Trial Report: Thirty-Five

This report covers the period Monday November 13 - Thursday November 16, 2000

Monday November 13, 2000

Two further affidavits were entered, unopposed, into the trial record. An affidavit from Danie Du Toit states that he was a National Serviceman at 7 Medical Battalion working under Dr Brian Davey to develop CBW training courses and training Special Forces medics. Chemical protection courses were only offered to select groups, not the SADF in general. Medics were trained according to a scale of three modules, Stage 1 being basic field medicine and Stage 3 the most advanced, which included CBW protection and decontamination procedures. In September 1987, Du Toit was a member of a 7 Medical Battalion team deployed in Angola during Operation Modular. There were no NBC suits available for troops in the field, who were briefed that in the event of a suspected chemical attack, they were to "dig foxholes, crawl in and cover themselves with their standard-issue ponchos". Du Toit acknowledges that this was by no means the ideal solution, "but it was all we had".

Even the 7 Medical Battalion Specialist Group had only between 10 and 20 NBC suits available. He cannot recall how many wet detection kits they had. He was deployed in Angola for about six weeks, and during this time, there was no report of a chemical attack or suspected attack.

The second affidavit from Sarie Van Wyk (nee Jordaan) states that from May 1, 1988, she served as Basson's secretary in the South African Medical Services head office. All Basson's visitors had to go through Van Wyk, who also kept a diary of his appointments. He was out of town a lot, but had a constant stream of visitors when he was not away, including several who came to see him only after 4.30pm. His appointments were handled on a need-to-know basis, but she can recall that he had many visits from 7 Medical Battalion doctors, General Niel Knobel, Ben Steyn, Dr Etienne Olivier and Professor Hofmeyr, who worked for Basson for a short period.

Senior prosecutor on the fraud charges, Anton Ackerman informed the court that he intends to apply to hear the evidence of Roger Buffham in the UK on Commission. He has sent a letter of application and request for international cooperation to the British authorities, but has not yet finalised the documentation required. He was first seeking a decision in principle from the court, but has been in contact with the British Home Office for a considerable time already and has been assured that there is a positive attitude towards a commission. Unlike the US, however, Judge Willie Hartzenberg would not be the presiding officer in such proceedings, but would have full observer status. The judge stated that in order to grant an application, there would have to be clear indications that the commission was both essential for the pursuit of justice, and that the accused would in no way be prejudiced. Ackerman said Buffham is a key witness in respect of Charges 1 and 3-10. Ackerman said Buffham fears for his personal safety and protection of his rights outside the UK. He has not been moved by repeated assurances that he would be protected in SA, and has even rejected an offer to be placed in a witness protection programme here. His fears extend to "the entire intelligence community and SA security forces" said Ackerman.

Defence counsel, Adv. Jaap Cilliers said his chief objection to a commission in the UK would be that the accused would not be able to attend the hearings. Unlike the USA, which had issued an "informal" warning to Basson that he was persona non grata, the British authorities had served him with formal notice, via their high commissioner in South Africa, that he was banned for life from setting foot on any British - or British-controlled - soil again. The judge agreed that this was an important factor in the accused's case, adding that when he incriminated a witness during cross-examination, it was important that he do so to the witness's face. Adv. Cilliers said Buffham could not be believed when he claimed to fear for his safety in South Africa. The judge hopes to give Ackerman a ruling by the end of the week on whether or not he will entertain a formal application for Buffham's testimony to be heard in the UK.

The only witness of the day was Rein Botha, who was with the National Intelligence Agency from July 1987 until he retired as section chief, counter-intelligence, in September 1999. Botha testified about the trunks of documents found after Basson's arrest and the process that was undertaken catalogue these documents. An inventory of documents found was handed to the court but may not be published or released to the public since some of the documents may contribute to proliferation. Initially two trunks of documents were found.

