$ ZAGREB, THE HAGUE, Oct 8 (Hina) - All ten Croats from central Bosnia who had handed themselves over to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague on Monday, pleaded innocent at their first
hearing on Wednesday.
HAGUE
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ZAGREB, THE HAGUE, Oct 8 (Hina) - All ten Croats from central Bosnia
who had handed themselves over to the International Criminal
Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague on Monday,
pleaded innocent at their first hearing on Wednesday. #L#
The first four indictees - Dario Kordic, Ivan Santic, Mario
Cerkez and Pero Skopljak, against whom a joint indictment had been
raised, under the name "Kordic and Others", appeared at their first
hearing on Wednesday morning.
The other six against whom a joint indictment "Kupreskic and
Others" had been raised - brothers Zoran and Mirjan Kupreskic,
Vladimir Santic, Drago Josipovic, Marinko Katava and Dragan Papic,
appeared before the panel of judges on Wednesday afternoon.
The date of the beginning of the trial will be announced
subsequently.
The prosecutor and defence teams have 60 days in which to file
appeals.
Before the surrender of the Croats, the United States had
given its guarantee that the trial would begin within three to five
months.
Dario Kordic, a political Croat leader in central Bosnia-
Herzegovina, is charged with crimes against humanity, heavy
violations of the Geneva Convention, and the violation of the
customs and law of war.
The same indictment used to include the named of General
Tihomir Blaskic, whose trial is in process, and Zlatko Aleksovski,
who is waiting for his trial to begin.
All four were indicted under the criteria of objective
responsibility.
They were performing military and political duties during the
time the war crimes they have been charged with, had been committed.
Kordic was the deputy president of the Croat Community of
Herzeg-Bosnia, Cerkez was the commander of a Croatian defence
Council brigade in Vitez, Santic the head of the municipality, while
Pero Skopljak was said to have been police commissioner in Vitez
during the time of Croat-Moslem conflicts.
Several witnesses for the prosecution at General Blaskic's
trial confirmed that Skopljak had been police commissioner until
June 1992, before the period the indictment relates to.
They are charged with attacks on several undefended towns,
villages and hamlets in the Lasva valley, in which a number of
Moslem civilians had been killed and wounded, with imprisoning
Moslems who were forces to dig trenches or were used as live
shields, and with attacks on and destruction of Moslem property in
the period from May 1992 to May 1993.
The second group, from the joint indictment "Kupreskic and
Others" are charged with direct participation in systematic attacks
on Moslem villages in the Lasva valley on 16 April 1993, with the
murder of Moslem civilians, and with the murder of about a hundred
Moslems in Ahmici, a village near Vitez, and the destruction of
Moslem houses in that village.
According to the indictment, they severely violated the Geneva
Conventions and custom and law of war.
The list contains eight names. Vlatko Kupreskic did not
surrender, and Stipo Alilovic, according to his family, was never in
Vitez during the conflicts between Croats and Moslems, but lived in
the Netherlands. He died in Amsterdam in 1995.
According to statements of witnesses for the prosecution at
General Blaskic's trial, the indictment against Marinko Katava is
disputable.
He is charged with the murder of Musafer Puscul on 16 April
1993 in Ahmici. According to a witness for the prosecution at the
Blaskic case, Muhamed Mujezinovic, Katava was on that day in his
flat, which is in the same building as Mujezinovic's.
(hina) lm
081934 MET oct 97