Amnesty Hearings

CHAIRPERSON: By arrangement we are going to deal with the evidence of Mr Barnard this morning, is that correct?

MS PATEL: That is correct, Honourable Chairperson.

MR TREURNICHT: Chairperson, I am acting for Dr Barnard. What we have done in order to try and assist and cut matters shorter, is we've prepared short statement dealing with the issues referred to in the subpoena. Not as briefly as one could have, but we thought it would be of some use to you to go a little bit wider. I have noticed from the records, the parts that I have read, there was some tussle before as to who should lead who. I will, if it is in order with you, the Committee, I will lead Dr Barnard who will testify from, who will give his evidence from this document and I might interrupt him just to enlarge on certain aspects thereof. If it pleases you.

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: (sworn states)

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, Mr Treurnicht?

EXAMINATION BY MR TREURNICHT: Thank you Mr Chairperson, in fact I forgot to tell you that Dr Barnard is testifying in Afrikaans. The statement is also in Afrikaans. What I intend doing is let Dr Barnard go through his statement and I will deal with certain aspects thereof as and when I think it fit to put more detail before you. It will be Exhibit K I think, Chairperson.

DR BARNARD

"I, the undersigned, Lucas Daniel Barnard, declare as follows. I am an adult man, occupying the post of Director-General of the Provincial Administration of the Western Cape Province. Previously, I was the Director-General of the Department of Constitutional Development and before this, the Director-General of the National Intelligence Service. I received witness subpoena in terms of which I have been requested to answer questions during a session of the Amnesty Committee, referred to as the Committee, regarding the issue of whether the Co-ordinating Intelligence Committee, CIC, gave approval for or had knowledge of, before, during or after, of an attack on members of the ANC in Lesotho on the 19th December 1985.

Although I am capable of answering these questions cryptically, I feel that it would be more satisfactory for the Committee if I were to elaborate on these matters and consequently I will deal with every one of the questions individually.

First Question: "Did the CIC grant approval for the attack?"

4.1 The CIC did not grant any approval for the attack and that Committee in terms of the knowledge of the members thereof also had no capacity in that regard.

4.2 Upon two previous occasions in Durban on the 14th July 1997 and in Cape Town on the 4th December 1997, I have given evidence before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and during this dealt with the establishment, functioning and capacities of CIC, that evidence was to the best of my knowledge was never questioned by any other witness and it can also not be attacked. For the sake of convenience, I embody herein certain relevant extracts from the original statements which I made during those sessions as well as an extract of the translated version of my verbal evidence in Cape Town.

4.2.1 From the statement made in Durban, paragraph 6.6.4, between 1980 and 1990 a body existed which was known as the Co-ordinating Intelligence Committee. From 1980 to 1992 I was the Chairperson of this committee. The committee was created due to the need to co-ordinate the intelligence activities of the South African Intelligence community. In this regard I point out that the role of NI, the Military Intelligence of the Defence Force, the Security Branch of the South African Police and the Department of Foreign Affairs was cordoned off during April 1980 during a meeting which was known as the Simon's Town Conference. The members of the intelligence community ..."

...(intervention)

ADV BOSMAN: I beg your pardon, Mr Barnard. Could you proceed somewhat slower to facilitate matters for the interpreter?

DR BARNARD: Should I begin again at 6.6.4? At the beginning thereof?

ADV BOSMAN: No, just proceed somewhat slower.

DR BARNARD

"The members of the intelligence community kept strictly and expressly to their areas of work and on honoured the point of departure that they would not spy on one another. Furthermore, intelligence services throughout the world as well as the RSA, all work on the principal point of departure which is known as the need-to-know principle. In English, the need-to-know principle. In terms of this, individuals determine and intelligence services also stick to the information that they require to perform their particular tasks. This compartmentalisation principle has certain considerations in mind so that damage could be restricted to the minimum in cases of treason or defection or where members of one service end up in the hands of another. This aforementioned work method had the danger as with many role players in the RSA, that relevant security information would not be co-ordinated and readily available for decision makers and in an attempt to overcome this problem the CIC was established. Therefore, the CIC was exclusively occupied with the classic main task of any intelligence service, namely the convergence, evaluation and availability of timeous security intelligence in order to enable the authorities to protect the security of the State and its inhabitants. The security intelligence of the intelligence community which was collected throughout the years is still available in the form of annual intelligence evaluations and many other intelligence documents.

4.2.2. This is from the statement which was submitted in Cape Town. Paragraph 9.8 of that statement:

The co-ordination of the intelligence activities of the South African intelligence community was managed by a body which was known as the Co-ordinating Intelligence Committee, (CIC). In paragraphs 10.1.6 to 10.1.10, I will deal more thoroughly with this Committee."

MR TREURNICHT: Just to avoid confusion, Dr Barnard, the reference there to paragraphs 10.1.6 and 10.1.10 are references to your previous statements?

DR BARNARD: That is correct. Then Chairperson, I'm at paragraph 4.2.3, from my verbal evidence in Cape Town: I Dr Barnard, say the following

"I wish to assist you, however, and I want to tell you that CIC at no stage at all - I being the Chairman for twelve years and CIC have a complete set of Minutes. If you look at the Minutes of CIC, I've asked for those but they were not made available ... Can you just wait till I've completed my answer? If you look at the Minutes of CIC, you will see at no stage any decisions were made regarding cross-border operations."

MR TREURNICHT: Dr, could I just interrupt you? Do you still maintain that there was no reference in any CIC Minutes with regard to cross-border operations which were approved and planned there?

DR BARNARD: I still maintain that.

"CID was involved in the intelligence gathering regarding these matters. At CIC, the Defence Force and the Police would have said that the operations could be planned against neighbouring States. Should you receive information regarding the terrorist bases, I would be glad if you could provide it to the Executive authorities. CIC did not authorise these activities, it gathered intelligence."

Then Mr McAdam asks:

"Did CIC receive any instructions from the Defence Force or the Police for assistance regarding information of people belonging to illegal organisations?"

And then my response as follows:

"I've already said that we did assist the Defence Force and the Police. The CIC was a body who co-ordinated the intelligence structure and to manage scarce manpower and resources. We each had our own line responsibility and we reacted on approaches by the South African Defence Force and Police and apart from what we were doing, we tried to present them with this intelligence, but at no stage information was required from us on the presumption that this information would be used for illegal operations."

Then paragraph 4.3:

"The correctness of what I have previously testified to and repeat herein is also completely supported by the Minutes of the CIC meetings during the relevant period of time of which copies have been provided to my legal representatives in order of the Committee."

MR TREURNICHT: Dr Barnard, may I ask you, you have just referred to the compartmentalisation of functions and you have referred to the quotations that you have submitted and this also referred to the Simon's Town meeting?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR TREURNICHT: Firstly, I want to ask you whether you are satisfied that the CIC Minutes which were now made available to you, span over a period from October 1985 to March 1986? Do these present a thorough record of what was conducted during the proceedings?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, I am satisfied.

MR TREURNICHT: I want to refer you to Volume 4 - Chairperson, I'm not sure whether that document, Volume 4, all the Minutes and so forth, of the SSC and the CIC, whether that's been given a number by you. It is Volume 4, I would have referred to it as Volume 4.

May I refer you to page 87 of this Volume 4 in conjunction with the points that you have made in paragraph 4.3 of your statement where you state that the correctness of what you had stated here is illustrated by the content of the CIC Minutes. The first Minute which was made available to you in this regard is that of a meeting on the 22nd October 1985, which appears on page 87. The passage that I would like to refer to of that document, and perhaps just for the sake of time, perhaps you should rather read it because I tend to speak too quickly.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I am assuming that you are referring to paragraph 2.3.2 on page 87? The paragraph reads as follows

"National Intelligence fixes the attention on the fact that division Military Intelligence, during the Simon's Town Conference, accepted the primary responsibility with regard to covert as well as overt collection of Military Intelligence internally and abroad. However, the dilemma originated when South African Defence Force representatives ...(intervention)"

MR TREURNICHT: Who are these representatives?

DR BARNARD: They are representatives from the South African Defence Force.

"When these representatives mentioned upon various occasions during inter-departmental committees that there was not sufficient tactical intelligence regarding, for example, ANC bases abroad. Seeing as this subject was regarded as a primary Military Intelligence responsibility in terms of the Simon's Town Agreement, the offer was made on the 10th September 1985 that division Military Intelligence in the event of assistance being required to obtain information about this, would lodge such a request with the CIC."

MR TREURNICHT: You have just quoted a CIC Minute. If one looks at page 83 of Volume 4 it would appear that you were not present during that meeting or at least that you did not attend the entire meeting as such but this section that you have just read, is this in correlation with the working method of the various components as you understood it?

DR BARNARD: Yes.

MR TREURNICHT: Then I also want to refer you to a further quotation from these Minutes, which will emphasise what you have stated. Page 116 which is the CIC meeting of the 3rd December, page 116 at the bottom, going over to the top of page 117. Apparently, there's a discussion regarding a sub-committee report with regard to covert intelligence collection. Then at the bottom of page 116, the CIC accepts the report of the sub-committee and then could you just emphasise what appears on page 117 at the very top?

DR BARNARD: Paragraph 6.2.2 on page 117 reads as follows

"The sub-committee will bring to the attention of the CIC any transgression of one another's terrains by members of the intelligence community and give attention to the Working Committee's order that the CIC should co-ordinate intelligence functions which are discussed in the reports of the interdepartmental border control working groups."

MR TREURNICHT: Is this with regard to the cordoned off terrains which were fixed at the Simon's Town Conference?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR TREURNICHT: Could you assist the Committee by indicating whether or not there was any sensitivity among these components when it came to the transgression of the various areas of work which were cordoned off?

DR BARNARD: Yes, there was a very determined level of sensitivity. Intelligence work was the sort of work which had to be well co-ordinated and departments should not interfere with the work of other departments, especially in terms of the Simon's Town agreement.

MR TREURNICHT: I want to refer you to another quotation on page 150 of Volume 4, paragraph 4.1.2 on that page and I do believe that you were the Chairperson of this particular meeting. This has to do with the flow of information to the branch National Interpretation.

DR BARNARD: Page 150, paragraph 4.1.2

"In terms of the remark of the branch National Interpretation Chairperson is that there is not sufficient warm intelligence which is being received to be sent through to the State President ...(intervention)"

MR TREURNICHT: The CIC Chairperson, is that you?

DR BARNARD: Yes that is correct.

"The CIC Chairperson would remind the meeting that the BNI deals with interpreted intelligence and that tactically warm intelligence should be sent through to the State President or the SP by the ministers of the various departments. In times such as these it is extremely important for the intelligence community to remain calm and to report only the truth."

MR TREURNICHT: Once again, the remark that you have made which is noted here, is an indication of how the system functioned with regard to the channelling of information?

DR BARNARD: Yes, that is so.

MR TREURNICHT: Page 155, the last quotation that I want to refer you to, which goes over to page 156 of Volume 4. There it is about action against the ANC, lack of target information. Could you just refer to that as well?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, paragraph 10.1, at the bottom of the page and it reads as follows

"The Chairperson (that is me) refers to repeated allegations by the SADF, the South African Defence Force, at the Working Committee and the SSC, that there is not sufficient intelligence regarding ANC bases in neighbouring States, which then creates the impression of a certain incapacity of the entire intelligence community with the decision makers. In this regard, the Chairperson refers to the fact that division Military Intelligence of the South African Defence Force, according to the rationalisation decision taken at Simon's Town is responsible for all Military Intelligence in neighbouring States and that the other members of the intelligence community thus should not fix their attention upon this."

Next page:

"If division Military Intelligence of the Defence Force cannot obtain sufficient information about this subject, it is free to consult the CIC for assistance after which determined responsibilities will be given to other members to obtain the required information. However, it must be understood that the requested assistance will require certain adjustments and that the information will not be provided immediately."

MR TREURNICHT: Very well, Doctor, with regard to the quotations from the Minutes, you maintain that this underwrites the operations of CIC?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR TREURNICHT: Please continue with paragraph 4.4 of your statement?

DR BARNARD

"The comparison between the documented functions and activities of the CIC and the statutory current National Intelligence Co-ordination Committee which was created in terms of Section 4 of the National Strategic Intelligence Act 39/94, indicates the nature of the activities of these bodies. The same considerations which previously led to the establishment of the CIC also led to the establishment of this body."

MR TREURNICHT: Briefly, Doctor, are you saying that what CIC did at that time has been embodied in this statute currently with the creation of this new body?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR TREURNICHT: Please continue with paragraph 5?

DR BARNARD: Paragraph 5, has the heading

"Did the CIC know about the attack before, during or after if took place?"

My response, paragraph 5.1:

"To the best of my knowledge, the CIC did not have any knowledge of the attack before or during the commission thereof. Any attack beyond the borders of the country would have been a line function of the South African Defence Force and the discussion of the execution of line functions was not part of the CIC's capacity and also did not take place there. The Minutes of the CIC meetings during the relevant period will also then indicate that there were no CIC meetings during which such an issue was tabled or discussed."

Paragraph 5.2:

"My attention has now been fixed upon the evidence given by Gen van der Merwe before the Commission. With the idea that he cannot recall it, he feels that it is probable that he may have discussed the relevant attack with certain members of the CIC on an informal basis. I cannot comment on what Gen van der Merwe thinks he would have done. At no stage whether during a formal gathering or a personal discussion, was it ever discussed with me. Furthermore, such actions did not fit in at all with the role and function of the CIC as what I have described it in the aforementioned pages."

MR TREURNICHT: May I just interrupt you? Are you saying therefore that there was never a discussion of an attack during a formal CIC meeting nor an informal gathering of CIC meetings or during a personal discussion?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR TREURNICHT: Very well, proceed.

DR BARNARD: Paragraph 5.3

"During the '80s, my children were still at school and every year, without exception, on the closing day of the Transvaal schools or as soon as possible thereafter, I departed on vacation to our beach house in Kleinbaai on the Cape South Coast where we stayed until the schools reopened. In 1985 the Transvaal schools closed on the 3rd December and therefore I would have been in Kleinbaai from a day or so later and I could not have been present at one or other formal or informal gathering of any CIC members."

Then paragraph 5.4:

"Later I was informed of the attack, as I accept all other CIC members would also have been informed. Although I was never informed that the attack was executed by the RSA or what the circumstances were under which it was done. Today it is impossible to say when I was informed of the attack for the first time. However, I can say that on that particular day I travelled by car from and to Kleinbaai and did not have any knowledge of the attack. It was also not disclosed during the SSC meeting of the 20th December 1985 and it was also not discussed during this meeting. The particular SSC meeting during that time of the year was regular practice, as I have already indicated in 1997 during my submission in Cape Town in paragraph 9.3.1 of that statement. As it appears from the Minutes of the SSC meeting of the 4th November 1985 which is now being provided to my legal representatives, the date of the meeting of the 20th December, had already been determined at that early stage."

