First Defence Witness to Appear Next Week
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The Prosecution included more than a hundred pieces of material evidence in the case file. Most of them refer to the arrest and detention of Serbs in 1992. Prosecutor Seid Marusic presented death registry entries for persons, who, as he said, were detained in Dretelj.
The Prosecutor said that the presented documents indicated that people were arrested in the Mostar, Stolac, Capljina and Bileca area. After having been arrested, some of them were taken to Dretelj.
Presenting objections to those pieces of evidence, the Defence of the indictees said that most of them were irrelevant.
“In regard to arrest sheets presented by the Prosecution, the Defence noticed that each of them mentioned the reason for arresting a certain person, but they were not read here,” said Emina Hasanovic, Defence attorney of Ivan Medic.
Ivan Zelenika, Srecko Herceg, Edib Buljubasic, Ivan Medic and Marina Grubisic-Fejzic, former members of HOS, are charged with crimes committed in Dretelj. According to the charges, they participated in forcing detainees to perform hard labour and tortured them. Several persons died due to consequences of the abuse.
The indictment alleges that Zelenika was former HOS officer, Herceg was Commander of Dretelj, Buljubasic was Deputy Commander of the military barracks in Dretelj, while Medic and Grubisic-Fejzic were former guards.
The Prosecution presented a document, appointing Buljubasic deputy Commander of “Bruno Busic” military barracks. Todor Todorovic, Defence attorney of Buljubasic, said that it was not disputable that the indictee was appointed Deputy of the military barracks.
The Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina also presented two documents with which it wanted to prove that Herceg performed the functions of military barracks Commander and Deputy Commander.
“One piece of evidence was presented with the aim of proving that Herceg was Commander, but the document does not say that. The second piece of evidence proves that he was Deputy Commander. Now we do not know whether he was Deputy Commander or Commander,” said Drazen Zubak, Defence attorney of indictee Herceg.
Zubak said that the Prosecution’s allegation that Herceg was member of HOS until August 1, 1992 was true.
Prosecutor Marusic presented a document titled “Organisation of HOS”, saying that the document indicated that the HOS Main Headquarters was in Zagreb and that it was formed by the Croatian Party of Rights.
A status conference will be held ahead of the beginning of presentation of Defence’s evidence on November 26, when indictee Herceg’s first Defence witness will testify as well.
