Ed Vulliamy became the first journalist to testify at the international war crimes tribunal since the Nuremberg trials. His testimony at The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, after covering the concentration camps in Bosnia, set a precedent and ignited a fiery debate about journalistic objectivity and the role media plays in covering war crimes. 

Vulliamy recently visited Kyiv to speak at the Docudays UA 2023, the biggest documentary  film festival in Eastern Europe. We spoke to him on his lengthy career in documenting war crimes.

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– We’re conducting this interview on the day [June 6] when Russia commited an act of terrorism on the Kakhovka dam. There’s this feeling here in Ukraine that the term “war crime” needs reassessment after this war, because Russia keeps coming up with the new ways to commit war crimes. What’s your perspective on this discussion?

– I’ve come to know genocide too well over the last half a century that I’ve been doing this. I mean, I’m half-Irish. [he laughs] The fundamental thing that Ireland and Ukraine share is the experience of political famine. The British tried to starve the Irish to death, Stalin tried to starve Ukraine to death, so we share that immediately. As most genocides, [the dictators and war criminals] will try to come up with the new [means], they will nearly work and then they won’t. Every Jew who survived the Holocaust is a testament to that. Every Ukrainian, who survived the Holodomor is a testament to that...

And this [Russia war against Ukraine] is the remarkable war, it’s almost like the World War 1 in the 21 century. We’ve got every kind of a genocidal act, concocted over the last 150 years, distilled into one atrocity. 

– “War, war never changes” is the quote, right? The methods of genocide can change but ultimately it’s still a genocide. 

– A genocide is always a genocide. The means, the instruments do change, but the goal remains the same – to obliterate a people or part thereof. 

The International Criminal Court has so far indicted Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, specifically for kidnapping Ukrainian children. “Readucation and adoption”, they call it. It has a sort of satanic dimension to it, this is devilish in the most extreme, almost unimaginably painful way. 

And the other thing is the damage to the civil infrastructure. That’s interesting, that’s where the [Kakhovka] dam comes in, because [with that ecocide act] Russia is clearly trying to obliterate a people or part thereof. It will inevitably fail at that. But the attempt is to destroy Ukraine, destroy the land. The 21 century is going to be dominated by the issues of climate crisis, ecology and the land, and here you are, the most fertile soil in the world [is being targeted by Russia]. And to blow up a dam, to cause flooding, eco-disaster to plants, creatures and people…

– Ecocide is the term.

– Thank you, exactly, that’s the word for that. To kidnap and reeducate children is the genocide of the 1920s, taken to satanic extreme. But this idea of destroying the land is very much 21 century. 

If any Russian would come to his senses he will realize that he had failed miserably, because Ukraine has a future. Because this war is against Ukraine’s future as well. The more they destroy infrastructure, – though “infrastructure” is a rather tedious word, – the more they destroy your land, the soild from which your crops grow, the land on which your cities and towns are built, the more they are declaring war on your future. It’s a genocide, it’s all part of it. 

– We also have have an ongoing discussion here about what exactly constitutes Ukraine’s victory in this war. The liberation of all the territories is definitely paramount, but another important thing concerns accountability, ensuring that the Russian war crimes will be prosecuted for all the atrocities… 

– That’s crucial. And that’s exactly why I was invited to speak [at Docudays UA 2023]. I have an honor of being here to talk about how journalism can assist in the process of restoring justice. 

Justice is an easy word here… Reckoning should be the word here, it’s the toughest word in the English language. I’ll have to ask you what’s the closes equivalent is in Ukrainian…

– I guess the closest term we have is «cпокута» or «розплата».

– Yeah, it basically means staring history in the eye, it means the perpetrator coming to terms with what he’s done and making amends. I mean, the closest recent example is Germany. 

– How would you describe the difference between terms “accountability” and “reckoning”?

– I think accountability can be done in documentation, it can be done by lawyers and diplomats. You can make something – a country, an organization, a corporation – look accountable. By coming to some kind of settlement, a treaty or signing a piece of paper. But “reckoning” is a moral word. Reckoning is what the Germans have done. 

– And reckoning usually takes generations.

– In Germany it took one [generation]. Germany’s done pretty well: it’s not the Jews that are building the [Holocaust] monuments in Berlin, it’s the Germans. But in Yugoslavia quite the opposite happened: the Serbs and the Bosnian Serbs have done absolutely nothing to reckon with what they’ve done. If anything, the denial is even worse than it was. It’s quite the reverse. 

