Bosanac, the war-time and current manager of the Vukovar Hospital, testified about the last two weeks before the fall of the town into the Serbs' hands on 18 November 1991, when Vukovar had already been pounded to rubble and the hospital was attacked daily by tanks, cannons, mortars and from the air.
On 3 November Bosanac sent a fax message to the European Community Monitoring Mission (ECMM) reading: "There are 350 wounded people and patients in the hospital, the situation is critical, we are out of medical supplies, we are desperate and need help," prosecutor Marks Moore said.
Asked by the prosecutor, the witness explained that 65-70 percent of the 350 people in the hospital were civilians, while the rest were members of the National Guard Corps (ZNG) and police.
She explained that most civilians sustained injuries from shells and bombs when they went outside to bring water or repair damaged roofs, which resulted in "horrible injuries and limb amputations", while soldiers were hospitalised mostly due to gunshot wounds.
Asked by the prosecutor if Croatian forces used the hospital for military purposes, Bosanac categorically said that they did not, because she was in the hospital the whole time and would have known or heard of it.
The prosecutor introduced as evidence an appeal Bosanac sent on 4 November to the ECMM and the then leading European politicians, German chancellor Helmut Kohl, British prime minister John Mayor, peace mediator Lord Carrington and others.
Bosanac said that she also sent several fax messages and phoned JNA General Andrija Raseta, who was negotiating with the Croatian government in Zagreb, and unsuccessfully appealed for a cease-fire.
She said that she also sent a message to the UN peace mission warning that the JNA was using chemical and poison weapons, and gas and phosphorous bombs.
Asked if there was evidence of this, she said that parts of a gas bomb and the boots and clothing belonging to a person killed by a phosphorous bomb were kept in the hospital.
The prosecutor said that Bosanac's testimony would be shortened today because she was in pain due to an ankle injury. The witness entered the courtroom in a wheelchair.
Mile Mrksic, Veselin Sljivancanin and Miroslav Radic are charged with eight counts of crimes against humanity and violations of the laws and customs of war committed through persecution, extermination, killing, torture and cruel and inhumane treatment. The initial indictment against them was issued on 7 November 1995, and they are now being tried under the third, joined and amended indictment of 15 November 2004. The charges refer to the imprisonment, torture and killing of at least 264 wounded persons, patients and civilians from the Vukovar Hospital at the Ovcara farm outside the town on 20 November 1991.