The Committee for the Collection of Data

on Crimes Committed against Humanity

and International Law

B e l g r a d e

Belgrade, December 1998

The camp was situated on the premises of a former warehouse of the Yugoslav People's Army and its ground included an administrative building and several hangars.

These illegally arrested Serbs lived under almost impossible conditions; many were physically liquidated or have survived but with seriously damaged health.

Daily instances of rape and of other forms of sexual violation of Serb women and men, along with unheard-of humiliation, almost impossible accommodation and hygienic conditions and starvation of prisoners, were in the function of ethnic cleansing of Serbs from the part of Herzegovina in which the camp was situated and in the function of genocide against Serbs.

From the statements of the interrogated Serb witnesses – former prisoners of the Dretelj Camp – one can understand how and why the Serbs arrived in a situation in which a camp of such a nature was to be established especially for them.

Witness 314/94² stated, among other things:

"Such a situation increased fear among the Serbs, as they did not feel safe in their homes. Consequently, somewhere in the second half of March and early in April 1992, on about ten occasions I, together with my wife and children, fled from Èapljina to the village of Klepci, where the Serb population was in majority… it was fear that made me send my wife and children to Berkoviæi. From there they proceeded to my sister's in Kruševac, never to return to Èapljina.

"I stayed in Èapljina and tried to go to work as regularly as possible. I remember that artillery shells began to fall on Èapljina on 12 April 1992 and that since that day every way out of Èapljina was closed – one can consider that since then we were in a state of war.

"It was at that point that Croats began to arrest and take away prominent Serbs."

This witness stated that he had not received any document from the authorities stating the reason for his imprisonment in the Dretelj Camp or whether he was sentenced for anything, or any document stating the time of his leaving the camp.

Witness 38/96-1, Serb, teacher of physics, stated that he had lived in Mostar and that towards the end of May 1992 persons unknown to him cut off all his fruit trees in a plot around his summer house in the vicinity of Mostar and left on the gate a board reading "Arkan shall be killed". Fruit trees in the neighbouring plots owned by Serbs were also destroyed.

The Serb man 445/94-8, former prisoner of the Dretelj Camp, stated that in the beginning of 1992 the Croats and Muslims in Mostar began to arm themselves, Serb houses were being blown up, shooting went on all the time, especially at night, so that fear crept among all the Serbs. Ransacking of the apartments in which the Serbs lived became frequent.

Witness 40/96-1, woman, teacher who had lived in Mostar, stated that war events in Mostar started on 4 April 1992, that the Yugoslav People's Army retreated in May 1992 and that only the territorial defence of River Neretva remained in that area. Already in June 1992 Serbs retreated from Mostar's left bank of the Neretva, whereupon the Muslims proclaimed that they had "liberated themselves from Chetniks" and that since then life became unbearable for the Serbs who had remained in Mostar.

The same witness also stated that, at a meeting at a school where she had been employed, Vahid Durakoviæ, teacher of defence and protection at that school, said, "If I had a rifle, I would shoot off her Serb ear", and that he was looking straight at her while saying this.

She added that until the emergence of national parties in Mostar, Serbs had lived normally with Muslims and Croats.

However, multiparty elections were followed by ethnic separation and by intolerance of Croats and Muslims towards Serbs.

From the evidence collected one can conclude that from May through September 1992 the most responsible persons in the Dretelj Camp were General Blaž Kraljeviæ, Commander of HOS for Western Herzegovina, Sreæko Erceg, Administrator of the Camp, and Edib Buljubašiæ. It is clear that during their administration of the camp these persons were also objectively responsible for all the crimes against Serb prisoners committed by direct perpetrators.

2. SEIZING THE PROPERTY OF THE SERBS

TAKEN TO THE DRETELJ CAMP

The majority of the interrogated Serb men and women who ended up in the Dretelj Camp in 1992 stated that their movable property was seized from them at the moment of their arrest and taken away from their apartments. As this happened almost invariably, the perpetrators of such crimes probably believed that those Serbs would no longer need their property. Below are several examples of this:

Evidence: 356/94-2

Evidence: 313/94-1

2.3. From the Serb woman 31/94, during her arrest, without providing her with any certificate of the seizing, was seized all the gold jewellery (about ten rings, 5 – 6 pendants, a necklace, a foreign exchange saving book (3,000 DEM), as well as "a considerable amount of the then Croatian dinars" – the witness's salary that a colleague of hers had brought her the day before.

2.4. The Serb man 208/96, born in 1925, who lived in Mostar and was arrested on 6 August 1992, as well as his wife, were ordered during the arrest to "deliver all valuables". They delivered the cash in the amount of 1,480 DEM and 9,000 dinars.

Evidence: 208/96

2.5. From the Serb woman 437/94-1, a teacher who had lived in Dretelj since 21 July 1992, at the time of arrest and before she was taken to Dretelj were seized a pair of gold earrings, a necklace, a ring, a gold-plated wristwatch and 500 DEM in cash, and from her husband S. was seized a wristwatch. No certificate of the seizing was issued to them.

Evidence: 437/94-1

Evidence: 445/94-1 and 445/94-40

2.7. The Serb man 445/94-2, brutally tortured in the Dretelj Camp, stated that as of April 1992 members of the Croatian Armed Forces (HOS) ransacked the apartments of all the Serbs in Èapljina. The apartments of the absent Serbs were broken into and ransacked. This also happened in his apartment while he was absent and some of his documents were taken away on that occasion. On 6 June 1992 a HOS patrol consisting of Mirsad Repak, Dragan Dujmoviæ and Ivan Mediæ overturned everything in the apartment, broke things, cut up armchairs, shot up the apartment and took away between 400 and 500 DEM.

Evidence: 445/94-2

2.8. From the Serb man 445/94-4, who had lived in Mostar and was taken to the Dretelj Prison Camp on 3 August 1992, were seized a wallet, a wristwatch, a car registration and other personal effects, and the administrator of the institution in which those effects were seized was Ivan Zelenika.

Evidence: 445/94-4

Responsible: Ivan Zelenika.

2.9. From the Serb man 445/94-5, who had lived in Mostar before being taken to the Dretelj Camp, on 5 July 1992 a HOS patrol seized 200 – 300 DEM in cash and "everything that was of value in the home".

2.10. From the Serb woman 445/94-7, who spent only two days in the Dretelj Camp, and who until her arrest on 15 July 1992 had lived in Mostar together with her family, Commander Ivan Zelenika – Ivo seized 5,000 DEM in cash (from the purse that had been taken away from her), as well as the gold jewellery that she was wearing (a wedding ring, a pair of earrings and a necklace).

Evidence: 445/94-7

Responsible: Ivan Zelenika

2.11 From Witness 445/94-8, arrested together with his parents and sister on 10 July 1992 and imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp until 18 August 1992, were seized about 1,000 DEM that he had given to his mother to keep them for him and that she kept in her wallet. In addition, all the jewellery that he and his family possessed was seized from them.

