Le Figaro, Malbrunot
Belgrade's refusal to grant access to its wiretapping was one of the main obstacles to the location of a war criminal.
Twice, General Philippe Rondot thought to hand over Radovan Karadzic. But each time, the criminal escaped war in extremis in French spymaster who hunted for ten years, alongside a small team set up by Carla Del Ponte, former prosecutor of the Hague Tribunal.
In 1999, while Karadzic is a refugee in Bosnia, one of his bodyguards returned by a team of French agents and CIA. But at the last moment, the man refuses to betray his leader. In January 2000, a telephone monitoring to locate Karadzic in the region of Trebinje. SFOR operation is then triggered, but when the French military arrived on site, the warlord is gone.
"When he saw that the pressure became too strong in Bosnia, Karadzic is spun to shelter elsewhere, "explains General Rondot. The Western intelligence services believe in Montenegro, Greece and even in Belarus, where the fugitive would have made a brief incursion. But Karadzic is hiding in Serbia finally where he has many supporters in the ultra-nationalist political circles, the security apparatus, as well as within the Church, especially in monasteries.
"In Serbia we butions on two problems to catch it, says General Rondot, former Prime Minister Kostunica, first, that does not give its green light, and an obstacle of a technical nature, with telephone interceptions, "essential to the work of detectives on the trail of Karadzic. Belgrade has always denied that other intelligence agencies use data collected from his plays.
"In Bosnia, we could patrol: the DGSE, the Directorate of Military Intelligence, but also our special forces have worked hard. In Serbia, our actions were reduced, "says Rondot. The French general is dependent on the goodwill of Serbia. "If the military intelligence cooperated well with us, however the BIA Civil Service himself was more reluctant, "he adds.
Karadzic was it covered by the BIA? An intriguing detail: about ten days ago, Rade Bulatovic left the direction of civilian intelligence. He refused to cover the arrest of Karadzic? One thing is certain: since the formation of a new pro-European government in Belgrade, the situation had changed for Karadzic. His capture was facilitated by the cooperation of a Western service, most likely the CIA, which has a center of wiretapping on Mount Ijman in neighboring Bosnia, and several members of which were operating within the security apparatus Belgrade.
Mistrust of his
No one knows who the source is at the origin of the catch? From his apartment in New Belgrade, Karadzic had every reason to be wary of his own. He knew that his family was under close surveillance. His brother, Lucas, a businessman who delivered "information room" was "treated" by General Rondot. His wife, Ljiljana, had called him to travel to international justice, and there is only one month his son Alexander was arrested and questioned at length by the services Security in Belgrade.
"Karadzic was probably cut all ties with the financial support networks and family so that we can not go back to him," says General Rondot. Sources said Karadzic had only three bodyguards around him. "Hirsute, it reminds me of another fugitive, Saddam Hussein when he was captured," says General Rondot.
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