The Syrian Civil War Update Thread

[Kasz216]

ArnoldRimmer said:

Kasz216 said:

However, she admitted that she was under heavy pressure to give that impression BUT also maintains she didn't cave to that pressure.  Anywhere.

Any source where she clearly says so? That she never gave in to any pressure whatsoever?

Kasz216 said:

There were no findings to suggest it wasn't a massacre, and that's what she said more or less, refusing to say it definitly was a massacre because there wasn't really any way to prove it definitivly.

Her opinion then, and now, was "Nothing to suggest it wasn't a massacre, but no definitive proof it was.  If I had to guess, it was".

Vs what they wanted which was "This was definitly a massacre."

There wasn't anyone who would of be it wasn't a massacre, based on the lack of any evidence of them fighting back.  Traces of gunpowder not found using superior techniques etc.

On Wikipedia, Ranta is being quoted saying something that translates to something like this:

"I am aware that one could say the whole scene had been arranged. I am aware of that. Because that is indeed a possibility. In fact, that's what our first investigations suggested, just like our later forensic investigations that we conducted in November 1999. And that's also the conclusion that we handed over to Den Haag.  Mr. Walker came to Racak on thursday, and it was his personal decision to talk of a "massacre". I myself systematically avoided using that word."

Whatever she really thought back then, I see at least two possibilities:

1. She believed that it was a massacre. In that case, she was just an extremely bad investigator, for she didn't even check for things like traces of gunpowder on the hands of killed that other investigations checked and realized that the killed were most probably UCK fighters, not civilians.

2. She believed that it wasn't a massacre, but realizing that certain people/governments etc. were only interested in information hinting that it was a massacre by the serbs, she decided to stick to telling half-truths: That she had no beyond any doubt proof that it wasn't a massacre.

http://www.hs.fi/english/article/1135240292632

Nothing in her statement was untrue.  It was kept intentionally vague because... that's what good scientists do.

 Your translation seems a bit loaded, as seen as... above.