Evidence: 445/94-8

2.12. From the Serb woman 445/94-9 and her husband 445/94-4, who had both lived in Mostar before being arrested (she was imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp from 3 August till 18 August 1992), during the arrest were seized "all the valuables they had possessed": a motorcar, all the gold they had (valued at about 6,000 DEM), up to 2,800 DEM in cash and a saving book with a deposit of 600 USD.

This witness also stated the following:

"… They took us out of our apartment and then forced us to give them the key to the apartment; we never returned to the apartment, where we left numerous valuable belongings and equipment, as we had both worked hard and saved all our lives and had no children…

"They took us to a prison in a former military infirmary in Mostar and brought us before Administrator Zelenika, who assaulted me right away that I was "a Chetnik woman", began to beat me and told me to take off the two gold rings that I had on my fingers. When I tried to take them off but failed, he grasped a knife smeared with blood and started shouting that he would cut my fingers off. Eventually I somehow managed to take the rings off and give them to him…"

Evidence: 445/94-9

Responsible: Ivan Zelenika

2.13. The Serb woman 445/94-10, who had lived in Mostar and was imprisoned in Dretelj from 3 August till 20 September 1992, stated: "Some men in multicoloured uniforms came on 3 April 1992, ransacked our apartment and took our two latest salaries (mine and my husband's) and other valuable things from the apartment."

Evidence: 445/94-10

2.14. From the Serb man 445/94-15, imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp from 12 June till 17 August 1992, upon arrival in the camp were seized a wristwatch, some money and documents; he was ordered to take off his clothing and was given a Yugoslav People's Army uniform, which he had to put on and wear.

Evidence: 445/94-15

Evidence: 445/94-23

Evidence: 445/94-38

Responsible: Ivan Zelenika

2.17. From the Serb woman 660/95-5, born in 1913, imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp from 1 August till 16 August 1992, upon arrival in the camp was seized her gold jewellery – a gold necklace, a ring and a pair of large earrings.

2.18. In the former military infirmary in Mostar, in May 1992 soldiers in black uniforms removed eight gold teeth from the jaws of the Serb woman J. K. and took them away before they took her to the Dretelj Camp.

Evidence: 334/97-20 and the Finding and Opinion of the Commission of Physicians and Experts BG-33 of 27 March 1998.

Evidence: 445/94-6

Responsible: Mirsad Repak

3. ACCOMMODATION, FOOD AND HYGIENIC CONDITIONS

IN THE DRETELJ CAMP

From the statements of numerous Serb witnesses – prisoners of the Dretelj Camp from May till August 1992 – it was established that the conditions of accommodation, bad and insufficient food, as well as poor hygienic conditions, were very difficult, or as many witnesses stated, terrible.

3.1. Accommodation Conditions

Initially, Serbs were put in smaller rooms in the Dretelj Camp – men separated from women, while later on, when the number of the prisoners grew, they were put in hangars. In some of the small rooms the floor was covered with parquet, while in the rest of the rooms and in the hangars the prisoners slept on concrete floors, often without a blanket or any other cover. The men were put in a room without beds – as a witness stated, in a room where the floor was of "bare concrete and we slept on the concrete" (313/94-1). The small size of the room and the great number of prisoners in it gave the prisoners an impression that they were "packed like sardines" (38/96-1).

According to the statement of Witness 445/94-15, as many as 10 men were put in a small room "about 1.5 m wide and not more than 3 m long".

The Serb women were in no better position than the men. The majority of them slept on concrete or, as Witness 445/94-37 stated, "on some kind of stretchers".

The statement of Witness 856/95 is illustrative evidence of the conditions in which imprisoned women lived: "… Together with us women taken there from Mostar, there were more than 60 women in that hangar. I slept on the bare concrete and those who managed to grab a blanket were considered lucky. Some of the women slept on hospital stretchers, some on military cots…"

Evidence: 31/94, 313/94-1, 437/94-1, 445/94-1, 445/94-2, 445/94-15, 445/94-23, 445/94-37, 660/95-4, 660/95-6, 674/95-1, 793/95, 856/95, 856/95-7, 38/96-1, 38/96-8, 84/96, 208/96, 364/96-7, 364/96-8, 364/96-12, and 444/96.

3.2. Food

In addition to utterly inhuman accommodation conditions, lack of basic conditions for maintaining hygiene, daily physical and psychological torture, forcing the imprisoned men to have homosexual intercourse, raping the women, and even murdering the prisoners (as will be shown in the text to follow), the Serb imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp were subjected to starvation.

The prisoners were given minimal quantities of food, of poor quality, and insufficient quantities of drinking water; as a rule, both food and water were issued irregularly, so that the statements of numerous imprisoned Serbs impose a simple conclusion that the aim was to destroy the Serbian nation.

"Food" was issued mainly twice a day, on some occasion thrice a day, sometimes only once a day, and according to the statement of Witness 445/94-40, when a member of HOS would get killed, "we were punished by being deprived of food…"

As a rule, breakfast consisted of a glass of tea, a small piece of bread and a small package of meat paste to be shared among several prisoners.

The second meal consisted of "some tasteless soup, so thin that we drank it" (Witness 221/94-11), or "a liquid in which one could notice a rice grain or a small piece of potato" (Witness 444/96), or "a bean soup, but without a single bean in it" (Witness 793/95) and the like, with a piece of bread.

Such "diet" and other conditions under which the Serb prisoners lived brought about their losing a lot of weight within a comparatively short time, so that at the time of leaving the camp they weighed much less than they did at the time of being taken to the camp, as numerous witnesses stated:

Evidence: 221/94-11, 295/94-1, 445/94-40, 231/95-2, 660/95-5, 674/95-1, 793/95, 856/95-7, 856/95-21, 84/96-3, 195/96-1, 364/96-7, and 364/96-12.

3.3. Shortage of Water and other Basic Conditions

for the Maintenance of Personal Hygiene

Numerous witnesses stated that the Serbs imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp, men and women alike, did not have even elementary conditions for the maintenance of hygiene.

As the prisoners did not have enough water even for drinking, they never had a bath or washed their faces throughout their imprisonment in the Dretelj Camp. The men did not shave or have a haircut, so that, according to Witness 84/96-3, the prisoners became infested with lice.

Witness 445/94-15, a prisoner of the Dretelj Camp from 2 June till 17 August 1992, stated that the first time he had a bath was after 72 days, when he was transferred from the Dretelj Camp to a camp in Grabovina.

Witness 445/94-23, a prisoner of the Dretelj Camp from 7 July till 18 August 1992, stated that "in the Dretelj Prison Camp no-one had a bath during those 40 days", i.e. throughout his confinement there.

The imprisoned Serb women were in no better position.

