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SARAJEVO, October 24 (FENA) - Former Bosnian Army Fifth Corps commander Atif Dudaković and 16 subordinates are accused of wartime crimes including over 300 murders and the destruction of Serb Orthodox churches.
The state court in Sarajevo on Wednesday confirmed the indictment of wartime Bosnian Army general Atif Dudaković and 16 of his subordinates on charges that have angered Bosniak politicians and war veterans.
“The competent prosecutor of the Special Department for War Crimes has been informed by the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina that the indictment has been confirmed in its entirety and that the next hearing in this case is due to be held on October 31 this year,” the prosecution said in a statement.
Dudaković and 16 lower-ranking members of the Bosnian Army’s Fifth Corps are charged with the murders of more than 300 people, the persecution and abuse of civilians and prisoners of war, as well as the destruction of 38 Serbian Orthodox churches and religious buildings, BIRN reports.
They are accused of committing crimes against humanity in the municipalities of Bosanski Petrovac, Ključ, Bosanska Krupa and Sanski Most, and war crimes against the civilian population in the municipalities of Bihać and Cazin.
“The defendants have been charged with committing the murders of more than 300 Serbs, most of whom were civilians, mainly elderly people, as well as soldiers who had either surrendered or had been captured, which means they were deprived of the ability to fight,” the prosecution said in a statement when the indictment was initially raised.
The prosecution said the bodies of some of the victims were found after the war and exhumed from several individual and mass graves, while the search for other victims’ remains is still ongoing.
Part of the indictment concerns war crimes against Bosniaks who were members and supporters of the National Defense Force of the Autonomous Province of Western Bosnia, a self-proclaimed Bosniak-led wartime breakaway statelet.
Dudaković, a popular Bosniak military commander, commanded the Bihac enclave in north-west Bosnia during the war. After the conflict, he became the general commander of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s army.
His arrest in April this year caused anger among Bosniak politicians and war veterans, but was praised by some Bosnian Serb politicians.
The other Bosnian Army Fifth Corps ex-soldiers who are indicted are Ekrem Dedić, Sanel Šabić, Ibrahim Siljedić, Safet Salihagić, Adis Zjakić, Hasan Ružnić, Redžep Zlojić, Samir Solaković, Fatmir Muratović, Muharem Alešević, Husein Balagić, Ale Hodžić, Edin Domazet, Ejub Konjezić, Ibrahim Nadarević and Said Mujić.
(FENA) S. R.
