Medical marijuana. I heard something in that area about it endo cannabinoid system that is unique to mammals and therefore we have some kind of receptors. Is that on anybodys, how are we doing on that apartment against propaganda . Guest they always have receptors in our break for every issue their something new and exciting. I think the timeframe is accelerating. We are doing two things. I dont want to take up too much time but with converting some cancers into chronic diseases, the best example is we took care of patients with this disease and they were uniformly fatal. Now they can take a pill and they live a perfectly normal life span. The pills after well dont work. The pharmaceutical industry has developed five followup bills that they were. So those patients are living really perfectly normal lives taking a pill everyday like a vitamin. They still have the disease but that conversion to chronic disease. I think some of the therapies studies are working simply. Some patients with lung cancer, the tumor is not quite going away but its not going either and theyre just staying there with into therapy. I think thats the change thats going on. The thing that the cancer act but also anger a lot of people was it opened up a grant system to all of the country. Was a Cancer Research in many european country. In fact, it would be a Clinical Trials program in europe except that we set it up. We set up and operating office in belgium and got them all going. Now they do very well. But it was a Cancer Institute a set that up. People who made major discoveries have done it with u. S. Dollars. That was the big point come we didnt know where a chore might come from and, therefore, we shouldnt restrict the grants just to the United States. [applause] i like to think the doctor and elizabeth are very much an amazingly informative and if anyone had lots lots of good questions. I hope you will come up and meet with our speakers, and thank you so much for coming. [applause] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] okay, ready to begin. Im Bradley Graham with politics and prose along with my wife, and on behalf of the entire staff, thank you for coming. A few quick administrative notes. Now would be a good time to turn off your cell phones or anything that might go beep. When you get to the q a part, if you have a question please make your way to this microphone here because as you can see we are filming both for our Youtube Channel and also for cspan booktv he. We would like to be able to hear your question. Also it uses the microphone, others in the store can have the question as well. At the end before you come up to get your book signed, our staff would appreciate it if youd pulled up the chairs youre sitting in and leaned them against something that looks like it will not topple over. This evening we are going to hear about it pretty remarkable true story, one that hasnt really been told before. Historic public author and journalist Julian Borger halls of the worlds most successful manhunt. This manhunt targeted 161 individuals wanted for war crimes in connection with the balkan conflicts of the 1990s. Remember, that was the period when the term ethnic cleansing emerged as a kind of euphemism for the wholesale slaughter that was once again taking place in the heart of europe. Those responsible for this brutality the identified and indicted subsequently by the International Criminal tribunal for the former yugoslavia. A special court in the hague created in 1993 by the united nations. It was the first time that a global court had been established to pursue war criminals and ended up engaging in an even more substantial hunt down the search for nazis after world war ii. I 2011, all 161 of those indicted had either been captured or killed or had surrendered or committed suicide. Now, a lot of the manhunt was conducted in secret, and involve special forces from a number of countries, spy agencies, even and attracted tracking unit inside the Hague Tribunal itself. But their achievement and the subsequent trials have set a precedent for how International Authorities can bring justice to bear against those responsible for mass atrocities and other crimes against humanity. Through much dogged reporting, julia who is an experienced register list, has pieced together this amazing story. He strong on more than 200 interviews with soldiers, intelligence officials, investigators, diplomats and others. And he also attend access to files of previously secret British Government documents. He covered the bosnian war for the bbc and the guardian living in sarajevo in the mid 1990s. In 1999 he returned to the balkans to report on the kosovo conflict. He is currently World Affairs editor of the guardian and is part of the team that won the guardians of 2014 pulitzer for Public Service journalism for coverage of the Edward Snowden files. Julian tutt book julians blog the butchers trail has received very favorable reviews from both its abundant detail and gripping narrative style. It was called a vivid page turning account, and your journal a box set quote, this fascinating tale is difficult to put down and reads the best written true crime. So please join me in warmly welcoming Julian Borger. [applause] thank you very much. Thank you very much to politics and prose for having me here. I really loved in the public state they referred to as distinguished refer to as testing which witches were not used in connection with me since my mother i would be maturely great in my early 30s. Thank you very much to all the friends who have come out here tonight. If they would hear my publishers of