Bundalo et al: Finding saviour in refuge

Zijada Hatic and Abdurahman Pervan, Prosecution witnesses, said that, in the summer of 1992, some Bosniaks from the Kalinovik area were detained in “Miladin Radojevic” school building and “Barutni magacin”, where they were physically and mentally abused, and some of them were killed.

“In June 1992 my husband Ismet, after having responded to an invitation to register for civil duty, was detained, together with other men, in the school building in Kalinovik. Later on they were transferred to ‘Barutni magacin’, where they must have suffered a lot. I do not know when he was killed. They found a watch and a comb, together with his remains,” Zijada Hatic said.

The Prosecution charges Ratko Bundalo, Nedjo Zeljaja and Djordjislav Askraba with having participated in the murder, forcible resettlement, detention, torture, rape, forcible disappearances and physical and mental abuse of Bosniak civilians in the Kalinovik area in 1992 and 1993.

“While the men were held in ‘Barutni’, my daughters and father-in-law visited Ismet. One of my daughters told me that she saw guard Askraba in there. I was surprised to hear that, as we were neighbours,” Hatic said.

In late July 1992 some Jelasac village residents, including witness Hatic, were captured by some “soldiers and policemen”, who then took them to the school building in Kalinovik. Zijada Hatic stayed there for 33 days.

“My two daughters stayed in the village. They managed to reach the free territory, after having walked through the woods. All others were killed. My father-in-law was also detained in the school, just like me. They killed him afterwards. I still have not found his body,” Hatic said.

While she was detained in the school building, Hatic used to see some unknown soldiers, who would come there and take valuables from detainees, mistreating them, and take girls away, who never came back.

“On one occasion they took sisters Pervan, witness B and another girl. When Zeljaja and a person named Zoran Visnjevac came to the school, witness B’s mother asked them to bring her daughter back. A short while later they brought her back to the school building,” Hatic recalled.

Second Prosecution witness Abdurahman Pervan testified about the murder of 13 members of Pervan family during the course of 1992. He escaped after having been hiding on mount Zelengora and walking for five days before being able to reach “the territory, controlled by the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina”.

“Between June 25 and July 25 I was hiding in the woods. Then I decided to run away and get to the free territory,” Pervan said, adding that he found his family in a column of refugees on mount Igman, near Sarajevo.

The witness said that he found the remains of nine family members after the war, adding that he was still searching for the remaining six. The remains of sisters Fatima and Azemina Pervan are among those.

The trial is due to continue on Friday, November 7.