Bosniak on Trial in Banja Luka for Killing Serb

Prosecution witness Borislav Vasiljevic told the court on Monday that while he was detained in the village of Vecici near Kotor Varos in the summer of 1992, he hear Zec saying he killed a man called Slavo Vasiljevic.

“After Slavo was killed, my father Mirko and I were detained by men from Vecici. When they brought us to the village, [two fighters called] Sulejman Beculic and Rukib Hibic asked my father why he killed Slavo. Then Zec came and said: ‘Don’t harass these people, I killed Slavo. I fired from Bojo’s meadow,’” said the witness.

He added that before the war he had good relations with Zec, and so the defendant did not beat or abuse him during his detention.

The Banja Luka district prosecution charges Zec with killing Vasiljevic with an automatic rifle on June 19, 1992, in the village of Staza, near Kotor Varos.

The indictment alleges that Zec went to a meadow owned by a man called Bojo Vasiljevic in the evening and fired a round at Vasiljevic, who was standing on his porch.

The second witness in the trial on Monday, Milenko Vasiljevic, said that in June 1992 he was near the village of Staza when he saw Zec running across the road with a rifle in his hand.

“I went to Staza to pick up my father, aunt and her children. When we were coming back from the woods, several people shot at us and wounded my aunt and I. Later I saw the defendant running across and going into the woods,” the witness said.

The trial continues on April 15.