the press who took a sudden leap of faith in publishing this book, and realized just how big a leap they have taken when they came back to me after reading it and sang why are there so many names ending in federal. Although i was pleased to see a lease initial in the amazon rankings ending in turn one. First bestsellers but has taken off of that one is the number two was mr. Hitler and the realists others mein kampf. What the publisher said, there are too many names ending in ich. It really says so much about the problem of the west, western intervention in bosnia and the balkans. Perhaps its because so many names ended in ich edit also seemed very comforted that it took three years to stop that war and to stop the killing. And it was my hope with this book to kind of breakthrough that barrier and focus on what is universal from this story which is the issue of mass atrocities, the issue of International Humanitarian law and the enforcement of that law. Because what are the hardest, tough problems in Foreign Policy then and now. Bradley said i was in bosnia during the war and afterwards, and my colleagues who were there, and i, were astonished after the war when there were 64,000 nato troops in bosnia, a they didnt go after these people would been indicted for some of the worst crime since the nazi terror. And actually made a point of avoiding going after them. In fact, that policy only change just after i left the region and 97, but i kept tabs on it and saw the arrests, gather momentum, and finally they got down to the big fish, Radovan Karadzic. They got him in 2008. Ratko mladic in 2011, and finally they got the last guy. I wrote up a magazine piece at the time because i thought it was striking that he was a u. N. Mission that it actually and completed. They had 10 161 names on the lit and it took a long time and they finally completed it. And in doing quite a short magazine story it occurred to me it became evident to me that there was a much bigger story underneath. Had to be, that have to be told the want of a vast and sprawling manhunt. If you talk to intelligence and special forces people who are in the business in the late 90s up to 9 11, more than likely they wouldve been involved in that manhunt one way or another. It was the biggest to put a special forces troops anywhere before 9 11. But it became, it was buried under layers of secrecy because it involves intelligence and special forces, but also it came to, was interrupted midway through by 9 11 and in all attention was focused on the war and terror, which is then that directly segued into the people who are looking for the war criminals in bosnia went off immediately and went to afghanistan, went to iraq. The first renditions were from sarajevo, the people have been involved in that manhunt we need to the Hotel Hollywood and picked up a jordanian, egyptian, and they as far as i know a few days after 9 11 with the first people to undergo, suffer rendition to the respective countries. Ive found out very hard to find out what happened to them since. But i did find the man had an extraordinary story from the very beginning. The first operation, arrest operation, specifically for the hague war crimes tribunal was called operation Little Flower which was a sort of pickup team, a mixed Multinational Team under the u. N. Flag which in a way does show all the best that the u. N. Can be. It was a group of people brought together serving a mandate. It was a diplomat general, an american diplomat general who lives in this town, an american prosecutor, Tim Williamson am a british bobby from stratford, ichat, site detected and a polish special forces unit. They concocted this elaborate sting operation to what other war criminals over the border so they could be arrested. They did so pretty much without the knowledge or the approval of their own government. This act of, maverick act open the floodgates. Because then nato was in bosnia did what it all. They called Mission Creep to go after the worker most. They were there. They said he to peace and they dont want to do anything else. After that it became much harder to make the argument that its highly for our troops because this was a bunch of u. N. Officials and some untried, unknown polish soldiers. So they set up a joint operation and stood guard, the uk, u. S. , france, the netherlands. The original idea was to have a multinational, big multinational sweep and pick up everyone pretty much at the same time involving going in to the headquarters with guns blazing. It was never clear to me what that actually meant to do this or they created an operation that would be so scared the politicians that they would cancel but it was never put to the test because the whole thing was torpedoed by an espionage in sex scandal that came to be known a french major whose job it was to go up and down the road from sarajevo to parlay and the cia became convinced that the flow of information was going the wrong way and that he was giving away far more information than he was collecting from others. Ca complaint about them. He was recalled to paris in debriefed by the french hierarchy sent it back and kind of gave kind of a shrug. And it occurred, u. S. Intelligence officers on the ground, maybe this was an individual act but it was a french force protection that they would let us know well be going in and be looking for some of your guys but if you want any trouble you might want to stay out of that area. The end result was the same. But they ended up leaving sarajevo eventually because one night a young woman came in to Police Station in sarajevo, complaints shed been sexually