ZAGREB, July 8 (Hina) - Zagreb County State Attorney Radovan Santek on Thursday expanded the indictment against Dinko Sakic, war crimes suspect and commander of a Croatian World War Two concentration camp, who is being tried at the
Zagreb County Court for war crimes against civilians. Santek told the court the indictment was adjusted with facts established during the testimonies given by surviving inmates in the four-month main hearing.
ZAGREB, July 8 (Hina) - Zagreb County State Attorney Radovan Santek
on Thursday expanded the indictment against Dinko Sakic, war crimes
suspect and commander of a Croatian World War Two concentration
camp, who is being tried at the Zagreb County Court for war crimes
against civilians.
Santek told the court the indictment was adjusted with facts
established during the testimonies given by surviving inmates in
the four-month main hearing.#L#
Sakic is now also charged with personally killing an unknown inmate
who had stolen corn, and with being accountable for the death of an
undetermined number of inmates by having taken part in the so called
"hunting game", i.e. shooting at inmates from the camp's command
headquarters.
The changed indictment expanded the count referring to the
selection and killing of ill and unfit for work inmates selected
from the inmates' hospital and barracks, and during musters.
The count now states that according to previously compiled data,
inmates were on occasions selected from their barracks at night-
time and subsequently killed in a significant, if not precisely
established numbers, mainly at Gradina, a killing site on the
Jasenovac camp grounds.
Such selections, the expanded count says, were frequent in the
autumn of 1944 when, according to the indictment, the defendant
commanded the camp.
The panel of judges allowed a break in the main hearing to give the
defendant's attorneys time to comment on the changes. The main
hearing will resume on July 15, and will then be postponed until
late August, panel of judges president Drazen Tripalo said.
Two witnesses testified today, Croatian State Archive (HDA)
manager Josip Kolanovic, and the head of HDA's department for
recent Croatian history, Slavica Plese.
Both confirmed the authenticity of two documents pertaining to the
Independent State of Croatia (NDH, 1941-1945) State Administration
for Reconstruction, which Santek added to the court files
yesterday.
One of the documents refers to the field of activity of the camps'
headquarters, while the other are instructions for the technical
equipment and organisation of service at the camps, with a
supplement on premises necessary at camps.
According to witnesses, the documents were made by the
reconstruction administration, which was established in June 1941
and dealt with property belonging to Serbs. Together with the
Administration for Economic Reconstruction, which dealt with
Jewish property, it subsequently became the Office for
Nationalised Property, which was under the jurisdiction of the
State Treasury Ministry.
Kolanovic said the two documents do not refer to NDH's
concentration camps, but to three camps, in Sisak, Slavonska
Pozega, and Bjelovar, which were used exclusively for the
deportation of Serbs from Croatia.
According to Kolanovic, in July 1941, NDH and Germany signed an
agreement under which 50,000 Slovenes were to move into Croatia and
be replaced in Slovenia by the volkdeutscher. The agreement further
envisaged the deportation of 170,000 Serbs from Croatia. By October
1941, when the three mentioned camps were no longer under
jurisdiction of the State Administration for Reconstruction, some
15,000 Serbs had passed through them.
Slavica Plese said the reconstruction administration
documentation contains data on the registration, nationalisation,
management, and sale of the entire movable and non-movable property
of 20,000 Jews, 9,900 Serbs, and 1,760 persons who had violated
public peace and order.
Plese stressed the data is not conclusive, with 30 percent still to
be processed.
County state attorney Santek inquired about the fate of the people
who were brought to the deportation camps. Plese said it could not
be inferred from the documentation, given that only "deported" is
written behind a deported person's name, without any further
explanation or destination stated.
Santek believes the regulations of the State Administration for
Reconstruction were not used only for the deportation of Serbs from
Croatia, but also for the imprisonment of Serbs, Jews, and others in
Jasenovac and other Ustashi camps. He requested that the
regulations be read out as evidence material for the prosecution.
The defence objected to Santek's opinion, but not to his request.
The regulations were read by panel of judges president Tripalo.
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