Karadzic: Fear of slaughter

During cross examination of witness Mevludin Sejmenovic, indictee Radovan Karadzic said that Serb forces in April 1992 took over control of Prijedor to stop „Muslim extremists“.

Witness Sejmenovic – who started giving testimony on Thursday, October 30 – said that this was untrue, and that Bosnian Muslims were forced to defend themselves, because the Serb forces started an attack.

During cross examination of witness Sejmenovic, who is a former republic delegate of the Party for Democratic Action, SDA, from Prijedor, Karadzic said that SDA formed an armed force named the Patriotic league in 1991.

Sejmenovic answered that the idea of the Patriotic league was never “fully developed” and this movement was never implemented in Prijedor. The witness said that Prijedor only had members of the Territorial defence, which “prepared to defend population from Serb attacks”.

Witness Sejmenovic also rejected Karadzic’s claim that Prijedor had an SDA crisis and war staff.  

Radovan Karadzic, former President of Republika Srpska, is charged with the systematic persecution of Bosniaks and Croats in Prijedor municipality, which, as alleged under the indictment, reached the scale of genocide due to the Serb authorities’ intention to partially or completely destroy those ethnic groups.

In addition, Karadzic is charged with genocide committed in Srebrenica, terror against civilians in Sarajevo by long-lasting shelling and sniping activities and taking international officers hostages.

After Karadzic said that SDA leader Alija Izetbegovic “ordered a mass mobilization” and “attack on Serbs” in April 1992, Sejmenovic said that “no one ordered attacks on Serbs, only defensive actions against attacks from the Yugoslav peoples army”.
 
“The Territorial defense in Kozarac and Prijedor municipality did not have Serbs for enemies, especially not the people. They only had a fear of slaughter which happened in other municipalities”, said the witness.

After Sejmenovic said he saw Bosnian Muslims beaten, abused and killed in Omarska and Trnopolje camps, Karadzic replied that the witness “never saw any of the ,killings he speaks of”.

“I did not see them with my eyes, but I heard the shots and I saw the man who buried them… They were killed near Beslagic’s place, near the bridge and were buried there. They were moved later – but I do not know where to”, said Sejmenovic.

Karadzic said that the testimonies of many prosecution witnesses are the same – “you say you saw someone being taken away, you hear shots, and the persons never comes back”.

“I was present when detainees were called, I heard shots and I never saw those people again… You can see their names on cemeteries, and I am not ‘all witnesses’ just one witness”, said Sejmenovic.

Karadzic said that television recordings of skinny detainees behind barbed wires in Trnopolje were staged and that they depicted journalists, and not Bosnian Muslim detainees. Sejmenovic rejected this, saying that the detainees were placed in a barbed wire area.

Karadzic asked the witness how come he was not killed, considering Sejmenovic said that most SDA officials were killed. “Most of the killings happened in the first 20 days during the ethnic cleansing stage. I just fell into their hands late on”, answered Sejmenovic.

The trial is due to continue on Monday, October 31.

R.M.