assaulted quite violently by him. And this was presented to the french generals on the spot and he was out within an hour leaving his property, clothes and possessions behind them. Whether he would set up a whether this was something, remains unclear but the result he was out and francoamerican military intelligence relations were very much a soured for the following years. And after that, didnt count for everything. Everyone went their own ways. The british started off in the dead about a dozen arrests in their zone bring it within their rough edge techniques that theyve perfected in northern ireland. Then attach who were operating under the weight of the guild of having been soldiers who were supposed to protect. Vineyard the u. S. Who learned men hunting techniques there that they would take on in the war of terror is. And you had the germans who went into the action for the first time in this manner, in the First Time Since the Second World War and took the first casualties since the Second World War in this manner. And, finally, the french, the most reluctant participants whose first time out turned out to be a real disaster. They killed the guy and almost killed a bunch of kids who are traveling within. Then went on to capture one of the biggest prizes of all. So by the time 9 11 when everyone was shipped out to afghanistan and into iraq, a lot of the small fry had been hoovered up, but what that meant is its the big fish, the people are given the orders had gotten away. By seeing the small fry being picked up, they fled to serbia and croatia where they found safe haven. And the next stage in a minute was about putting the pressure on those government in belgrade and zagreb to do the hunting themselves. It meant economic pressure. And ultimately the big fish were only arrested when there was fundamental political change in those countries, and then in those countries intelligence agencies. What ill do is only an excerpt about the final, when Radovan Karadzic was finally arrested in 2008 after those political changes happened. So by 2008, Radovan Karadzic is europes most wanted ma man d its greatest embarrassment. The selfdeclared republic the foremost psychiatrist and put had carved out of boston have brought death camps, mass executions and genocide back to the heart of a continent that it fooled itself into thinking it is let such abominations behind. The atrocities in bosnia had drawn expressions of horror and outrage from the capitals of europe, yet it had taken three years to stop the killing and 12 more years had slipped by in which the west combined intelligence agencies supposedly stretched everything you to find the perpetrators. Yet karadzic, the wartime president of boston is serb republic and high priest of ethnic cleansing, remained at large. And every day he was at liberty called into question the worlds promises to sit in judgment on the killings if it failed to stop. The pursuit of karadzic have been marked by false starts, blunders, but trails and near misses, from the abortive negotiations over surrender, the spy drama of the affair and the consequent long running francoamerican spat followed by a series of what the american ambushes that the fugitive always managed to avoid, either by the landlocked either by blind luck, tipoffs, or highly sensitive those for danger. When out of the blue lock for once abandoned the fugitive in favor of his pursuers. One of the many dormant phone numbers on the bia, thats a serb intelligence agency, list suddenly rang after four years of silence. More interesting still, the person using the same card in question was Radovan Karadzics younger brother and staunchest defender. He was a blustering smalltime businessmen preoccupied with defending himself against charges of killing a young woman in a drunk driving incident in 2005. But who was he calling . The voice on the other end of the phone was unfamiliar to the bia eavesdroppers. It was mailed that highpitched with the belgrade accent. But the conversation told them nothing more. A couple of investors was said to take a look at the address to which the machine and phone number was registered. They returned having discovered his name was dropped on top which, if somewhat eccentric old character bulletin with a high rise apartment drops outlined the street named in honor of the first man in space in a shabby remains of the concrete socialist dream that was new belgrade. About the bushy white beard and glasses he sported a top not type with a black bow harsh distractingly on his snow we have. Dabic made a living as a new age mystic, offering spiritual cures for chronic diseases and everyday maladies but in the world of alternative medicine he was a minor celebrity with a regular column in the National Magazine healthy living, a parttime gig representing a Connecticut Company and while the sexologist aimed at rejuvenating the sperm of infertile men. The therapist in question claimed that the sluggish sperm would start moving faster if dabic placed his hands in their facility. Dabic seemed an unlikely acquaintance for the hard drinking splenda to everyone who attended to show little interest in alternative lifestyles. So the bia officers dug deeper. The more you look into life of this whitehaired shaman, a stranger a. According to a second the records, dabic came from a town west of belgrade halfway to the croatian border but there was one rather glaring discrepancy. Was another track in dabic with exactly the same data for the dispersion look nothing like the looming scandal figure in new belgrade. He was a squat former construction worker with short gray hair and a