I testified at nine trials trials, from the little guys up to the three leaders: Milosevic, Karadzic, Mladic (the Serbian president, the Bosnian-Serb leader and the Bosnian general). What did these judgments achieve in the context that I’ve just described? Not very much. A man called Stanisic, the head of the Serbian secret service (he’s the equivalent of [Nikolay] Patrushev in Russia) was convicted just last week [in May 2023], after 32 years, having been acquitted in the first round of trials. What does that do to the survivors of the concentration camps and the rape camps, to the 8,000 mothers of the men and boys, massacred at Srebrenica? What does that do to them, now that this man, finally, after three decades [is convicted]? Most of the mothers are dead now, I’m afraid. 

On one level, the lawyers say that that’s a historic judgment, that finally Serbia itself is found responsible. It’s a bit like if Russia was to be had accountable [in the ICC], not the People’s Republic of Donetsk or Luhansk [Russian occupation administrations], that would be the equivalent. It’s important, because what happened in Yugoslavia was the maquette for the statue that Putin is now trying to build in Ukraine. Milosevic was nothing, if not [little] Putin. And [Serbia] is still the russophile, putinistic country in Europe. It’s all related. 

To answer your question, there is a reason to issue these indictments, to have trials, whether they are in abstentia or not is another matter. But it’s going to be more difficult in the case of Putin, because Russia is not trying to join the European Union [which was a condition for Serbia]. 

What is the Ukrainian victory? Ukrainian victory is the defeat not only of Russian forces on your territory, that’s the bottom line, but the dismantlement of the Russian Empire, forever. And the complete isolation of Russia from international [governing bodies]. If Russia keeps its seat on the United Nations Security Council, Ukraine has not won the war. If Russia is part of G7, G8 or however many G’s there are... This has to be the last time you fight this war. And if it isn’t the last time, you haven’t won. As the Mexicans say: “You can do what you want, but that border won’t go anywhere”.  

There’s still this ghastly mindset in the west, that it’s only Putin’s war, that only he wants to wage this war. But if you cut him out of the equation, probably, someone even worse will come to power. Yes, I would like to see him taken out. But the problem is not Vladimir Putin, the problem is Russia. And Ukraine wins when Russia is at worst diminished, at best – destroyed. 

– So, basically, when Russia comes to its own reckoning.

– I don’t think Russia will ever reckon with what it's done. And there’s no reckoning until Russia hands over Putin and hundreds of other people to the court for war crimes. At the moment, I have to say, it’s hard to imagine. 

There’s still this sentiment in the West: “Oh, how did the great Russia become so awful? Oh, the tragedy of Russia! Oh, I love Leo Tolstoy!” 

– But it’s all in Tolstoy and Dostoyevskiy, if you read it, it’s there.

– It’s all about the tragedy of Russia for them, but I’m not interested in the tragedy of Russia. I’m interested in the tragedy and the cause of Ukraine. The tragedy of Mariupol is what interests me now.

There’s still this hope for some kind of liberal enlightenment in Russia, that they will come to terms with all this. I don’t think there will be, I don’t see any sign of it. It’s the same with Serbia, there’s something endemic in this Russian, neo-Russian or neo-soviet mindset that does not reckon. Germany reckoned, because Germany was crushed. The British have never reckoned with Ireland properly, the French have never reckoned with Algeria properly. 

People use this word “closure”, I don’t like it. I think it’s a fantasy. Without reckoning, there’s no closure. I remember when Mladic was convicted and some TV reporter said: “This will, at last, bring closure to the mothers of Srebrenica massacre.” No, it won’t! What does closure mean? Closure is the type of word that’s being used by the people, that have never seen the war, but still talk about it.

– You’ve actually touched on this topic, but I would like to ask you specifically about your role in covering the Yugoslavia war crimes. Now obviously it was your report that really started the discussion around the Serbian prisoner camps and rape camps. But did you feel you made a difference there?

– I’m told that the ICTY [The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia] was established because of the concentration camps we’ve found in 1992. But the Srebrenica massacre was in 1995, three years later. That bloody war was allowed to continue, aided and abetted by the West. There’s an element of contrition in that, I think the West responded [to the Russia-waged war in Ukraine] better, that in Bosnia, still not adequately though. 

Did it make a difference? I mean, not every story you do gets a reaction from the president of the United States. The day after we found these camps George H. W. Bush said: “This will not continue, we will stop this, this cannot be allowed to happen in the heart of Europe.” But it did, for three more fucking years. And we, the reporters, did a reasonably good job, trying to report these atrocities. And it made no difference whatsoever.

– Because it did not stop the war.

– Because there was no intervention. I mean, Srebrenica is the living testimony to the lack of impact of journalism. And the ICTY… My American colleagues were like: You mustn’t do this [testify at the trials]. It’s an American thing to say: “Our work is to report, not testify.” I mean, The New York Times roasted me for testifying: “Mr Vulliamy handed over his notebooks to be called by the defense.” 

