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Tomislav Miladinovic from Belgrade said he had known the defendant since 2006 and was proud of their friendship.
“Gavrilo Stevic was and still is a religious mystic. He fascinates us with his reasoning and calmness,” the witness said, adding that “Sarajevo has always been Stevic’s inspiration”.
Responding to questions by Stevic’s attorney Veljko Civsa about defendant’s personality, the witness said that Stevic “suffered injustice from first Serb nationalists” when presenting his stands on the beginning of the war in Croatia.
The witness, who said his grandmother was from Ukraine, said he spoke to Stevic in Belgrade about organizing a performance and plays in order to draw attention to the conflicts in the Ukrainian region of Donetsk. He said he frequently travelled to Ukraine, but in late 2013 it became clear that a series of plays in Belgrade would not help the situation in Donetsk.
“I realized that the Donetsk cause was lost. Gavrilo insisted, proposed that we go to Russia to help,” Miladinovic said, adding that Stevic went to Russia in 2014.
The witness said he met Stevic again in the fall of that year and he told him which writers he had met in Russia.
“He had the intention to implement in Russia what we could not implement in Belgrade,” the witness said, explaining that the defendant told him where he had been.
When asked by prosecutor Suada Pasic whether the witness himself was in Russia with the defendant, he answered negatively, adding he did not know whether Stevic stayed in Ukraine.
“No, he did not tell me and I did not ask,” the witness said.
The State Prosecution has charged Stevic with having gone to the Ukrainian region of Lugansk via Belgrade and Moscow in 2014 and joined Jovan Sevic unit. According to the allegations in the indictment, Stevic was assigned weapons and uniform and performed various military activities, like patrolling at checkpoints, until the end of September 2014.
Second defense witness Goran Petkovic, a publisher from Banja Luka, said he had known the defendant since 1991, adding that “he was known as Gavrilo, the poet”.
Speaking about the defendant, he said he liked all religions, especially the Islamic culture and literature.
“He is a religious person, but not a religious fanatic,” the witness said, adding that Stevic frequently travelled and visited monasteries. As he said, he also visited monasteries in Russia.
“The conflict in Donetsk hurt him. As he loves Moscow, he embarked on his Don Quixote journey,” the witness said, adding that Stevic told him about writers and publishers in Moscow.
When asked by the prosecutor whether the defendant spoke about going to Ukraine, the witness said he “does not remember that he spoke about having been in Ukraine”, also adding he did not travel with him.
During the hearing the defendant’s attorney requested that new pieces of evidence be introduced. This included an order to conduct an investigation against witness Slavenko Kuzmanovic and the criminal record of that witness, which he requested the Court to obtain, and examination of witness Igor Krunic from Foca.
The trial will continue on January 28.
