Witness Says Popovic Pillaged Houses in Visegrad Area

Jovan Popovic has been charged with abducting civilians in Rodica Brdo in the Visegrad area in mid-June 1992 and taking them to a police station. Popovic allegedly acted in collaboration with a group of soldiers led by Milan Lukic, a Bosnian Serb paramilitary leader sentenced to life imprisonment by the Hague Tribunal. The civilians have remained missing since. He has also been charged with pillaging houses in Rodica Brdo and other villages.

State prosecution witness Muzafer Delibasic testified at today’s hearing, and said he used to live in Babin Potok with his family. He said he and his neighbours kept watch in the area surrounding their houses in April 1992. He said the local population of the village was in panic, because fire was opened at their houses from the surrounding villages.

Delibasic said that following the departure of the Uzicki Corps, a soldier told him the situation in the village was no longer be safe. He said he went to a nearby forest, where he hid for about two and a half months. He said he used to come to the village to get food.

A few days after an attack on his village on June 3, 1992, Delibasic said he saw Jovan Popovic pillaging houses in Babin Potok.

“A boy aged 11 or 12 accompanied him…He took a TV out. He also took an object wrapped in a blanket out of one of the houses,” Delibasic said.

He said he knew Popovic, who is also from the village of Rodica Brdo. He said he was family friends with his uncle Huso.

Delibasic said his aunt Hatidza told him his uncle was taken away on May 29, 1992. He said Jovan Popovic asked about his uncle’s whereabouts while driving in Seval Zukic’s car, another resident of the village who disappeared.

“My uncle Huso has been missing without a trace since. We don’t know if he is dead or alive. Jovan Popovic guaranteed his safety. Had he not done so, my uncle would have come to the woods with me…Seval Zukic was taken away after that. I don’t know who took him away, but Jovan took his car,” Delibasic said.

Delibasic said Hasan Zukic told him that his son Fadil had been taken away from Rodica Brdo. He said Zukic told him Jovan Popovic had come to his house at the same time, searching for him.

“Hasan told me Jovan Popovic carried an automatic rifle…Everybody believed he encouraged those men to go to certain houses and take people away,” Delibasic said.

The trial will continue on October 28.