drooping mustache who grew tomatoes and make plum brandy. He barely strayed more than ive miles from his birthplace in his entire life and didnt even own a mobile phone. The record show only one drag and dabic had been born there in the 1940s, so one of these two men was clearly an imposter and it didnt take Sherlock Holmes to the dinner has been to figure which. Theres other styles that didnt fit of a spiritual healer. He could have a dozen mobile phones. You some of intimate contact with nationalists and being against the Hague Tribunal. Bia office will send back to 257 gregarious street to hang around and take a closer look strolling past him in the road. The officer turned, returned with a startling suggestion. Perhaps this meant was that the mysterious link to Radovan Karadzic, the survey listing of suspected if you cut off the top not, shaved the beard and remove the causes, dabic could be karadzic himself. But by this time word had reached karadzic who was being watched but according to his lawyer, the fugitive begin to spot unfamiliar faces in midjuly rushing past him on the stairwell at his apartment block of his favorite buyer, the madhouse. He knew he was encircled. The endgame has begun in which the fugitive king was running out of ponds to shield himself from his hunters. But he was prepared to simply wait for them to come knock on his door for on july 17 to bia Surveillance Team sound the addressing to identified men into the apartment with large bags it look like the old minsky to run. The next evening dabic left in a light blue tshirt and a broad brim straw hat that was pulled low over his face. He was weighed down with baggage from a white plastic bag, a shopping basket and a knapsack all of which seemed to be full. He walked to a nearby bus stop where he was soon discredited joined by one of his bia trackers. They boarded the number 73 bus bound for the suburb about eight miles to the northwest. Dabic sat in the front. His shadow sat several seats affected as the bus lumbered through the streets from the concrete towers of new belgrade into the older, richer district, this eccentric character known as tranthirttranthirt een out in his last minutes of the long running performance put on his clear glass spectacles and opened a spirituals text. Through the window city blocks gateway to greenfield turning gold in the light of a balkan summer evening. The unhurried column inside the bus contrasted with the hectic activity in the surrounding streets triggered by dabics sudden departure from new belgrade. The new bia chief had set up a snatch plan in motion. A few stops before in the green belt around belgrade a couple of patrol cars steered in front of the bus and four plainclothes policeman got out, two in the front got on and two in the back. They made their way towards his seat posing as inspectors showing the badges and asking to see tickets to the old man and a straw hat was reaching into his pocket for his fire when he felt a policemans grip around his arm. Radovan karadzic . No, dabic. No, its Radovan Karadzic, the policeman insisted. Your superiors aware of which are doing, the man as . Yes, fully, came the reply. The officer ordered the driver to stop the bus and the captive was escorted onto the grass shoulder. At 9 30 p. M. On july 18, 2008, the flamboyant depiction better than dabic evaporator. In his place, the ghost of Radovan Karadzic who touted the balkans for a decade we materialized on the belgrade roadside as a flustered old man, his straw hat askew clutching a white plastic bag to his breast. Three years later they finally got ratko mladic would become isolated by this time in one of his cousins farm house. He, although the most ruthless of men was given a way but a moment of sentimentality. They were following, bia were following his son who went on a trip to the village because he had several cousins there. During this visit, two of the grandchildren walked into the courtyard of a cousins house, which was as far as i knew empty because all the cousins were elsewhere partying, and the grand children stood in his courtyard for several minutes. And then left and they all went to the family party at they couldnt take it out why they had done it. They raided the place and there was a small room very much in his underwear they found ratko mladic. The reason he was caught was he wanted to see his children. He wouldnt be able, his grandchildren he wouldnt be able to talk to but he wanted to see them in the courtyard. And then a few months later the last man, goran hadzic, was caught in the woods in northern serbia, bringing to an end 17 year manhunt. The lessons from the manhunt were in one way technical. One of the special forces, delta forces, said everything we did in iraq and afghanistan that came to me and hunting we learned in bosnia. We learned it is better to go small and big. They learned how to use drones. They learn how to integrate intelligence and special forces. But the bigger lesson, the lesson from my point of view that was taken away from this experience was the realization that peace is never enduring without justice. The generals that went into bosnia and who resisted any talk of Mission Creep learned after about a year that it wasnt working by leaving the war criminals at large, was undermining the peace process, the whole idea of returning people to their homes and reintegrating the country was being sabotaged by the people. So after painfully after many much they learned this lesson, and that an enduring peace had to be accompanied by some measure of justice. But in a way my impression of those lessons have been unlearned