Witness Denies Involvement in Transporting Bodies to Petkovci Dam

Marko Milosevic and Ostoja Stanisic are on trial for the mass killing of approximately 1000 Srebrenica civilians on a dam near Petkovci in Zvornik in mid-July 1995. The indictment alleges that at the time Stanisic was the commander of the Sixth Battalion of the Zvornicka Brigade of the Bosnian Serb Army, while Milosevic was his deputy.

Defense witness Dusan Nikolic, who was accused of transporting bodies to the Petkovci dam with a tractor, said he occasionally visited his parents in the village of Djulici near Petkovci. He said he lived with his sister in Zvornik, where he was attending school.

Nikolic said he never drove his father’s tractor during the war, and said he passed his driving test after the war, in 1996. Defense attorney Petko Pavlovic said that a protected witness known as SM-106 claimed Nikolic was at the Petkovci dam in July 1995, transporting bodies.

“That’s not true. I declare that I didn’t drive the tractor until the end of 1997,” Nikolic said, adding that he’d never been at the Petkovci dam.

Nikolic said that his relations with SM-106’s family weren’t good, because he had slapped his son once at a wedding.

Nikolic denied claims by prosecutor Predrag Tomic, who’d said Nikolic hadn’t slapped SM-106’s son. He said there were other problems between their two families. He said he would agree to face SM-106 in the courtroom.

Stevan Ivanovic, the second witness to testify in Milosevic’s defense, said he worked at the Secretariat for People’s Defense in Zvornik in 1995. He said the secretariat kept records of the material and technical needs of military units.

Ivanovic said the Sixth Battalion of the Zvornicka Brigade didn’t use the new school building in Petkovci for their needs. The indictment alleges that detainees were held at the new school building in Petkovci before being executed at the dam.

“Schools weren’t used for military purposes,” Ivanovic said.

In response to questions from the prosecution, Ivanovic said he wasn’t in Petkovci in July 1995.

The trial continues on July 8.