CROSS-EXAMINATION OF DZIDIC TO RESUME IN THE HAGUE ON 19 AUG

AUG $ THE HAGUE, July 31 (Hina) - On the second day of cross-examination of a Prosecution witness, Sefkija Dzidic, at the trial of Bosnian Croat General Tihomir Blaskic before the International War Crimes Tribunal, the Defence continued to analyse aspects of the state of affairs in central Bosnia during 1992 and 1993, which Dzidic did not mention during his testimony. The Defence layer, Anto Nobilo, cited about twenty cases of the killing, wounding or abuse of HVO (Bosnian Croat armed force) members between February 1992 to April 1993. In his testimony, the witness Dzidic, who was a former head of the Stari Vitez (Moslem-led) territorial defence, claimed that the Moslem side had not carried out violence against Croats, and replied that mentioned incidents were shoot-outs between Croats or isolated cases. I did not issue an order that on 16 or 17 April 1993 fire be opened from a rifle at Blaskic's associates Marko Prskalo and Zoran Pililic when they were returning from Stari Vitez to Blaskic's headquarters in the Vitez Hotel, the witness said. An investigation in the wounding of them by two bullets each while they were running through a cordon of UNPROFOR soldiers toward the hotel did not yield any result, Dzidic added. He then spoke of the activities and organisation of the Bosnian army in central Bosnia. Asked by the Defence with which units Mujaheddin served who kidnapped an HVO commander in Zenica and killed his four escorts on 15 April 1993, the witness said that in some way Mujaheddin were included into the Bosnian army. Trying to show that Blaskic's headquarters was surrounded in spring 1993, the Defence and the witness analysed the control over points along all roads from the town of Vitez. The witness confirmed that in October 1992 the local command of the territorial defence ordered to set up a barricade on the road from Vitez to Busovaca in the village of Ahmici so that HVO troops be prevented to pass there. Dzidic explained that while he was the commander of the defence of Stari Vitez he belonged neither to the Bosnian Army's 325th brigade of nor to its third corps, but a person serving with the 325th brigade called from Ahmici on 16 April 1993 when the attack on the village commenced. He said that during 11 months that he spent in surrounded Stari Vitez he had obtained arms only by seizing or taking them from houses in Stari Vitez. Then the Defence layer Nobilo quoted Bosnian Army General Mehmed Alagic as saying in his book that weaponry in Stari Vitez was sent to Stari Vitez via connections in the UN. The commander of defence of Stari Vitez said on Thursday that he had not accepted HVO public calls for evacuation of civilians from Stari Vitez, but in his first testimony Dzidic said that HVO had not even allowed evacuation of the wounded. The cross-questioning of Dzidic, which the Defence portrayed as very important to the presentation of the situation in central Bosnia in 1992 and 1993, will resume on 19 August. (hina) mš 312228 MET jul 97