SERBS 'NOT GUILTY' OF MASSACRE

Hugh McManners, Defence Correspondent

The Sunday Times, October 1st, 1995.

"BRITISH ammunition experts serving with the United Nations in Sarajevo have challenged key "evidence" of the Serbian atrocity that triggered the devastating Nato bombing campaign which turned the tide of the Bosnian war.

The experts, who examined the scene of the market massacre in Sarajevo in August, say they found no evidence that Bosnian Serbs had fired the lethal mortar round. They suspected the Bosnian government army might have been responsible.

They say French analysts who also examined the scene agreed with them. But they were overruled by the senior American officer, and the UN issued a statement saying it was beyond any doubt that the Bosnian Serbs were responsible for the blast, in which 37 people were killed and 90 wounded."

...

"The fifth shell, which caused the bloodshed, had come from a different position on a bearing of 170deg, which they could not identify. They suspected that the perpetrators might easily have been not the Bosnian Serbs but the Bosnian government army, which has been implicated in other incidents such as a rocket attack on Sarajevo's television station on June 29, in which five people died and 30 others were injured.

The observations and findings were confirmod by the French, and they returned to base to make their report.

A senior American officer at the United Nations Protection Force (Unprofor) headquarters in Sarajevo dismissed their findings ..."

END