Botha told the court that on Monday, February 3, 1997, he requested a meeting with Gen. Knobel to inform him about the documents in the trunks. Knobel and Basson's successor as project officer, Col. Ben Steyn, came to the National Intelligence Agency offices and after some discussion, Steyn was instructed by Knobel to assist the NIA team in analysing and assessing the documents. Other "experts" also had to be called in. At Steyn's suggestion, the first person consulted was Dr Andre Immelman. Daan Goosen and Mike Odendaal were also enlisted to assist. According to Botha, foreign intelligence agencies also helped.

On Saturday, May 10, 1997, Botha took charge of another two trunks that had been stored at the home of Sam Bosch's father. These were handed to the National Intelligence Agency at the office of attorney Ernest Penzhorn.

Botha said that Trunk 1 contained a large number of documents relating to various SADF activities, including original copies of correspondence between Basson and Knobel, correspondence with Chief of Staff Finance and Chief SADF, scientific reports on certain substances, the notorious Sales List, several passports, foreign currency, the cremation certificate for Basson's father, a passport in the name of Annette Versluis with a covering letter and correspondence relating to its issue, a miniature shield which appeared to have been awarded to Basson for meritorious service, personal photographs and a cardboard box containing a number of small vials and miniature bottles of gin and vodka. Botha said most of the SADF documents were intelligence reports.

The names of front company personnel, details of experiments and sub-projects were later found in Trunk 3, including a full list of all Delta G Scientific personnel, while Trunk 2 contained a list of Roodeplaat Research Laboratories personnel and the names of various Armscor and Protechnik personnel. The trunks also contained information and documents dealing with the weaponisation of certain substances. Botha filed two interim reports on the contents of the trunks - one in May 1997 for the surgeon-general, SADF chief, Defence Minister and Minister of Intelligence and Justice.

Asked if he had information about any attempted espionage by means of contact between foreign intelligence agencies and Project Coast front company staff, Botha said there was evidence that in the late 1980s, a group of British intelligence agents visited Roodeplaat Research Laboratories under the cover of being diplomats. According to Botha, the RRL staff were not aware that they were, in fact, spies.

Trunk 4 was filled mainly with books dealing with subjects such as science, weapons of mass destruction, biological cultures and toxins. There were also a number of magazine articles, RRL annual reports, an article on possible use of a poison dart in the assassination of President John F Kennedy and reports on special applicators such as screwdrivers.

Botha says the most recent date on any document in the four trunks was December 2, 1996. This was a fax found in Trunk 1 to Basson from "Bill", warning Basson that he was being investigated by the US authorities and offering him safe harbour at his home outside London. Botha also found some documents dated late 1995, including one for December 1995 which deals with authorisation for expenditure, Project Jota. Adv. Cilliers is on record as having told Sam Bosch during his cross examination that Basson had nothing to do with the trunks since he was in Libya in April 1995 when they were delivered to Bosch's home by Philip Mijburgh, who was supposed to have destroyed the contents after scanning the CBW reports etc onto fibre optic disks. Note: It is not clear why expenditure would have been authorised for Project Coast in 1995 when the Project should have been terminated at the end of 1993.

Botha said he was also handed an additional small box of documents by Knobel at some point. Knobel told Botha the contents had come to him from Military Intelligence, which had, in turn, obtained them from the Department of Information. The documents were evaluated by NIA, but in the run-up to the mid-98 Truth Commission hearings on CBW, Knobel informed Botha that he needed them in order to prepare his testimony. The box was given back to Knobel, and has never been seen by NIA again.

In cross examination Adv. Cilliers claimed that documents had been slipped into the trunks after they had been found. This he said was the case for a fax from "Bill" offering Basson sanctuary. The fax mentions Gerald Bull and suggests that Basson could meet the same fate as Bull (who was assassinated). Cilliers claimed in court that Bull had helped Basson set up the South African CBW program which was the reason for his assassination.

