After the State Court in November rejected a redacted indictment against Milenko Stanic for crimes against humanity in the Vlasenica area in 1992 and 1993, the State Prosecution has re-filed it.

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Bosnia Prosecution Re-files Stanic Indictment for Vlasenica Crimes

Vlasenica. Photo: BIRN

Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Prosecution has re-filed an indictment against Milenko Stanic for crimes against humanity in the Vlasenica area, one month after the court rejected a redacted version of the document and sent it back for new procedure.

Bosnia’s State Prosecution confirmed to BIRN that the original indictment against Stanic was issued on November 15, 2021, but was sent back.

“As per a state court’s decision, the indictment was sent back for editing, after which it was edited and filed with the Court for confirmation on December 3, 2021. The Court issued a decision to reject the indictment, but the Prosecution appealed the decision with the extra-procedural council of the Court, which upheld the appeal and sent the indictment back for a new procedure,” the Prosecution said.

The Prosecution has charged Stanic with having participated, between April 1992 and March 1993, in a joint criminal enterprise, which included murders, unlawful detention, rape, torture, forcible disappearances, deportations and other inhumane acts, as well as persecution of the Bosniak population from the municipality of Vlasenica in eastern Bosnia.

According to the charges, in the said period Stanic was president of the Crisis Committee in Vlasenica and later also the wartime presidency of that municipality.

He is charged with having committed crimes during an attack on the villages of Drum, Gradina, Dzamdzici and Alihodzici, when several Bosniak civilians were killed and their property destroyed and set on fire, while a number of civilians were taken away and unlawfully detained in Susica detention camp in Vlasenica.

The defendant is accused of unlawful detention, murder, torture, abuse, rape, and sexual abuse of detainees in Susica, as well as destruction and demolition of the Hajrija Mosque in Vlasenica with a large quantity of explosive. The mosque was a cultural and historic as well as religious monument.

The Prosecution plans to call 104 witnesses, including 14 witnesses who have been granted protection measures, and introducing several hundred pieces of material evidence.

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