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Prosecutor Dzevad Muratbegovic said that there was a grounded suspicion that the suspects committed crimes in a military prison located in the former “Viktor Bubanj” military barracks in 1992. The Prosecutor said that the suspicion was based on material evidence and statements given by more than 40 witnesses.
“We consider that, by staying at liberty, the suspects would interfere with the criminal proceedings by influencing witnesses and contact other suspects in the investigation against Kerim Lucarevic and others,” Muratbegovic said.
The Prosecutor said that Lucarevic was Commander of military police with the Territorial Defence of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, RBiH.
Muratbegovic said that members of the State Investigation and Protection Agency, SIPA had discovered that Muderizovic and Avdovic visited Eastern Sarajevo over the course of the past months in an attempt to persuade former prisoners not to testify against them.
As said by the Prosecutor, more than 150 Serb civilians were unlawfully held in the former military prison, where they were beaten up and forced to perform hard labour. He said that several of them died in those conditions.
The Defence of Muderizovic and Avdovic objected to the custody order motion, saying that most pieces of Prosecution’s evidence and witnesses’ statements did not pertain to an incrimination against the suspects.
The Defence attorneys denied the Prosecutor’s allegations that the suspects tried to contact the injured parties and that Muderizovic was Manager of the military prison and Avdovic was the Commander of Guards.
“The allegations about contacting the other suspects are incomprehensible. All of them live in Sarajevo. They have had an opportunity to talk to each other since 1992. On the basis of the motion it is obvious that an investigation against 25 other suspects is underway. Now, all of them can contact each other, but Muderizovic is the only one who cannot,” said Emir Kapidzic, Defence attorney of suspect Muderizovic.
Mirza Kovac, Defence attorney of Avdovic, said that his client did not have any function, but he was just an ordinary guard.
“We can see that many people are at liberty. All of us, who lived in Sarajevo at that time, know who arrested people and took them to the prison…It is shameful that some other people are not here now,” Kovac
said.
M.T.