Thus Witness 437/94-1, a Serb woman imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp from 21 July till 18 August 1992, stated that "… the conditions of life were terrible, as there was not even enough water. We were unable to maintain personal hygiene. They never let us wash ourselves during that month… I did so only once, while I was washing their laundry…"

Evidence: 221/94-11, 314/94, 437/94-1, 445/94-15, 445/94-23, 445/94-38, 445/94-40, 674/95-1, 84/96-3, and 364/96-12.

3.4. Prisoners Relieving Themselves

under Inappropriate Conditions

The Serb prisoners of the Dretelj Camp were not provided with rooms intended for their relieving themselves and had to do so in very humiliating circumstances. They had to relieve themselves in pails in the rooms in which they were confined, sometimes in a smaller room and sometimes in a hangar, depending on the number of prisoners; they ate and slept in the same room. Now and then the pails would be taken out, but remained in the rooms overnight.

From the statements of former prisoners of this camp it has been established that during the day the permission to prisoners to relieve themselves outside the rooms in which they were living was given by the guards, but some of the guards refused to grant such a permission to the prisoners (445-94-1).

It has been established from the statements of the prisoners that the living conditions were almost unbearable during the days when air temperature in those rooms went up to 45⁰ C and the prisoners had to relieve themselves in the rooms (the example given by Witness 84/96).

A witness, former prisoner of the Dretelj Camp, a Serb woman born in 1940, secondary school teacher, stated: "… there were no toilets, so we had to beg the guards to allow us to go to the woods to relieve ourselves, while the guards watched us do it. This was a terrible humiliation for us…"

Evidence: 437/94-1, 445/94-1, 445/94-15, 434/95-3, 660/95-4, 660/95-5, 793/95, 84/96, 364/96-12, 444/96, and 334/97-20.

4. HUMILIATION OF SERB PRISONERS

In addition to all the rest of the conditions, which were almost unbearable, the Serb prisoners of the Dretelj Camp were brutally humiliated by the camp staff, from the guards to the administrators of the camp. Besides subjecting them to starvation, unbearable hygienic conditions, daily torture and even murder, the camp staff ruined the dignity of the prisoners by subjecting them to the worst forms of humiliation, such as only a sick mind can conceive. Below are just a few examples:

4.1. Licking Boots and Toilet Floor Tiles,

Cleaning and Clearing Clogged Toilet Bowls with Bare Hands

4.1.1. The Serb man S. N. was forced to lick toilet floor tiles.

Evidence: 364/96-8

4.1.2. The Serb man C. S., together with a group of other imprisoned Serbs, was forced to clean toilet bowls with his bare hands and to clear them with his bare hands when they got clogged.

Evidence: 445/94-23

4.1.3. The camp staff would first dirty their boots by walking in excrement, whereupon they would force the imprisoned Serbs to lick the excrement off the boots.

Evidence: 445/94-38

4.1.4. Even a doctor employed with the Dretelj Camp ordered Witness 445/94-39 to lick his boots.

Evidence: 445/94-39

4.2. Forcing Serb Prisoners to Imitate Animals

4.2.1. One of the guards took off his belt, tied it around the neck of the Serb man S. B., and forced S. B. to crawl on all fours and bark like a dog.

Evidence: 84/96-3

4.2.2. The camp staff would force the imprisoned Serbs to pull out grass and bark, bleat and bray while doing that.

Evidence: 208/96

4.2.3. Many Serbs – former prisoners of the Dretelj Camp have witnessed that the imprisoned Serbs were forced to bleat, neigh, moo, meow and chirp.

Evidence: 445/94-2, 231/95-2, 434/95-3, 364/96-8, and 444/96.

4.2.4. A witness – former prisoner of the Dretelj Camp – gave a vivid description of the circumstances in which this form of humiliation of Serbs was applied:

Evidence: 445/94-38

4.3. Forcing Serb Prisoners to Graze and Swallow Grass

A great number of the Serb prisoners of the Dretelj Camp stated that one of the favourite ways of humiliation of Serbs was forcing them to graze and swallow grass.

4.3.1. Witness 84/96-3 stated: "…I had to graze grass with stubble. The dry and rough grass got stuck in my throat, so I nearly choked. They forced other prisoners as well to do that – on numerous occasions".

4.3.2. Witness 445/94-15 stated: "… and we had to swallow grass together with earth. Also, we had to swallow cigarette butts, so that I ate at least a kilogram of butts…"

4.3.3. Particularly interesting is the statement of Witness 231/95-2, who stated that the guards forced the prisoners "… to pull out and graze grass… especially on the ground around some structures in Dretelj which those guards suspected to had been mined, so that in a way we served to clear the ground of field mines…"

From the statement of Witness 445/94-3 it has been established that this form of humiliation of the Serb prisoners was the most frequently practised by the guard Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max), from Stolac.

Evidence: 295/94-1, 445/94-2, 445/94-15, 445/94-23, 445/94-39, 231/95-2, 434/95-3, 38/96-1, 84/96-3, 364/96-7, and 444/96.

Responsible: Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max).

4.4. Forcing Serb Prisoners to Kiss Animals

4.4.1. Witness 208/96 stated that the staff of the camp would bring a dog and order the imprisoned Serbs to kiss it "because this is your brother St. Sava".

4.4.2. Witness 364/96-7 stated that the Serbs were forced to kiss the anus of a dog.

4.4.3. The Serb 674/95-1, a former prisoner of the Dretelj Camp, stated that Ahmet Makitan and a Zoran, AKA Zoki, from Konjic, tortured him by ordering him to lick the sexual organ of a female dog. As the dog kept dodging and struggling, they turned her around so that she faced him and then they forced him to kiss her and to put his tongue in her mouth. After that they angered the dog, so she started biting his hands. The entire event was confirmed by Witness 445/94-1.

4.4.4. Witness 221/94-11, a Serb man of 46 years of age, also stated that the camp staff "brought a female dog and forced us to kiss it under the tail and lick her sexual organ. The dog was brought by Marina, a member of HOS, 25 years old, dark-haired, with a few teeth missing."

Evidence: 221/94-11, 445/94-1, 445/94-38, 445/94-39, 674/95-1, 208/95-1, and 364/96-7.

Responsible: Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max) and Zoran, AKA Zoki, from Konjic.

4.5. Spitting in Prisoners' Mouths

Evidence: 364/96-12

4.6. Forcing Serb Prisoners to Sing Songs

Humiliating and otherwise Insulting Serbs

4.6.1. Numerous Serb witnesses – former prisoners of the Dretelj Camp stated that they had been forced to sing Ustasha songs for hours and hours; they had to learn those songs by heart; as a rule they had to sing at night. The Serbs would be ordered to sing at the top of their voices the songs that glorified Ustashas and Ante Paveliæ and insulted Serbs and their glorious ancestors; if the camp staff were not satisfied, the imprisoned Serbs had to sign those songs over and over again (84/96-3).