MR TREURNICHT: Doctor, if you would page through bundle 4, you have that before you? You have already testified to that with regard to the determination of the date of the December SSC meeting. If we study page 20, that is the last part of the Minutes of the SSC meeting which was held on the 4th November 1985, paragraph H. There the following appears under "Last Meeting"

"The last meeting of the year of the State Security Council shall take place on Friday 20th December 1985 at 11H00 in Tuynhuis in Cape Town."

Is that what you refer to?

DR BARNARD: Yes, that is what I refer to.

MR TREURNICHT: And in the light thereof, I do not know whether it is a suggestion, but at some stage there was a suggestion that this SSC meeting on the 20th December would have been held as a result of the attack in Lesotho. And what would your comment be to that suggestion?

DR BARNARD: My comment would be that the suggestion is not correct.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR TREURNICHT

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Berger?

MR BERGER: Chairperson, my submission is that we should cross-examine last considering that Dr Barnard has now been led properly in evidence, that all those who have an identity of interest with Dr Barnard should question him first and that we should cross-examine only at the end.

CHAIRPERSON: Any objections to that?

MR VISSER: Yes Chairperson, I do object. May I remind this Committee that Mr Barnard was brought here at the insistence or behest of Mr Berger and his attorney. We've listened to him now, we don't know what is going to happen in the cross-examination of Mr Berger. As I am sitting here now I have no questions for him, but I may have, depending on what Mr Berger does. So it's clear that he should go first, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Berger, I thought that we decided that you, with these subpoenaed witnesses, would start, like in the case of Mr van Heerden? I really thought that that was the agreement.

MR BERGER: Chairperson, I've tried to point out that Dr Barnard is represented today and that's why the position is different, but I'll cross-examine and then my learned friend, Mr Visser's examination will be in the nature of a re-examination.

CHAIRPERSON: We'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR BERGER: Dr Barnard, my name is Danny Berger and I represent the families of those who died in the attack on 20 December 1985.

I'd like you to just confirm something that Mr van Heerden said on Friday. He said that you were unique on the CIC in the sense that - firstly, you were the most senior member of the CIC, is that correct?

DR BARNARD: I was the Chairperson of the CIC, that is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: But were you the more senior person?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I was the only chief of a State department who sat on the committee. I was the Director-General of National Intelligence. There were other representatives, the Chief of Military Intelligence, the Chief of the Security Branch of the Police and then a senior representative from Foreign Affairs. From time to time other persons were also invited to attend the meeting. I do not know if I answer your question. In that regard, I was the senior official.

MR BERGER: Dr Barnard, if you press your mike at the same time as me now then we can both be on simultaneously. If you will just do that.

He also said that you were the only person on the CIC who was represented on the State Security Council, would that correct?

DR BARNARD: The only person CIC at the SSC, that is correct, yes.

MR BERGER: And that your Minister was the State President, PW Botha?

DR BARNARD: Yes that is correct.

MR BERGER: You reported directly to PW Botha and you had obviously direct access to PW Botha.

DR BARNARD: That is correct, yes.

MR BERGER: Now if you would turn to page 59 of Volume 3. You'll find there a letter dated 17 October 1985 from the Secretary of the State Security Council to all members of the State Security Council in connection with - well, it's headed

"Authorisation of South African Defence Force, Operational Cross-Border Actions."

DR BARNARD: I do have that, yes Chairperson.

MR BERGER: This document was placed before the Working Committee of the State Security Council on the 2nd of October and then it was placed before the State Security Council on the 21st of October 1985 and it was accepted with certain minor amendments, is that correct?

DR BARNARD: That is how I have it, yes. Correct, Chairperson.

MR BERGER: And is it correct that you were aware of this document at the time?

DR BARNARD: Yes, I was aware of it.

MR BERGER: Is it correct that this document dealt with both covert operations by the South African Defence Force as well as clandestine operations of the South African Defence Force?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, the terms clandestine, overt and covert were terms which were used by the different departments in different manners. In a sense where as I understand your question, that is correct. It draws the attention that the words clandestine and covert were not used by everyone in the same manner and were not understood by everyone in the same manner.

MR BERGER: Alright. If you have a look at page 61, you'll see there it says, paragraph 6

"As a result of the changed situation, it is necessary that the following broad guidelines be put down."

And then there are two main areas. The one is:

"(a) Operations which have to be cleared in advance by the Chairperson of the State Security Council."

that's (a) and then:

(b) Operations which can be approved by the Minister of Defence and where necessary, in consultation of the Chairperson of the State Security Council.

Do you see that?

DR BARNARD: I have that, yes.

MR BERGER: And we know that the Chairperson of the State Security Council was your boss, PW Botha?

DR BARNARD: That was the State President, yes.

MR BERGER: Then those operations which had to be cleared by him in advance, there are two sub-divisions. The one is

"Large scale offensive operations and the second is revenge operations."

And the second is:

"Revenge operations."

And then those that had to be cleared by the Minister of Defence or could be approved by the Minister of Defence, where necessary in consultation with PW Botha, are:

(i) Small scale offensive operations;

(ii) Follow-up operations;

(iii) Reconnaissance operations; and

(iv) Special operations.

And then under special operations, you'll see "covert operations" and "clandestine operations".

Now, would I be correct in saying that your understanding - when I speak about "your" understanding, not only you personally, but also the understanding of State Security Council, at the time was that special operations the covert and the clandestine operations, were operations that had to be conducted in secret and for which the South African Government would not claim responsibility. Would that be correct?

DR BARNARD: Correct, yes.

MR BERGER: So, for example, if there had to be a raid on an ANC base or an ANC house in Lesotho, a cross-border raid where ANC soldiers were going to be killed and the South African Government did not want to claim responsibility for that raid, then the military, the SADF could be used, in terms of this document, could be used to carry out such a raid in such a way as that the South African Government would not have to claim responsibility for it, would that be correct?

DR BARNARD: Yes that is correct.

MR BERGER: And then the document, then after these general guidelines, you can see that this talks about general guidelines, then the document goes on to deal with specifically Lesotho and you can see there, that's at page 64 of the bundle: operations which must be cleared by the Chairperson (this is under paragraph 14(a)) operations which must be cleared by the Chairperson of the State Security Council in advance and operations which must be cleared by the - or which can be approved by the Minister of Defence and where necessary, in consultation with the Chairperson of the State Security Council.

And you see there it's again under (b) we have - in fact you can see that it follows the same pattern as at page 61, it's just now in shorthand, do you see that? Under (a) at page 61, the same pattern under (a) at page 64.

DR BARNARD: Do you refer to paragraph 6(a) on page 61 and do you compare that with paragraph (a) on page 64?

MR BERGER: Yes that's what I'm doing. It's exactly - the same would apply to Lesotho as applied on page 61 under paragraph 6(a)?

DR BARNARD: That is how it appears in the document, that's correct Chairperson.

MR BERGER: And then the same in relation to paragraph 14(b), (i), (ii and (iii), it's the same as page 61(b) (i), (ii), and (iv)?

DR BARNARD: Yes that is correct.

MR BERGER: Is my reading correct?

DR BARNARD: Correct, yes.

MR BERGER: So where it refers at page 65(iii) to "Special Operations", one must read that as encompassing what is typed at page 62 under (iv), Special Operations including covert operations and clandestine operations. Would I be correct?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, yes Chairperson.

MR BERGER: And is that why at page 8 of your statement, Exhibit K, you said the following, in paragraph 5.1 when you were asked whether the CIC had any knowledge of the attack before, during or after the attack, you said no, not to the best of your knowledge and then you went on to say, you said

"Any attack outside the borders of the country would have been a line function of the South African Defence Force."

DR BARNARD: That is correct, yes.

MR BERGER: And the reason that you said that was because of this document that I've just been referring you to, would that be correct?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, yes.

MR BERGER: And then you go on to say

"And the discussion of the carrying out of the line functions was not part of the CIC's capacity and would in any event not have taken place there."

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR BERGER: Would it be fair to say that just as it was not part of the line function of the CIC or it was not part of the capacity of the CIC to authorise such an attack, so too it would not have been within the authority of any member of the CIC, individually, to authorise such an attack?

DR BARNARD: Absolutely correct, yes.

MR BERGER: Now I'd like to refer you, Dr Barnard, to the meeting where you were present, the CIC meeting of the 3rd December 1985. It's in Volume 3 at page 73.

MR TREURNICHT: And Volume 4, at 109.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I'm looking at Volume 4, it is the same Minutes. Are we referring to the Minutes of the meeting the 3rd December 1985, the CIC meeting? It also appears in Volume 4 and the part which starts with regard to ANC bases in Lesotho, page 113.

MR BERGER: Yes, it's the same document. It also appears in Volume 2.

Now the part of the Minute that actually deals with this case is paragraph 3.2. Now I'm sure you've read this particular paragraph before you came here today.

DR BARNARD: I did yes.

MR BERGER: And we've already canvassed with Mr van Heerden, the information that he brought to the CIC meeting that day. The upshot of that information was that there were ANC soldiers in Lesotho who were ready to attack South Africa. That was the bottom line of that information, am I correct?

DR BARNARD: Whether they wanted to attack South Africa, I don't think they could have been able to attack South Africa but they would have been able to commit acts of terror. There's a difference there.

MR BERGER: I know what you're getting at, so let me be more specific. That there were ANC soldiers who were in Lesotho, on the verge of entering South Africa to kill people?

DR BARNARD: That was the information which Mr Neil van Heerden conveyed to the CIC meeting of the 3rd December, that is correct, yes.

MR BERGER: And also, he informed the meeting that the police had asked him before the meeting, "him" meaning Foreign Affairs, to urgently inform Lesotho about this an tell them if they did not take action then South Africa would deal with the situation as they deemed fit?

DR BARNARD: Yes Chairperson, with respect, I do not know what the question is.

MR BERGER: Do you recall that that was what Mr van Heerden told the meeting?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, if we look at the paragraph - may I just go through the paragraph? The paragraph says

"Mr van Heerden mentions that information on the 29th November ..."

This was four days before that date. I do not know whether it was four or five days before:

"... was received from the Security Branch ..."

and then he says:

"During October of 1985 (and that is the information), 30 ANC terrorists arrived in Lesotho and that there are 80 ANC terrorists present in that country who are ready to act against the RSA."

and then it says that:

"The Police requested, the SAP is the Police, that Foreign Affairs, that the Department of Foreign Affairs contacted Lesotho with regard to this and informed them that if they do not take any action and that means that if the Government does not take any steps, the Government of Lesotho, to prevent those terrorists - I mean those terrorist will come in, then the RSA would act as they deem fit."

That is how I have it.

MR BERGER: Did you understand or what did you understand by the words that South Africa would act as they deemed fit? Did that include violence across the border?

DR BARNARD: That could have possibly included it. At no occasion during this meeting was it mentioned. You have to keep it in mind that at that stage there were many citizens of Lesotho who were working in the gold mines of the Free State and Lesotho was "'n land omslote Staat" and because of the transport, they were dependant on South Africa and that was one of the methods to apply pressure on the Government of Lesotho by taking so-called economic steps against them and that is what I understood by it.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Barnard, the question was did you yourself also envisage the possibility of cross-border killings, that that would also be a possibility in terms of the message that you received?

DR BARNARD: Thank you Chairperson. On this specific occasion you now refer to Lesotho. Not at all.

CHAIRPERSON: May I understand you. You did not include it as a possibility?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, no, I did not include it as a possibility on this occasion, with the discussion on the 3rd December when the matter of Lesotho was discussed. I did not envisage it as a possibility.

CHAIRPERSON: Not even as a possibility?

DR BARNARD: No Chairperson, not as a possibility.

MR BERGER: Dr Barnard, can you press your mike again? Thank you.

You see, you're saying that at this meeting you didn't even consider the threat to include violence as a possibility. What I want to ask you is - you see the threat came from the Police, the SAP, the SAP was saying to Foreign Affairs "Tell Lesotho that if they don't act then South Africa will act". They're not saying if - and I concede, they're not saying "If they don't act, we will act, we the Police will act", but this is a threat coming from the Police. Did you not consider at this meeting that what the Police were saying was "If you, Foreign Affairs, tell Lesotho that if they don't act, we the Police are going to come across the border and we're going to deal with the situation as we deem fit"?

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Berger, before you get a response to that question, just to be fair to the witness, perhaps it must be made clear to him that when you're talking about whether the meeting itself discussed it or whether he personally considered the possibility ...(inaudible) in terms of that threat.

MR BERGER: Thank you, Chairperson.

Dr Barnard, I'm asking you for - or let's start off with you, personally. You were at the meeting when this threat was uttered, although it was Mr van Heerden reporting, we are told, Mr van Heerden was reporting what the Police had told him, the threat emanated from the Police. Did you understand that threat to mean that the Police were saying "If Lesotho does not handle the situation, we the Police, are going to come across the border and deal with it as we deem fit"?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I understood that Mr Neil van Heerden came with this matter to CIC in order to fix attention on it, that there was an increase in the numbers of ANC persons in Lesotho and that possible attacks would be undertaken over the Christmas period and that in a diplomatic manner, endeavours should be launched as happened in other cases, that we cannot accept that ANC bases would be kept in the neighbouring states from which they could launch attacks into the RSA That is how I understood it.

MR BERGER: Dr Barnard, let me then break it down. Mr Neil van Heerden also reports to the meeting that the Police have asked him to convey a message to Lesotho. You were there, you heard that, am I right?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, yes.

MR BERGER: He tells the Committee that the message that the Police have asked him to convey to Lesotho is if they do not act, South Africa will deal with the situation as it deems fit. That's the message that the Police asked him or asked Foreign Affairs to convey to Lesotho. You were there when that was reported to the meeting?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, yes.

MR BERGER: Did you, Dr Barnard, understand the Police to be saying that if Lesotho did not deal with the situation, the Police would deal with the situation in the way that they deemed fit?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I already explained that I did not understand it as such.

MR BERGER: Well what did you understand the Police to be saying? What did you understand the Police to be conveying with the threat that South Africa would deal with it in a way that South Africa deemed fit?

DR BARNARD: The Police was that State department who was responsible for the Free State and the surrounding areas surrounding Lesotho, in order to maintain security there. Their Security Branch, that's the inference I draw, gives them information to say that attacks will take place over the festive season and they inform Foreign Affairs in order to request from Foreign Affairs, that's how I understood it, that Foreign Affairs should follow diplomatic channels in order to place pressure on Lesotho to ensure that these attacks do not take place over the festive season. I think that was the purpose of the Police's information. That's how I understood it.

