Former Prisoners Describe Torture by Bosnian Croat Forces in Livno School

Andabak, Jasarevic and Velagic have been charged with the detention, torture and murder of Serb civilians who were detained in the Ivan Goran Kovacic school building in Livno in 1992. The indictment charges them with 29 counts of detention, torture and murder.

Andabak was the commander of military police with the Croatian Defense Council for the operational zone of North-Western Herzegovina. Jasarevic was Andabak’s deputy. Velagic was a member the Croatian Defense Council’s military police in Livno.

State prosecution witness and former prisoner Borko Pazin said he was transferred from a civil prison to the Ivan Goran Kovacic school in Livno on August 25, 1992. On the evening of his arrival, he said a man with the last name Garic ordered him to go to a classroom to be interrogated by a commander with the last name Ibrahimagic.

“Ibrahimagic said, ‘Speak.’ Garic, Zdenko, Babo and Velagic were standing on the side…Garic hit me first, with a baton. He’s hitting me. I’m screaming. I fell down. They took a jar of water from the table and poured it over me. Jasarevic then hit me with a knotted steel rope,” Pazin said.

Pazin said he lost consciousness, and woke up when Andabak started kicking him. He said Andabak and Velagic then continued punching and kicking him. He said he fainted eight times during that evening.

“I was broken,” Pazin said.

Pazin said Andabak also threatened him with a handgun during the same incident.

“He did it for pleasure. It seemed to me that Garic did it because he had to,” Pazin said.

He said he didn’t know Andabak, but had known his father. He said he learned the names of the men who beat him from other prisoners.

Drasko Radivojsa, a state prosecution witness and also a former prisoner, was the second witness to testify at today’s hearing. Radivojisa, who was initially detained in a civil prison, said he was sent to the Ivan Goran Kovacic school one evening in September 1992 to be exchanged. The exchange was unsuccessful, and Radivojsa said he was beaten so brutally he wanted to commit suicide from the pain.

“I entered the classroom. Ljuban Bilic was the chief investigator. Fifteen military policemen were sitting at the school desks. I was ordered to sit on a chair like a cowboy…They kicked me, punched me, hit me with cables and a baseball bat,” Radivojisa said.

He said he was beaten up two more times and was also tortured with an electric cattle prod over the course of the same evening.

“I couldn’t stand the pain. I wanted to kill myself,” Radivojisa said, crying.

He said he was returned to the civil prison after that night and left Livno at the beginning of November 1992.

Radivojsa said he heard about Zdenko, Jasarevic and Velagic from others.

The trial will continue on December 30.