Bosnia Rejects Srebrenica Massacre Prosecutions in Serbia

The Bosnian state court said on Friday that it had “rejected the proposal of the Bosnian prosecution to cede jurisdiction to Serbia” in the cases against former Bosnian Serb policemen Nedeljko Milidragovic, Aleksa Golijanin and Milisav Gavric, who are all believed to be living in Serbia.

The court said the prosecutor’s office had withdrawn the request, but prosecution spokesperson Boris Grubesic declined to explain why. “We have no comment,” he said. The Serbian prosecution also declined to give any explanation.

The decision outraged representatives of the Srebrenica victims.

The president of the Mothers of Srebrenica Association, Munira Subasic, told BIRN that she was “surprised and disappointed”.

“On Monday I will ask for an emergency meeting with the Bosnian prosecution. If I sense there is politics involved and some games, I will withdraw our association’s agreement that this case be sent to Serbia, and without this agreement, Bosnia cannot send cases about Srebrenica to Serbia,” said Subasic.

Victims’ permission is necessary before cases are transferred.

The Bosnian prosecution should have ceded the cases to the Serbian prosecutors under the terms of a protocol on cooperation in war crimes cases signed in 2013, which was meant to stop perpetrators with dual citizenships escaping justice by hiding in neighbouring countries, as Bosnia and Serbia do not extradite their citizens.

According to the charges filed by the Bosnian prosecution, Milidragovic, a former commander of a squad from the Bosnian Serb police special brigade’s Jahorina Training Centre, and Golijanin, a former deputy commander of a Jahorina Training Centre squad, committed genocide against Bosniaks from Srebrenica between July 10 and July 19, 1995.

The prosecution accuses Milidragovic of killing a disabled Bosniak man during a search of the Potacari area near Srebrenica on July 12 and then taking a group of 15 to 20 men away from their families and killing them in a nearby meadow.

He is also charged with ordering the shooting of about 100 Srebrenica captives in the village of Kravica.

Golijanin meanwhile is accused of participating in the capture of several thousand Bosniaks.

He is also charged with ordering Jahorina Training Centre squad members to execute 15 to 20 captives by the side of the road leading from Konjevic Polje to Bratunac, and personally participating in the executions.

Meanwhile Milisav Gavric, who was a deputy police commander in Srebrenica in 1995, is accused in a separate case of committing, abetting, ordering and supporting criminal acts whose goal was the persecution of the Bosniak population on national, ethnic and religious grounds.