The fax also suggests that after 14 December 1996 Basson may be "pressurised". Adv. Cilliers drew attention to the fact that Basson was arrested a little more than a month later and suggested that this was a set-up by a foreign intelligence agency. 20

Tuesday November 14, 2000

The first witness called was Corrie Botha, former production manager at Delta G Scientific. Botha was the production supervisor for the manufacture of approximately one ton of methaqualone (under the code name Mosrefcat) at Delta G. The order for the production was placed by managing director Dr. Philip Mijburgh, and in every respect but one, the project was run like any other Delta G project. The only difference was that in the case of Mosrefcat, Botha had no personal contact with the client, and did not even know, while production was in progress, who the client was.

Cross-examination was brief. Botha said he was not informed at the time Mosrefcat was launched that the client was the SA Defence Force, but later "heard in the corridors" that this was the case, and that the substance was to be used in grenades for riot control.

The next witness was Jan Mare, who joined the SADF in 1965 and Military Intelligence two years later, specialising in counter-intelligence. He became involved in Project Coast towards the end of 1987, when he was the senior staff officer, counter-intelligence, at Military Intelligence headquarters. His chief function was liaison with the front companies, Delta G Scientific and Roodeplaat Research Laboratories. He knew both Wynand Swanepoel and Philip Mijburgh reasonably well, and visited their facilities from time to time. He was not fully informed about overseas visitors to the companies or front company contracts, despite the fact that both these aspects had significant security implications.

Mare said that towards the end of 1987 or beginning of 1988 he was called to RRL by Swanepoel and told that Dr Daan Goosen had been guilty of serious security breaches regarding the SADF's role in Project Coast. Goosen was called in and when questioned by Mare, made no attempt to hide or deny what he had said. Mare's recollection is that Goosen said he could not or did not want to continue living a lie.

In 1988 Mare was assigned to be stationed at RRL after Swanepoel reported that animal rights groups were posing a threat to the companies security. Asked if Andre Immelman ever approached him for assistance regarding security aspects of his work, Mare said yes, Immelman told him that Basson had made arrangements and given him direct orders to meet with certain "operators" whom Immelman believed were members of Special Forces. Immelman did not know these people, and referred to them by first names only.

During cross examination Adv. Cilliers put it to the witness that he was not an expert on foreign banking matters and that the only expert on these matters in the SADF was Basson.

Court adjourned until Thursday.

Thursday November 16, 2000

The first witness called may not be identified or photographed in terms of a court order, and is to be known as Mr H. At the end of 1990/beginning of 1991, he was the Senior Staff Officer Project Security at Military Intelligence, tasked with testing the security of various covert projects. At the beginning of 1991, he was ordered by then Chief Director Counter-Intelligence, Dirk Verbeek, to monitor the security of Project Coast, as there had been a communications breakdown between Verbeek and Basson, the project officer. This was the start of the 18-month investigation into Project Coast which has previously been cited by defence counsel Jaap Cilliers as having been thorough and comprehensive, and resulted in failure to uncover any evidence of irregularities.

According to Mr H, however, the probe was neither comprehensive nor complete, and after a year and a half, he was forced to tell Verbeek that the investigators had "no idea" what they were looking at in terms of Coast's finances, and did not understand their esoteric nature. An expert would have to be found to decipher the transactions, Mr H told Verbeek. It was this situation that led to Wally van Heerden of the Auditor-General's office being appointed to investigate Coast's finances and, ultimately, to the Office for Serious Economic Offences launching their seven-year investigation in 1992.

