The Managing Board of the Vojvodina Bar Association at its meeting held in
Novi Sad on April 1999 unanimously adopted the following opinions:

The Managing Board of the Vojvodina Bar Association considers that:

1. the attack of the NATO military forces on Yugoslavia that was initiated
by air strikes on March 24, 1999 and that still continues, is made in
direct contravention of the U.N. Charter articles 1 and 2, 39 and 42,
because it was undertaken without a proper prior decision of the U.N.
Security Council and because it was not undertaken for the purpose of
maintaining or establishing international peace and security.

2. the attack of NATO on our country has all features of agression as
defined by the Resolution of the U.N. General Assembly number 3314-XXXIX
dated December 14, 1974, because it was not based on the U.N. Charter,
because it was directed against sovereignty, territorial integrity and
political independence of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and because it
comprises bombardement, decisions of certain countries to allow the acts of
agression to be launched from their territory and the use of banned
exlosive devices. 

3. the bombardment violates the 1922 Hague Rules on aerial war, in
particular article 24, because it is not directed exclusively against
military facilities, and it also violates the provisions of the 1949 Geneva
Convention providing for the existence of protected zones for wounded, ill,
elderly and children.

4. the bombardment violates the provisions of the 1949 Geneva convention on
the protection of civilians in the times of war, because the attacks are
ruthlessly destroying and/or threathening human lives and civilian property.

5. the bombardment violates the Convention on the protection of cultural
monuments in cases of armed conflict of May 14, 1944, including the special
Rules on the implementation of the Convention, because cultural monumbents
have not been spared from the bombardment 

6. the statements of certain statesment from the member states of  THE NATO
and the statements of the NATO officials to the effect that the attacks
will be intensified and will continue until the total destruction, contain
all elements of genocide, as defined by the 1948 Convention on prevention
and punishment of the crime of genocide.

7. the conditions have been met for initiating proceedings for ascertaining
criminal liability of those who have inspired, ordered and executed this
agression for the international crimes of  agression, war crimes, genocide,
crimes against humanity and international law, immoderate inflicting  of
human suffering and damage to property.

8. pursuant to the 1949 Geneva Convention it is necessary to raise the
issue of individual criminal liability within the member states, and the
same issue may be raised before the Hague Tribunal for the fomer Yugoslavia
or another proper ad hoc international court.

9. it is necessary to request from the U.N. to establish a special
investigating commission which will investigate serious violations of the
U.N. Charter, of the Geneva Conventions and of other violations of
international humanitarian law, committed in the agression against the
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

10. there is a joint and several civil liability of all member states who
directly or indirectly participated in the act of agession against the
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to compensate the resulting damages.

11. although every attack making part of the agression is illegal and
inhumane, the Managing Board of the Vojvodina Bar Association, expresses
special consternation over the third barbarian attack committed on April 1,
1999 on the city of Novi Sad, an important cultural center of Europe, a
city of democratic, multicultural and multynational tradition, which after
already sufferring human loss and material destruction from previous
attacks, witnessed in this attack the destruction of its old bridge in the
vicinity of the city center, which caused collateral damage to buildings
and monuments of culture and brought the lives of tens of thousands of
inhabitants of Novi Sad and their property into danger.

On the bases of the aforementioned  opinions, the Managing Board of
Vojvodina Bar Association decided to:
- request from the United Nations, NATO and all other relevant
international organizations and the member states of NATO to immediately
terminate all acts of animosity and agression against the Federal Republic
of Yugoslavia,
- submit an accusation before the Hague Tribunal for former Yugoslavia
against the general secretary of NATO and other currently unknown
commanders and executors of the aforementioned international crimes,
- submit a request to the United Nations for establishment of a special
investigation commission to investigate serious violations of the U.N.
Charter, of the Geneva Conventions and of the international humanitarian
law, committed by the act of the NATO agression against the Federal
Republic of Yugoslavia.
- inform the president of the International Association of Lawyers and the
president of the bar associations of the European Community of these opinions,
- send these opinions to the Federal Ministry of Justice, to the Presidency
of the Alliance of Bar Associations of Yugoslavia (the Bar Association of
Yugoslavia) and to the  Managing Board of the Bar Association of Serbia,
for the prupose of undertaking appropriate action.

President of the Managing Board
Vojvodina Bar Association
Slobodan Beljanski

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