Woman Who Testified Against Slobodan Milosevic Wants to Leave Witness Protection and Sue the British Police

A key witness who was relocated after testifying against Slobodan Milosevic during the former Serbian leader's trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) has said she wants to regain her previous identity and sue the British police.

"I have a double life," she said in an interview with the Times of London. "One life is in my house and one life is when I go out. My husband and I cannot do this anymore,"

While testifying at the trial in 2003, the woman was known as B-129. Though her voice was altered and she spoke from behind a screen, a recording of her real voice was accidentally leaked. She later survived an assassination attempt in Belgrade when a car tried to run her over.

As part of a witness protection scheme organized by the ICTY and managed by London's Metropolitan Police, the woman received housing in northern England and an allowance of about 100 pounds ($151) per week.

The move meant that both B-129 and her husband lost their identities. The Times of London reported that she now works in a Marks & Spencer department store, and that she and her husband have two children together.

She reportedly wants to sue the ICTY and the Metropolitan Police for damages related to "everything that's gone on."

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"I'm not thinking about risk because I would like to speak clear and loud," she said. "Victims and witnesses should be protected. Anonymity makes me a criminal, not them."

B-129 also claims that she was "bullied" by the ICTY in 2010. She claims the court wanted her to give evidence against two Serbian officials in a trial that ultimately failed to net any convictions.

"I'm not concerned about my safety because most of the people are already dead," she said. "Things have changed."

She previously served as secretary for Zeljko "Arkan" Raznatovic, the leader of the Serb Volunteer Guard, a paramilitary group nicknamed the "Tigers." Her testimony linked Milosevic to Raznatovic and the Tigers, one of the groups that Milosevic allegedly used to commit war crimes.

The ICTY indicted Arkan — who was assassinated in 2000 — and the Tigers for a number of crimes, including murder, rape, and willfully causing great suffering. During her 2003 testimony, B-129 claimed that Arkan's Tigers took their orders from Milosevic's security chiefs.

"Arkan always told me that without orders from the state security, the Tigers never went anywhere," she reportedly said.

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B-129 also said she kept a diary of the group's operations, and that she distributed about 4 million Deutschmarks to Arkan's men — worth about $2.2 million in 2003, according to an AP report from the time of the trial. Some of this money came directly from the office of Milosevic's wartime security chief, Jovica Stanisic, while more came from other Milosevic associates, including customs chief Mihalj Kertes.

She claimed that Yugoslav army general Dusan Loncar organized the delivery of both weapons and gasoline to the Tigers. B-129 said that she heard the Tigers boast about the things they had done.

"They never had any prisoners of war," she said. "I took this to mean they executed all prisoners."

More than a decade after she testified, B-129 told the Times that the things she saw never affected her. "That was war," she said. "The same things happened on the other two sides. I'm not defending any party. War is the last and worst solution."

The ICTY's website states that witness relocation is a "drastic measure" that is only applied when there is a "verifiable, identifiable and sustained threat to the life of a witness." In a 2008 internal audit report, the court also noted that there were gaps in providing psychological support and counseling for witnesses, and stated that "the near absence of systematic post-trial follow up could reinforce the feeling of abandonment."

Follow Sally Hayden on Twitter: @sallyhayd

Photo via Wikimedia Commons