HEARING OF SECOND WITNESS IN SAKIC CASE TAKES FIVE HOURS

( Editorial: --> 4734 ) ZAGREB, June 30 (Hina) - Tuesday's hearing of the second witness in pre-trial proceedings against Dinko Sakic, the Jasenovac concentration camp commander during World War II, lasted five hours. The pre-trial proceedings against Sakic are being conducted in the Zagreb County Court. According to Ivan Kern, Sakic's court-appointed attorney, the hearing of witness Dragan Roler lasted a long time because the investigating judge attempted to gain as much information as possible about the general situation in the Jasenovac and Stara Gradiska camps, where the witness spent three years as a prisoner. At one stage of his imprisonment, Roler worked as a nurse in the camp infirmary. The witness recollected in detail everything that had happened from the moment of his arrest in 1942 to his release in 1945. Kern said that Roler only once directly accused his client, for attending the hanging of a prisoner in Jasenovac. Roler was a student at the time he received a three-month prison sentence in Zagreb and was sent to Jasenovac in line with a police decision. He remained in the Jasenovac and Stara Gradiska camps for three years. Roler said he had known Sakic since the moment he was taken to the Jasenovac concentration camp. Namely, Roler was with Sakic on the same train while being taken to Jasenovac on February 18, 1942. (hina) jn rml /mbr 301648 MET jun 98