INDICTMENT ISSUED AGAINST FIVE PERSONS FOR WAR CRIMES IN ROGATICA AREA

A prosecutor of the Special Department for War Crimes of the Prosecutor’s Office of BiH has filed an indictment against:

1. Zoran Nešković, born in 1965 in Rogatica

2. Panto Pantović, born in 1948 in Sarajevo

3. Slaviša Đerić, aka “Đera”, born in 1973 in Rogatica

4. Nenad Ujić, born in 1972 in Rogatica

5. Pero Despet, born in 1963 in Rogatica.

The charges against the indictees are that during the war and armed conflict in BiH, in the second half of 1995, they as members of the VRS Military Police, namely the accused Nešković as Commander of the Detention Facility in the facility ‘Rasadnik’ Agricultural Estate in Rogatica and the other indictees as guards in the said facility, acted contrary to the Geneva Conventions for the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War.

The indictment alleges that in late July 1995 more than 40 Bosniak civilians from the Rogatica, Žepa and Srebrenica areas were detained at the facility, most of them elderly people in their 60s and two minors, as well as more than 10 persons who needed medical aid and who had been abducted from the convoy accompanied by international forces, on the road Žepa-Kladanj.

The indictees are charged with multiple beatings, robberies, sexual abuse and humiliation and other forms of severe ill-treatment of detainees. Most of the victims suffered severe physical and mental injuries and health impairments the consequences of which they still feel.

Also, the defendants are charged with the murder of one detainee who was a religious official, who was taken out of the facility and killed by shooting from a firearm.

The indictees are charged with the criminal offence of War Crimes against Civilians under Article 142 (1) of the assumed Criminal Code of the SFRY and the Prosecution will prove the allegations of the indictment by subpoenaing 45 witnesses, 3 of which with granted protective measures, as well as 2 expert witnesses, and it will enclose more than 150 pieces of material evidence.

The indictment was forwarded to the Court of BiH for confirmation.