MR BERGER: Dr Barnard, if you don't understand my question, please tell me because you're not, with respect, answering my question. You see, my question is very simple. The Police asked Foreign Affairs to warn Lesotho that South Africa would deal with the situation as it deemed fit. My question to you is, what did you understand the Police to mean when they said that South Africa would deal with the situation as South Africa deemed fit?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, are you asking me what do I understand "as they deemed fit"? Is that what you're asking me, what do I understand the Police meant when they said "as they deem fit", is that what you're asking me?

MR BERGER: Yes.

DR BARNARD: Okay, I think the Police meant as they deemed fit would mean that we would take those economic steps to close the border and to place pressure on the Government of Lesotho, so that these planned attacks across the border would not take place. That is what I meant.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Barnard, are you serious?

DR BARNARD: I beg your pardon, Chairperson?

CHAIRPERSON: We have evidence before this Committee already which says that what this hearing is about is not the first cross-border attack by the South African Police or Defence Force. Certainly, you yourself would have thought well, it is a possibility that we will attack those people if Lesotho's Government does not do as we request.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, may I react?

CHAIRPERSON: Yes please, I expect it.

DR BARNARD: My personal point of view has been put forward in the hearing in Cape Town on the 4th December 1997, in which I took up the stance that I and National Intelligence Service were not against it, that cross-border operations would be undertaken if above all doubt there was information that there were camps or bases of persons who wanted to attack South Africa. That is a point of view which I explicitly put forward there and I understood, as it refers here "as they deemed fit" and if I may take it further to the six steps which were later tabled at the SSC of the 20th December, that this did not include the sixth step of cross-border operation. That is how I understood it, it does not mean that it could not happen but that would not have been the immediate thing that the Police have asked.

CHAIRPERSON: But the past half an hour you have been asked if you foresaw the possibility or whether you considered the possibility that it could happen?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I do not know how to answer the question. It was never discussed here. Are you now asking me if I in the back of my mind could have thought that ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: You yourself as the Chairperson.

INTERPRETER: The speaker's mike is not on.

DR BARNARD: In the back of my head I may have thought that it could be a possibility but it was never discussed at any occasion.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Berger, like I requested, just let's make the questions as simple and as direct as possible. I'm not suggesting that you're not doing it but you see what's happening.

MR BERGER: Chairperson, with respect, no. Dr Barnard, his evidence as I - perhaps I'm wrong, but his evidence so far has been that he never considered the Police to be threatening cross-border violence at this meeting at the 3rd December 1985.

ADV BOSMAN: Mr Berger, if we could perhaps just get that clear? Is your question directed at the Police themselves threatening cross-border violence, or the Police threatening cross-border violence within the wider parameters of the Security Forces? I think that is perhaps what is confusing Mr Barnard.

MR BERGER: Advocate Bosman, my question is the Police themselves. The reason I'm asking the question is because the Police, the SAP, are the ones who are asking Foreign Affairs to convey a threat, of South Africa doing what it deemed fit and my question to Dr Barnard throughout has been, "Did you understand at that meeting that the Police were conveying a threat, that the Police would embark on cross-border violence to sort out the threat in Lesotho?", and his answer throughout has been "No".

CHAIRPERSON: You see, Mr Berger, that's the point I've made about fifteen minutes ago, that "Did you at the meeting", as if it was discussed at the gathering as opposed to his own view, sitting there as Chairman without really telling the meeting about his views, and that's what we should get clear for his benefit and perhaps for ours as well.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: Mr Berger, you are asking Dr Barnard to give you his understanding then. This is how I understand your question?

MR BERGER: Absolutely, Judge Khampepe ...(intervention)

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: And he has not been able to respond, except to allude quite briefly to the fact that he thought they would take economic sanctions?

MR BERGER: Judge Khampepe, what Dr Barnard has told me is that his understanding then was that the Police were not threatening cross-border violence by the Police.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: Yes. That he thought, generally, that the action that could be taken would be economic sanctions.

MR BERGER: And he thought at the meeting that what the Police were referring to when they said South Africa would deal with the situation as it deemed fit, was economic pressure. Dr Barnard, have I understood your evidence correctly?

DR BARNARD: That is correct as the Honourable Judge stated now, that is correct, yes. And then the Chairperson asked me

"Did you, without it being discussed at the meeting, somewhere in the back of your head think that it may be so?"

Upon which I answered:

"I could have thought that in the back of my head that it could be so, yes."

MR BERGER: Well now I am confused, because your evidence throughout has been that what you understood the Police to mean by their threat was that they were threatening economic action against Lesotho. That's what you understood at the meeting?

DR BARNARD: Yes that is correct. Chairperson, may I answer the question? I'm not saying that there's a difference in the point of views there, I understood that the Police meant that economic punishment would be applied, that is what the Police saw and then the Honourable Chairperson asked me

"But would you, as the individuals sitting there, would you have thought in the back of your head that it could mean armed action?"

CHAIRPERSON: But Dr Barnard, it is in that capacity that Mr Berger has been questioning you. You, yourself, did you understand it as such?

DR BARNARD: The possibility without it being discussed - Chairperson, may I ask is, the question from the Advocate to me, "Did you, Dr Barnard, in yourself without discussing it with anyone, thought that it could have been the Police's intention?"

CHAIRPERSON: May I say that I would be surprised if anyone in this room thought different.

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: No, but the past fifteen minutes, that is what Mr Berger has been asking you, in your personal capacity what did you think the Police meant with this where they requested Foreign Affairs to send a message through?

DR BARNARD: Yes Chairperson. My answer to that is yes.

MR BERGER: Dr Barnard, could you press your mike please?

Dr Barnard, maybe you're thinking when the Chairperson talks about possibilities, I may be wrong, but maybe you're thinking about the possibility of cross-border action at some future date, that that could have been at the back of your head, but my questions to you are far more specific, my questions to you are - and when we talk about you, personally, we know that you were at this meeting as the Chairperson but you are Dr Barnard with your own brain and I'm asking you, when you sat at this meeting and you heard from Mr van Heerden what the Police had asked him to convey to Lesotho and in particular, you heard that the Police had asked him to convey that South Africa would deal with the situation as it deemed fit, when you were at that meeting, did you consider the Police, did you think that the Police were referring to economic action against Lesotho or did you think that the Police were referring to them, the Police, going across and committing violent acts in Lesotho?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, with respect, I cannot respond to the question as such because the two issues are opposing. I understood that "deeming fit" would indicate economic measures which had to be instated but in my mind I must also have entertained the possibility that it could mean that the Police would also take cross-border action.

MR BERGER: Well, did you entertain the possibility at that meeting, that the Police were threatening cross-border action?

DR BARNARD: I cannot do any better than my previous response. I have just said that it could have been a possibility, I thought that they could have considered it.

MR BERGER: You're saying you considered the possibility or it's possible that you considered it? Do you see the difference?

DR BARNARD: I must say I'm not entirely certain whether or not I understand the difference, perhaps you should explain it to me once more.

MR BERGER: Okay. Are you saying that at the back of your head, at the meeting, you considered the possibility that the Police were threatening cross-border action by themselves, or are you saying it is possible that you considered it at the meeting?

DR BARNARD: I have said that it is possible, your second option. It is possible that I could have thought that they would do it.

MR BERGER: Okay.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: May I interpose, Mr Berger, I'm also getting a little confused.

Mr van Heerden, what I want to find out is whether at that time, in your personal capacity as Mr Heerden who was attending the meeting of the 3rd December, whether you considered the threat which had been conveyed by the Police to Mr van Heerden in his capacity as a person who was working with Foreign Affairs, whether you considered that threat to include violence, not necessarily by the Police but violence that could be meted out to Lesotho by the South African regime?

DR BARNARD: Honourable Chair, during that meeting of the 3rd, that it could be possible, yes.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: Did you consider that possibility yourself?

DR BARNARD: Yes, but may I say, Chairperson, that must have been a distinct possibility, that might have been possible but that was not the main thrust of the possibility of any action from the side of the South African Government.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: What could have been another possibility?

DR BARNARD: Foreign Affairs and South Africa during 1985 were in a spiral of increasing international pressure and so forth on South Africa, and particularly Foreign Affairs always emphasised that action should be as such taken against the neighbouring States so that we would not cause further international isolation or sanctions against us and all the consequences that went along with it. So the entire point of departure at that stage would have been that all attempts short of the application of violence, should be made to prevent further isolation of the RSA. I hope you understand my response?

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: So you are basically saying that you never considered the threat to include violence?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I stated that I did have the distinct possibility of it in the back of my mind and considered it as a possibility.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: And did that distinct possibility include violence by the Police, as the people who had actually conveyed the threat to Mr van Heerden?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, it could not have been the Police. As I thought about it at that stage I would have told myself that this was an operation which would have to be executed by the SADF. It was a cross-border operation which was then the responsibility of the SADF and this was spelt out in all the relevant documents of that time. So if I had to think about the distinct possibility of this at that time, if I thought that it was going to be executed, I would not think that it would be executed by the SAP but by the SADF according to the Agreement.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: Thank you Mr Barnard. Mr Berger?

MR BERGER: Thank you Judge Khampepe.

Thank you Dr Barnard, because that's where I was going. The document that you're referring to is the document which was placed before the State Security Council on the 21st October 1985, the one which contained guidelines for the SADF in cross-border action.

DR BARNARD: That is the document that you have referred to previously.

MR BERGER: And when you talk about cross-border operations by the SADF, that would include overt as well as covert operations, am I correct?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR BERGER: Now what was decided at that meeting of the 3rd December was that "Tak Nasionale Vertolking" had to put together a document before the 16th December. You'll see that, paragraph 3.2.2, dealing with the movements of the ANC in Lesotho and that document you will find perhaps at other places but also in Volume 3 at page 77.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I have page 77 before me.

MR BERGER: Now we know that the CIC meeting of the 3rd December was the last meeting of the year and we know also that that was decided, in fact, before the 3rd December. Yes, if you have a look at page 102 of Volume 4, you will see that by the 11th November in a letter that was sent to all members of the CIC, paragraph 4, it was noted or it was said that the last CIC meeting of the year would take place on the 3rd December 1985.

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR BERGER: And the next meeting after the 3rd December was going to be sometime in January and then it was in fact cancelled and the next meeting was on board that ship from the 12th to the 14th February.

DR BARNARD: Correct.

MR BERGER: So when it was decided on the 3rd December, to commission TNV to produce that report before the 16th December, for whose attention was that report intended?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, it was done in order to provide the SSC meeting which would take place three days later, with information with regard to the threat from Lesotho.

MR BERGER: And then if there was any information contained in that report, perhaps information updated from the 3rd December, then the State Security Council would then have to take a decision on what steps ought to be taken against Lesotho. Would that be a fair assessment of how things were planned to pan out?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, let me commence as follows. The SSC decided on the 4th November that the meeting would take place on the 20th December. It was a practice of President PW Botha's - I think it is significant for me to bring this to the attention of the Committee, it was a practice of President PW Botha every year, not only in that particular year, approximately a week before Christmas to conduct a meeting in order to determine for the Christmas and New Year's season, whether or not the Security Forces were prepared and whether or not security would be maintained throughout this period. So this was not a unique occasion that took place in that particular year. According to the best of my recollection, it took place on an annual basis. There were indications in the intelligence community that there were bases of ANC members in the neighbouring States, among others Lesotho. Then it took place that on the 3rd December there was a CIC meeting and Neil van Heerden, the Foreign Affairs representative, provided information indicating that the numbers had increased and that there might be attacks in the process. The CIC had six sub-committees and one of those sub-committees was known as the National Interpretation Branch. I don't know precisely what the name would have been in English, Branch National Interpretation or Evaluation, which received high-level security intelligence from all the compartments and then had the responsibility to present to the SSC, an integrated evaluated intelligence document.

I reckon that it is logical that the Chairperson of the CIC was there and he would have known that in approximately two to three weeks time the SSC meeting would take place, that this information was received and to request the Branch National Evaluation or Interpretation to create an integrated and evaluated document to be presented to the SSC on the 20th December. The reason why reference was made to the 17th December is that one must remember that those documents and reports were distributed before the time, along with the agendas, to the members of the SSC and that is why it is logical that the document had to be produced in such a way so that it would be available to cabinet and statute members who would have session during such meetings. I don't know if that assists you in any way.

MR BERGER: No, absolutely, thank you. So it was intended that once TNV has evaluated and assessed everything, placed that before the State Security Council so that the State Security Council can decide what action, be it economic or military, that needs to be taken to deal with this threat in Lesotho?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR BERGER: And also what you said, it's become apparent, is that this document, although it was asked to be prepared by the 16th December in terms of the CIC Minute and it's dated the 17th December, we know that in fact it was available before that because - I don't know if you know, but on the 13th December, Foreign Affairs sent a telex to Maseru in which much of the information which is contained in the report is included in the telex and it's clear now that Foreign Affairs had had the information which is included in this report, at least by the 13th.

MR VISSER: But Chairperson, I must interrupt my learned friend. I'm not quite sure whether he is putting this quite as the evidence allows him to because Van Heerden's evidence was quite clear that he didn't see this report at the time when the telex went out and he got the information from Van der Merwe. So my learned friend's statement isn't quite, quite correct that because the telex contained information which is contained in the Situation Report, he must have seen the report, as I understand the question, before the 13th December. That doesn't follow at all and it certainly isn't the evidence.

CHAIRPERSON: When did the telex go off?

MR VISSER: The telex went off on the 13th. This document is signed on the 16th, and I specifically asked Van Heerden this because I wanted clarity on this issue and he said "No, I got that information - we know it's in the Situation Report, but I got that information from Van der Merwe". He made it absolutely clear, Chairperson, if you will remember, that he did not - and I asked him that, and he said he did not see this report prior to the 13th when the telex went out.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, may I attempt to assist the Committee?

MR BERGER: Well I seem to remember my learned friend, Mr Visser, cross-examining Mr Pik Botha precisely on the basis that what is contained in the telex of the 13th of December is a mirror image of what is contained in the Situation Report.

CHAIRPERSON: No but that's not the objection as I understand the objection. He said it doesn't follow that what is contained in the transcript of the document that was telexed, is based on information that has come from another source other than Mr van der Merwe. That's the objection.

MR BERGER: Chairperson, I don't mind, really.

CHAIRPERSON: Did I understand that correctly, Mr Visser?

MR VISSER: That's precisely correct, Chairperson. We say it is the same information, obviously.

MR BERGER: Chairperson, I really don't mind. I'll put the question differently, ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: There's no dispute then.

