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Prosecution witness Rasid Hodzic told the trial in Sarajevo on Tuesday that troops beat prisoners held in a tyre repair shop in Vogosca, but defendant Branko Vlaco treated the detainees fairly.
Hodzic testified that he, his brother and the rest of the men from the village of Svrake were taken to the tyre repair shop known as Naka’s Garage in 1992 and held there for 20 days. He said a total of around 150 people were detained there.
“Vlaco came as soon as they brought us in. He spoke to us nicely. He said we would have it good here, no one would abuse us. I have to say that he never treated me bad, but others did,” said the witness.
He said that during the night unknown soldiers came to the garage and abused the prisoners physically and mentally after introducing themselves as “Arkan’s Men” – a reference to notorious Serbian paramilitary leader Zeljko Raznatovic, alias Arkan.
“They came, took you out in front of the garage, hit you with fists, legs, rifle butts, whatever they had. When they did not beat you, they made you sing songs, mostly vulgar ones about Muslims,” explained Hodzic.
The prosecution accuses Vlaco, as the warden of the Bunker, Planjina Kuca, Sonja and Naka’s Garage detention camps in Vogosca, of participating in a wide-ranging and systematic attack by Serb forces against civilians from May 1992 to the end of October.
Hodzic said that after 20 days spent in Naka’s Garage, he was moved to Planjina Kuca, where he spent another month with his brother.
“We had to sleep in Planjina Kuca, but they let us go home during the day. I never saw Vlaco there, nor was I beaten again. The worst that happened to me there was when they took my brother one night together with another 12 prisoners and none of them have been seen since,” he said.
Asked by the defence why prisoners at Naka’s Garage never complained to Vlaco that unknown soldiers abused them, the witness said they were afraid to do so.
“If we said something today, we were afraid it would get worse for us tomorrow. And Vlaco was nice to us, so we did not want that to change,” explained Hodzic.
The trial will resume on May 15.
