Random or Targeted Fire

During the continuation of Ratko Mladic’s trial at The Hague, the prosecutors try to prove that the Republika Srpska Army, VRS, randomly fired modified air-bombs on Sarajevo in 1995, while Defence witness Vladimir Radojcic denies that.

Colonel Radojcic, the then Commander of the Ilidza Brigade of VRS, confirmed yesterday that he ordered the firing of two modified air-bombs on the Sarajevo Television building in April and June 1995, because the station “broadcast the worst propaganda”, and on the “Aleksa Santic” school building in Hrasnica, where “the centre for training of special forces of the Army of BiH” was located.

While cross-examining the witness, Prosecutor Dermot Groome said that, on April 7, 1995 Radojcic’s unit did not target the school building, but it fired the bomb randomly on “the centre of Hrasnica.”  

“That is absolutely not true,” the witness responded.
After that the Prosecutor presented Radojcic with an order to target “the most valuable targets, where the biggest human losses will be caused,” in the central part of Hrasnica with the air-bomb.  

Radojcic responded by saying that the order referred to the enemy soldiers, not civilians, and that he understood and carried it out in that way.  

He mentioned that the ABiH Commander in Hrasnica “was obliged, according to the international war laws, to remove civilians from the area” from which he had attacked VRS in the past three days, but “he failed to do that.”
“If I were ordered to target civilians with an air-bomb, I would never do that…When an order says that a bomb should be fired on a target, I consider that it refers to a military target,” Radojcic said, adding that the order to conduct the attack on Hrasnica was “clumsily written”.

Responding to questions by Prosecutor Groome, the witness confirmed that he knew that civilians were present in Hrasnica but he targeted the areas in which there were no civilians.

“We missed the target, but not that much as to endanger civilians,” Radojcic said.

According to the charges against Mladic, a modified air-bomb destroyed one and damaged 11 houses on April 7, 1995. One person was killed and three were wounded in the explosion.

Mladic, the then Commander of VRS, is charged with terrorising the local population in Sarajevo, committing genocide in Srebrenica, persecuting Bosniaks and Croats throughout BiH and taking UNPROFOR members hostage.  

The Prosecution is due to complete the cross-examination of Radojcic on Wednesday, July 2. No hearings will be held in Mladic’s case on Monday and Tuesday, because two of the judges have obligations at other trials.