Bosnia Retries Serb Ex-Soldier for Killing Bosniak Family

The retrial of Sretko Pavic opened on Tuesday at the appeals chamber of the Bosnian state court after the first-instance verdict sentencing him to 13 years in prison for crimes against humanity was quashed.

Pavic was convicted in June last year of participating in the murder of five Bosniak civilians, all members of the Causevic family, in the village of Rizvanovici in the Prijedor area in the second half of July 1992.

The defendant, a wartime member of the Volarska Company with the Sixth Ljubija Battalion of the Bosnian Serb Army, was sentenced to 13 years in prison.

However, the verdict was quashed and a retrial ordered.

The defence proposed on Tuesday that a doctor who carried out autopsies on the victims’ bodies should be called to testify, while the prosecution said that the evidence it presented at the original trial should stand.

The trial will continue on February 17.

The retrial of two other former Bosnian Serb Army soldiers in a separate case also opened on Tuesday at the Bosnian state court.

Boro Milojica, a wartime member of the 6th Ljubija Battalion of the Bosnian Serb Army, was found guilty in June last year of the murder of Bosniak civilians in the village of Hambarine in the Prijedor area in July 1992.

Under the same verdict, Milojica and another member of the same battalion, Zelislav Rivic, were found not guilty of the murders of other Bosniak, Roma and Croat civilians in July 1992.

However, the verdict was quashed by the court’s appeals chamber and a retrial ordered.

The retrial will continue on February 25.