4.6.2. A former prisoner remembers the lyrics of one of the songs that the Serbs were forced to sing:

Evidence: 221/94-11

4.6.3. Witness 674/95-1 stated: "… After they would beat us senseless, we had to get up, stand upright with our arms raised, and sing Ustasha songs. We had to remain in that position for a couple of hours at a time. Of Ustasha songs I can mention the following one:

Witness 445/94-15, a former prisoner of the Dretelj Camp, is of the opinion that, as he stated, forcing the prisoners to sing Ustasha songs was "a way of destroying our personality."

4.6.4. The camp staff would say to the imprisoned Serbs, "… you yourself are to blame for being Serbs; you Serbs are schismatics, you are not a nation, there is no Serbian orthodox religion, only Catholics and Muslims will remain; we shall convert one third of you into Catholicism, kill one third, and expel one third to the Corfu Island and the Belgrade District…"

Evidence: 295/94-1

4.6.5. The camp staff forced an imprisoned Serb man, a former policeman, to put on a priest's robe and walk the camp wearing it.

Evidence: 314/94, 445/94-39, and 674/95-1

Evidence: 84/96-3

Evidence: 445/94-38

On one occasion a Serb woman prisoner, who had been raped by numerous guards and other camp staff, was taken out naked to a place where there were about thirty soldiers and was forced to lie on the ground and stick a truncheon in her vagina.

Evidence: 221/94-11, 295/94-1, 313/94-2, 314/94, 445/94-1, 445/94-15, 445/94-23, 445/94-38, 445/94-39, 434/95-3, 674/95-1, 84/96-3, and 364/96-8.

4.7. Imitating Aeroplanes

One of the ways of humiliating the imprisoned Serbs was described by Witness 221/94-11:

"They would force us to imitate aeroplanes: a prisoner would have to run around with his arms spread and to imitate the sound of an aeroplane, while an Ustasha would make believe that he was shooting at the "aeroplane". When he would "shoot the plane down" the prisoner would have to crash and to hit the ground with his head. I remember well that they often did this to B. M., a military officer."

Evidence: 221/94-11

5. THE RAPE OF SERB WOMEN

From the statements of the Serb men and women – former prisoners of the Dretelj Camp it has been established that almost without exception the Serb women imprisoned in that camp were sexually molested.

Thus Witness 793/95-3 stated: "… each of their soldiers could choose the woman who he would rape…"

Witness 674/95-1 stated: "… I can say that each of the women in Dretelj was raped a few times".

According to the evidence collected to date, during 1992 the rape of the following Serb women was attempted or committed:

5.1. The guard nicknamed Drakula (Dracula) attempted to rape the Serb woman 793/95-3, born in 1930: he entered the dormitory, grabbed her from behind with the intention of raping her, but abandoned the attempt when she started begging him to spare her and said that what he was trying to do was wrong, as she was "old enough to be his mother".

Evidence: 793/95-3

Responsible: HOS guard Drakula (Dracula)

5.2. The Serb woman 437/94-1 was raped by Hasan Blagajac and Vinko Primorac. After the rape she was depressed and kept crying.

Evidence: 437/94-1, 793/95-3

Responsible: Hasan Blagajac and Vinko Primorac

5.3. According to the statement of the Serb woman 356/94-2, imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp from 5 May till 17 August 1992, she was raped by 19 men; some of them raped her several times. About this she stated:

"I am basing the statement on the notes that I made immediately after leaving the camp. I memorised all those men very well during my stay in the camp that lasted 105 days and that I shall never be able to forget…"

She stated that the perpetrators were the following persons:

Numerous Serb women, former prisoners of the Dretelj Camp, confirmed in their statements that this Serb woman was raped many times.

Witness 264/96 stated: "… I know that the women were raped and otherwise sexually molested…"

Witness 444/96 stated: "In the beginning of August, around 5 o'clock p. m., two members of HOS took this woman into a room within the camp ground and returned her seven days later. She looked very pale, exhausted and extremely depressed; later on I heard that during those seven days she was raped many times by many men, but she never told me anything about it".

The same witness also stated that Tomislav Vidoviæ from Šibenik made three successive attempts at raping her, but failed all three times because he was drunk, whereupon he committed various acts of perversion against her.

Witness 231/95-2, a Serb man imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp from 11 May till 17 August 1992, stated that, to his knowledge, there were about 70 Serb women prisoners in this camp. As a rule, the guards seldom beat these women; however, they raped them regularly. This was confirmed by Witness 356/94-2, a Serb woman, who admitted to him that she and the rest of the imprisoned Serb women had been sexually molested and tortured in many different ways. This witness said that the guards would brag before the imprisoned Serbs about the things that they did to those women.

Evidence: 313/94-2, 356/94-2, 231/95-2, 660/95-4, 660/95-6, 793/95-3, 264/96 and 444/96.

She stated that she had lost a kidney before being taken to the camp and that in spite of that and of her being exhausted from the torture in the camp, they took her to the camp infirmary, where she was brought before Dr Hraniloviæ from Zagreb. She described Dr Hraniloviæ as a "great evildoer" who tortured the prisoners by giving them injections which caused great pain; swearing at her Serb mother, he gave her an injection from which she felt severe pain and occasionally lost consciousness. Then he called the guards and said to them, "… take over now, do the man's thing…". The guards tore her dress off and raped her; after that three men came in and also raped her, pulled her hair out, urinated in her mouth and did "other monstrous things that do not become normal people".

Evidence: 9/94

She stated: "After ten days, they started raping me too, two to three times every day. The first time I struggled, but then they knocked my teeth out. After that I no longer had any strength to resist them".

This witness also stated that the Serb women were photographed while being raped.

Witness 674/95-1, a Serb man imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp, stated that this woman had told him that she had been raped in her apartment by seven or eight Ustashas, in the presence of her tied-up husband, who was forced to watch her being molested.

Evidence: 313/94-2, 437/94-1, 660/95-4, 660/95-6, 674/95-1, and 264/96.

5.6. The Serb woman 660/95-4 was raped in the Dretelj Camp; she was also raped before being taken away from her apartment in Èapljina.

Evidence: 669/95-4, 674/95-1, and 264/96.

5.7. Witness 660/95-6 described the Serb woman D., who was also raped in the Dretelj Camp, as one of the women who had "a particularly miserable time" in the camp.

Evidence: 660/95-6

5.8. In the Dretelj Camp the staff raped Witness 793/94-2, a Serb woman born in 1927. Among the rapists was a young member of HOS, who – as she said to Witness 444/96 – was young enough to be her grandson. Having raped her, this young man beat her up so badly that this rendered her immobile for a long time.

Witness 313/94-2, a Serb woman, stated that the torture experienced by her was also experienced by V., "who was an old woman".

Evidence: 313/94-2, 793/94-2, 660/95-6, and 444/96.

