Abused at Jewish Cemetery

The presentation of Prosecution’s evidence at the trial of Slobodan Bogdanovic and Goran Sladoje, who are charged with crimes in Sarajevo, has been completed with the reading of a statement given by a deceased witness and presentation of material evidence.

In his statement given to the Safety Services Centre in Sarajevo on June 16, 1992 Bajro Besic said that two Serb members of the Territorial Defence, who lived in Trebevicka Street, took him to a metal garage and handed him over to two soldiers whom he had never seen before. 

“They hit me on my back with a baton and forced me to eat salt and sing Chetnik songs,” Besic said, adding that they took his son Suad to another garage where they mistreated him. 

The witness said that, later on they took him to the Jewish Cemetery and forced him to climb up a wall and jump down with the intention to provoke members of the Territorial Defence of Bosnia and Herzegovina, BiH, to shoot at him, but they did not do it. 

“While I was hiding, I heard my son begging them not to kill him,” Basic said in his statement.  

He said that he then crawled to the territory controlled by the Territorial Defence of BiH. 

Bogdanovic and Sladoje are charged with having come to Besic’s house on June 13, 1992, took Bajro and Suad Besic to a garage, where they beat them, and then took them to the Jewish Cemetery, where they used them as human shields. Suad was killed on that occasion.

At this hearing Prosecutor Sead Krestalica read a part from a book authored by Josip Sloboda titled “A Drama at the Jewish Cemetery”, indicating that Bajro Besic said that a few persons, including Goran Sladoje, escorted him to the Jewish Cemetery.
 
Krestalica then also presented a few pieces of material evidence, including documents on the exhumation and identification of Suad Besic, whose skeletal remains were found at the Jewish Cemetery. 

The trial continuation date will be set at a later stage. The Defence was given a 15-day deadline to submit a written proposal of its evidence.