On January 27, 1993, Mr H accompanied Basson on the SA Air Force flight over the south Atlantic ocean, which has been certified (by Mr H) as the destruction of chemical substances held by Project Coast. Basson arranged that Mr H would meet him early on the morning of January 27 at the headquarters of 7 Medical Battalion. On arrival, he found a truck already loaded with the cargo and covered with tarpaulins, which was then driven to Air Force Base Waterkloof. The cargo was off loaded by Basson, Wynand Swanepoel, Philip Mijburgh, the truck driver, air crew, Mr H and the small group of troops who had acted as an armed escort for the truck. As the cargo was being placed on pallets, Mr H made kept a tally of the load - 112 drums in all. He cannot remember if the cargo was physically weighed, or if the air crew estimated the weight. Mr H said that while the drums were on the apron, Basson insisted that samples had to be taken, and did so himself, "apparently at random" from four of the blue plastic drums, after donning rubber gloves. Four plastic pill containers containing the samples were then handed to Mr H, which he locked in his office safe on his return.

He said he observed the testing procedure from a short distance, but could see that Basson took samples only from the top layer of the contents in the four blue drums. The drums were sealed with metal bands and enclosed in plastic bags, which were torn to gain access. There were no labels or markings on any of the drums, or on the sample containers which he was given. Mr H says he asked Basson several times, on the apron and during the flight, what was in the drums, but was given no answer. Later, Basson told him the contents were identified only by use of certain letters of the alphabet. Mr H says between 20 and 30 mortar bombs in cardboard boxes were also in the cargo.

The contents of the blue plastic drums were in plastic bags, which were removed and thrown into the sea. The empty drums were brought back. All the other drums, and the cardboard boxes, were dumped intact. On the way back to Waterkloof, the party on board - including Swanepoel and Mijburgh - enjoyed "a few drinks" and after landing at about 3.30pm, they all made their way to the bar at 7 Medical Battalion's Head Quarters. Mr H said that at the bar Basson, Swanepoel and Mijburgh were despondent and angry that the substances had to be dumped.

The certificate vouching for the destruction of substances was drawn up by Mr H on March 30, 1993. The details were supplied to Mr H by Basson on that date, and Mr H was also given three more plastic pillboxes containing samples for forensic analysis. Unlike the four taken on January 27, these were labeled - B, C and BX. Mr H says he had discussed the taking of samples with Verbeek prior to the flight, and Verbeek had decided that no samples should be taken, as this might "draw attention" to the covert CBW project.

In cross-examination, Cilliers put it to Mr H that in fact, it was not Basson who insisted that samples of the substances be taken for testing, but that this was an intrinsic part of the MI officer's responsibility. Mr H says this was not the impression he had. Cilliers said according to his client, it was Mr H, and not Basson, who took the samples from the blue plastic drums at Waterkloof - but according to Basson, Mr H refused to take samples from any of the other, more hazardous drums.Mr H denies this, insisting that the only samples were those taken by Basson from the small blue plastic drums. No samples were taken from the larger drums or the small white ones.

The next witness was Brigadier Hein Strauss, head of the SAP Forensic Laboratory until March 1995 and the man who analysed the samples brought to him by Ben Steyn. Although Mr H testified that he had seven pill containers in all, only four appear to have been handed over for testing - those marked B, C and BX and one unmarked container. Strauss's tests identified B as BZ, BX as MDMA (Ecstasy), C as Cocaine and the contents of the unmarked container as methaqualone.

Asked to explain the difference, if any, between Quinezoline and methaqualone, Strauss said he could not do so, as he was not familiar with the term Quinezoline, and the closest substance/formula which he had been able to find, was not the same as methaqualone. Methaqualone was not a substitute name for Quinezoline, and Quinezoline could never be methaqualone.

This report has been prepared by Chandré Gould and Marlene Burger. Chandré  Gould is a research associate at the Centre for Conflict Resolution working on the Chemical and Biological Warfare Research Project. Marlene Burger is monitoring the trial  as part of the CCR Chemical and Biological Warfare Research Project. The Chemical and Biological Warfare Research Project is funded by the Ford Foundation, the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung and the Norwegian Government.

Centre for Conflict Resolution, UCT, Private Bag, Rondebosch, 7701, South Africa Tel: (27) 21-4222512 Fax: (27) 21-4222622 Email: [email protected]