5.9. Several witnesses confirmed that one among the women raped in the Dretelj Camp was the Serb woman B.

Witness 313/94-2, a Serb woman who was raped many times in this camp, describing the circumstances under which she was raped, stated, among other things: "… The same torture that I suffered was suffered by B., and that lasted for 60 days…"

Witness 674/95-1 stated: "… As for B., I can say the following: she was a medical doctor; she was taken out and raped every day; later on she was exchanged…"

Evidence: 313/94-2, 674/95-1, 444/96, and 264/96.

5.10. The Serb woman prisoner R., born in 1940, described in details the circumstances under which she had been raped:

"… They took us, one at a time, to their dormitory on the same floor and raped us there. The rape was committed mainly by Poskok (Viper), of whom I remember that his first name was Ivan, as well as by some other men that they would bring, but I do not remember their names. Several of them would take turns… I was taken out exactly three times, and there are women who were taken out and raped as many as 20 times during those 10 days…"

She also said: "… This was the most infernal part of my imprisonment in the Dretelj Camp and of my whole life, so I hate even thinking of it" (445/94-4).

Numerous witnesses confirmed that R. had been raped in this camp.

Evidence: 313/94-2, 445/94-40, and 264/96

6. FORCING PRISONERS TO HAVE HOMOSEXUAL INTERCOURSE OR INTERCOURSE WITH ANIMALS

Numerous Serbs – former prisoners of the Dretelj Camp witnessed that they had been forced to have homosexual intercourse among themselves or with the camp staff, as well as to have sexual intercourse with animals.

6.1. The Serb men imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp were frequently ordered to put their penises in each other's mouth.

Witness 445/94-2, imprisoned in the Dretlej camp from 6 June till 17 August 1992, stated:

This witness stated that the whole thing was happening in the camp yard and that all the time the naked Serb men performing this were surrounded by the guards, other camp staff, as well as a group of HOS soldiers from Mostar, accompanied by a group of girls, who kept laughing and jeering at the prisoners.

Evidence: 295/94-1, 314/94, 445/94-2, 445/94-5, 445/94-38, 434/95-3, 674/95-1, 38/96-8, 84/96-3, 364/96-8.

Witness 221/94-11, a man of 64 years of age, former prisoner of the Dretelj Camp, described an event in which Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max) was the perpetrator of the crime.

This witness stated:

"I know that one night some guards or HOS soldiers singled out from a group of prisoners a man who we called Pop (Priest) and I believe that he was R. D., as well as M. B. and two more men whose names I do not remember. They ordered these prisoners to come under the window of the hangar above the entrance door, to take their clothes off and masturbate each other's penis until erection took place, whereupon they were forced to perform mutual fellatio. This was organised by Maks.

Evidence: 221/94-11

Responsible: Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max).

6.3. The camp staff forced a Serb prisoner with a developed penis to put it in the mouth of every older man; after that the staff maltreated him in various ways and hit him on the penis many times. (674/95-1)

6.4. One evening, Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max) and Damir Glogovac, AKA Vampir (Vampire) forced the men B. M. and B. M. to kneel before them; then they put their penises in these prisoners' mouths and forced them to perform fellatio until Maks and Vampir ejaculated, after which they forced these men to swallow the ejaculated semen. (445/94-2)

6.5. The Serb men imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp were also forced to have sexual intercourse with animals – the camp staff would bring a dog and force them to do it. (295/94-1)

Evidence: 221/94-11, 295/94-1, 314/94, 445/94-2, 445/94-5, 445/94-38, 434/95-3, 674/95-1, 38/96-8, 84/96-3, and 364/96-8

Responsible: Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maaks and Damir Glogovac, AKA Vampir

6.6. Ahmet Glogovac, AKA Maks, ordered the imprisoned Serb men M. and B. to take their clothes off and to perform mutual fellatio, while he was looking on and laughing.

Evidence: 445/94-6

Responsible: Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max)

6.7. In the night between 31 July 1992 and 1 August 1992 a group of Serb men and women was transported from Mostar to Dretelj by truck. Zvonimir Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood) beat them during the transport and forced the women B. and S. (the latter's husband was also on the truck) to behave like lesbians. He ordered B. to take her panties off and then ordered S. to touch B's genitals. S had to comply, because Little Red Riding Hood would hit her on the head whenever she tried to stop doing it.

Evidence: 878/95

Responsible: Zvonimir Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood)

7. THE WAYS OF TORTURING THE SERB PRISONERS

The Serb men and women imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp were put to all sorts of torture, which was often of such a nature that the tortured Serbs wished for, and even asked for being killed, just to have the torture stop.

Witness 364/96-7, a sculptor, said in his statement before the investigating judge: "… In short, what I can say about Dretelj is that in that camp we were tortured in a beastly way, beaten and persecuted, and that it was real hell…"

Witness 660/95-6, a woman prisoner of the Dretelj Camp, stated: "…Screams were often heard from the hangar where the men were kept and it was terrible for us to listen to that… the following morning I would notice that the men were bloody and beaten up…"

7.1. Forcing Men to Wear Winter Clothes at High Temperatures

7.1.1. The men were also tortured by being taken out of the warehouse in which they were confined and ordered to put heavy military overcoats on; they had to stand in the sun for several hours dressed like that, whereupon they would have to carry on their backs water cans weighing 25 kilograms while the guards would hit them with truncheons.

Evidence: 674/95-1, 793/95-3, 84/96-3

7.2. Forcing the Men to Fight One Another

Numerous witnesses – former prisoners of the Dretelj Camp stated that the camp staff were forcing them to fight one another and that the perpetrators of this crime had peculiar "ideas" about this.

A witness described the method:

"… They would single out a pair of imprisoned men, make them face each other and say: "Look, there is a mosquito on Miloš's head; kill it". All the male prisoners would have to take turns at "killing the mosquito" on the chosen prisoner's head. They made the prisoners beat one another senseless…"

7.2.1. Witness 295/94-1, a Serb man born in 1952, as well as three more Serb men, were forced to fight one another; beside that, the guards would bring their soldiers and let them beat the Serbs before those soldiers would leave for the battlefield.

Witness 314/94, a Serb man imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp from 10 June 1992 till 18 August 1992, suffered various forms of torture in the camp and described both the torture that he himself had been out to and that experienced by other Serb men. Among other things, he stated that on the second day upon being taken to the camp he was taken out of the room together with another imprisoned Serb man – a retired policeman. They were taken out by Zvonko Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood), "the most infamous Ustasha and torturer of Serbs", who cuffed the witness's right hand to a bed and ordered the other Serb prisoner to hit him on the head twenty times with a stick. The other man had to hit him, but Little Red Riding Hood was not satisfied with the strength of the blows, so he himself hit Witness 314/94 on the mouth with all his strength, showing to the other Serb how he should do it and ordering him to hit the witness on the head with the stick twenty more times, which that Serb did, and the skin on the witness's head split from the blows. His wounds could not heal even within 60 days, and the scars on his head are still clearly visible.

