WEEK AHEAD: Three war crimes verdicts due

Three verdicts are scheduled to be announced next week before the War Crimes Chamber of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

On Friday, December 8, both the defence and the prosecution presented their closing arguments at the retrial of Nedjo Samardzic, and that verdict is scheduled to be announced on Wednesday, December 13.

The prosecution has requested a long prison sentence, and the defence has asked for an acquittal.

At the beginning of October, after both sides in the procedure appealed, the Appeals Chamber made a decision to hold a retrial of the indictee. The Appellate Council had concluded that “the facts were not correctly determined” during the first-instance procedure.They proposed to re-hear the testimonies of most witnesses, which were or played on audio records, and to review all written documents. In the first-instance verdict, which was announced at the beginning of April of this year, Samardzic was sentenced to 13 years and four months imprisonment for crimes committed on the territory of Foca.

The prosecution and defence in the trials of Nikola Andrun and Dragan Damjanovic will present their closing arguments on Tuesday, December 12.

According to the indictment, Nikola Andrun, the former deputy warden of Gabela detention camp located near Capljina, is charged with murders and abuse of detained Bosniaks. Gabela was formed in mid-1993, at the time of disputes between Croat Defence Council – to which Andrun belonged – and the Army of BiH.

The prosecution has questioned a number of witnesses, former camp inmates, who recognised Andrun and spoke of the crimes with which he is charged.

But the defence questioned witnesses who testified that Andrun only served as a guard in the camp and argued that he did not abuse the detainees but instead helped them on several occasions.

The closing arguments will be presented on Tuesday, December 12, and the verdict will be announced two days later.

The defence and the prosecution at the trial of former Army of Republika Srpska member Dragan Damjanovic will also present their closing arguments on Tuesday, December 12.

Dragan Damjanovic is charged with crimes committed against civilians detained in camps located on the territory of Vogosca municipality near Sarajevo, including the rape and murder of civilians. The prosecution questioned former camp inmates, some of who recognised the indictee in the courtroom and described the abuses they either personally suffered or witnessed during their detention.

The defence questioned two witnesses,both of whom are former fellow soldiers of Damjanovic, who denied his guilt on one of the counts of the indictment which charges him with the murder of five civilians.

The two witnesses also told the court that they knew of another Dragan Damjanovic who is not the person present in the courtroom.

If the three-day legal deadline is fulfilled, the verdict should be announced by the end of next week, but the public has not been informed as to when that will happen.

Goran Damjanovic‘s defence should start presenting its evidence next week, on Wednesday, December 13, and continue presenting it the following day.

Goran Damjanovic is charged jointly with his brother Zoran, both of whom are former members of Army of Republika Srpska,with abuse of detainees in Bojnik in 1992. Goran is also charged with possession of a significant amount of weapons and explosives.

Goran Damjanovic’s defence was supposed to start on November 27, but the hearing was postponed because one of the two defence attorneys did not arrive.

Senad Kreho, Goran Damjanovic’s defence attorney, announced that he will call “three to five witnesses”, two of whom are supposed to give an alibi for the indictee for August 12, 1992 when, according to the indictment, a crime was committed with which he is charged. The defence is trying to prove that Goran was visiting his father in the hospital at the time when the crime was committed.

At the end of the week, on Friday December 15, the defence of indictee Gojko Jankovic will continue presenting its evidence. The defence is trying to deny the statements in the indictment according to which Jankovic committed a series of crimes,including murders, forced deportations, rape and sexual slavery of women, young women and girls on the territory of Foca.

Defence witnesses who appeared thus forgave Jankovic alibis for some of the dates mentioned in the indictment and spoke of the indictee’s character as well as the character of some of hisvictims.

Ljubomir Dostic, former commander of 4th battalion with which Jankovic’s unit cooperated during the war in Foca municipality, is also scheduled to appear as a defence witness on Friday. Dostic is still active in the military.

The trial of Radisav Ljubinac is scheduled to continue on Tuesday, December 12 and December 13, 14 and 15.

Ljubinac is charged with participation in murders, forced relocations, detainment of civilians and inhumane acts committed on the territory of Rogatica municipality. Among other things, he is charged with the murder of 15 locals from Seljani village, whose bodies were later found in a mass grave near the indictee’s house.

According to announcements, next week on December 12 and 15, the prosecution will continue presenting evidence against Momcilo Mandic.

The prosecution claims that Mandic, as former justice minister in the government of Srpska Republika BiH, had responsibility for forming and operating detention camps in 1992 on the territory of former Srpska Republika BiH. He is also charged that he was in charge of an April 1992 attack carried out by Serb forces on a Bosnian internal affairs ministry staff training centre.

On three days next week – December 13, 14 and 15 – the prosecution will continue presenting physical evidence in the case against 11 indictees charged withgenocide against Bosniaks in Kravica village, located near Srebrenica.