MR BERGER: That's not the gist of - that's not where I'm going, so let's rather continue.

Dr Barnard, you had a response. Perhaps I can rephrase the question if you want?

DR BARNARD: I understood that one of the reasons for my presence here is to assist the Committee. You can only imagine the CIC met on the 3rd and told the senior officials to prepare a document of Lesotho for the 16th. In other words, they didn't just sit down one day and complete the document in 24 hours, they would spend a few days on it, gather all the intelligence, that is how intelligence services operated and it would have been obvious that Foreign Affairs had information as well as all the other compartments. So if there was certain information which was sent through by Foreign Affairs on the 13th, it would be logical because the Committee gathered information from all departments.

MR BERGER: Yes I appreciate that, I have no difficulty with that whatsoever, in fact that's where I was going.

Chairperson, I see it's almost 1 o'clock, perhaps this would be an appropriate time to take the adjournment.

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: (s.u.o.)

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR BERGER: (cont)

Thank you Chairperson. Dr Barnard could press? Thank you.

Dr Barnard, before lunch we were dealing with that special report dated the 17th December, which is in bundle 3 at page 77.

MR BARNARD: I have it, Chairperson.

MR BERGER: Now you'll see in the summary on the first page, the last sentence reads

"An increase in acts of terror, propaganda and infiltration can be expected because of the increase in the number of terrorists and following on unconfirmed reports, the ANC plans already in December of 1985 and specifically over the festive season, to launch armed attacks against targets in the RSA"

Were you aware of this information in December 1985, that the ANC was planning to launch attacks from Lesotho over the Christmas period?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, the information that I had was the information which was supplied at the CIC meeting of the 3rd December. As a member of the State Security Council I also saw this document and against that background I was aware of this information.

MR BERGER: Mr Barnard, I'm sorry, you'll have to talk a little louder than that when you continue. No, but I think what you've said is on record.

As a member of the State Security Council, when would you have received this document?

DR BARNARD: I would have received this document two or three days before the meeting.

MR BERGER: You are referring to the meeting of the 20th December 1985?

DR BARNARD: Yes that is correct, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Where would you have been when you received it?

DR BARNARD: In my statement I have already said that I was in Kleinbaai on the Cape South Coast and I drove in to Cape Town and went to the meeting and I went back there.

MR BERGER: So from your holiday in Kleinbaai, you drove to Cape Town for the State Security Council meeting of the 20th December and then you drove back to Kleinbaai?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson.

MR BERGER: So would I be correct in assuming that a copy of this report would have been delivered to you in Kleinbaai, a few days before the meeting so that you could familiarise yourself with it's contents?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson.

MR BERGER: And would that have been the procedure with all members of the State Security Council? No matter where they were in South Africa, copies of this report would have been delivered to them so that they could be informed of the contents of the report before they attended the meeting of the 20th December?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson.

MR BERGER: What was the attitude of PW Botha to this information, before the meeting of the 20th December, in the days preceding the 20th December?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I can't assist you in answering that question, I did not have any contact with Mr PW Botha in the days before the meeting of the 20th.

MR BERGER: When was your last contact with PW Botha before the meeting of 20th December 1985?

DR BARNARD: That would have been probably if I recall correctly, if there was an SSC meeting on the 2nd December. Is that correct?

DR BARNARD: I think you are correct.

DR BARNARD: I would have been at that occasion. I cannot recall that I, after the 2nd December - I've already mentioned that right after the schools closed in Transvaal I left from Kleinbaai, I went there for a holiday and I would not have had contact with the State President.

MR BERGER: So you wouldn't - you didn't, not you wouldn't have, you didn't discuss the information that you got at the CIC meeting of the 3rd December 1985, with PW Botha, nor did you discuss the contents of this report at page 77 of Volume 3 with PW Botha?

DR BARNARD: I did not discuss it with him.

CHAIRPERSON: Was Mr PW Botha not present at the meeting, the meeting of the 20th?

DR BARNARD: Mr Botha was there, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you not deal with it then?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I did not submit the information at the meeting there. The President is the Chairperson and the officials and the Ministers are all there and I did not have a personal discussion with him with regard to this.

MR BERGER: Chairperson, my questions were directed to activities before the meeting of the 20th December 1985.

CHAIRPERSON: Carry on.

MR BERGER: Thank you Chair.

I want to refer you to a Minute, it's in Volume 3 at page 4, this is a Minute of a meeting of the Working Committee of the State Security Council which was held on the 29th January 1986. When did you return from leave?

DR BARNARD: I cannot recall exactly but it had to be a few days before the Transvaal schools reopened in December or January 1986.

MR BERGER: I assume you're referring to the white schools and if my memory serves me correctly, the white schools opened very early in January 1986, would I be correct?

DR BARNARD: That's possible, I cannot recall.

MR BERGER: And you would have been back at your desk shortly before the schools opened?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, yes.

MR BERGER: So by the 29th January 1986 you would have been at work probably for more than two weeks already?

DR BARNARD: Let's say approximately, Chairperson.

MR BERGER: Now I know you were not at this meeting but I want to ask you if you can help us. At page 4, under the heading of "Lesotho", the following is minuted

"The State Security Council approved a step by step strategy with regard to action against Lesotho."

Now we know that that was the "trapsgewyse strategie" which was agreed to on the 20th December 1985, at the State Security Council meeting, am I correct?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson.

MR BERGER: "The results thereof are already clear."

I'll finish and then I'll come back.

"The Chairperson of the SSC, (that's PW Botha), expresses his thanks for the particular good interdepartmental collaboration during this operation."

Now in your capacity as Director-General of Intelligence and as the person closest to PW Botha as far as a D-G to his Minister is concerned, it's in that capacity that I ask you, what is meant by the sentence:

"The results hereof are already clear"

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, my opinion is this has regard - as I understood, the border of Lesotho was closed on the 1st January 1986 and such closure of the border would be co-operation between various State departments, Department of Police, Foreign Affairs, Home Affairs, Transport and so forth. I would think that is what is being referred to when they say that the results thereof are already clear.

MR BERGER: We know that once the border was closed, the border was closed on the 1st January 1986 and I think if I am correct, on the 20th January 1986 there was a coup in Lesotho. Are those the results - and then of course there was a change of government which was far less sympathetic to the ANC than the previous government had been, is that correct?

DR BARNARD: That's how I understand it, Chairperson.

MR BERGER: And is that what is meant by "the results hereof are clear"?

DR BARNARD: That could have included that, partially, yes.

MR BERGER: But then PW Botha expresses his thanks to the various departments for their co-operation during this operation. "This operation". Which operation is being referred to?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, may I just tell you what is happening, may I just take you back to page 3? On page 3, number (b) says

"Extraordinary State Security Council meeting of the 20th December 1985"

so what is happening here, the Chairperson of the Working Committee of the SSC is giving feedback, back to the meeting as to what had happened at this extraordinary meeting and therein he refers, as I understand it, to what the Chairperson has said there and I think that is why he says there the co-operation which is relevant to the six steps which has been agreed upon on the 20th December and the borders being closed on the 1st January. That's how I understood it.

MR BERGER: What I want to know is, if you can, what was PW Botha referring to when he spoke about "this operation"?

DR BARNARD: This operation meaning the operation of co-operation of border closures on the 1st January 1986.

MR BERGER: It doesn't refer to the attack on Maseru on the 19th/20th December 1985?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, not as far as I can recall it, no.

MR BERGER: So when was PW Botha briefed about the attack?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I cannot assist you there. I do not know when he was briefed. I left the afternoon of the SSC meeting. According to the Minutes the meeting ended a few Minutes before 4 o'clock, I climbed into my vehicle and I drove back to Kleinbaai and I do not know when the State President was informed.

MR BERGER: You never briefed him about the attack?

DR BARNARD: No, I did not brief him.

MR BERGER: Did you ever discuss the attack with PW Botha?

DR BARNARD: The attack on Lesotho?

MR BERGER: Yes, and when I refer to the attack, I'm talking about the attack on Maseru on the night of the 19th/20th December 1985. Did you ever discuss that attack with PW Botha?

DR BARNARD: I cannot recall that in the immediate weeks thereafter I discussed it with him, that the discussion could have ensued at an occasion thereafter, it's possible, yes.

MR BERGER: And when you - you say it wasn't in the immediate weeks after the attack but you say it's some time later you may have discussed it with him. In that discussion or those discussions, did you know - let me start off with you, did you know that the South African Security Forces or an arm of the South African Security Forces were responsible for the attack?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I did not know.

MR BERGER: Did ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Did you think it could have been them?

DR BARNARD: I thought it could have been them, yes Chairperson.

MR BERGER: Well, if you knew that it could have been them, did you discuss that possibility with PW Botha?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, the task of the National Intelligence was not to spy on other departments, it was not our responsibility. If there was a line function which was taken by other departments to see what they did and how they did it, that was not our task, it didn't have anything to do with Security Intelligence.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Barnard, are you trying to tell this Committee that a matter that caused so much international furore, was regarded as less important to the loyalty and not able to spy on a colleague in another department?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, but it is obvious that the practice would have been that whichever department of which I did not know who it was, while I said it could have been one of them, that that particular department, it was the chief of that department and the Minister of that department, it was their responsibility to inform the State President with regard to that.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Barnard, listen to me. You were in the State President's office at the time, isn't it?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I was not in the office of the State President.

CHAIRPERSON: He was your Minister?

DR BARNARD: Yes, he was the Minister, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: And you had direct entrée to him?

DR BARNARD: Yes, I had direct access to him, that is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: At the time when you suspected - let's assume you did not warn him of this possibility prior to the event, but when it occurred, it crossed your mind that look, it could be the armed Forces of South Africa? Why didn't you the raise it with him?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I've already explained to you, the responsibility of the security departments and the South African Defence Force, the South African Police and Foreign Affairs with regard to affairs which they were active in, it was their responsibility to use the proper channels and to convey this to the State President on the proper levels. Chairperson, you can think, it cannot work, with respect, that a department chief sits with a State President and tells stories with regard to other departments. Mr Botha's evidence, if I recall his evidence before this Committee correctly, he stated it clearly, this is Mr Pik Botha, that the State President did not allow any such matters. Why would it be expected of me that I should convey such matters to the State President while other departments who had direct access in the cabinet to the State President, could inform him themselves?

CHAIRPERSON: Well, they're not here to answer that, Dr Barnard, I'm asking you why you didn't. That's what I'm asking you, I'm not asking about why others didn't do it.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I did not do it, with respect, because I believed that the department who was responsible for it and knew about it - I did not know that it was the State department, I said I had a suspicion it was and that is why I expected that it was their responsibility to inform the State President.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: Dr Barnard, you were the Chairperson of CIC whose responsibility was to co-ordinate intelligence work on behalf of the State Security Council, am I correct?

DR BARNARD: Yes that is correct, Chairperson.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: Would it have been an intrusion on your part, once you had this suspicion that the Security Police or somebody else might have been involved in the raid, to have enquired from the South African Defence Force whether they were involved or not?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, the CIC was responsible for making submissions with regard to the general threat with regard to South Africa, the general security threat, the totality thereof abroad and inside the country. CIC did not exist to perform executive line functions of other departments, whether it be security departments who took certain actions, whether it was certain civil departments who took certain action, it was not CIC's responsibility to go in there and report to the SSC with regard to those incidents, and that is why I did not confer with the Defence Force or the Police to find out whether they were responsible for it and if it is so, what had happened. And both the Police and the Defence Force denied it publicly that they were involved in this attack anyway.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Barnard, you were the Chief of Intelligence Committee, is that not so?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Did anyone come to you as Chairperson of that Committee and ask you "Who did this in Lesotho? You are the Chairperson of Intelligence, you should know and besides that, when persons abroad say it is South Africa who did it.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I've already explained. It was not the function of National Intelligence Services and CIC to determine what other departments were doing in their line function.

CHAIRPERSON: I did not refer to other departments. Did anyone in the Government come to you and ask you, as Chairperson of the Intelligence Committee, "Who launched the attack in Lesotho?" Not which department, whom?

DR BARNARD: No, Chairperson. People certainly must have come to me and asked me who was responsible for it and my answer to that could have been the Police have denied it, that is how I think about it, this was fifteen years ago. I cannot recall correctly but may I say what probably would have happened was I would have said the Police has denied it, the Defence Force has denied it, I have a suspicion that it might be one of the two of the departments who are involved there but it is their responsibility if they did it and it is not my responsibility to now in all covert manners and by means of other sources, try to determine was it the Police or was it the Defence Force who launched this attack and then take it to the State President. That was the understanding of line function responsibilities which existed in the security community at that stage. That was the point of departure with regard to the agreement that we had reached in Simon's Town.

MR BERGER: Dr Barnard, I still don't understand, I'm sorry. As Director-General of Intelligence, are you saying that it did not make any difference to you whether the attack in Maseru was carried out by an agency from South Africa, from the South African Security Forces, or from Lesotho, someone unconnected to South Africa? It would have made no difference to you?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I did not say that it did not make any difference. Possibly you misunderstood me. I did not say that it did not make any difference, I said the Police and Defence Force has denied that they were involved and then I said I had a suspicion that it could have been one of the two departments and then I said it was not my responsibility, that's not indifference. It is not the responsibility of National Intelligence and the intelligence community to follow up on line function actions of other departments and to decide who did it and who did not do it. In a government it cannot work in any other manner and if a department took such action, then it is the responsibility of the head of that department and the Minister of that department who has direct access on another level as an official to the State President and to inform in, but it was not practice as I've explained now to go into it now and try to determine who was responsible.

MR BERGER: But wasn't it one of the primary functions of National Intelligence to look after the security of the State? Wasn't that one of your primary functions?

DR BARNARD: The law said that that was our primary responsibility ...(intervention)

MR BERGER: Alright, now if that was your primary function - sorry Dr Barnard, if I could just - and I'm not talking about difference in the looser narrow sense, whether you were indifferent to it, I'm saying to you, as someone concerned with the security of the State, surely it was of vital importance to find out whether your enemy was being killed by your side or by someone unconnected to your side? Surely that was something that affected the security of the State? For example, if it was a faction within the ANC that was assassinating other members of the ANC, that was something that would have a direct bearing on the security of the State and that is something that you ought to have know, am I right?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson.

MR BERGER: So then if was of paramount importance for you, as Director-General of National Intelligence, to find out who was responsible for this attack. Isn't that so?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I've already answered that question. We did not afterwards give any specific instructions in order to determine who was responsible for the attack in Lesotho. I did not do that.

MR BERGER: Okay, you didn't do it. My question to you is, why not? If it was of such importance to find out who was killing your enemy, why did you not launch such an investigation?

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: May I interpose, Mr Berger?