Immediately after that the witness was ordered to start hitting the other Serb prisoner on the head with a stick; the witness had tocomply. This was followed by the two of them having to hit each other with their fists many times.

Evidence: 314/94, 445/94-39

Responsible: Zvonimir Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood).

7.2.3. On 13 July 1992, Witness 38/96-8, a Serb man born in 1928, prisoner of the Dretelj Camp, and Witness 314/94 were brought in for interrogation, the camp staff cuffed the right hand of each of them to a bed, gave each of them a stick in the left hand and ordered them to start hitting each one on the head. Whenever the guards were dissatisfied with the strength of the blows, they would beat both prisoners.

Evidence: 314/94, 38/96-8

Evidence: 314/94

7.2.5. The guards forced the imprisoned Serb men to group fighting.

7.3. Driving Nails and Needles under Fingernails and Toenails

7.3.1. The Serb man S. S., born in 1972, was brutally tortured in the Dretelj Camp.

Evidence: 434/95-3, 84/96-3

7.3.2. In the camp they drove nails under the fingernails of the Serb man 38/96-8, born in 1928 and, according to a witness, after that there was not a single fingernail left on his hands, as the torturers in the camp had pulled them all out.

Evidence: 364/96-8

7.3.3. They drove a knife and nails under the fingernails and toenails of the imprisoned Serb man B. S. and pushed truncheons and three-core electric cables in his anus.

Evidence: 295/94-1

Evidence: 434/95-3, 84/96-3

7.3.5. They drove needles under her nails, put a bayonet to her throat and tortured in various other ways the Serb woman prisoner 313/94-2 and other imprisoned Serb women.

Evidence: 313/94-2

Evidence: 38/96-8

7.3.7. Witness 445/94-2 was tortured in the following way: while one of his torturers was hitting him from behind, he had to kneel down and put his hands on the table, whereupon Mirsad Repak drove safety pins and small nails under the fingernail of each of the fingers on his both hands. He repeated this several times, causing such a terrible pain to the Serb prisoner that he screamed at the top of his voice.

Evidence: 445/94-2, 231/95-2

Responsible: Mirsad Repak

7.3.8. On numerous occasions Witness 445/94-40, a Serb woman prisoner born in 1944, was brutally tortured and beaten by Mirsad Repak, who had participated in her arrest and transportation to the Dretelj Camp. She had to put her hand on the table, whereupon Mirsad Repak would repeatedly hit her on the hands and fingers with a tennis racket, and then drove a needle under her nails several times. On one occasion he brought the witness's son and forced him to watch him beating the witness and driving the needle under her nails.

Evidence: 445/94-40

Responsible: Mirsad Repak

7.4. Piercing the Tongues and Other Parts of Prisoners' Bodies

with Knives and Bayonets

7.4.1. The imprisoned Serb man B. B. was brutally beaten and had his ears were pierced with a bayonet; his mother was listening to his screams reaching her from the hangar.

His worst torturers were Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max), and Damir Glogovac, AKA Vampir (Vampire).

Evidence: 660/95-6

Responsible: Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max), and Damir Glogovac, AKA Vampir (Vampire).

7.4.2. A Serb man imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp had his tongue pierced with a knife; this left a scar on his tongue.

Evidence: 295/94-1

Evidence: 313/94-1, 84/96-3, 264/96

Evidence: 364/96-7

Evidence: 445/94-1

Evidence: 445/94-2

7.5. Daily Beating and Torture of Prisoners

Numerous former prisoners of the Dretelj Camp stated that torturing the prisoners was a daily practice.

7.5.1. Witness 208/96, a Serb man born in 1925, stated that the camp staff beat the imprisoned Serbs daily, with fists, boots or rifle butts.

Evidence: 208/96, 364/96-12

7.5.2. Witness 674/95-1 stated that a group of some 20 – 30 prisoners was detailed to clean the dormitories of the camp staff. The staff would order them to pour water on the floor and then kneel down and mop it up. Then the guards would jump on the prisoners' backs and start hitting them with "all sorts of things". When an imprisoned Serb man collapsed, a guard splashed a pail of dirty water on his head and jammed the pail on the prisoner's head, saying, "Here, Chetnik, freshen up".

Evidence: 674/95-1

7.5.3. Witness 674/95-1 described how he was forced to clean a toilet that was extremely dirty because the guards had intentionally defecated outside the bowl. They ordered the witness to empty a few pails of water on the floor, kneel down and clean the toilet with his bare hands. Then a guard jumped on his back; the prisoner fell in the excrement and dirtied his face, ears, nose and eyes and the guard repeatedly hit him with his submachine gun, saying, "Eat, eat, stuff yourself, you Chetnik motherfucker".

Evidence: 674/95-1

7.5.4. The Serb prisoner S. S., from Travnik, twenty years old (84/96-3), suffered the worst beating. Evidence of his suffering was given by numerous witnesses (574/95-1), as well by himself.

Evidence: 84/96-3, 674/95-1

7.5.5. On several occasions a guard would order the imprisoned Serb man 221/94-11 to keep his mouth open even up to 15 minutes, during which time the guard would insert a knife in the prisoner's mouth, making believe he was counting the prisoner's teeth, touching the prisoner's uvula with the tip of the knife and repeatedly spiting in his mouth.

Evidence: 221/94-11

7.5.6. The Serb woman J. K., born in 1926, a prisoner of the Dretelj Camp from the beginning of June 1992 till 18 August 1992, was beaten every day, especially at night; on one occasion a guard kicked her in the leg so hard that he broke her leg.

Evidence: 334/97-20; The Finding and Opinion of the BG-33 Commission of Physicians and Experts BG-33 of 27 March 1998

7.5.7. The guard Hasan Toporan said to Witness 674/95-1, a Serb man imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp, that the witness's son had been captured and skinned alive and that he would be brought to the camp so his father could see what he looked like; then he ordered a young man from Ljubuški, who did not act like a normal person, to take a club and beat the witness until the man fell down, which the young man did. After that, the young man, applying the blow called hammer, kept hitting the prisoner on the collarbones, neck and head with both hands, until the prisoner fainted.

Evidence: 674/95-1

Responsible: Hasan Toporan

7.5.8. Witness 273/94 stated that on 25 August 1992, as soon as he arrived in the Dretelj Camp in a group of eight men and four women, he was physically assaulted. He said: "They flew at us like wasps and started beating us. Particularly badly beaten was M. B., on whom they poured water several times to bring him around, after which they would start beating him again…"

The witness stated that he was beaten by a girl of about 17 years of age, by the name of Suzana. When he said that his nationality was Yugoslav, another Suzana, from Zagreb, kept kicking him with her boot for about 20 minutes.

