV
9. Fisk, Kill Your TV
10. Orlovic, Media War
11. Philip Hammond, A War of Words and Pictures, The Independent, April 6, 1999
12. Tanjug, April 19, 1999
13. Tanjug, April 18, 1999
14. Robert Fisk, Taken in by the NATO Line, The Independent, July 2, 1999

Commission of Inquiry
c/o International Action Center
39 West 14^th Street, Room 206
New York, NY 10011
email: iacenter@iacenter.org
http://www.iacenter.org
phone: 212 633-6646
fax: 212 633-2889

war crimes

Table of Contents: Selected Research Findings