At the war crimes trial of Tomislav Mercep, top advisor in the Croatian wartime Interior Ministry, the court heard the testimony from the wife of one of the missing Croatian Serbs.
Pero Rajcevic, from the village of Pakrac, was arrested at his home on October 11, 1991, and has been missing ever since, despite a long and extensive search, testified Rajcevic's wife on Wednesday.
The witness, who made a plea to media not to publish her name, recalled how „three uniformed men“ came to their home on that day, arrested her husband and took him away in a car.
Rajcevic was the director of the Pakrac branch of the Bjelovarska Banka, a small bank in central Croatia.
She said that several times she visited Tomislav Mercep asking for his help in finding her husband, because she suspected Mercep's men where the ones who captured Rajcevic.
Mercep told her that he did not know who Rajcevic was, but promised to help. Howver nothing happened.
She also visited the prison in Pakracka Poljana, but she was told Rajcevic was not there.
Miroslav Brisevac, former driver in the „Mercepovci“ unit, also testified on Wednesday, claiming he does not know who commanded the unit.
Tomislav Mercep is charged, as a commander of the “Mercepovci” unit, with having personally ordered the unlawful arrest, torture and killing of civilians from October 8, 1991 until mid-December 1991 in and around Zagreb and in the towns of Kutina and Pakrac in central Croatia.
The trial continues on October 16.
Timeline of events in the case against 13 former Serb fighters charged with committing war crimes in the villages of Cuska, Zahac, Ljubenic and Pavlac in Kosovo in 1999.