Barisic, whose statement, given during the investigation, was seen as crucial for the issuing of the indictment, said today that he could not recall most of the events.
Asked how he was able to recall the events when giving his statement to an investigating judge in 2001, Barisic said he had not suffered from amnesia at the time, and now suffered from amnesia and could not recall most of the events. He said that in 1993 he suffered a serious traffic accident, as a result of which he had bouts of memory loss.
Despite opposition from the defence counsel, Judge Spomenka Tonkovic, who chairs the panel of judges conducting the trial, read out the witnesses's statement given during the investigation on 11 October 2001.
Barisic said at the time that during a tour of a section of the prison on 12 and 13 April 1992 he saw many people wearing uniforms worn by reserve members of the former Yugoslav People's Army, who were mutilated, "without eyes, ears or tongues and who begged to be killed".
The witness said he had concluded by their accent that they were probably Montenegrins or (Serbs) from Trebinje in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
When he testified at the initial trial at which the accused were released, a ruling quashed by the Supreme Court last year, Barisic said that he was not incriminating the accused with his statement, but that the leading people of the Military Police 72nd Battalion and the Security Information Service (SIS) office in Split were responsible for the crimes.