Before you even answer that question, Dr Barnard, let us make you privy to what Mr van der Merwe has already stated on this issue, his evidence was that any person who thought that the raid had been carried out by any institution outside the Republic of South Africa would have been an imbecile, so to speak. It was clear to all and sundry. It must have been clear to all and sundry that the people who carried out the raid were within the confines of the Republic of South Africa.

DR BARNARD: Thank you Chairperson. That is why I stated both the Police and Defence Force denied it. I believed that it was most probably one of these two departments who did it and that is why I believed that and not the theory that it was a faction of the ANC or any other event. That is why I did not give an order within NI to attempt to determine further who was responsible for the incident, because it was a departmental responsibility to bring it to the attention of the State President via the appropriate channels. So to answer your question, yes I understand, I would have imagined that a State department in South Africa was responsible for the attack.

CHAIRPERSON: How would you have handled it if PW Botha came to you and asked you "Who did it, I want to know"? "As the head of this country I would like to know who is responsible for this?"

DR BARNARD: I would have said to the President, with respect, "Why are you asking me this question, why don't you ask Gen Malan?"

CHAIRPERSON: But then he would have said that you are the head of Intelligence?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, if you will just grant me the opportunity? I would have said, "President, you know that there are only two departments who would be able to execute this, that would be the Defence Force or the Police, why don't you call the two Ministers and Departmental heads together and ask them who was responsible and to tell you?" Why should he use NI to spy as it were on his colleagues in the cabinet? It was not the custom to spy on one another. That was precisely on of the reasons why the Simon's Town Conference was convened. If the President said to me, "Nonetheless Dr Barnard, I'm asking you", I would have said "President, I would then be breaking the Simon's Town Accord", and I would have to recruit senior Police members or senior Defence Force members and co-opt them into telling me what happened and that simply wasn't the custom among the State departments, that was not the way things operated.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: Dr Barnard, would it have been really spying on your part if you went in to get this kind of intelligence information as the chair of CIC?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I would like to say that the activities of the National Intelligence Services are incorporated in an Act which is the Act on Intelligence Security for the SSC and it is expressly and statutorily stated what the responsibilities are of all the different departments, the responsibilities of NI, of MI, the Security Branch and we were not permitted, that was precisely one of the reasons why. Before I became the D-G of the National Intelligence Services, it was the time of PW Botha and General van der Berg, there were many differences in the intelligence community as to what the responsibilities were, who had to gather Military Intelligence, who had to gather intelligence on an internal basis, who had to gather economic intelligence on an external level. There was a waste of manpower and there was much duplication and overlapping and that is why during April 1980 a conference took place in Simon's Town where NI, the Military, the Police and Foreign Affairs were present. For three to four days they conferred and said "We cannot afford for the South African Government not to have an integrated picture of intelligence, we cannot spy on one another and try and find out what we are doing." I hope that I have assisted you in understanding the background.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: You have tried, thank you. Mr Berger.

MR BERGER: Dr Barnard, do I detect a shift in your evidence? Previously you said that you did not know who was responsible for the attack and you thought that it was possible that it could have been the SAP or the SADF, but both of them issued public denials and so you did not know who was responsible. That was your evidence. Now I detect a shift and you say "heel moontlik" it was the SAP or the SADF despite their public denials.

DR BARNARD: I responded to the question as such because you said to me, "Wasn't it your responsibility in the event of factions within the ANC being responsible for the attack?", which wouldn't have been the case in this case and that is when I said to you that if it was one of those two State departments, it would have been their responsibility.

Could I take it further by saying what would have happened, what would Messrs le Grange and Coetzee's reaction have been if I went to the State President and said to him, "Mr President, in the public eye certain departments are denying responsibility for certain things that have happened but I just have put you into the real picture." But that wasn't my responsibility.

MR BERGER: Oh Dr Barnard, are you seriously saying that as the Director-General of Intelligence you never went into the State President's office, closed the door and the two of you had more than a chit chat, a detailed discussion on what was happening in the country, whether - when there was a particular attack in Lesotho, are you saying that you never discussed with the State President that it's either the SAP or the SADF who were involved in this attack?

DR BARNARD: I've already told you that I cannot recall a precise occasion after the Lesotho incident when I discussed this with the State President. It may possibly have been so that we may have held discussion regarding the matter and I also know better than what I can explain the matter, that when it came to the Defence Force and the Police's responsibilities and matters, I never discussed it with the State President. I never received an order from the State President to spy on the Police or to spy on the Defence Force in order to determine what they were up to. That was not the custom and it did not occur that way.

MR BERGER: Are you saying that PW Botha was never briefed about this attack before or after? Are you saying that?

DR BARNARD: I cannot respond on behalf of the former President, PW Botha, but apparently, according to my inference, he was the Chairperson of the SSC on the 20th December and as the Chairperson, he never referred to it, so therefore I have to conclude that nobody informed him about it. I don't have any evidence about that. I did not brief him about it.

MR BERGER: Well, if he had been briefed about the attack, are you saying that you would not necessarily have been present?

DR BARNARD: It could have been a possibility.

CHAIRPERSON: How so, as head of Intelligence?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, if it were to be that way, that State departments would explain their executive decisions to the State President, the Minister and the departmental head would not have invited me or Barnard along and said we are going to brief the State President about an executive operation. Similarly, whoever was the head of the Defence Force and the Military Departments and Magnus Malan would not have said to me "Come with us to the State President's office to discuss this matter." If these matters were discussed, it was about operations pertaining to a small group of persons who were taking determined actions which could be lethal and that is why I do not think it would be a phenomenon which appeared only in the South African Government or SSC all over the world. Only a small group of persons and not the broader context would be implicated in these discussions. I myself was never present during such discussions, therefore I cannot assist you with this.

MR BERGER: I'm not suggesting that Mr Coetzee or Mr le Grange should have said "Come along, we're going to have a chat with the State President", what I am putting to you is, if there had been a briefing of the State President about this attack, the State President would have brought you in as his Director-General of Intelligence so that you too could have been informed about who was responsible for the attack?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I'm afraid that we have a misunderstanding here with regard to the method in which it operated at that stage. The Defence Force took all cross-border operations and I was never present on any occasion to discuss this with the State President, nor was this the case with the Police. It may appear to be strange to you but that is in actual fact the position.

MR BERGER: So the State President could have been in possession of certain information which affected the security of the State which his own Director-General was not aware of. Is that the factual position?

DR BARNARD: That is a possibility, that there was specific information pertaining to line function of the Defence Force and the Police and that he discussed it with that Minister and that departmental head and that it was not brought to my attention. I was not an all-knowing person in every single aspect or regard.

MR BERGER: Well we know that the attack was not part of the line function of the South African Police. We know that this was an extraordinary attack, something which was done outside of the law, apparently, and you as Director-General of Intelligence were not informed about it, either before, during or after the event?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I don't know, should I answer this question once again? The answer is no. I have reiterated this in my evidence this morning, that I did not know about it before, during or after the incident.

MR BERGER: And you also cannot recall any discussion with PW Botha before, during or after the attack, about the attack itself and who was responsible for it?

DR BARNARD: I have stated that I did not have any discussion with President Botha before the time. I have referred to during the time, also not at that time and I also stated that I cannot recall that I discussed it with him after the incident. However, it is a possibility that I may have.

CHAIRPERSON: What would have happened if somebody had come to tell you "Look, we are from the Police and we are going to cross the border and kill these people in Lesotho"? What would you have done about it?

DR BARNARD: If, according to my judgement and in terms of the persons who had conveyed it to me, the information was correct, I would have contacted my colleague, the Commissioner of Police in some or other manner and told him that I was confused about what was going on because during the CIC meeting of the 3rd December, we prepared a document and Neil van Heerden indicated that there would be certain economic steps and that if they were considering more grave steps, then they would have to go to the Minister and the State President and inform these two persons about their intended actions. It was not my responsibility to inform the State President directly. The appropriate channels should be followed, Louis le Grange, the cabinet and the President.

MR BERGER: Is that what you would have told Mr van der Merwe if he had come to you before the attack to say this is what we are planning?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I find it problematic to respond to this question because Gen van der Merwe did not discuss it with me but if he had done so, I would have said to him, "Colleague, you have to take this matter further through the channels of the Police and to the State President because it is your responsibility if you want to do these things." I could not have been the custom to expect of me to inform the State President regarding a line function of another department pertaining to such a critical issue. The line function would be to advise my colleague to use the appropriate existing channels and their member who had session on the cabinet, but this conversation never took place.

CHAIRPERSON: Didn't you have a channel to the State President?

DR BARNARD: Yes, I was a channel to the State President but not a channel with regard to line functional departmental activities of other departments, that channel was something that they had to manage themselves in dealing with the President.

ADV BOSMAN: Dr Barnard, if I may just interrupt at this point. Could it have been a line function of the Police to cross the border and launch attacks there?

DR BARNARD: No, Chairperson, not as I understood it.

ADV BOSMAN: Then why would you have told Mr van der Merwe to follow the line function? I don't understand.

DR BARNARD: I responded to the question, Chairperson, the question was, "You didn't know about it but if somebody had informed you that the Police was busy planning something like this, what would your response have been?? And that is when I said that the Police would have had to follow their own channels to the State President. I did not understand the question to indicate that the Police was authorised to undertake such actions.

ADV BOSMAN: I find it strange that your answer wasn't something like "This is illegal, you can't do this."

DR BARNARD: But Chairperson, with respect we are referring to a hypothesis and a discussion which did not take place.

ADV BOSMAN: Thank you. You may proceed Mr Berger.

MR BERGER: Thank you Advocate Bosman.

I understand your evidence that you say Mr van der Merwe never came to discuss any raid or attack with you before the 20th December 1985. I understand that and you also say in fact he never came to you afterwards either to tell you what he had done.

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR BERGER: But the question was, if he had come to you before the raid to say this is what we are planning, to as it were bounce it off you, as Dr Barnard, as the Chairperson of the CIC, as the person who had direct access to PW Botha. To bounce it off you, to get some sort of approval from you, or to see perhaps if there was not any resistance on your part. You say you would not have given approval, you would not have indicated that it was okay with you, am I correct?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, yes.

MR BERGER: In fact you say what you would have said to him was "No, no, you must take this to your head of department, who was Mr Coetzee, or to your Minister so that it could go through that function to the State President for his final approval."

DR BARNARD: That is correct. Correct.

MR BERGER: Thank you Dr Barnard, I have no further questions.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR BERGER

MR HATTINGH: Thank you Mr Chairperson, I have no questions.

NO QUESTIONS BY MR HATTINGH

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR VISSER: Thank you, Chairperson.

Mr Barnard, I'm appearing on behalf of Gen van der Merwe and Brigadier Schoon in their amnesty applications before this Committee. There are a number of questions that I wish to put to you, if you don't mind.

Firstly, may I ask you, the State President, Mr PW Botha, he had a reputation for putting the security of his country and his citizens first, would you agree with that?

DR BARNARD: Yes. Well not always but it was a very important issue to him.

MR VISSER: And the construction and establishment of all the state security structures took place under the leadership of the former State President, the structures such as the SSC and all the other related structures. The SSC or the Act for the SSC was adopted in 1972, which was before President Botha became President and from the commencement of his term as a President, the security function was considerably elaborated. Would you agree with the criticism that one heard of the former State President indicating that he was autocratic, that he was intolerant of anything taking place that he did not know about when it came to security, would you agree with such a general statement?

DR BARNARD: Well, the State President was a person with a very strong personality, who had a very strong interest in security matters and very strong opinions and beliefs on the issue.

CHAIRPERSON: That doesn't answer the question, Mr Barnard. The question is that he does not accept that he was not informed about certain things.

DR BARNARD: If the question was that he wanted to know about everything that was going on, all the important matters with regard to the security of the State, then the answer is that is correct, he wanted to know about everything that was going on.

MR VISSER: Yes, that was the gist of the question. Thank you Doctor.

We are aware and I don't wish to reiterate this because the Committee has heard it numerous times, but the 1980's was a time of revolutionary struggle for South Africa, would you agree?

DR BARNARD: Yes.

MR VISSER: And there was an increase in dramatic and drastic statements from politicians regarding how the enemy could be neutralised, is that correct?

DR BARNARD: Yes, that is correct.

MR VISSER: We are aware that General Magnus Malan, when in 1986 while he was the Minister of Defence, for example stated in Parliament

"The Security Forces will hammer them wherever they find them. What I am saying is the policy of the Government."

Is that correct?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR VISSER: The point of this is simply that Gen van der Merwe and numerous other Security policemen gave evidence that what they understood by these statements was that at all costs, be it illegal or not, they had to combat the revolutionary onslaught. Or let me rather ask it as such, is that also your view today?

DR BARNARD: Could I just understand the question correctly. Are you saying that this is what Gen van der Merwe and the other police officers believed their obligation or duty to be?

MR VISSER: Yes.

DR BARNARD: I cannot tell you what they thought but I could imagine that that would have been their view.

MR VISSER: Yes, that is satisfactory. And then with regard to you, in National Intelligence, did you have a branch office in Bloemfontein?

DR BARNARD: Yes, we did.

MR VISSER: And in Maseru?

DR BARNARD: We did not have a branch office there but we had sources.

MR VISSER: Informers?

DR BARNARD: Yes, informers or sources.

MR VISSER: And we also heard from Mr van Heerden that during this period in time there was a serious diplomatic crisis which was building up between Lesotho and the RSA, is that correct?

DR BARNARD: Yes, that is correct.

MR VISSER: And all of this was about the custom or the fact that the ANC used Lesotho as a springboard for their acts of terror against the RSA.

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR VISSER: Would you agree with the time period attached to it, I think both Gen van der Merwe and Mr van Heerden stated that it was during the second half of 1985 that this crisis was coming to a head?

DR BARNARD: Well, I cannot recall it as pertinently but from their evidence it would appear to be so and I would regard this as correct then.

MR VISSER: If I could come to this point with you, we agree with regard to the capacities of CIC and why it was established, but the only point that I wish to discuss with you is when you explained that the CIC co-ordinated intelligence, then I would like to ask you, was the intelligence that we refer to here perhaps not somewhat broader than what we have heard from you thus far, and what I have specifically in mind is intelligence co-ordination, wouldn't that also have included, if one thinks for example about an action, whether it's internal or external, that the CIC would have held a discussion? We're referring to an overt action, not an illegal action as such, that the CIC would hold discussions in order to prevent that the various members of the Security Forces do not clash with one another, as the English say overlap and shoot one another's informers and so forth. Was that the sort of thing which would have been discusses among the CIC?

