All language subtitles for The Death of Yugoslavia - Eyewitness to History The Death of Yugoslavia - Part 1

The Wall had come down in '89.

The Soviet Union was sort of
in the process of imploding

and had actually come to an end
by the end of '91.

And there was this brave new world

that was supposed to be
the end of history -

all the stuff around "Democracy
had won, communism had fallen."

And then suddenly,
there was this war in Europe.

Back in 1991...

..I'd never heard
of Slobodan Milosevic,

and I don't think many of
the Great British public had either.

But two guys from
Austrian television

turned up at the offices
of the small company

Brian Lapping and I had then

and said,
"We've got a proposition for you.

"There's this terrible war going on
in Yugoslavia" -

I hadn't noticed much about it,
we'd been in Russia -

"and the people who are causing
the trouble are the Serbs

"and their leader,
Slobodan Milosevic.

"But we Austrians are close
to the other side, the Croats,

"and nobody will speak to us.

"So we thought
we'd have a co-production,

"and you do the Serbs,

"you know, in the same way
you've done Gorbachev

"in The Second Russian Revolution,

"getting them to tell you
the inside story

"of their strategies and politics.

"And we do a co-production."

Brian said, "Don't be ridiculous.

"When we did Gorbachev, he was
in the middle of his reforms.

"The policy of glasnost - openness -
was taking off.

"It was the ideal time to ask them
that sort of questions.

"But in Yugoslavia,
there's a war on!"

GUNFIRE, SHOUTING

"People will never tell you
that sort of thing with a war on."

So I said, "Look,
we're a small independent company.

"We've done
Second Russian Revolution,

"we're in the middle of Watergate,
but who knows what comes next?

"This is an interesting commission.
Let's give it a try."

So, how do we find out?

Well, Brian had just the right idea.

We send a producer we trust.

He goes there for a couple of weeks,

and he finds out
whether they'll talk.

So, off you went!
Off I went.

And I got to a meeting
with the head of Serb TV,

which, of course, in those countries
is such an important place to go to.

And that was the first person we met
who we knew spoke to this man,

Milosevic, who was
at the heart of the story

that we were trying to work out.

What we wanted to know is that
we could tell the story

of how he'd come to power
and of how he had stirred

this nationalism in Serbia

that was causing the whole country,

the whole of Yugoslavia,
to break up.

ARCHIVE: That night, Serb television
created the Milosevic legend.

Serbia saw him embrace the cause
of the Serbs in Kosovo.

And this head of television
had a very important friend.

Had a very important friend,
who was Mrs Milosevic.

Of course, she was
an old socialist - just like me -

and she said, "How interesting.

"Do you still call
each other comrade?"

And this was the days
of Jeremy Corbyn.

I could say, "Yes, yes, we do."

And she said, "That's where we began
to go wrong.

"We started to call each other
Gospodin, Mr and Mrs,

"and we took the wrong direction."

So, we had a bond. She was
the most extraordinary woman.

She talked this Soviet,
socialist claptrap,

wearing high-heeled shoes
with little pink bows on the end,

in a very girlie voice.

She was extraordinary, wasn't she?

Milosevic could see the writing
on the wall for the Soviet Union.

It was two years before it fell,

and he thought,
"If I want to be leader,

"I'd better ride
this nationalism wave."

And so when he was given
the opportunity,

which is the story
of the first programme,

he jumped on it.

CHEERING

But the thing about Milosevic is,
he was so key.

And the way we deal with people is,

we send them the points
that we want to talk with them.

So what do we put in this request

for an off-the-record interview
with Milosevic?

I mean, it might be the only time
we ever meet him.

There were so many things
only he could tell us.

But if we asked anything
too tough and nasty,

he wouldn't agree to be filmed.

So we occasionally
had some small disagreements

on this long trip to Belgrade,
had fierce arguments into the night,

particularly when we got
the appointment.

We stayed up
till absolutely forever,

trying to get the appointment.

So, off we went with our questions
in my large handbag...

..and the head of information
took us in.

And you walk in there and you've got
your bag, and there's Milosevic.

And it's one of the funniest...

One of the funniest interviews
I've ever seen because, normally...

You might have found it funny!

So, Milosevic came in,

and there was this cold, empty
marble palace and a big round table,

and he sat down on one end
of the round table,

he plonked a clock down
on the table,

and I reached into my bag
to get out my questions

and he locked me in eye contact.

I'd never experienced this
before then,

and I just couldn't look down
to get it.

Fortunately, we'd argued so long
over the questions,

I had them pretty much memorised.

But I did the whole interview

absolutely with my eyes
locked into his gaze.

I don't know how he did it. So,
at the end of an hour of torture,

he picked up his clock
and he was gone.

It was also
extraordinary experience,

because there were two things
about it, is...

You and Brian are the only people
on the planet who, given this is

the man that every journalist worth
their salt wanted to interview,

would say, "We'll just have
an off-the-record

"research interview first, sir."

And you go in. And of course,
the man, Milosevic,

it was fascinating
cos he absolutely locked you,

but he was terrified of you
at the same time

because he was constantly expecting
to be told,

"Why are you murdering Croats?

"Why are you committing genocide
in Bosnia?"

Or whatever the question might be.

"Why have you got blood
on your hands?"

Instead, you were asking
the gentlest questions,

so as not to put him off,

and he just didn't know
how to respond to them.

