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Bihac Cantonal Court. Photo: BIRN BiH
The Cantonal Court in Bihac has confirmed an indictment charging Husein Cejvanovic with shooting a prisoner dead during the conflict between the separatist Autonomous Province of Western Bosnia wartime statelet and the Bosnian Army.
Cejvanovic, a wartime member of the Jastrebovi Unit of the Autonomous Province of Western Bosnia’s National Defence force, was charged with holding soldiers from the Bosnian Army’s Fifth Corps captive in the basement of a house in the village of Johovica in the Velika Kladusa municipality on July 19, 1995, along with other members of his unit.
The indictment alleges that Cejvanovic fired several bullets at one captive, killing him. He and members of his unit then assaulted two other prisoners, kicking them and hitting them with their fists, rifle butts and barrels all over their bodies, according to the charges.
“There are reasonable grounds for believing that during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the armed conflict between members of the Fifth Corps of the Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina and National Defence of the Western Bosnia Autonomous Region, the defendant, in his capacity as member of the National Defence’s Jastrebovi military unit, acted contrary to the rules of the international humanitarian law, breaching provisions on treatment of prisoners of war,” the Una-Sana Cantonal Prosecution said when it announced the charges.
The Cantonal Court in Bihac confirmed the indictment on September 22 but the announcement was issued on Wednesday.
Cejvanovic is currently living in the United States.
