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Ljubicic: Two Days in a Manhole

28 November 2007  

Two Prosecution witness recall what they lived through in detention camps in central Bosnia in 1993.

At the trial of Pasko Ljubicic, a protected Prosecution witness - who testified under the pseudonym of L - spoke of the torture and maltreatment he suffered during his 66-day long detention in various camps controlled by the Croatian Defence Council (HVO) in central Bosnia.

Witness L said he spent two nights in a concrete manhole together with his friend.

"On April 16, 1993, HVO members approached us from the back while we were on duty as guards near my village. They captured me and my friend, and took us towards Zabrdje through the forest. After that, they bound us with wire and transferred us to the elementary school in Donja Vecerska," said L, adding that the detainees, who were held in the school premises, were tortured, beaten and maltreated by soldiers and civilians.

Pasko Ljubicic is charged, as commander of the Fourth HVO Military Police Battalion, with having "ordered and participated in the attacks on Vitez, Busovaca and the surrounding villages, including Ahmici, Pirici, Santici, Nadoci, Gornja Vecerska, Gacice and so on. Bosniaks, residents of these villages, were detained in detention camps where they were tortured, maltreated and forced to dig trenches, while their property was demolished".

The witness claims to have spent two days in Gornja Vecerska. After that, he and his friend "were tied to each other with string", their "eyes were bandaged and they were taken to Stojkovici", where they were "ordered to go down into a manhole, whose bottom was filled with stinky water".

From that manhole, the witness was taken to Kaonik detention camp. He claims to "have been beaten several times" in that camp and he had to go and dig trenches "although he was almost immobile".

He was released on June 19, 1993.

The second Prosecution witness, Azra Dedic, spoke about the HVO attack on Santici village in Vitez municipality on April 16, 1993.

"After being separated from the men, women and children from Santici village were locked in my garage. We stayed there the whole day and the following night. The day after, HVO soldiers took us to a house in the same village," said Dedic, adding that, when she was leaving the garage, she saw "my husband's dead body". He was killed at the same time as her son, who was 23 years old at the time. Her son's body was in the vicinity of that place, but she claims she did not see it.

From the house in Santici village, women and children, as well as some men, were taken to the elementary school in Dubravica, where this witness spent 17 days together with her sister-in-law and her baby.

The trial is due to continue on December 5.