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Nihad Bojadzic, the former deputy commander of the Bosnian Army’s Zulfikar Squad, said that he was not told about an attack on the village of Trusina, where 22 Croats were killed.
Bojadzic told the Sarajevo court on Monday that he did not know that his Zulfikar Squad comrades would participate in the attack on the village of Trusina in the Konjic municipality on April 16, 1993.
The former soldier, who is accused of leading the attack, has denied any involvement in the murder of 18 Bosnian Croat civilians and four captured Croatian Defence Council soldiers in the village.
Bojadzic told the court that he attended a meeting of representatives of Bosnian Army and the civil authorities in Bradina near Konjic the previous night.
“There was no discussion about Trusina,” he said.
Defence lawyer Vasvija Vidovic said that part of the Zulfikar Squad was sent to the Konjic area even before that meeting. When she asked Bojadzic if he knew what their task was, he replied: “Me and my commander Zulfikar Alispago did not know where the unit would be used.”
He said at the last hearing that he only found out about the violence in Trusina in the afternoon of April 16 after two wounded members of the Zulfikar Squad were transported to Bradina.
The indictment alleges that Bojadzic ordered the soldiers to attack Trusina and that he issued an order that no one in the village should remain alive. It also alleges that he ran the attack from the nearby hills.
“If I did participate in that, I would have to inform the commander what I did and how I did it,” Bojadzic said.
On trial for crimes in Trusina alongside Bojadzic are Mensur Memic, Dzevad Salcin and Nedzad Hodzic, all former members of the Zulfikar Squad, and Senad Hakalovic, a former soldier from the Neretvica Brigade of the Bosnian Army.
Bojadzic will continue his testimony on May 12.
