Bosnian Serb Soldiers’ Srebrenica Genocide Trial Opens
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According to the charges, on the morning of July 12, 1995, members of the Vlasenica Brigade demined a road in the village of Luke, near Vlasenica, so that buses and trucks transporting Bosniak prisoners from Srebrenica could pass, and set up a checkpoint.
The indictment alleges that the defendants and other Vlasenica Brigade troops stopped vehicles at the checkpoint from July 12 to 17, 1995 and seized money and golden jewellery from Bosniaks.
Vlasenica Brigade soldiers separated the women from the Bosniak men, took the women away and raped them, and tied up the men and detained them in a school building where they were abused, the charges claim.
“On the night of July 13 to 14, they took out 22 male detainees and took them to Mrsici, where they shot 21 of them. Only one detainee survived,” prosecutor Predrag Tomic told the court.
The first prosecution witness in the trial testified on Tuesday that she was transported from Potocari near Srebrenica to the village of Luke, where she men being taken away towards a “big house”.
Witness Sehida Abdulrahmanovic said she was taken by truck from a former battery factory in Potocari to an unknown destination on July 13, 1995, together with her daughter and other civilians.
“Buses and trucks were parked on the road. Everything was ready for us. We were not told where they were taking us,” she said.
While getting off the truck, Abdulrahmanovic said she saw a friend of hers, Rizo Mustafic, as well as the son of another acquaintance whose surname was Ahmic.
“A soldier was pushing them with a rifle, directing them towards the big house. I did not recognise the other men who they were escorting, because they were facing away from me… Those who were taken away never came back,” Abdulrahmanovic said.
Two other former Bosnian Serb soldiers, Borislav Stojisic and Rajko Drakulic, were originally indicted in the same case, but the proceedings against them were separated from the others because they were on the run in Serbia.
The trial is due to continue on July 10.
