Bosnia Witness Recalls Fighters Torching Village Homes

The protected witness codenamed ‘B-1’ told the court on Thursday that defendant Zoran Marinic and another soldier from the Croatian Defence Council set his house on fire and abused his family.

“I was inside the house with my wife and three children when on April 26, 1993, around 23:00 hours, two soldiers from the Croatian Defence Council banged on our door. They said they were military police,” said the witness.

He said that the soldiers broke in and he fled through the window to hide at his neighbour’s house, but then returned to watch what was happening.

“The other soldier put his knife to my wife’s throat. They abused them and my daughter said, ‘Why don’t you kill us already?’ My wife told me later that she reminded Zoran Marinic she had fed him like a mother would, to which she responded, ‘Shut up, you should all be killed,’” said B-1.

He said his wife told him that Marinic set a curtain on fire and the whole house started burning.

The witness said he saw two soldiers leave the house and open fire at the roof.

He said he later learned neighbours that the other soldier was defendant Zoran Milic.

As members of the Croatian Defence Council, Marinic and Milic are charged with participation in the murders of four Bosniaks in Busovaca in 1993 and illegal destruction of property.

B-1 said that after his house was set on fire, he sent his family to the woods, where he joined them later. Before that, he saw a neighbour’s house on fire and bodies being taken outside.

He said that he later learned that two people were killed and three wounded, two of whom later died.

The trial is set to resume on June 14.