DR BARNARD: If I have understood the question correctly, Chairperson, in CIC we dealt with the overall co-ordination of these three bodies which were covertly occupied from a foreign perspective. If I understand correctly, that it could also have been about operational actions because there are so many different terms. I must tell you that I cannot recall that an operational action by the Defence Force or the Police was ever discussed at a CIC meeting. There were bodies within the security management system, I did not have any documents at my disposal to refresh my memory, but there was an overall body which was referred to as the Joint Management Structure. There were also the Joint Intelligence Centres and the Joint Operational Centres and if I recall, executive actions were co-ordinated among those bodies to avoid this overlapping and this was never done at the CIC. It does not mean that the broader principles were not mentioned during these meetings but with regard to operational status, it was never conducted at CIC meetings.

MR VISSER: Very well. And then the question of compartmentalisation, Dr Barnard, isn't it correct that by far, the most security intelligence which was ever tabled at the CIC would have come from the Security Branch?

DR BARNARD: It would be difficult because there was much competition among the various intelligence services but when it came to the general security situation and internal security and intelligence then the Security Branch would have offered the most information.

MR VISSER: And that must also have damaged the whole principle of compartmentalisation? Or let me put it this way, CIC itself didn't have its own informers, it had to rely upon that which it heard from the other members of CIC.

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR VISSER: Actually, I am simply posing these questions in terms of what you stated in your evidence when my learned friend, Mr Berger, cross-examined you. You stated that if the Defence Force had a problem they could approach the CIC for assistance. You certainly did not mean by that that the CIC would then task its informers to assist the Defence Force as such, wouldn't it rather have meant that the CIC could have information which came from the Security Branch that they could then make available to the Defence Force to assist them?

DR BARNARD: The CIC as a body had no capacity, it consisted of various bodies, and as I stated this morning and quoted from the CIC Minutes, the Defence Force stated that there wasn't enough information in neighbouring States regarding the ANC bases and that is when it was said, "If you don't have that information, consult with us and we can consult with one another, most probably with NI and with the Security Branch and initiate a process of placing informers strategically so that that information can be sent through." I must just make this point, one would not recruit an informer in the intelligence community today and expect information back from him tomorrow, this was a process which took a while to instate and to bear fruits.

MR VISSER: I understand. If I could then go to the Minutes of the meetings in general, Dr Barnard, if I were to make the statement to you that Minutes quite frequently were a selective reflection of everything that was discussed during a meeting, would you agree with this in broader terms?

DR BARNARD: No, I do not agree with that.

MR VISSER: What would have happened, and this question was put to you, I'm just putting to you from a different angle, what would have happened if Van der Merwe had told you during the CIC meeting of the 3rd December that he was going to be sending his men in, that he was going to attack the ANC bases because he knew where they were and that he was going to eliminate all the MK members that he found there? And hypothetically speaking, let us say that the members of CIC regarded this threat so seriously that they felt that something had to be done about it and they agreed with Van der Merwe? This is simply a hypothetical question. Would you truly be able to say that this would be reflected in a CIC Minute with the knowledge that it was an illegal action?

DR BARNARD: It was not discussed during the meeting.

MR VISSER: Yes, I realise that.

DR BARNARD: And if it was ever stated, it would not have been reflected in the Minutes.

MR VISSER: Then it would not have been recorded in the Minutes. That is what I meant by selective. The curiosity about this, Dr Barnard, and I hope that you can assist me with this, is that it is a fact that there was an attack on the night of the 19th December 1985 in Lesotho and it is also a fact that subsequently nowhere in any Minute of the SSC or the CIC or the Working Committee or the Secretary or the Cabinet was there ever any reference to this attack. Can you offer any explanation for that?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, during cross-examination this afternoon I have been extensively examined about this. I can assist you by attempting to explain. The attack took place, the Defence Force and the Police denied it, I myself and other persons suspected that it could be them but the South Africa of December 1985 didn't only have to do with an attack as critical as it was and as it is today with the Committee. It wasn't only an attack in Lesotho, there were diplomatic boycotts on a global level, there were serious developments in the rest of Africa, there were many other developments internally, such as trade union unrest, unrest at schools. There was a spectrum spanning 360 degrees, which was aimed at attacking the security of the country and it took the full capacity of all the Security Forces to combat this and in the light of that context, I feel that it is viewed in a certain way, but the extent of the threat internally and on an international level is the only background against which I can attempt to explain any of this.

MR VISSER: But wouldn't you agree that an important fact like an attack on Lesotho which found its way to the U.N., to its Security Council, under the normal circumstances would never have been discussed anywhere? It's senseless and illogical, don't you agree?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, in retrospect it is strange that it did not take place.

CHAIRPERSON: What about that time? We're not referring to today. Wasn't it strange at that stage?

DR BARNARD: Yes, it was strange but if it was discussed at the U.N. Security Council, why didn't the Minister of Foreign Affairs deal with the matter in the SSC and other structures? It would have to have been other officers from the Police and the Defence Force to do so.

MR VISSER: Mr Barnard, I understand what you are saying but National Intelligence certainly had a role to fulfil? In your evidence you briefly stated that you acted in terms of an Act and that this had to do with internal and external security and security intelligence. Isn't it correct, to put it plainly, that anything that had anything to do with security was the business of National Intelligence? Wouldn't you agree with this?

DR BARNARD: No, I don't agree with that.

MR VISSER: You do not agree with that. Very well.

For example, the elaboration of the MK manpower in Lesotho where 30 new members joined the existing numbers, would that have been something that National Intelligence would have been interested in?

DR BARNARD: No, it was not because there was an express agreement in Simon's Town. It's not that we wouldn't have been interested in it but we would not have appointed or recruited informers to determine what the situation was because that was the responsibility of the Defence Force.

MR VISSER: To collect that intelligence?

DR BARNARD: Yes.

MR VISSER: But now you have to account as the DG to the State President, PW Botha, and those of us who knew him knew what that meant. You had to stand on your toes and you had to have all the answers or you'd be in tremendous trouble, isn't that correct?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I don't wish to make any personal statements about Mr Botha. I did not have all the information and I must just make this point, that if one dealt with information, one would have to tell political heads when you didn't have it. One should never pretend that one had it if one didn't have it. That was very important.

MR VISSER: The question is simply about this. When you heard during the CIC meeting on the 3rd December about this proliferation, you certainly didn't think it didn't have anything to do with security intelligence because it was pertinently connected to this. Can you recall this specifically or not, that you would have conveyed that information to PW Botha?

DR BARNARD: To the best of my recollection, I cannot recall in any way whatsoever that I conveyed this information to PW Botha.

MR VISSER: Very well. And then, could I suggest then that there was no crisis during the CIC meeting of the 3rd December 1985, at least not an immediate crisis which required urgent attention because that was the evidence of Gen van der Merwe? And what has not yet been put to you which I would like to put to you is the following. Remember that throughout all of this Gen van der Merwe, just as you, cannot recall with which CIC members he discussed this matter after the 3rd December. Please just bear this in mind for the sake of background, but the evidence indicates that after the 3rd December, further information came to light from an informer in Lesotho and that further information indicated that there was a group of terrorists, as they were defined in terms of the Act at that stage, who were on the verge of entering the RSA in order to commit acts of terror, particularly over the festive season. Therefore with respect towards you, you were incorrect, perhaps it was a slip of thought, when you stated that that information had been available on the 3rd December 1985 during the CIC meeting because it was not yet available, it only became available later. This was the issue pertaining to the festive season. Would you agree with me or are you prepared to concede thusfar?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I would just like to study that Minute.

MR VISSER: Yes, you may do so and you will see - if you can just find the reference ...(intervention)

DR BARNARD: I am afraid Chairperson - may I read the introductory sentence to you? It says that

"Mr van Heerden mentions that according to information which was received from the Security Branch during October, 30 ANC terrorists arrived in Lesotho and that at the moment there were 80 ANC terrorists in the country who are on the verge of acting against the RSA."

Therefore it is possibly so but ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Visser, did you refer to the festive season?

Dr Barnard, the question is that the information with regard to an attack by people from Lesotho on or around Christmas, that information was not available on the 3rd December.

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson.

MR VISSER: Thank you Chairperson.

MR BERGER: Chairperson, if I could just interrupt my learned friend. He put to, or he informed Dr Barnard that Mr van der Merwe can't remember who he spoke to on the CIC about this planned raid. Well, that may have been Mr van der Merwe's evidence at one point, but if I could just refer you to page 592 ...(intervention)

MR VISSER: Chairperson, really, my learned friend shouldn't say this, I'm coming to this very point. Why is he bringing this up now? I haven't put any question to this witness which is incorrect and which is not based on the evidence.

CHAIRPERSON: Well Mr Visser, it may be incorrect if he had two versions. Then you should have put to him that one of the versions is - if Mr Berger is correct.

MR VISSER: That's not what it's about, Chairperson. Can I put the question to Mr van Heerden, because I know exactly what my learned friend is referring to now.

CHAIRPERSON: Well let's wait.

MR BERGER: Chairperson, with respect, I won't read it if Mr Visser has a problem with my reading, but the point is what Mr Visser put to Dr Barnard about what Mr van der Merwe says is not strictly speaking correct because Mr van der Merwe says many things and one of ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Would you be satisfied if one of his versions be what he put to Dr Barnard?

MR BERGER: One of the versions is that he didn't know who he spoke to.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, ...(indistinct - no microphone)

MR BERGER: Yes Chairperson, but it goes beyond that because in other parts of his evidence he tells us who he spoke to.

CHAIRPERSON: No, I'm aware of that.

MR BERGER: And Dr Barnard, in all fairness ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: If the objection is that it was incorrectly put to him, then I agree with you but then we've got to wait for the alternative also to be put to him.

MR BERGER: Very well.

MR VISSER: And my learned friend, Mr Berger, doesn't appear for Mr Barnard, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: It does affect his case, but proceed.

MR VISSER: Thank you Chairperson.

Dr Barnard, this point will become known to you soon enough but I'm just referring to the facts here and I want to know from you what you were aware of or not and then I shall get to that point. We now know or you cannot deny that new information came about?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR VISSER: And that further information possibly came about which worsened the crisis, because you see in the Situation Report of Major General van Vuuren dated the 17th, he mentions the festive season and he mentions a weapon cache point. You recall that, you have read it?

DR BARNARD: Yes that is correct, I have read it.

MR VISSER: And now the point of this thus far is what was not a crisis on the 3rd December when you listened to this information became a crisis later.

Now we get to Mr Berger's point. Gen van der Merwe cannot recall with whom he held discussions and consequently, while your legal teams were here, gave evidence and worked on what probably would have happened because when cannot recall then one could only say that what probably would have happened is the following, and Gen van der Merwe gave the following evidence. He said he was second-in-command of the Security Branch, he also said that he knew about the diplomatic crisis between South Africa and Lesotho at that time and that he knew that it was a period of much tension and he did not want to step on anyone's toes. That is why he would have wanted to raise it at the CIC meeting. We now know that he does have objective evidence that it was raised by Van Heerden, but he went further by saying that he would have discussed the new events with CIC. After his application it became clear that there was no further meeting of CIC after the 3rd December and Van der Merwe then said well, he must have discussed it with members of CIC but he is not able to say with whom. Do you follow me?

And now we get to the point. Mr van der Merwe also gave evidence that it is probable that he would have discussed it with you, we talk of probabilities, because he said he knew that you had a direct line to the State President.

Is that the point, Mr Berger?

MR BERGER: Never mind the point. I was going to read the extract from the evidence but you stopped me.

CHAIRPERSON: Gentlemen, please, let's not cross talk here.

MR VISSER: I just want to know whether that's the correct ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Carry on Mr Visser, we'll find out if he objects, he's not shy to object.

MR VISSER: Thank you Chairperson.

That was evidence which Gen van der Merwe gave on the probabilities. Do you have any comment? I think you have already commented on that.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I shall repeat. Gen van der Merwe did not discuss it with me. What I do not understand is that the viewpoint is taken up that the chief of another State department, his opinion is tested while the Commissioner of Police' opinion is not tested, the person who had to handle with the situation. You are referring to probabilities now. How can an official in one department - we now refer to a hypothesis, this is just a hypothesis, how can he go to another department to receive authorisation for it from another department? I do not know. The State as I recall, that is not how it functioned, with respect, Chairperson.

MR VISSER: Yes we have to be careful when we use - I'm not saying that he obtained authorisation from you, he did not say that and that is not what I am saying. What he said was that it was important for him to find out whether there was any objection against any action, but you were saying that you were not one of the persons with whom he spoke. Your evidence is on record.

Did you know of the telex which Foreign Affairs sent on the 13th December, were you aware of it before the 20th December?

DR BARNARD: No, Chairperson.

MR VISSER: And some of the ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: But you knew that it would be issued, the decision that was taken on the 3rd?

DR BARNARD: Yes, I knew on the 3rd that a communication would follow, that was a decision by Foreign Affairs but I did not know that it would take place on the 13th and what the contents would be thereof. That is the point.

MR VISSER: Now I would like to ask you, Dr Barnard, to cast your mind back to two or three days and on the 20th December 1985, if you had then read what was contained in the Situation Report, would you have thought that there was a serious crisis here or would you not have thought that?

DR BARNARD: I would have thought that there was an escalation of - the information is much better, there was an escalation of a threat from Lesotho.

MR VISSER: And this was a serious crisis, people want to enter the country to commit acts of terror?

DR BARNARD: Yes as I said, over the festive season.

MR VISSER: But you are saying that the State President did not discuss it with you?

DR BARNARD: No.

MR VISSER: And it was also not raised at the meeting?

DR BARNARD: No, not at the meeting.

MR VISSER: So what happened there was, a decision was taken of six steps which would be taken to discuss the problem "with Lesotho" and now I want to ask you the following. Do you think that anyone on that day at the SSC meeting at Tuynhuis on the 20th December, did anyone think that the first five steps of those six steps, and this was going step by step, would have averted that crisis?

DR BARNARD: You were asking whether members who were present there could have thought?

MR VISSER: No, I am asking you.

DR BARNARD: With myself, the closure of the borders and all the other steps - would you just assist me with the page number?

MR VISSER: You can have a look at page 35 of bundle 4.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, if we look at the steps here, then the steps are "diplomatic negotiation " ...(intervention)

MR VISSER: Can I just stop you there? Let us just go through it. "Diplomatic negotiations", weren't there any negotiations ongoing?

DR BARNARD: Yes.

MR VISSER: And did Van Vuuren not say in his statement, and I refer you to page, if you have the memo before you, it is bundle 3 and the Situation Report as on page 77, yes, and then if we study this you will see on page 80, the last paragraph thereof, it only says one thing

"Van Vuuren from Branch National Interpretation says 'Boys speak to these people'".