since this manhunt, this rather forgotten manhunt. The strength of the icc, the International Community corp. , which in a way theres a legacy of the Hague Tribunal as it has been undermined to the point where it can only really function in africa which is a problem in itself. Internationally medicare law and its enforcement out of fashion but i mean i think the present situation in middle east as a demonstration that if you think that the enforcement of International Humanitarian law is expensive, you should try impunity. Because in a way the situation in syria, the growth of daesh, isis, our outcroppings of the commission of mass atrocities by murderous regimes that have gone forward with impunity. And this book is to demonstrate that there is an alternative to that root, and that the enforcement of International Humanitarian law is not simply pieinthesky idealistic, but it has been done and it has worked. Thank you very much. [applause] does anyone want to ask a question . Thank you for coming. Looking at the situation now 20 years out from the dayton peace accord, more than 20 years now, what do you think of the situation in jenin the balkans, and in general in europe with the refugee crisis, the increasing threat of terrorism . Do you think theres a possibility that it could happen again and this time spread . Thank you. Youre right. 20 years after coming back to boston and its a depressing sight. The Peace Agreement that ended the war has also constrained, strangled the peace by dividing bosnia, ethnic lines and making it difficult to succeed politically if you dont fly the ethnic flag. And that is deep and the division and made it really hard to function as a state. That contributed paralysis, a high youth unemployment rate. And no, i dont think it will lead to more like we saw in the theyve had enough and i think europe cannot allow it this time. They have seen this movie before i dont think they will let it play out again. That doesnt mean that everything is fine. It is remarkable to me the art more jihad is coming out of its remarkably there are not more jihad is coming out of bosnia. Disincentive to live in a situation where what happened there being denied. The people went back are not allowed to talk about what happened. If they want to get along. So it amazes me there isnt a bigger jihadists threat. Isis is trying very hard. They have production biggest aim at the region trying to recruit people. I dont think europe is going to get away with it for much longer but it may not be warlike we saw in the mid 90s but it will not be pretty. [inaudible] the icc having great promise seems to me even now. Do you have any insight as to why the United States has taken such an entrenched position for the success of the icc . I mean, it seems to me as a professor at georgetown you probably know better than me. Clinton cited in his last days in office to fulfill a promise, whether he meant it ever to go through, expected it to ever go through, thats hard to say. But as you know they went as far as to unsigned it. It is about i think the idea of exceptionalism. They are must never ever come a time when an american would face four and justice come even though the rome statute that set up the icc is full of safeguards, but if you have functioning, losses of any kind you will not face the justice from icc. But the moot in the bush administration, which are the worlds most powerful country. And then the price of exceptionalism means youre not creating come youre not creating international norms. Youre not creating a rule of law. You pay a long time price but you know well the prospects of ratification of the own statute or any Major International treaty are the grip with the congress we have here right now. Nice to see again. I was wondering about your thoughts on what it took so long to get this whole process running. We were there. They were out skiing. These guys running around. Maybe there was method to the madness, they wanted things to settle down and they didnt want to go after them immediately. Why do the whole process takes so long to get started . Thats a very good question. I think its really hard now to go back to that mindset, the military mindset before 9 11. After so much blood has been spilled on largely pointless conflicts, to remember how risk averse the military was back then in the 90s but it was said if he were a general in the u. S. Armed forces in that time, your chances of getting an extra star were minimal if you casualties under your watch. It was the most career destroying thing that could happen, and so for that reason as remember, the u. S. Forces who came in as part of the International Peacekeeping force, they played baseball in their flak jackets and helmets. Not a shot to be fired after the dayton treaty pretty much. But it wasnt just the u. S. It was the bricks and the french. None of them wanted to risk casualties for a task that wasnt specifically mandated brits in the dayton Peace Agreement. As far as theyre concerned they were there to keep the peace, not to these other things that took about a year and have for the penny to drop that the peace depended on removing these people. Thank you very much for presentation to very interesting. My question is usually historians when looking at these mass crimes look at the roles of perpetrators. And only recently about the role of [inaudible] my question is how the people responded to this mass hunting . What was the response of people to this massive mass hunting of the world criminals in former yugoslavia . It is very much depended on who. Not just a question of ethnicity. Obviously, most