Well, I handed over everything that I had to the prosecution, and the defense has a right to see anything the prosecution has, that’s just how justice works. I did not hand anything over to the prosecution, I’d made everything that I had available [to the process]. It was really nasty, and it can become nasty here in Ukraine [when the Russian war crimes trials start]. 

There’s this saying [in the media] that journalists should work in tandem with the law. Nobody “works in tandem”! What does that mean exactly? What kind of priesthood is this? 

I mean, in the case of ICTY, it’s not up to me to decide whether we achieved anything. It’s up to the survivors to decide. In a court of law people tend to say things that they wouldn’t say to the media, especially the survivors of war crimes. The women who testified at the ICTY trials stepped up to the plate, they were cross-examined and asked things like: “Did the defendant ejaculate inside you? Do you see the defendant in court? Will you point to him?” The courage of those witnesses is quite extraordinary. So it’s not for me to decide whether it has achieved anything, it’s up to them. And among all of them that I know very few feel any kind of satisfaction. 

– That’s the media perspective you’re talking about. Do you feel that the public perception has shifted?

– Now obviously we’re talking about a tiny percentage of the population, 0,0001% of the public. Nobody in the U.S. and Europe gives a shit about what happens in the Hague. 

With Ukraine it would be a lot more, because Ukraine is more embedded in the imagination of the people, thanks largely to the reporting and the cause of your country, the essence of what you’re doing. It was hard for Bosnia to capture the imagination of the world, it’s not that hard for Ukraine, it’s definitely better. 

– All that said, what is the biggest lesson for Ukraine from the Yugoslavia war crimes tribunals? What are some of the most pressing matters that we should start attending to now?

– We don’t know whose side is time on in this war. For Ukraine to lose the war is unthinkable, but, let’s face it, it’s not impossible. 

– It’s existential for us.

– That’s right. But if there comes a point further down the line and the West – the U.S. and European Union – would start signaling to Ukraine to begin some kind of talks about a settlement, Ukrainian government should say: “No, there is no settlement.” 

Because the Dayton Peace Agreement never ended the war in Bosnia, it simply postponed it and made it worse and worse. If you give an aggressor a milimiter, all you’re doing is saying: “Do it again! Get more!” Ukraine should return every milimiter of its land and then you can talk about [sustainable peace]. Serbia not only won the war, it survived it. And that cannot happen with Russia in Ukraine.  

Of course, the Ukrainian society should make this choice. I can’t sit here and tell you that tens of thousand of young Ukrainians should die for it. That would be arrogant. But settlement is defeat, there is no peace treaty here that can be called a victory. That’s my fear. 

I don’t think your country will allow it. I don’t want to down Bosnia, but they don’t have the metal that you guys have. You have a vast, deep country with a deep culture and a proud resolve to withstand all the divisions. When the Right Sector and a rave club suddenly decide they’re in love with each other, you know that something interesting is going on. You have a chance to build a society which would be a role model for all of us now. 

– The trick is to sustain this feeling of unity. 

– Absolutely, there would be this 1945 moment, when all the soldiers will come back home, when there would be flowers in the military cemeteries, more than you can count, the way it was for the U.S. and Great Britain [after WW 2]. 

Okay, we no longer have anything we’re fighting against, what are we fighting for? Are we fighting for oligarchs to come back? No. Are we fighting for neoliberalism? No. Do we want to hold on to the best of what we got and get rid of the worst? Yes! But that’s the challenge. 

– And what about the war crimes documentation at this stage? Why is that important to start this work now, not after the victory?

– On one hand, it’s just good to strike while the iron is hot, do it as you go along. What the War Archive and The Reckoning Project are doing is absolutely crucial. And not just to the legal process. Because the achievement of the ICTY was not actually legal, it was historical. The courage of the people who told their stories gives you historical record. The story is told, the narrative is there. 

Now, in the case of Bosnia the narrative no longer belongs to the survivors, because of what we’ve been talking about for the last hour. But this narrative will belong to Ukraine, just like the narrative of the [Holocaust] belongs to the Jews. And that narrative is there, and it is true. And there’s nothing more important than truth, that’s what journalism is supposed to be about, what justice is supposed to be about. 

After ICTY you know what happened, in vivid detail. And what these wonderful people in Ukraine [War Archive and The Reckoning Project] are doing is collecting and amassing the narrative. It’s a huge achievement, it means that your children, in the free Ukraine, will be able to know what happened if they care to find out. It’s a testimony, in the deepest historical sense, not just the legal sense.