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Humanitarian Law CenterI refuse to acknowledge a single sentence from the minutes of 24 May 1999which I had given to the investigative judge of this court, which does notagree with my statement given today before this court. The only promisethey kept was that, after five or six days, they did inform my family aboutmy whereabouts.Concerning my statement given in the premises of the prison in Bijelo Poljeto the same investigative judge, I did give a statement then, but I think thatthis statement agrees with the statement I have given before this court today.It is upon the court to look into the statement and assess it within theframework of the totality of my defence.”The defendant was presented with the fact that a part of the statementfrom the minutes of 18 July 2001 concerning the events in Podujevo and thefact that, in it, the defendant clearly described the event from his point ofview, but with the precise description of the place where the civilians werekilled, who had ordered their killing, and he also remarked that the orderhad been given by Slobodan Medić.In connection with this, the defendant replied: “The investigative judge,Mijat Bajović - whom I would like to see here and ask him a couple of questions- had to, in order to justify his actions, write what had been written inthe minutes. And, by the way, there were no threats in Bijelo Polje.In connection with this statement, I would like to say the following: in BijeloPolje I was tried because of a certain crime and my defender was Mrore Kalanj who is the defender in this case as well. He had already beenengaged, and the investigative judge will have to give me an explanationwhy he hadn’t allowed me to have a defender who had already been engagedby me. The investigative judge didn’t even ask me whether I wantedor didn’t want a defence lawyer.”Asked whether there were any comments in Prolom Banja about the eventsin Podujevo, the defendant replied: “There were comments and we tried tolearn what really happened, but we were not successful in it.”Asked by the court whether he knew Dejan Demirović, the defendant replied:“I did not.274