Witnesses Claim that Cvetkovic Did not Participate in Srebrenica Attacks

Nemanja Bobar told the Court that he was mobilised, as a signalman, by the Tenth Reconnaissance Squad of the Republika Srpska Army, VRS, as of January 1995. He said that he was deployed with the Vlasenica Squad, but he also performed the tasks of a signalman with the Bijeljina Squad.
 
“Milorad Pelemis was Commander. Franc Kos was his Deputy for Bijeljina and Lule for Vlasenica,” Bobar said, adding that the Squad had a mixed ethnic composition but the relations were good.
 
Bobar said that all members of the Squad, including soldiers, signalmen, cooks and drivers, received salaries and that commandos received additional pay when they participated in military operations. Also, he said that humanitarian aid was equally distributed to all members of the Squad and that all of them were treated in the same manner.
 
“The Slovenian guy and those Croats figured among the others. I guess it was because they wanted to prove themselves. They participated in all operations,” Bobar recalled, adding that he involved, as a signalman, in two attacks on Srebrenica, namely the one known as “the tunnel” and the other one that took place around St. Peter’s Day in 1995.
 
He said that he knew Aleksandar Cvetkovic, who was a driver with the Vlasenica Squad, but he neither went nor drove soldiers to the operations in Srebrenica.
 
“He could rarely be seen in the Base. He used to ramble in Serbia and collect aid. He once brought new sneakers for everybody,” the witness said, adding that Cvetkovic had a good sense of humour and that he had never noticed that he demonstrated aggressiveness.
 
This witness said that he had not heard that Cvetkovic participated in any liquidation.
 
The Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, BiH, charges Cvetkovic, former member of the Tenth Reconnaissance Squad with the VRS, with the murder of more than 900 Bosniaks on Branjevo military farm in July 1995.
 
The Court of BiH previously sentenced Franc Kos to 35 years in prison for having committed crimes against humanity in Srebrenica in July 1995.
 
Second witness Zeljko Vukovic, former driver with the Tenth Reconnaissance Squad of VRS, said that he drove commandos to both attacks on Srebrenica and that Cvetkovic surely did not come with them.
 
Vukovic said that, upon his return from Srebrenica, he saw Cvetkovic in the Base, repairing a truck, around July 15.
 
“I heard that he came from a rich family. He was awesome, a man of wit,” Vukovic said.
 
Both witnesses said that all people in the Base used to make jokes about the indictee and “grunted” whenever he passed by, thus making an association to his story that he saw a sow, weighing 400 kg. None of the witnesses could tell where Cvetkovic allegedly saw that sow.
 
The trial is due to continue on November 11.