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Bosnian Serb Policemen’s Bileca Abuse Trial Opens

17. June 2014.00:00
The first witness at the trial of four former policemen accused of abusing non-Serb prisoners in the south-eastern town of Bileca in 1992 said that one of the defendants assaulted him.

This post is also available in: Bosnian

The prosecution witness told the trial in Sarajevo on Tuesday that defendant Miroslav Duka took him and his cousin to the police station in Bileca June 1992 and then started to abuse him.

“Duka came and gave an order to take us to solitary confinement. And so it was,” said the witness, Edin Bajramovic.

Bajramovic said that Duka, who at the time was the commander of the police station in Bileca, first assaulted him while interrogating him about weapons.

“I got a couple of kicks in the chest,” Bajramovic said, adding that the defendant knew karate.

Duka is charged with the abuse of Bajramovic and other prisoners at the police station and the student dormitory in Bileca. Also on trial are former police officers Goran Vujovic, Nedjeljko Kuljic and Zeljko Ilic.

They are charged with participating in a joint criminal enterprise aimed at the persecution of the non-Serb population in Bileca from June to December 1992.

After the first blows, witness Bajranovic said, there were beatings “every other day”.

Bajramovic, who goes by the nickname ‘Dida’, said that Duka broke his nose twice.

“Dida, I will now break your nose so you remember me every time you see yourself in the mirror,” the witness recalled Duka saying.

He said that seven of his ribs were also broken by police officers, and that he saw Duka beating other prisoners.

“He took out Sabir Bajramovic, he beat him, he destroyed him. He destroyed Sajto Bajramovic as well,” he said.

The witness will continue his testimony on June 24.

Amer Jahić


This post is also available in: Bosnian