Dronjak: Detainees Beaten Regularly

“Detainees were beaten up in Kamenica detention camp all the time. They were beaten from morning until evening hours – when they got food, went for an examination, went to the toilet… If they wanted to kill someone, they would beat him every day. If they needed someone for an exchange, they would beat him every three days,” said Rifat Tahric, who said he was held in Kamenica detention camp for nearly four months.
 
Testifying for the Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Tahric said that he was brought to Kamenica in November 1994, adding that several persons died during the course of his detention.
 
“I buried two of them. As far as the others are concerned, I saw it or heard from other detainees. When a person dies, they put him into a black bag and order someone to bury him,” the witness said, adding he thought that detainees were not killed, but they died due to bad living conditions in the detention camp.
 
“It was not easy. We rarely left the classroom where we were held, except when we were beaten with feet, sticks or poles every day. We got food once a day, but there was not enough of it. We could just dream about getting a slice of bread, let alone bathing or personal hygiene. There was simply no hygiene at all,” Tahric said.
 
The Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina charges Ratko Dronjak, as Commander and Manager of Kamenica detention camp and the Slavko Rodic school building prison in Drvar, with having participated in torture, murder and other inhumane acts committed against non-Serb detainees.
 
During cross-examination, Tahric repeated his earlier statement that detainees knew that Dronjak was the detention camp manager, while people in Kamenica used to say that he replaced Dragisa Barovic, who treated detainees in “a tolerant and mild” manner.
 
Sulejman Kapic testified at this hearing too. After having been captured, he spent two and a half months in the Kamenica detention camp basement.
 
“I was held in an isolation cell for nearly 90 days. The room measured three by five metres. The floor was covered with mud and stones. I had one blanket and a small window, which was covered with an iron sheet from the outside. I do not know how I managed to survive,” Kapic said, adding that the living conditions in Kamenica were “catastrophic” and he sometimes did not get any food for three days in a row.
 
Kapic told the Court that he was beaten in the cell every day. He recalled that two other detainees stayed in the same cell, but they never came back after they were taken away.
 
“I remember that they were just kids. About 18 or 19 years old. We did not talk much, as we were exhausted and hungry. I do not know what happened to them. I just heard screams and I saw them being taken out. That is all I know,” the witness said.

He added that either Dronjak or Dragisa Barovic was manager of the Kamenica detention camp, but he said he never saw Dronjak in the camp.  
 
The trial is due to continue on March 17, 2011.