THE HAGUE/ZAGREB, Jan 29(Hina) - Former Croatian Defence Council (HVO) commander Ivica Rajic, who is charged by the UN criminal tribunal in The Hague with war crimes against Bosnian Muslims in the early 1990s, on Thursday pleaded not
guilty to all ten charges of the amended indictment.
THE HAGUE/ZAGREB, Jan 29(Hina) - Former Croatian Defence Council (HVO)
commander Ivica Rajic, who is charged by the UN criminal tribunal in
The Hague with war crimes against Bosnian Muslims in the early 1990s,
on Thursday pleaded not guilty to all ten charges of the amended
indictment.#L#
Rajic, 46, who also went by the name of Viktor Andric, commanded the
HVO Second Operations Group. He is accused of ordering an attack on
the Muslim population of the village of Stupni Do near Vares in
central Bosnia on 23 October 1993 when at least 37 people were killed,
women were sexually abused and the village destroyed. The indictment
charges him with the arrest, maltreatment and inhumane confinement of
250 Muslims in Vares in October 1993.
On the basis of individual and command responsibility, Rajic was
accused of serious breaches of the Geneva Conventions for the wilful
killing, inhumane treatment, including sexual abuse, unlawful
confinement of civilians, appropriation and wanton destruction of
property not justified by military necessity.
(Hina) vm sb