No Information about the Shooting along the Jadar River
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Protected Defence witness KW-558, who was present in Konjevic Polje on July 13, 1995 in his capacity as communications officer with the Communications Centre of the Police Command, said that he did not see Deronjic in Konjevic Polje on that day.
He denied having taken KDZ-065 from the Command building to a nearby warehouse, where he was beaten up. Commenting on an allegation by witness KDZ-065 that he was then taken, along with other prisoners, from the warehouse to the Jadar riverbanks where they were shot, Karadzic’s witness said that he had not heard about any liquidation on the Jadar riverbanks.
During his testimony protected Defence witness KDZ-065, who survived the shooting, accused the then policeman Deronjic for the shooting of 15 Bosniak captives on Jadar riverbanks on July 13, 1995.
While being cross-examined by the Prosecutor, witness KW-558 confirmed that he saw captives Resid Sinanovic and Salih Hasanovic, who looked “scared”, in the Police Command building in Konjevic Polje on July 13, 1995. The witness said that Momir Nikolic, the then Security Officer of Bratunac Brigade with the Republika Srpska Army, VRS, then came and took the captives away.
The Hague Tribunal sentenced Nikolic to 20 years in prison after he had admitted guilt for crimes in Srebrenica. When asked whether he knew that Sinanovic and Hasanovic were found in a mass grave later on, the witness said that he “heard about it much later”. He said that he thought that the two captives would “be exchanged”.
Karadzic, former President of Republika Srpska and supreme Commander of its armed forces, is charged with genocide against about 7,000 Bosniaks in the days that followed the occupation of Srebrenica by the Republika Srpska Army. Besides that, he is on trial for persecuting Bosniaks and Croats, terrorising civilians in Sarajevo and taking UNPROFOR members hostage.
The second Karadzic defence witness, former policeman Mirko Peric said that KDZ-065’s allegation that he escorted captives to the warehouse in Konjevic Polje was not true. Peric also said that he “has not heard” about the shooting on Jadar riverbanks and that he did not see Deronjic in Konjevic Polje on July 13.
Commenting on RK-065’s allegation that a blonde woman drove the Bosniak captives by bus from the warehouse in Konjevic Polje to the execution location on the Jadar riverbanks, Peric said that he spent the entire day at the cross-roads and that he did not see any female drivers. He confirmed that buses, transporting Bosniaks away from Potocari, passed the crossroad the whole day.
Peric confirmed that he took Resid Sinanovic, who surrendered to Serb forces deployed alongside the road near Konjevic Polje, to the Police Command in the village.
The trial is due to continue on Friday, July 5.
