Mr Slobodan Milosevic told Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladic not to kill civilians at Srebrenica in 1995 but was ignored, ex-NATO commander Wesley Clark said in evidence at The Hague published today.
General Clark, a US Democratic presidential hopeful who helped negotiate the Dayton accord that ended the 1992-95 Bosnian war, told Mr Milosevic's war crimes trial in The Hague he had discussed the Srebrenica massacre with Mr Milosevic at the 1995 talks.
During a break in talks then, General Clark had asked Mr Milosevic about the massacre, General Clark told the UN war crimes tribunal where the former Yugoslav president is on trial charged with genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes in the Balkans in the 1990s.
"I simply continued the discussion with him and asked him, 'You say you've had so much influence on these people. If you had so much influence, how did you permit General Mladic to kill all those people at Srebrenica?'," General Clark told the court.
"He looked at me and said, 'Well, General Clark, I told him not to do it, but he didn't listen to me," the general said in his evidence.
Mr Milosevic, who is conducting his own defence and cross examination of witnesses, told judges he had never discussed Srebrenica with General Clark at Dayton.
"General Clark, this is a blatant lie," Mr Milosevic replied during his cross examination of General Clark.
"First and foremost because we did not talk about Srebrenica at all, and secondly because I, throughout the time, through all of those years, I never issued a single order to General Mladic or was I in the position to issue him orders," Mr Milosevic said.
More than 7,000 Muslim men and boys were massacred at Srebrenica in July 1995 after Bosnian Serb forces overran the enclave. It was Europe's worst atrocity since World War Two. Mladic and Mr Milosevic are both charged with responsibility for the massacre.