DR BARNARD: I have to say that I do not interpret that paragraph as such. May I just read the paragraph? The paragraph says

"It is further clear (this is the last paragraph and this the situation of what was said there), that periodic discussions between the RSA Government and Lesotho with regard to ANC activities in the State, that the ANC up to then did not limit their activities from in and from out of Lesotho. The nature and scope of the ANC activities in and out from of Lesotho is to such a nature that it is improbable that the Lesotho Government does not have any knowledge of it."

But that's another point now.

MR VISSER: Just turn to page 81 and then you have a look at what Van Vuuren says.

MR BERGER: That's not Van Vuuren, that's a Minute from the State Security Council meeting.

MR VISSER: My learned friend has told me this before and I've forgotten again.

Please study the Minute on page 81, there's an extract of the Minute there under the heading:

"The Supply of Terrorists from Neighbouring States"

and then in the middle of the first paragraph, I shall read it to you:

"A target submission to the Secretariat of the State Security Council (Branch National Interpretation) has to be done now. If similar incidents like the land mine incidents in the Northern Transvaal take place, then drastic steps including the cross-border use of military force has to be applied."

And in the light thereof we return back to the first point, "Diplomatic Negotiations." The Department of Foreign Affairs sends a telex on the 13th December and according to the telex and according to Minister Botha, he reports on this date, on the 20th December, that the answer from Lesotho was nonsensical. Now I want to find out what was the sense of item number 1 then, in order to try to avoid this threatening crisis?

DR BARNARD: Do you mean item number 1?

MR VISSER: Yes, "Diplomatic Negotiation".

MR BERGER: Yes, I would have thought that the approach of Foreign Affairs which played a significant role at the SSC, it would be important that South African have to try by means of diplomatic negotiations to see whether they can reach an agreement and I think that is a typical line function of diplomats. They continually have to try to see whether one can save a situation by means of negotiations.

MR VISSER: Do you see you are correct, because this would have facilitated their task. If they had to go and discuss, if they did not have to discuss violence at the U.N. and is this not simply a long term plan, is that not the point of these six steps? Everything indicates to this.

DR BARNARD: Yes, the six steps would indicate - it is only logical that more pressure which should be applied on the Lesotho Government so that these ANC persons would be handled in such a manner so that no attacks would take place from Lesotho to South Africa.

MR VISSER: But of course you are correct, and this would never have been implemented before Christmas, all these steps?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

MR VISSER: And now I would like to put it to you that the reason for this decision of the SSC could only have been taken with the knowledge that the crisis had been solved the previous evening.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I do not agree with that at all.

MR VISSER: Well, if it was not for the attack of the evening of the 19th, would you not have expected that the SSC would have taken a much more drastic step in order to combat this threat over the festive season?

DR BARNARD: But the information which they gave with regard to the supply of terrorists - if I can return to page 109 of bundle 3, the Chairperson asked there that the information - they do not mention CIC by their name there, was to pay attention to the situation there, I shall not go back to it but the Minute, with respect Chairperson, from the SSC does not say that it was discussed there. I understand as I read Mr Botha's evidence he denies it and I deny it, it is not there. So whether anybody else knew thereof secretly, I do not know.

MR VISSER: May I just ask you as follows then? If the crisis was not diffused on the night of the 19th December, would you have expected that the SSC would have discussed it, the influx of terrorists over the festive season and the commission of acts of terror and they would have taken decisions as to how to deal with it, or how would you have expected it?

DR BARNARD: I would have expected it Chairperson in the light of that by the 9th December, CIC had this information and they went through these steps and that is why CIC prepared the document which was distributed on the 17th December and that is why it was discussed on the 20th December.

MR VISSER: Dr Barnard, I have almost reached my conclusion. After the incident, the attack of the 19th December, do you say in your evidence today that you heard of it while you were on your way from Kleinbaai? I'm not certain whether I wrote this down correctly.

DR BARNARD: I am sorry, Chairperson, that is not what I said. I said that I cannot recall when I became aware of it.

MR VISSER: No, you did say that, but you also added that you heard it in your car. Not? Then I fabricated two sentences here. I apologise. But as my learned friend, Mr Berger, wanted to know from you is that, is it so that in the first week of January when you returned to your office in January 1986, that you would have become aware of the attack?

DR BARNARD: On all the probabilities I should have. I do not know exactly but before then I wasn't.

MR VISSER: You see it was in the newspapers, there was much uproar from the time of the 20th December, the Lesotho Government sent a note of protest and raised it at the United Nations. Would the persons at your office have kept you informed even though you were on vacation?

DR BARNARD: I must have read about it in the newspapers, I do believe I may have read it in the newspapers.

MR VISSER: You see, because I would like to just take it up with you that you are saying that you had a suspicion but you didn't do anything about it because you thought that it was the responsibility of that department, it would be their responsibility to take it further. What did you call it? The procedures or the line function or whatever you called it, to the top, they would have to take it up to the top.

Now you know Minister Botha gave evidence before the same Committee that Ministers did not always inform him, sometimes they lied to him if it was about unlawful actions of the Police and so forth. Would you agree that that could have happened, that Ministers would not have informed each other with regard to unlawful actions?

DR BARNARD: That Ministers did not inform each other or did not tell the whole truth is apparently - it was true, yes.

MR VISSER: Because an amnesty application was heard with regard to the ANC offices in London, England, and the evidence there was - and we did not have the benefit of Mr Louis le Grange's evidence because he was already deceased, but the information there was that this action came from Mr le Grange and it was devolved down to the persons who went and executed it in England and even in that instance there was no indication that Minister le Grange informed the State President about it, although certain people did believe so, but there was never any proof of it.

Now the point is, if you expected that Commissioner Coetzee had to go and tell his Minister le Grange and this, on his turn, would go and tell the State President but they do not do this, isn't it logical that National Intelligence would at least tell the State President, "Listen, I do not know whether these people came to you but I have heard about this and they admitted to me that they went into Lesotho on the night of the 19th and they launched this attack." If that was the fact, that's the same hypothesis with which we are working now. Would it not have been necessary for you to go and inform the State President? I heard that you say it would not be, but in the light of what I put to you, this deals with National Intelligence, does it not?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, except that it never happened. If it did happen then I would have said what I have said previously, "Colleague, I understand it as such, you are now giving decorations ..." and if I knew this, " ... if the President does not know of it, it is your responsibility to inform the President with regard to this."

MR VISSER: Thank you, Doctor. May I just discuss the CIC Summit on Table Mountain. That was from the 12th to the 14th December and you will find that in bundle 4 from page 120.

DR BARNARD: I do have that, Chairperson.

MR VISSER: I would just like to know from you because Mr van Heerden was not in a position to assist us here, but if you study page 126, under Lesotho and Botswana, Dr Barnard, you will see there it is said there

"Foreign Affairs referred to the success that was accomplished in the recent past in the Lesotho matter by a small high-profile or high level project team by RSA officials."

Now upon the supposition that they refer there to the diplomatic crisis of the previous year, what was this small high-level project team. Can you recall or can you not recall?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I cannot inform you in detail but I would like to answer as follows. I assume that senior level officials - I see on the following page they refer to a Deputy-General level, and I infer from the negotiations with the Lesotho Government there were this type of departments, for example Home Affairs, Foreign Affairs, possibly South African Police and others held discussions with the people and they were appreciative of this discussion that had taken place. In other words it was an ad hoc group of senior officials who went through.

MR VISSER: But what is of importance here is this does not refer to the attack.

DR BARNARD: No, not as far as I know.

MR VISSER: Will you please look at paragraph 10.2 on page 127. It says there

"Members refer that plans have to be made for actions against the ANC and as many front organisations and fighters in the RSA as well as abroad, as well as action with regard to schools unrests."

and then the Minute further says:

"The NVBS or National Security Management System has to deal with this."

and then the sentence is:

"The question now exists whether crisis situations would be handled ad hoc by informal systems?"

What did that mean?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, CIC Summit from the 12th to the 14th February 1986, took place in the climate of escalating security dilemma for South Africa and CIC met for two days and held discussions. Seen from that angle with regard to the worsening condition and the greater pressure on the South African Government, we came together and discussed, amongst others, what could happen that the State be managed better with regard to security. That is how I recall it. And if you on the same point go to page 128, if I have it correct, the last paragraph before 10.4, it says that

"Although it has been realised that the CIC in this matter acts outside its task instruction, but it has to be kept in mind that it has to be brought under the decision maker's attention and the intelligence community has also tried to assist here."

You can see there, people asked questions there, "Should the SSC or a co-group of the SSC not meet once a week instead of twice a week?" So this whole discussion in that paragraph takes place from the senior officials on the intelligence community who came together. The situation was escalating, they discussed it with each other and they wanted to know whether the systems were still working, functioning properly, because was it our responsibility to do this but there was some type of discussion with regard to this. And against this background, I would like to submit that the National Security Management System, and the best that I could do is that the State has to think that from time to time they should not function on this structured matter and that from time to time they have to move quicker and bring together smaller groups to do better planning. That is the best I can do.

MR VISSER: Once again, the long and short of it is that it does not refer to a small group of policemen who went and dealt with a crisis on the 19th December.

DR BARNARD: In my judgement, definitely not, Chairperson.

MR VISSER: I would just like to put it to you that the evidence of Gen van der Merwe was, as I have told you, he thought that he discussed with CIC but it would appear that he did indeed discuss it with CIC and he also says that after the attack he reported to his Commissioner, Johan Coetzee, and Coetzee came and confirmed it here. Coetzee also testified that in that time it was the Minister of Police, he discussed it with the Minister of Police, Louis le Grange, and that a recommendation came from Van der Merwe for medals to be given for bravery to the staff of the Police which was authorised or approved and which was promoted by Commissioner Coetzee to his Minister, Mr Louis le Grange, and I do assume that you do not know anything of this, but would you be surprised to hear this?

DR BARNARD: I do not know anything about it but I would not be surprised to hear of it.

MR VISSER: And the point hereof is, you see Dr Barnard, is that Van der Merwe, not at any stage did he try to cover up the part of the Security Branch within the borders of the intelligence community, he did not try to keep it secret and he testified that if anyone asked him within the intelligence community, he would have told them "Yes it was us, you knew it was us." It may be difficult for you to comment on this but may I ask you as follows, did you ever speak to Van der Merwe, Coetzee or Le Grange afterwards to find out from them whether they were responsible for the attack?

DR BARNARD: To the best of my recollection I did not speak to Minister le Grange, Gen Coetzee or Gen van der Merwe and ask them from my side "Did you do this?" No, I did not.

MR VISSER: And in conclusion, I would like to put to you that - maybe you would like to comment on this, maybe you would not but I will argue before this Committee that because of the facts that I have now put to you in cross-examination, the fact that the CIC meeting became aware of the veracity or how serious the Police were and the fact that on the 20th December not a word was said, or afterwards, and the fact that the crisis had been resolved indicates only to one thing, this attack, that there had to be people in the SSC who knew either on the 20th or thereafter that the Police was responsible for this and they, knowing that it was an unlawful act, did not address it openly but welcomed and approved of it secretly.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I do not have any facts to that effect. It is possible.

MR VISSER: And furthermore that this Gen van der Merwe was promoted to full General afterwards, he became the Security Chief afterwards and not long afterwards he became the Commissioner of Police, so we would agree that if anyone did not agree with his action in this matter, that would not have happened, but that's argument that I put to you if you want to comment.

CHAIRPERSON: I do not know whether the witness can answer to your argument?

MR VISSER: I've got no further questions, thank you Chairperson.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR VISSER

MR CORNELIUS: Thank you Chairperson, Cornelius on behalf of Vermeulen, I've got no questions.

NO QUESTIONS BY MR CORNELIUS

MR JOUBERT: Thank you Chairperson, Joubert on behalf of McCaskill, I have no questions.

NO QUESTIONS BY MR JOUBERT

MR LAMEY: Chairperson, thank you, Lamey on behalf of applicants Nortje and Bosch, I've got no questions.

NO QUESTIONS BY MR LAMEY

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MS PATEL: Thank you Honourable Chairperson.

Doctor, just one aspect. If one accepts that Gen van der Merwe had indeed had a discussion with members of CIC about the intended raid, given how CIC had operated at the time according to your knowledge, would you not have expected those members, whoever they were, to have informed you about the discussion?

DR BARNARD: I do not know of it, members of CIC were senior, the permanent members of CIC, if Gen van der Merwe had discussed it with them in my opinion they would have given the same answer that I would have given on the hypothesis that "Listen, colleague, if that is the case then you have to take it up further through your channels." It's a Police responsibility and they have to take it further.

MS PATEL: Thank you Honourable Chairperson.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MS PATEL

ADV BOSMAN: Dr Barnard, all these activities in Lesotho, this had to be of primary concern to you with regard to the entire security situation?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson.

ADV BOSMAN: How did it then come about that nowhere did you discuss the issue of the attack?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I have previously explained as I have it, that the attack took place, the Police and Defence Force denied it, it does not appear anywhere else, it takes place within an escalating, threatening climate and all these things are ongoing in the country and the attack in Lesotho in the consequences thereof, did not have anything to do with a threat. This was an executive action which was taken by a department. I did not have facts to go in further to say what the consequences were with regard to the security intelligence about it.

Secondly, I think this morning I made it quite clear that insofar as it was related to military targets, it was an issue which was the responsibility according to the Agreement of the South African Defence Force, and that at CIC meetings it was often said to them "If you do not have the information, come to us and ask us so that we can discuss it." That is the best I can do.

ADV BOSMAN: But Lesotho was on the agenda continually, for a long time also, is that correct?

DR BARNARD: If I read the SSC Minutes correctly, then the President asked Mr Botha to inform us, tell us where we are internationally, what is South Africa's position and that is where Lesotho, Swaziland and Botswana was discussed, that's correct yes.

ADV BOSMAN: And you also say that in the back of your head you thought the Police had something to do with this attack.

DR BARNARD: It could possibly have been the Police, that is correct yes.

ADV BOSMAN: And that would have been unlawful in your eyes because you knew it was not part of the line function?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson.

ADV BOSMAN: Did NI not play a role where there was such an important issue over such a long period of time and you suspected that there was unlawful action by the State body, to follow this up from your side?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, the National Intelligence Services Act did not perform as intelligence services who, respectfully, existed in typical socialist States. It was not some or other high-level powerful institution which had its fingers in all the pies and did not have to go to the State President to say that be careful, they are busy with this and that. This was a classic intelligence service which had a task and the task of the intelligence service was that if a country wants to maintain its independence and sovereignty then it has to be informed as to what is a threat to that sovereignty and that task or the threat that is held for the sovereignty and independence of the country has to be collected by intelligence. We primarily collected intelligence abroad in order to find out what is going on with the security situation or the threat. So I have to tell you that the fact that we had to have the capability and had to work in accordance with that, the State of that time and the relationship between us and the other departments of the security community did not function in that manner.

