Bosniak Passengers 'Seized From Bus and Killed'

Prosecution witness Sakiba Hodzic testified at a court in Sarajevo on Tuesday that she was told about the abduction of the Bosniaks from Sjeverin in Serbia on October 22, 1992.

She said she used to communte daily from Sjeverin to the Serbian town of Priboj along with some of the Bosniaks who died.

But that night she stayed over in Priboj instead, and was told by a local shop owner in the morning that the others had been taken off their bus along the route in the village of Mioce.

“I called my neighbour Mira and asked her what happened. She was shaken up, she cried. She only told me it was true... She was on the bus and I went to see her at her work. She said that in Mioce, people in uniforms were standing by the Amfora tavern and they stopped the bus,” said Hodzic.

The witness recalled that her neighbour said that two men, one wearing a fur cap with Serbian Chetnik insignia on it, entered the bus.

“They ordered everyone to show their IDs. They told Bosniaks to get out. There were more uniformed people outside, among them a woman. The driver pleaded with them, tried to stop them,” said Hodzic, adding that the passengers were then taken away.

The next day, she said, she read the names of all those abducted in a newspaper which said they were all killed in the town of Visegrad.

Krsmanovic is charged with participating in the abduction of the 16 Bosniak civilians from Sjeverin who were travelling to Priboj.

The civilians were allegedly taken out of the bus on a part of the road that goes through Bosnia and taken to the Vilina Vlas hotel, where they were beaten with wooden batons and then killed.

The prosecution showed Hodzic photographs from the Vilina Vlas hotel and she recognised some of her neighbours, including her husband’s brother.

The trial of Krsmanovic, who, as a member of the Bosnian Serb Army's 2nd Podrinje Light Infantry Brigade, is also charged with other war crimes in Visegrad, will resume on March 26.