Salcin Renounces Statement Given Under Therapy

Testifying in his own defense, Dzevad Salcin denied a statement he previously gave in 2012, in which he’d said that he cut Dragan Vukovic’s ear off.

“I’m saying I didn’t commit that crime…I was undergoing heavy medical therapy when I gave that statement…They killed my son because of the Trusina events eight months prior to my arrest,” Salcin said. Salcin gave this statement to the Bosnian state prosecution on March 21, 2012.

According to the charges against him, Salcin cut off a part of prisoner Dragan Vukovic’s ear in front of the Mraziste Hotel on Mount Igman in March 1993. He is also charged with beating prisoners in the kitchen of the Mraziste Hotel on Mount Igman during the first half of 1993.

Salcin told the trial chamber that he joined the Zulfikar Unit in late June 1992, and was stationed on Mount Igman until January 1993.

“When I arrived, there was nothing on the mountain. They tasked me with keeping watch at Strajiste…I was loud, I quarreled with them, so I decided to go to Mostar,” Salcin said.

Salcin said he stayed in Mostar until the end of March 1993 and then returned to Mount Igman, where he saw people in civilian clothing chopping firewood and cleaning snow. He was told they were Serb prisoners.

When asked whether the name of Dragan Vukovic sounded familiar, Salcin said he knew him and that he was on Mount Igman in March 1993, but he wasn’t present when his ear was cut off.

Salcin said he heard that Sadikovic, also known as Struja, cut off Vukovic’s ear, and also heard that Vukovic injured his own ear while falling down from a self-propelled gun.

Salcin said he left Mount Igman on April 14, 1993 and went to Trusina.

During a break the Bosnian state prosecution proposed that Salcin admit to cutting Vukovic’s ear, and said the prosecution would drop the charges contained in the second count in return. Salcin said he objected to the proposal and didn’t want to admit any guilt, because he didn’t cut Vukovic’s ear.

The trial will continue on July 2.