Under Vlaco’s Protection

Witness Ekrem Piknjac, retired teacher, told the Court that he was taken from the military barracks, where he was detained with about 600 or 700 local residents from the Vogosca area, to “Bunker” detention camp. He spent a short time in Branko Vlaco’s office before being taken to “Bunker”, where he saw several persons, whom he knew. “I personally did not perform labour. I was not used as human shield, but other detainees were. Nobody mistreated me. Brane Vlaco protected me,” witness Piknjac said, adding that a man named Mladen, his former student, insulted him verbally. The witness said that he used to see indictee Vlaco every two or three days and that he asked him how he was doing. He said that he allowed his father to visit him.

Piknjac said that guards treated him in a good manner, but it was not the case with other detainees. “Somebody threw tear gas into the room on Eid. We coughed and struggled for air. Vlaco then came. He began cursing. He asked ‘who did this?’” Piknjac said, adding that Vlaco then opened the “Bunker” door in order to let fresh air into the room. Branko Vlaco, former Manager of “Bunker”, “Planjina Kuca”, “Kod Sonje” and “Nakina Garaza” detention camps, is charged with having established a system for punishment of detained civilians, who were abused, forced to perform hard labour and used as human shields. Many of them were killed at those locations, while tens of them are still missing. Testifying at this hearing Kasim Softic and Suad Krso explained that they went, along with protected witness 2, to negotiate with Branko Vlaco in a summer house owned by a man named Elez in May 1992. Softic and Krso said that Vlaco told them not be afraid. He did not force them to leave the villages in which they lived. According to Softic and Krso, women, children and the elderly were resettled from Krse and Ugljesici villages, while they stayed in order to “defend” themselves. They described how an attack on Krse village happened, but the Defence objected, because those circumstances were not mentioned in the indictment. The Chamber upheld the objection. The trial is due to continue on November 13.