Doomsday for Bosniaks

Sefik Djuveleg said that he was detained in a garage with other male residents from Kotor on June 25, 1992, when he heard Dusko Maksimovic’s voice.
 
“He said: ‘If my brother was wounded, kill five of them. If he got killed, kill ten’. I knew him very well, as we used to work together,” Djuveleg recalled, adding that he was not able to see Maksimovic at that moment. 
 
The witness said that five men were separated and shot near Ante Zeba’s house, adding that his brother Seval was among them. As he said, the detainees were then taken from the garage in front of the Dispensary in Kotor-Varos.
 
Several local residents, including his father, were killed on their way to that place.
 
“I saw my former colleague Dusko Maksimovic at that place. I asked him: ‘Dule, have I deserved this?’ He then kicked me with his shoe,” the witness said, adding that he was then taken, along with the others, to an old prison in Kotor-Varos, where they were beaten upon arrival.
 
Dusko Maksimovic is on trial, along with Savo Tepic, Dragoslav Bojic, Dusko Vujicic, Radojko Keverovic and Ilija Kurusic, for having committed crimes in Kotor-Varos. They are charged with having participated in the detention, torture and other inhumane acts against Bosniaks and Croats.
 
According to the charges, Tepic was Chief of the Public Safety Station, Bojic was Commander of the Police Station in Kotor-Varos, Vujicic was an active policeman, while Maksimovic, Skoric and Keverovic were reserve policemen and Kurusic was member of the Republika Srpska Army, VRS.
 
Witness Sejfo Bilic said that he too was captured in Kukavice hamlet, Kotor village, on June 25, 1992, adding that this was “the doomsday for Bosniaks”. 
 
“We were doomed. All of us, Bosniaks, and everything that belonged to us,” Bilic said.
 
He said that “members of special forces were responsible for everything”, adding that he saw indictees Dudko Maksimovic and Ilija Kurusic in his village on that day.
 
According to the witness’ testimony, Esad Muminovic, Samir Avdic, Seval Djuveleg and Resid Vilic and his son were taken out and killed on that day.
 
“Vilic said: ‘Dule, brother, do not kill my only son’,” the witness said. He specified that he told this to Dusko Maksimovic, but he did not know whether Maksimovic went to the place next to the house, where the shooting happened.
 
Bilic said that all Bosniak and Croat houses were set on fire on that occasion and that the murders continued on their way towards the Dispensary in Kotor-Varos, as well as inside the Dispensary itself, where “Dule Maksimovic broke three of my teeth out”.
 
The witness said that he recognized Rajko Skoric and Dusko Vujicic at that place as well.
 
Witness Bilic told the Court that he and his neighbours were transferred to the old prison, where he stayed until July 19, 1992. 
 
Witness Selim Smailovic, who was detained in the old prison in Kotor-Varos, said that others told him that they were beaten by Dusko Vujicic.
 
“He told me: ‘You see how nice you are. I have not even touched you’. And he did not,” the witness said.
 
Bojic’s Defence attorney Milan Romanic informed the Trial Chamber that somebody had called his client over the phone in relation to this case for about ten days and requested him to “reveal the names of the others”. 
 
At this hearing the Trial Chamber rendered a decision to discontinue the criminal process against Rade Skoric, about whose death the public was informed at the hearing held on December 1. 
 
The trial is due to continue on December 22.