Evidence: 273/94

On one occasion Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max), kicked Witness 434/95-3 in the face with his boot and broke the witness's nasal bone.

Evidence: 434/95-3

7.5.10. The guard Damir Glogovac, AKA Vampir (Vampire) often beat up the Serb prisoner B. A., a man born in 1934, and forced him to kiss Glogovac's boots while this guard was beating him.

Evidence: Damir Glogovac, AKA Vampir (Vampire)

7.5.11. Groups comprising three or four men and sometimes even up to twenty men, as well as women, all of them wearing uniforms and boots, would come to the Dretelj Prison Camp every evening and brutally beat up the Serb prisoners with their hands and boots. They would say to the Serb prisoners that the latter were not permitted to breathe the Croatian air.

Evidence: 92/94

Evidence: 313/94-1

7.5.13. As a consequence of daily torture, the health of R. D. from Stolac, M. S. from Èapljina, and B. S. was seriously damaged.

Evidence: 313/94-1

Evidence: 364/96-7

7.5.15. The man who perpetrated the worst beating and torture of the prisoner 195/96-1 was Hasan Toporan.

Evidence: 195/96-1

Responsible: Hasan Toporan

7.5.16. Witness 84/96-3, a man born in 1972, prisoner of the Dretelj Camp from 21 May 1992 till the second half of July 1992, was brutally tortured, as can be seen from his statement and from the statements of numerous other interrogated witnesses.

Evidence: 84/96-3

On the second night following the witness's arrival in the camp, this witness was kicked in the kidneys by Zvonimir Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood), who used to indiscriminately beat up other Serbs as well.

Evidence: 84/96-3

Witness 85/96-3, a Serb man, stated: "… A group of six drunk HOS soldiers dashed into our hangar and started beating everyone… on me alone they broke three laths hitting me on the back with them… other prisoners said that my back looked as if someone had been ploughing it… the following night I felt severe pain in the abdomen, and a prisoner said to me that it was probably my appendix…"

Evidence: 84/96-3, 264/96

7.5.17. Several witnesses have confirmed that the Serb prisoners were daily tortured in the Dretelj Camp, both during the day and at night.

Evidence: 795/95-3, 38/96-1

7.5.18. The Serb prisoners were beaten daily. They were hit by whoever pleased to beat them; they were beaten with all sorts of weapons, including clubs and steel cables.

Evidence: 38/96-6

7.5.19. The Serb prisoners were beaten and harassed on a daily basis. They suffered the worst beating by the guards while they carried water in some sort of military plastic bags.

Evidence: 38/96-8

7.5.20. The Serbs 295/94-1 and 84/96-3 were beaten every day by Zvonimir Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood).

Evidence: 38/96-8, 264/94-1

Responsible: Zvonimir Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood)

Evidence: 437/94-1

7.5.22. The Serb man 295/94-1 and the retired policeman 445/94-39, the latter forced to wear a priest's robe, were beaten by the camp staff.

Evidence: 295/94-1, 445/94-1, 445/94-39

Evidence: 445/94-1

Responsible: Luka Šešelj

7.5.24. The Serb 445/94-2, a prisoner of the Dretelj Camp from 6 June till 17 August 1992, was daily beaten by the camp staff. He stated:" I believe that all the beating I suffered there would have been too much for a hundred men…until then I would have been unable to believe anyone telling me about the atrocities of the kind that I had to endure in the Dretelj Camp. I simply would not believe it."

7.5.25. On one occasion, Witness 445/94-2 was beaten by about 20 men at a time. They beat him with iron bars, wooden clubs, steel cables, whips made of braided wires, rifle butts – all over his body, until he fainted. Then they shaved his head and carried him to his cell. When the prisoner came round, he asked for a razor blade or a piece of glass, because he wanted to commit suicide. The Serb woman D. said to him once that watching what was happening to him was more difficult for her than her own suffering.

Evidence: 445/94-2

Evidence: 445/94-2

7.5.27. Guard Zerina Šuta, together with other guards, tortured the Serb S. B. in the following way:

On one occasion she approached him and asked him: "Would you fuck me?". He tried to avoid a straight answer, but she was so persistent that he eventually answered affirmatively, whereupon the guards flew at him and beat him up so badly that he was unable to either speak or walk. The following day Zerina Šuta asked him the same question, to which he promptly gave a negative answer, but that again was a pretext for the guards to beat him up brutally.

Evidence: 445/94-2

Responsible: Zerina Šuta and NN guards

Evidence: 445/94-4

7.5.29. Witness 445/94-9 confirmed daily beating of Serb prisoners. They were beaten both during the day and at night, on their heads and all over their bodies.

Evidence: 445/94-9

The Serb man 445/94-15 was beaten daily. They kicked him and jumped on him. He has medical evidence of that.

Evidence: The Opinion and Finding of the Commission of Physicians T-8 of 7 October 1994.

Evidence: 45/94-23

7.5.32. The Serb prisoner 295/94-5, a man born in 1944, imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp for only three days in August 1992, was beaten all the time. The man who gave him the worst beating was Hasan Toporan.

Evidence: 295/94-5

Responsible: Hasan Toporan

Evidence: 364/96-7

7.5.34. The Serb prisoner V. R. was beaten by several guards "with all sorts of weapons and all over the body, so that he was unable to open his eyes for seven days".

Evidence: 364/96-8, 660/95-5

7.5.35. The prisoner Š. M., a man born in 1935, was particularly tortured and beaten by Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max), the consequence of which were hematomas all over the prisoner's body and two broken ribs on the left side of his chest, of which this former prisoner submitted medical evidence – the finding of a specialist at the Medical Centre in Trebinje dated 19 August 1992.

Evidence: 364/96-12 and Medical Evidence

Responsible: Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max)

7.5.36. Witness 364/96-12 was beaten up by a Zoran, AKA Zoki, at the moment when this Serb prisoner was waiting to enter a doctor's office.

Evidence: 364/96-12

Responsible: Zoran, AKA Zoki

Evidence: 660/95-4

7.5.38. In the first half of August 1992 the guards beat up the Serb man R. D., nicknamed Honda, and then threw him in the hangar where the Serb women were imprisoned. "He was mutilated, almost a dead man, he just remained lying on the concrete, he could not move, he did not eat or drink anything".

Evidence: 660/95-5

7.5.39. Witness 878/95 stated that one day the guards brought three Serb prisoners to the witness's room. One of them, by the name of Honda, was half-dead from the beating, so he could neither stand up nor urinate.

Evidence: 878/95

7.5.40. The Serb prisoners were tortured and ruthlessly beaten not only in the Dretelj Camp, but also in the former military infirmary in the centre of Mostar, in which they were detained before being transported to the camp, and where Ivan Zelenika interrogated and beat them. He beat up Witness 878/95 too, and the detained Serb men were particularly badly beaten by Zvonimir Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood), who wore a red beret.

