Bosnian Awaits Verdict after Admitting to Fighting for ISIS

In his closing statement to the Bosnian state court on December 24, prosecutor Cazim Hasanspahic asked for a sentence close to the legal maximum of 20 years for Ibro Cufurovic, who has admitted going to fight in Syria.

Defence lawyer Senad Dupovac meanwhile asked the court to sentence Cufurovic to between a year and a half and two years in prison.

The verdict will be delivered on December 27.

Addressing the court, Cufurovic expressed regrets for having gone to fight in Syria, but added that some nice things also happened to him there, like starting a family there.

According to the charges, Cufurovic, under the name of Abu Kasim Albosni, participated in terrorist activities, provided assistance to and fought for ISIS in Syria as a member of the Bejt Komandos unit, which was later renamed El Aksa.

Prosecutor Hasanspahic said that, following testimony by a protected witness, Cufurovic admitted the crime in its entirety, adding that his admission corresponded to the prosecution’s evidence.

The prosecutor said that Cufurovic’s departure to Syria was deliberate, with intent and direct premeditation.

“He stayed with ISIS until the end, until his arrest and handover to forces which escorted him to a detention camp,” Hasanspahic said.

He said the court would have a chance to see a video recording depicting what the prosecutor said was Cufurovic holding an automatic rifle next to bodies of two dead soldiers.

“I think that such behaviour requires a strict punishment, close to the maximum sentence prescribed for such crime,” Hasanspahic said.

Defence lawyer Dupovac pointed out that defendant Cufurovic was prevented from concluding a guilt admission agreement, adding that immediately after the filing of the indictment the defence provided the prosecution with a guilt admission proposal, foreseeing the sentence between one-and-a-half and three years, but the prosecution did not accept it, saying the proposed punishment was too light.

He said the defense then proposed that the prosecution offer a new proposal with a different sentence. However, the prosecution did not do this.

“When he was prevented from concluding an agreement, Cufurovic pleaded not guilty orally and in writing,” Dupovac said.

He claimed that “the recording was fabricated and altered”, and it did not indicate when the incident happened, where it happened, to whom the soldiers belonged or whether they or not were dead.

“There are at least 50 warring parties in Syria. A fabricated, altered recording in the name of a person who no longer exists is more than inappropriate as the basis for a court decision,” Dupovac said.

He said that the protected witness confirmed that Cufurovic tried to buy documents in order to return to Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Dupovac pointed out that Cufurovic went to Syria when he was 19, he tried to return to Bosnia and Herzegovina several times, and spent 19 months in detention camp. He also said that Cufurovic had a family and considered that “a sentence in the range between one-and-a-half and two years in prison is adequate and can achieve the purpose of punishment”.

Dupovac said that so far 28 returnees from Syria have been prosecuted and sentenced to between one and three-and-a half years in prison, even though some of them displayed disrespect for the court.

“None of them has got into trouble with the law again, which means that those sentences have achieved their purpose,” Dupovac said.

Cufurovic pointed out that he admitted that he fought in Syria, acted as a sentinel and participated in military units in 2014 and 2015 before being detained.

“I was captured at the Turkish border with my family as a civilian in 2016. I was arrested and taken to a military prison,” Cufurovic said.