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Dead Bodies in the Loader

13. October 2014.00:00
At the trial of Goran Saric, charged with genocide committed in Srebrenica, the witness for the prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina said that in July 1995 he saw dead bodies on a loader.

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Zivorad Lakic said that, as a policeman from Bijeljina in July 1995, he was assigned with guarding the road between Konjevic Polje and Milici, and that he saw Bosniaks being brought to the nearby warehouse.
 
The witness said that Bosniaks were brought in by the so-called deserters, who had fled to Serbia, where they had been arrested and returned to Bosnia and Herzegovina, and who were sweeping the terrain from Konjevic Polje towards Bratunac.
 
He said that deserters had blue bulletproof vests, but that he did not know where their headquarters were and under whose command they were.
 
He said that the Bosniaks were then taken over by members of the Zvornik police station, who took them to the warehouse.
 
The witness emphasised he did not see these people being murdered, but he saw a soldier, heard a burst of fire and then saw bodies in the loader.
 
“Those people were killed by army members,” said Lakic, adding that the soldier came with one of the buses.
 
According to the witness’s estimate, there were 10 to 15 Bosniaks who had been brought to the warehouse in the loader.
 
Lakic said he did not remember saying during investigation in 2009 that guys from the special police were bringing prisoners to the warehouse, and that the army members were coming in the evening hours and killing them.
 
“This is unknown to me, I don’t know whether it’s been pulled out of context, I did not read the deposition,” said the witness.
 
Asked by the Defence he said he knew Saric in 1995, but did not see him in Konjevic Polje.
 
Saric is charged, as commander of the special police brigade, with issuing an order to policemen to guard the Bratunac-Konjevic Polje road, as well as to imprison people from Srebrenica who attempted to reach the territory controlled by the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina through the woods.
 
“I claim with utmost certainty that I did not see him in those days in the territory of Srebrenica, nor had I been talking with him on the phone. Except for dispatches coming from the police station, there was no other way of communication,” he said.
 
The trial is scheduled to resume on October 20.

Albina Sorguč


This post is also available in: Bosnian