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“Josip Tolic and Ante Golubovic took one man out of “Fric Pavlik” school gym in Bosanski Brod. When I went to the toilet, I passed by a room and saw Tolic, Golubovic and others gathered around him like executioners, slapping and hitting him. The man was lying in blood. Later on I saw him covered with a blanket,” witness Miro Pavic described, testifying via video link.
The witness said that he was taken from his house in Odzak in April 1992 and detained in the local Dispensary, where detainees were mistreated by members of the Croatian Army. As he said, later on he was transferred to “Strolit” factory premises, where the mistreatment continued.
“They hit me until I fainted. It cannot even be called beating, but breaking,” Pavic said.
He said that he met Tolic in “Strolit”, but he did not know who he was. The witness said that, later on, when he was transferred to the school building in Odzak, the indictee introduced himself by saying: ‘I am an Ustasha, Josip Tolic’.
“Tolic and Golubovic were the two worst men. They decided who would stay alive and who would be liquidated,” the witness said.
He said that indictee Tolic beat him up in the school building. When asked by judge Stanisa Gluhajic how many times he beat him up, he said he did not know, adding that the beatings happened every day. When the judge asked him if Tolic beat him every day, the witness said: ‘I cannot tell you that’, adding that the indictee mostly hit him with his legs.
Josip Tolic, former member of the 102nd Odzak Brigade of the Croatian Defence Council, HVO, is on trial for having participated in the abuse of Serb detainees in the Odzak and Bosanski Brod area from May to October 1992.
The witness said that Tolic was in charge of selecting people who would dig trenches, as well as for taking away and bringing those people back.
“Trucks would come in order to pick us up. HVO was written on them. They drove us to the frontlines. Many people got killed while digging trenches,” the witness said.
Also, Pavic said that he was transferred to “Tulek” construction material warehouse in Bosanski Brod and that women were brought there and raped.
“They were in a room across from ours. When HVO soldiers came in the evening, the windows would be closed and screaming would begin. They ordered us to sing ‘Here comes the dawn, here comes the day, here come Jure and Boban’ . While we were singing, they raped the women, who were screaming,” Pavic said.
The trial is due to continue on September 5.