bosnia ask were right behind because they had been come 80 of the civilian casualties from the war had been bosnians, main victims. So theyre very much in support among others, the nationalists were very much against it because they saw it as ceding sovereignty, we will take care of our own issues, thank you very much. Having just gained independence they did want to be ceding sovereignty to some international court, plus they were complicit themselves. What changed was the arrival in office of people who saw the future in europe but also wanted to draw a line between those people that were responsible for the mass atrocities and the people as a whole. They did want them all to be seen as complicit in this. And so the way to get out of that once defined the guilty men, and all but one were men in terms of the hague id delis, and handed over but that was a question of political. Thank you very much for coming. I look forward to reading the book. Thank you. I was the american commander in bosnia in 199596. And i would just like to make a couple comments. First of all we were not smart enough to do what was done a year later, a year and a half later. And it took the whole institution a long time to figure it all out. And as i told one of the visitors we dont want to ask me if i could to capture mladic, he was in my sector. I said sure. I said i know where his headquarters is but i dont but statute. Ive got a Tank Division the i can destroy the mountain and i can go in there and sort out who is left, entities that are i will hand you his body, alive or dead, but i dont do snatches. You got to do better. Thats one point. The second what i would say is, is that having spoken to senior american political leaders, Senior National leaders from all of the countries participating, there was not a political directive to the military performance. And only thing i really take exception with what you have to say tonight was the fact that its not up to the generals what they do. Its up to the government that tell the generals what to do. And we would all sacrifice our democracy and the civilian control of the military if you were to put yourself in a position whether it be bosnia or iraq or afghanistan where the generals were making political decisions. And so i dont excuses for not being smarter, but i do think it was a good idea to listen to the president of the United States. I mean, i would say one thing that i actually agree, shortly before the clinton reelection in 96, there was absolutely no willpower at all. Nothing that would upset the reelection campaign. My understanding is after the they had a principals meeting where they made clinton and gore said this is something we ought to do. And very much to the defense secretarys dismay at the time, but between that time and when the americans at least began, there was a lot of internal institutional resistance because of this issue. If we have casualties, if we suffer casualties, we will be the one to blame. I got the impression, correct me if im wrong, that the was, that albright and wes clark were very much for it. Then you have someone like Eric Shinseki on the greatest troops they believe what theyre the backlash if someone was killed or if there was a backlash for the arrest were very much against Something Like that. Right. Yes, thank you for the book. Thank you for your outstanding reporting that preceded the book from the balkans as well. I would say there was an informed view among some policy people, exgovernment people, human rights activists in this town, and some in europe that the principal actors were given in some form immunity in the course of the dayton negotiations. And thats certainly some of those figures believed that they had received it. What, if anything, did you uncover on that front . Karadzic and the people around the track for me to distinct claims about immunity. One that Richard Holbrooke promised, and the second one, chirac it. Chirac promised us. How can this happen . With holbrooke, i doubt it. I can imagine a situation, if youre able to osha, i can imagine a situation in which he intimated that maybe would be less the problem, but he was never stupid enough to commit himself in any way, sorely not in writing. Theyve never been able to produce anything in writing. With the french its different. At the end of the work they had two pilots who were captured and therit was a long drawnout negotiations. And money changed hands, seems to be clear. Some weapons are likely to change hands, and it is quite possible that some soft promises that were made, dont worry about the tribunal. Certainly not to me but french officials told a french journalist who wrote a book about this, that they understood that under the chirac administration, undertakings were given but they were probably given knowing that they were empty because it wasnt a gift from the french, not ultimately. Thank you very much. It seems like the general move to the balkans now that it is the largest discipline for a variety of reasons. Do you think the courts ultimately have been successful or do you think its not lived up to the effort that was put into it . I mean, when i called this the most successful manhunt, it really refer to the main event, getting the bodies into the court and not the decisions the court been made, which are controversial. Up in some very controversial acquittals, although the most controversial one has been now reversed. They havent covered themselves in glory. At the end its going to be hard, class helpful sort of story. If you talk to the families of the dead, the bosnians, they will say it took so long, so