Croat Fighters Expelled Bosniaks From Villages
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Prosecution witness Armin Pracic told the court in Sarajevo on Thursday that in the summer of 1993, Croatian Defence Council troops entered his village of Podanis in the Prozor municipality and killed two people.
He said he ran to the nearby garbage dump when he saw three soldiers chasing him.
I hid under a rock and covered myself in garbage. The three of them stood over me and talked. I recognised the voices, it was the defendant Zeljko Jukic and the brothers Tomo and Ante Beljo. They were members of the [Bosnian Croat] Kinder platoon, said the witness.
Pracic said he remained hidden for a while until the soldiers did not come back. Then he heard a shot.
I could not see a thing, but upon my return to the village I saw the body of [villager] Hata Pracic on the road. I did not see who killed her, but I know that is the exact way [the fighters] would have gone back, explained the witness.He said that later that day he saw houses burning in the village.Jukic is charged with having participated in the forcible resettlement of the Bosniak population from the Prozor municipality. He is also charged with murdering Bosniaks, among other crimes.
Witness Hajrudin Bektas also testified at the hearing that members of the Kinder platoon entered the village of Varvara in the summer of 1993 and took all the civilians to the high school in Prozor.
Croatian Defence Council members entered the village. Mostly younger men, volunteers… Among them that day I saw Zeljko Jukic with an automatic rifle rounding up civilians, said Bektas, who added that he recognised Jukic because he already knew him.
The trial will resume on March 21.
