Witness Statement at Saric Trial Describes Burial of Bodies

Saric has been charged with participating in the search, disarmament and forcible resettlement of women, children and the elderly in July 1995. He’s also been charged with separating men and boys from their families, and executing them in the Srebrenica area later on.

According to the indictment, Saric ordered police forces to guard the road between Bratunac and Konjevic Polje and capture men who were trying to escape the protected zone of Srebrenica through the woods.

At today’s hearing, a 2009 statement given by protected witness SG-10, now deceased, was read in the courtroom. SG-10 had said that during the fall of Srebrenica he was a member of an engineering unit and drove a loader. He said he went to Cerska in July 1995, because he was tasked with covering corpses on the side of the road with dirt.

“I remember they had killed some men, Muslim men,” the statement said. SG-10 said he covered the corpses, which had already become worm infested, in approximately one hour.

SG-10 said in his statement that someone replaced him as the driver of the loader when he went home or was on sick leave – he’d said that he didn’t know what kind of tasks the other drivers were doing.

SG-10 said holes were dug during the day, while trucks brought corpses to the dig sites at night. Then, the corpses would be buried. He’d said he worked at several locations in that area and “felt bad.”

Saric’s defense attorney objected to the witness statement, and described it as “unacceptable and irrelevant.” The defense also asked whether SG-10 was a member of the Drinski Corps of the Bosnian Serb Army, as well as a set of questions on the time period in which he would have been digging holes.

The defense said it wasn’t convinced that they’d received the full transcript of the statement.

The trial will continue on June 15.