Trial of Frano Vulic Begins

Witness Almir Duvnjak said that his father Omer was arrested in their family house in Prozor in the summer of 1993 and detained in Dretelj detention camp.

“I remember that the Croatian Defence Council, HVO, arrested all Bosniaks, who were capable of military service. At that moment I did not know where my father was. However, when the first detainees left the detention camp, I found out that my father, Hasan and Izet Duvnjak were killed by a soldier. Persons A and B told me that,” Almir Duvnjak said.

The Defence attorney of indictee Frano Vulic asked the witness whether persons A and B told him how many bullets the soldier fired through the window. The witness said that they only told him that he was killed. The Defence attorney then presented a statement given by the witness during the investigation in 2011, in which he said that he was told that several bullets were fired. “I did not say ‘one bullet’. If there was shooting, there must have been several bullets,” the witness said.

Frano Vulic, former member of HVO military police in Capljina, is charged with having shot at three detained Bosniaks through a hangar window in Dretelj detention camp on July 14, 1993, killing the detainees.

Second witness Admir Duvnjak said that he remembered the beginning of the arrests of Bosniaks in Prozor in the summer of 1993, but he could not remember everything that happened at the time.

“I remember some things. I was ten at the time. It was summer, so we played outside. Some soldiers came. They began arresting Bosniaks. My mother told me that they arrested my father. It did not happen that day, because my father was not at home, but they arrested him some time later,” Admir Duvnjak said.

Later on he found out that his father and two cousins were wounded.

When asked by Trial Chamber Chairman Slavko Pavlovic whether he found out that they were wounded or dead, the witness said: “I do not know if I found out at that moment, but, when people were released from Dretelj detention camp, persons A and C informed me that my father and Izet were killed immediately, while Hasan was wounded.”

The next hearing is due to be held on September 16 this year.