ADV BOSMAN: I only have one more question. If there was a general feeling amongst senior officials of the government or in the State service that a department acted unlawfully, who would have taken the initiative to point out this unlawful act?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I do not think at that stage there was a need to point out the unlawful act, there was no need to indicate it. Really, Chairperson, I do not think - I asked you, you have to think that this was fifteen years ago and we went through a long process, I asked you to think of the climate in 1985 and what was happening in South Africa during that time. I do not think there was great activities with regard to - there was no great activity with regard to indicating any unlawful acts, that is so.

ADV BOSMAN: May I just summarise it? Do I understand you correctly, if there was this feeling and it was to the advantage of the country, was it "Oh well, it suits us, we won't ask any more questions"?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, earlier this morning in cross-examination I stated that I myself and National Intelligence Service, as I understood international law where there were bases in neighbouring States and areas where there was complete facts available that from those countries attacks were being launched and landmines were placed on farm roads and persons were killed on their farms and so forth, that I used the word that it would be extremely naive to think that a government would think of it or know of it and does not take any action. This is not only applicable in Africa, as far as I know this is a world-wide phenomenon. So if it is so, then the idea that we acted in this manner to avoid that people are killed in that time, would be a matter which no country can view otherwise. That is my viewpoint of it.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: Thank you, Dr Barnard. You were the Chair of the CIC for quite some time, I just want to find out if it was normal practice for the CIC members to have informal meetings amongst themselves about any issue or to consult quite informally amongst themselves on decisions which they intended to implement in their various departments.

DR BARNARD: No, no Chairperson. I do not think it was the practice to have informal discussions with regard to important issues and that would not mean that matters with regard to cross-border operations in principle, would be discussed between myself and someone like Gen van der Merwe. That may be possible but the idea that informal discussions took place, that is not my recollection thereof. It was a formal structure which functioned in a formal manner.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: You are, however, saying it was conceivable for Gen van der Merwe to have had a private conversation with you about an issue such as the one that we are dealing with?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I deny that Gen van der Merwe discussed the matter with me. I am saying that it is conceivable that Gen van der Merwe and myself over the many years that we worked at CIC, could have had discussions on occasion with regard to incidents, with regard to possible cross-border operations.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: It was Gen van der Merwe's evidence that one of the persons that he would have consulted with about his intended decision to launch a raid in Lesotho, would have been yourself in your capacity as the Chair of the CIC, or any person that would have been appointed in your absence as an Acting Chairperson.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, the problem that I have with the General's viewpoint is that CIC could not authorise executive decisions, it was not its task, it could not authorise any executive action, but if a proposed executive action ... that is what I cannot understand. The logical line would be that it would be taken through the departmental channels, if I understand the question correctly, that's how I understood it.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: When you took leave from the 3rd of December and went for Kleinbaai, was there any person who was appointed as an Acting Chairperson of the CIC?

DR BARNARD: Yes, certainly not as a Chairperson of the CIC. The normal practice would be that over the school holidays CIC did not meet, it was therefore not necessary to appoint an Acting Chairperson. To the best of my recollection there was no such meetings, so no-one would have been appointed.

CHAIRPERSON: There was one on the 19th.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: So no person would ordinarily be appointed as an Acting Chairperson because you didn't meet over the festive season?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson. That does not mean that someone was not appointed as the Chief of National Intelligence, but from CIC there was no Acting Chairperson.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: No, my only interest is only with regard to the CIC as a structure. In your opinion, Dr Barnard - now I'm only asking for your opinion because I know you've already stated that the CIC did not have any authority to sanction a raid such as this one, in your opinion, did the Security Police have authority impliedly or otherwise or could Gen van der Merwe, as the person who was second-in-command of the Security Police, could he have believed that he could authorise a raid as the one that he did on the 20th December?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, Gen van der Merwe statutorily did not have the right to take such action. If it is so that the Police - and now I refer to hypothetically, that is what you mean, that is why you want my opinion, if the Police by the 16th, 17th and 18th obtained information or more information than what is said in the Situation Report of the 17th and that if they do not act in 24 hours, it is possible that information was to that effect, that if they did not act within 24 hours and stop the following vehicles at the border and to perform their function there, then he could come as an official and be in a position that this decision has to be taken immediately otherwise people would lose their lives. It does not make it a legal action but then I have comprehension for this and for his decision. It is possible.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: When the meeting of the 20th December took place, were you personally aware that a raid had been launched in Lesotho?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, no I was not aware.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: And when did you become aware of the raid?

DR BARNARD: I became aware of the raid - I don't know exactly when, it must have been within the following two days after the raid but I cannot remember exactly when.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: Were you not one of those fortunate people who were able to read a newspaper from Kleinbaai when you travelled between Kleinbaai and Cape Town? As we have been advised that this was widely reported by the 20th December here in this country.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I said that I drove back with the vehicle at about 3.30 and in the following days I certainly would have read in the newspapers or on the radio exactly when and how but I did become aware of it in the following days.

JUDGE KHAMPEPE: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Barnard, I just want to carry on with the question that my colleague here started. Mr van der Merwe, we all know, had long service ...(intervention)

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I beg your pardon, I have some difficulty in hearing you.

MR TREURNICHT: Chairperson, you may continue, I think he can hear you. People were just talking here.

DR BARNARD: There is some noise here, that is why I could not hear you. Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr van der Merwe has long service in the department of Police, is that not so?

DR BARNARD: I have taken the thing off because they are interpreting to me in Afrikaans and I would rather hear what you say in English. I apologise, Chairperson. ...(transcriber's interpretation)

CHAIRPERSON: Would you agree that Mr van der Merwe can be regarded as a person who has had long service in the Police department?

DR BARNARD: Absolutely correct, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: And that would have been the case in 1985?

DR BARNARD: In 1985 he was already a police officer with a lengthy record, yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, now bearing in mind the principle of need-to-know that you refer to in your statement, is it not possible that Mr van der Merwe could have thought that by consulting influential people who so happened to be members of CIC, was important in assessing in whether he should proceed with this planned operation?

DR BARNARD: It could have been possible that Gen van der Merwe may have thought so.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes. Now is there any - to carry on with my colleagues frame, what would have been the reason for him to have such a belief, if we all know that CIC or its members were unable to authorise such an attack legally or otherwise?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I can only speculate about that. I cannot speak on behalf of Gen van der Merwe and indicate the motivation for his thoughts.

CHAIRPERSON: You see, and I haven't discussed this with my colleagues yet, it is Van der Merwe himself that says that he referred to CIC members when the issue of whether he had authority to do what he did or not arose, I'm trying to find out what would it have made him think that members of CIC, or CIC itself, was in fact the source to consult, to obtain this implied or otherwise authority?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, are you asking ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Can you think of why he could have thought so?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, could I begin by saying that no other so-called cross-border operation of that time was ever served before the CIC, so we have a unique situation. It does not exist in any Minute whatsoever. I would think that Gen van der Merwe ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: No, well let's forget the Minutes, we all know what the Minutes of the State of those days were and how we can rely on them. Let's forget about the Minute now.

What would make Van der Merwe think that he could obtain this authority either from members of CIC or from CIC itself? Let's make it as broad as that.

DR BARNARD: I think that Gen van der Merwe would have been able to calculate two points. As a long serving official of the Police he would know that if executive steps were to be taken against Lesotho, it would have serious international diplomatic ramifications for South Africa. That is why, and I reiterate that I think he may have thought so, that is why he would have wanted to enter a discussion at least with Foreign Affairs so that he could obtain ideas from them. And the second reason is that he most probably had the opinion that the head of Military Intelligence would work directly with the State President and if anything were to happen it would take place with the sanction of the State President, because the head of NI would enjoy the sanction of the State President. If you ask me how Van der Merwe may have thought then that is what I would offer as a possibility.

CHAIRPERSON: Well, I can think of no more influential person than the Chairman of that committee to consult if he did in fact consult, would you agree?

DR BARNARD: I think that is correct, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Especially if the Chairman of that committee had entrée to the State President?

DR BARNARD: That is correct, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: In fact I think he testified to that effect, that he would have expected you to have mentioned it to the State President because you were in close contact with him.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I must say that as a Minister and his departmental head would have had narrow contact with Mr Botha, I did not inform Mr Botha about it.

CHAIRPERSON: His head being the Commissioner of Police?

DR BARNARD: I beg your pardon, Chairperson?

CHAIRPERSON: His head being the Commissioner of Police? Mr van der Merwe's head would have been the Commissioner?

DR BARNARD: That is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: Well if the Commissioner was not in town or unavailable, what would the position be then, and if he had no faith in the Commissioner's stand-in, would he not be able to come to you?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, but that would not be appropriate channel to follow.

CHAIRPERSON: Well Dr Barnard, let's forget about channels now, we all know how those channels were abused when it suited people. Could he not have come to you?

DR BARNARD: I don't understand the question entirely, with respect, Chairperson?

CHAIRPERSON: In the absence of the Commissioner and the Commissioner's stand-in, I forget his name now ...

DR BARNARD: It was the Acting Commissioner De Witt, I think.

CHAIRPERSON: ... De Witt, ja, in whom, to put it bluntly, he had no faith in, in determining this particular issue, why couldn't he have come to you?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I think that I have gone to great lengths today to explain that there were differences between the Defence Force and NI and the Police and if you think that somebody from the Police would have gone to National Intelligence regarding a very sensitive issue that he wanted to discuss with us, that would be incorrect. I have also stated Chairperson, that I cannot understand that Generals van der Merwe and Coetzee would not have been able to maintain contact with each other. I don't understand that.

CHAIRPERSON: Well, let us determine that. I'm just asking, in those circumstances is it not possible that he could have come to you?

DR BARNARD: He could most probably have evaluated the situation that way.

CHAIRPERSON: No then, if you're prepared to say so, then did he not come to you?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I don't know, you have placed me in a very difficult position. I have stated on numerous occasions this afternoon and I will reiterate that he did not do so.

CHAIRPERSON: Now when did you actually find out who were responsible for this attack that we're now discussing?

DR BARNARD: I discovered for the first time that it was actually the Police when it emerged during the amnesty hearing of Mr de Kock and only subsequently did I learn the details of the incident.

CHAIRPERSON: And that must have been after 1994? This whole process only started after the new government took position.

DR BARNARD: Yes, that is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: So for nine years you laboured under the impression that the official version that this attack was conducted by some group within Lesotho, was in fact the position?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I testified previously that there was a possibility in the back of my mind that either the Police or the Army was responsible. It was a strong possibility, I stated so quite a number of times but I did not use the NI intelligence capacity to attempt to determine what exactly had taken place.

CHAIRPERSON: Well I was coming to that. Why not? Isn't it because you knew, officially?

DR BARNARD: No Chairperson, it is not because I knew, I did not know. I explained previously that the NIS collected security intelligence which was viewed as a threat to security of the State in the broader spectrum of the threat, they did not collect intelligence regarding the executive actions of other departments.

CHAIRPERSON: The situation in South Africa at that time was such that it escalated and to an extent, may I suggest, even PW had to stand down from the presidency because of the situation in South Africa. Did that not, the situation in South Africa, compel you to find out who was committing all these acts overseas and therefore leading to all these types of boycotts against South Africa, and embarrassments?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, the events that you have explained, do you know where this led the NIS? It led to the commencement of discussions with Mr Nelson Mandela who was in prison, these discussions eventually led to the elections in 1994 and NIS played a prominent role in this.

CHAIRPERSON: I'm aware of that.

MR BARNARD: Whether we had specific investigations, the answer would also be no.

CHAIRPERSON: But I'm getting to the point of when PW had to decide what his next step would be, didn't he ask his intelligence people, "Look, what's going on here, why is South Africa taking the blame for something we say we didn't do?" "Why do people outside think that we did it?" Did he not ask you?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, he did not ask me this.

CHAIRPERSON: And during that nine year period did you not think it fit to ask Mr van der Merwe then, privately, "We are now colleagues, what happened there, didn't you do it by any chance?"

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I've already explained earlier this morning, as important as it is for this Amnesty Committee and the applicants, these were events that took place based upon a broad spectrum of activities in which the situation in Lesotho presented one set of activities and the time ensuing afterwards was probably one of the most eventful periods in time in the history of South Africa, in which NI played a critical role on many levels, and I did not ask my colleague, Mr van der Merwe, if he knew who was responsible for the attacks in Lesotho.

CHAIRPERSON: And nobody approached you, as being a person approached by Mr van der Merwe, to inform you that look, this is what the prospects are in the near future, that the South African Police are going to intrude on the sovereignty of Lesotho and use violence there? As Chairman of the CIC, would you have expected to be informed even if he had approached other people?

DR BARNARD: I would not have expected to be informed of this because CIC and NI was not involved in executive actions, why then would the CIC and the DG of NI have to be informed about this?

CHAIRPERSON: No, I'm not saying out of - how could I put it, in Afrikaans it is "beleid", I'm not talking about policy, just as Chairman of CIC, would you not have expected that if anybody else of CIC were to have been informed, that that person or people would have just told you that this is what they've heard?

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, I believe there is a misunderstanding. The CIC has been built up to the status of super body during these hearings and that is not what the case was.

CHAIRPERSON: Well, I'm not seeing CIC as a super body, I'm just saying that for intelligence purposes and co-ordination of all the activities, would the Chairman of CIC not be the one then to be informed? Unofficially.

DR BARNARD: Chairperson, with respect, those were not intelligence activities, it was a cross-border attack, an executive line function, a physical action.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, thank you. You are excused.

WITNESS EXCUSED

MR VISSER: Chairperson, may I ask also to be excused? Unfortunately, I have a very important meeting which I'm leaving at half past four.

CHAIRPERSON: I think we're going to break now. What have we got next for tomorrow, Ms Patel?

MS PATEL: Honourable Chairperson, I don't believe that my learned colleagues have decided on the sequence. I would presume that Mr de Kock would follow tomorrow morning, but perhaps Mr Hugo can confirm.

CHAIRPERSON: I'm just asking if we've got work to do tomorrow?

MS PATEL: We've got enough work to keep us going for a long time, Honourable Chairperson.

MR BERGER: Chairperson, can I ask if you are mindful of starting at 9, could we start at 9.30 rather? Why? Because it just makes life a little easier coming from Johannesburg and at the last sitting we also started at 9.30. You miss the traffic and it's much easier to come through.

CHAIRPERSON: ...(inaudible) on the plane this morning indicated that - well, the other day rather, that starting work after eight is the gentleman's hour. Well, 9.30 it is.

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS