Radic et al: Tattoo from the Prison

Testifying at the trial of four former members of the Croatian Defence Council (HVO), protected Prosecution witness AF said that, during his three-month stay in Vojno detention camp, he was most severely beaten by indictees Dragan Sunjic and Damir Brekalo, and described how the guards forcibly tattooed his arm.

Sunjic, Brekalo, Marko Radic and Mirko Vracevic are charged with having participated, as members of the HVO Bijelo polje Battalion in 1993, in the murder, beating, rape and forced labour of Bosniaks imprisoned in Vojno detention camp.

“Mario Mihalj, Dragan Sunjic and Damir Brekalo lined us up in two columns in the Vojno detention camp garage and started beating us. After the first hit, I fell on the ground. Mihalj took out a needle and some Indian ink and ordered one prisoner to tattoo a cross on my shoulder. It hurt, but they laughed,” said witness AF, adding that they made a new tattoo of a lily over the cross and then started beating him because he now “had the lily sign and they fought against that sign”.

The witness showed the tattoo of a lily on his arm to the persons present in the courtroom. During the war, the Army of BiH used the lily as its official sign and it was also presented on BiH flag.

Mario Mihalj, whose name is also mentioned in the indictment, died before the four HVO members were arrested.

The protected witness claims to have seen Radic three times during his detention in the camp. The first time he saw him, Radic was standing next to Mihalj and ordering the prisoners to “carry grenades to the frontlines”. He then saw him carrying “two sniper guns from the headquarters” and also visiting the frontlines where detainees were digging trenches.

From his arrest on July 3 until December 1993, the protected witness was held in Gabela detention camp. He was then transferred to Heliodrom detention camp. In mid January 1994 he was transferred to Vojno and returned to Heliodrom on April 18, 1994. He was released five days later.

Second Prosecution witness Zulfo Humackic was arrested in Pjesivac village near Stolac on July 1, 1993. After the arrest, he was taken to Dretelj detention camp near Capljina. Twenty days later, he was transferred to Heliodrom, and some time later to Vojno.

“Vojno was the worst of all the detention camps in which I was. In the first four days of my detention, I was so severely beaten that I could not walk. Mario Mihalj and Dragan Sunjic beat me in the first three days. On the third day, three more joined them,” Humackic recalled.

Humackic said that he heard from other detainees in Vojno detention camp that six detainees were killed, but he did not witness any of the murders.

After spending ten days in Vojno, Humackic was returned to Heliodrom. On October 19, 1993 he was transferred to a hospital in Mostar because he was wounded. He was released shortly after that.

The trial is due to continue on December 12.