Bosnia Charges Ex-Fighters, Policeman with Wartime Violence
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The Bosnian state court and prosecution building. Photo: BIRN BiH
The Bosnian prosecution filed an indictment on Wednesday charging former Territorial Defence fighters Mirsad ‘Mire’ Smajic and Nijaz ‘Nice’ Smajic with committing war crimes in the village of Serdari, near Kotor Varos, in 1992.
The two men, who according to the prosecution live in Croatia, have been charged with participating, jointly with other individuals, in an attack on the Serb civilian population of Serdari on September 17, 1992.
According to the prosecution, they went to a house where Serb civilians were living, including elderly people, children and a pregnant woman, and threw an explosive device into the house. They then forcibly entered the house while firing their weapons.
They killed a total of seven civilians, while another two were severely wounded, including the pregnant woman.
In a separate indictment filed on Wednesday, the state prosecution charged Miroslav Pjano, alias Miro, who has Bosnian and Serbian citizenship, with committing a crime against humanity in the Foca area in 1992.
The indictment alleged that Pjano, who was a policeman at the Public Security Station in Foca, with persecution on ethnic and religious grounds as part of a widespread and systematic attack targeted on the Bosniak civilian population in the Foca area.
The prosecution claims that Pjano participated, jointly with uniformed and armed members of the Bosnian Serb Army, in the murders of at least eight on May 5, 1992 in the village of Sas.
It also claims that he participated in the murder of two elderly civilians in the village of Bijele Vode on July 27, 1992, and the murder of six Bosniak civilians in the village of Potpece on August 29, 1992.
The prosecution said that after shooting dead the six Bosniaks in Potpece, the fighters then “threw a bomb and set the house on fire with the bodies of the killed civilians in it”.
The indictment further charges Pjano with participating in detentions, inhumane treatment and torture, inflicting physical and mental suffering on captured civilians, and the forcible resettlement of several Bosniaks.
Both the new indictments have been sent to the state court for confirmation.
