Vogosca Witness Recalls Use as Human Shield

The witness, Sabahudin Sehic, said that in mid-August 1992 he was brought to Planjina Kuca, in Semizovo, where the warden was Branko Vlaco, who, the witness said, introduced himself to the prisoners as such.
Sehic added that he also saw Vlaco in front of Planjina Kuca when the soldiers came to take the prisoners to do hard labour.
“We would leave the camp and line up on the meadow. Vehicles would come there and the people who came would tell Vlaco and the guards how many people they needed,” he said.
The prosecution accuses Vlaco, as warden of the Bunker, Planjina Kuca, and the Sonja and Nakina Garaza detention camps in Vogosca, of establishing a system to punish civilians held there from May to the end of October 1992.
The charges say detainees were abused, forced to perform hard labour and used as human shields on the Sarajevo frontline. Many were allegedly killed at the camps and dozens remain missing.
During his imprisonment in Planjina Kuca, Sehic said he was forced cut down trees, dig trenches, and carry food and water for the Army of Republika Srpska. While doing hard labour, he explained, prisoners were killed or wounded. He said that one morning, after the prisoners were lined up, Vlaco said that around 40 younger people had to go to Zuc. When they were taken there, the prisoners were used as human shields.“They lined up eight of us and we set off towards the front line of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina,” he recalled.”The shooting started behind us while we were advancing slowly. We were told to look for mines,” he added.”The shooting went on around us. We were doing this for five days. There were dead prisoners and soldiers. While we were walking, we found dead soldiers of the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina.”It was hell,” Sehic said.Speaking about the conditions in Planjina Kuca, the witness said they were good. But he said one of the guards abused him twice, and that he saw Vlaco hit a prisoner in the face.Sehic left Planjina Kuca in late 1992, without being told why he was imprisoned.At the beginning of the trial, the witness said that before coming to Semizovac, he was a prisoner in another two facilities in the municipality of Ilijas.The trial is scheduled to resume on April 24.