VUKOVAR: TRIAL OF 13 PERSONS INDICTED FOR GENOCIDE BEGINS

VUKOVAR, Jan 24 (Hina) - The trial of 13 persons, mostly Serbs, accused of committing genocide, a crime against humanity and international law, during the Serbian aggression on Tompojevci in Croatia's eastern Vukovar-Srijem County, began at the Vukovar County Court on Wednesday. Only two defendants are present at the trial - the third indictee Petar Djukic and the ninth indictee Tihomir Pavkovic. The other eleven indictees, who are at large, are being tried in absentia. The State Prosecutor's Office in Osijek issued an indictment in late 1996 and the two indictees present at the trial were arrested in November last year and have been in custody since. According to the indictment, between October 10, 1991 and March 17, 1992, the indictees "acted systematically with the aim of making living conditions for the Croat residents of Tompojevci in the Vukovar area impossible, as part of a general plan of establishment of an ethnically cleansed 'Great Serbia'." Reading the indictment, Deputy State Prosecutor Bozidar Piljic said the indicted had organised local authority under the name 'territorial defence' and, dressed in the uniforms of the former JNA (Yugoslav People's Army) and wearing weapons, "restricted movement between 6 pm and 6 am, introduced obligatory permits for movement in the village, confiscated all jewellery, money, gold and other valuable things, and entered houses both during the day and at night, made death threats and committed physical abuse." The indictment further reads that the indicted inflicted injuries on many Croat villagers, and on March 17, 1992 expelled 299 Croat villagers having forced them previously, under death threats, to sign statements saying they were leaving all of their movable and immovable property to the so-called Republic of Srpska Krajina and abandoning the Republic of Croatia 'of their own accord'. Djuro Kljajic, Dane Djukic, Stefan Pencarski, Jovo Radeka, Eva Radeka, Sreten Katic, Djuro Kosnjar, Zeljko Grubljesic, Ranko Mirilovic, Milan Kovacevic and Nenad Macura are tried in absentia. The indictment also included the names of Andrija Antolovic and Momir Andjelic, for whom it was established in the meantime that they had died. Charges against indictee Ranko Grubljesic were dropped before the start of the trial. The trial is to include testimonies by 48 persons who witnessed to the war events of 1991 and 1992 in the Tompojevci area. (hina) rml