And of course, it terrified him.

Well, I guess,
because he just got up and left

and we never got a chance to say,
"We're coming back in November.

"Can you give us
a filmed interview?"

That was it. It was gone.

So the filming trip was over
and we never got the...

Didn't even get close.

So, our long edit began
and we put the programmes together.

But Mrs Milosevic was in there
pitching for us.

And Laura Silber, the
Financial Times correspondent there,

who was our series consultant,
would, every week or so, ring up.

And Mrs Milosevic said...

.."Well, he's agreed in principle,

"but it's like asking him
to go to the dentist.

"He says, 'Not this week, dear,
not this week.'"

And the edit was getting to an end.

So Laura finally rang,
in desperation,

and for the first time,
a man answered the phone.

This was his home.

And she said, "Oh, this is BBC.

"We absolutely need an interview
with President Milosevic.

"We're coming to the end
of our time."

And the man said,
"Ah, well, come to my office...

"Sorry, come to
President Milosevic's office

"in the morning."

She'd got the man himself.

So we turned up to film.

This time, Laura - who spoke
perfect Serbo-Croat -

was doing the interview.

We thought, perhaps, maybe
he would be less bemused

by someone who spoke his language.

So we were trailing in
for the interview,

and the press guy said,
"Oh, by the way, Norma,

"there's just one little condition
for this interview.

"You can use it in the five
programmes you were making,

"but you have to transmit
the whole thing...

"..as he says it, as...the last
programme of your series."

And I said, "Sure, sure."
If he would have said,

you know, "Can I have your mother
for a sixpence?",

I would have said yes. We were
so determined to get this interview.

And the interview happened.
Again, it was an hour,

in which he told pretty much
nothing but lies -

"Me, a nationalist? Never!"

Laura is a really good journalist -
tried and tried.

Nothing but lies.

So I went back to the hotel
and it struck me.

We'd got this interview
after waiting for months,

it's nothing but lies,

and I've made a promise to Milosevic
that I can't possibly...

..possibly... I mean, it's not me
who schedules BBC Two.

So I said, "Well, what do we do?"

I said, "Well, why don't you call
the chairman?

"Brian, why don't you call
the controller of BBC Two?"

"Oh," they said,
"no, no, no, you do it."

You know, its... "You do it."

So I got the controller
on the phone, quaking,

and, in fact, it was a doddle.

He said, "Well, you're in luck.
BBC Two's just gone 24 hours

"and we have nothing to put out
in the middle of the night,

"so...fine.

"Stick some subtitles on it
and we'll put it out."

For me, what was so extraordinary
about him was,

both the times we met him -

both the research interview
and the filmed interview -

is, he felt to me like...

I don't know, like Macbeth
wandering around an empty palace -

quite apart from the fact
he had a wife,

so we can blame the women,
as always -

but it was just something
quite extraordinary about,

you go into places of power
and you imagine they're bustling

with noise and people
and secretaries,

and it felt like he was in there
on his own,

at the heart of this,
and this terrible war was going on.

6,000 Muslim men are still missing

after the fall of
the Srebrenica Safe Area last month.

The Bosnian Serbs continue
to deny charges

that they massacred
Muslim prisoners.

But as yet, international agencies
have not been allowed into the area

to investigate.

REPORTER: Today, the town
is a shambles.

Belongings are strewn over pavements
and apartments are wrecked.

Homes stand witness
to the hurried exodus

of the town's
mainly Muslim population.

The streets are mostly deserted.

The majority of civilians
were escorted from the town,

but for men of fighting age,
it was a different story.

After gun battles in the hills,

some trekked for days
to reach safety

and brought with them
stories of atrocities.

One claim was that up to 3,000 men
were lined up and shot.

All I could think of is,

we were getting the key character
in our story.

It never occurred to me
what this person was really like.

And so it was kind of a bit of
a shock, later on,

when we were doing our editing
and smiling and looked at the dates,

we realised that the moment
that we were interviewing Milosevic,

his people were conducting
a horrific massacre in Srebrenica.

Yeah, we knew that
something terrible

was happening in Srebrenica,
we just didn't know the scale of it.

And I remain... Nothing like
the scale... And I remain convinced

that he knowingly gave us
that interview that day.

I have always believed it.

It certainly fits with his very

"pulling the wings off flies"...
Absolutely. ..sense of humour.

Looking back at the series,

the thing that most makes me
feel guilty, actually,

is just how second-rate
these people were -

the Karadzics, the Krajisniks.

And, you know, I don't want to be
rude about local councillors,

but it was like
these local councillors

had been put on this great pedestal
and they just loved it.

And it was...this extraordinary
self-importance.

And there was us,
as guilty as the politicians,

because we, as journalists,
camped out,

wanted interviews with them
and gave their, you know,

genuinely second-rate
political abilities

some huge standing at the time.

And you really felt that.

I feel it, watching the programmes.

Karadzic was a therapist, poet.

One of the other people
was a Shakespeare scholar

of some not great standing.

Dear old Karadzic is in
a British prison to this day.

He is still alive, and he is
in a prison on the Isle of Wight

as a result of a sentence
passed down by The Hague.

It's an extraordinary reality.

There'd been no war in Europe
since the Second World War

till Slobodan Milosevic
went into Kosovo

and decided to jump on
the nationalist bandwagon -

and look what happened
to Yugoslavia.