Responsible: Ivan Zelenika and Zvonimir Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood)

Evidence: 878/95

Evidence: 445/94-6

7.5.43. Witness 38/96-8, a Serb man born in 1928, described the beating and torture in the Dretelj Camp that he particularly remembered.

Evidence: 38/96-8

7.6. Skin Cutting and Scalping

7.6.1. Using a bayonet, the camp staff carved a five-pointed star in the forehead of the Serb man Š. S. . (364/96-12)

7.6.2. The Serb man B. S. was badly beaten on his legs and body with iron bars; he was also scalped. After that, his name was the first at the roll call every evening and he would be beaten senseless. (674/96-1)

7.6.3. Three members of a family – a married couple and their son – were taken to the Dretelj Camp in 1992. All were brutally tortured, and the woman was also raped.

Evidence: 313/94-1

Evidence: 364/96-7

Evidence: 445/94-1

Evidence: 445/94-1, 445/94-2, 264/96, 313/94-1

7.7. Various Ways of Torturing the Prisoners

7.7.1. On several occasions the Serb man 295/94-1, former prisoner of the Dretelj Camp, was taken out to be shot. They would put him up against a fence, and order him to turn his back towards the firing squad; after that they would shoot above his head. In addition, they would put a knife to his throat, so that the prisoner was "frightened to death".

The same Serb man would be put against a tree, after which a HOS soldier would throw knives in his direction, driving them into the tree that he was leaning against. This caused enormous fear to the prisoner.

Evidence: 295/94-1, 84/96-3

7.7.2. Witness 674/95-1 described a special way of torturing the Serb prisoners:

The prisoners would have to go through a concrete canal intended for changing the vehicle motor oil. About twenty guards lined up in two rows facing each other would wait for them there and all the prisoners had to walk through while the guards hit them, so that each Serb prisoner would fall down at least five times, covered with blood, before he would walk through.

Evidence: 674/95-1

7.7.3. The Serb man M. S. had the skin on the inside of both his arms, from the palms of his hands to his armpits, scorched with a cigarette lighter by the camp guards.

Evidence: 674/95-1

7.7.4. Witness 221/94-11, a man of 64 years of age, was often subjected to group beating in a hangar in the Dretelj Camp, as were other Serb prisoners. The witness would get the worst beating from a Zoran, AKA Zoki. "… They would beat us all up in that hangar, with their hands and feet, with karate blows… they would kick us applying a strong swing and a twist of the body; one of the ways of hitting us was that a man would suspend himself from an overhead structural beam of the hangar and, with a full swing of his body, would kick a prisoner in the chest or in the abdomen with a force that would throw the prisoner back against the wall".

Evidence: 221/94-11

Responsible: Zoran, AKA Zoki, from Konjic

7.7.5. According to Witness 674/95-1, the Serb prisoners of the Dretelj Camp were forced to stand on one leg and keep turning around with their arms spread until they get dizzy, after which they would have to "land" like an aeroplane, i.e. to fall down on the ground. They were always bloody after this.

Evidence: 674/95-1

7.7.6. The Serb prisoners – both men and women – had their eyebrows, hair, hairs in the nose, beards or moustaches burnt, had the letter "U" carved in the skin of their heads, and had to eat the hair that their torturers had cut off. Witness 434/95-3, imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp from 10 July 1992 till 16 August 1992, had to eat his own hair.

Evidence: 434/95-3

7.7.7. Zerina Šuta, a member of the camp staff, of whom Witness 434/95-3 stated that she was "a special evildoer", repeatedly stamped on the Serb R. D., called Honda, and kicked him in the crotch.

Evidence: 434/95-3

Responsible: Zerina Šuta

Evidence: 434/95-3

Evidence: e434/95-3

7.7.10. The Serbs S. P. and B. B. were forced to jump down on the concrete from a 5 metres high hangar roof.

Evidence: 434/95-3

7.7.11. They tortured the Serb prisoner B. B. by ordering him to change a tyre on a vehicle wheel belonging to the camp administration and driving a vehicle across his chest while he was doing it.

Evidence: 434/95-3

7.7.12. The Serb prisoners were forced to pull out bramble with their bare hands, which made their hands bleed.

Evidence: 92/94-2

7.7.13. The staff of the Dretelj Camp daily extinguished cigarettes on the chests and other parts of the prisoners' bodies and made them swallow lighted cigarettes.

Evidence: 313/94-1

7.7.14. The Serb prisoner 84/96-3 was forced to drink half a litre of motor oil.

Evidence: 313/94-1

Evidence: 313/94-1

7.7.16. Prisoner 313/94-2, a woman who was raped on numerous occasions during her imprisonment in the Dretelj Camp, was beaten by the camp staff; the staff also extinguished cigarettes on her body.

Evidence: 313/94-2

7.7.17. Zvonimir Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood) extinguished a cigarette on the back of the right hand of the Serb prisoner 314/94, which left a scar; he also extinguished a cigarette on the right side of the prisoner's neck.

Evidence: 314/94-4

Evidence: 314/94-4

Responsible: Zvonimir Bijeliš, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood)

Evidence: 314/94

7.7.20. Witness 364/96-7 confirmed that Dr Zoran Hraniloviæ was a physician in the Dretelj Camp and stated: "He had with him several ruffians who would beat up the prisoners coming to him for medical help…" The witness described the case of P. N.

Evidence: 364/96-7

7.7.21. They tortured the Serb woman prisoner N. S., from Mostar, by slitting her right breast with a knife, putting a hand in the wound and dragging her around.

Evidence: 364/96-8

Evidence: 313/94-1, 314/94, 437/94-1, 445/94-2, 445/94-37, 445/94-38, 231/95-2, 878/95, 38/96-6, 84-96/3, 364/96-7, and 364/96-8.

Evidence: 878/95

7.7.24 Witness 364/96-7 stated that Dr Zoran Hraniloviæ, the camp physician, " had with him several ruffians who beat up the prisoners coming to him for medical help".

Evidence: 364/96-7

7.7.25. The Serb 445/94-2 was an eyewitness when the prisoner J. R. came to Dr Hraniloviæ and complained that there was blood in his urine. This doctor gave the prisoner a glass and told him to bring his urine in it for examination. When the prisoner filled the glass with his urine that clearly contained blood, Dr Zoran Hraniloviæ said to the prisoner: " I see no blood here; this is fruit juice, and you will tell me what it is after you have drunk it." This Serb prisoner had to drink his own urine, whereupon the doctor asked him what had he drunk. The prisoner had to agree that it was fruit juice, to which Dr Hraniloviæ laughed and commented: "Well, now you have seen for yourself that this is indeed fruit juice, as I told you, and not urine."

Evidence: 445/94-2

7.7.26. A special way of torturing the Serb prisoners was that every evening a van would be driven into the hangar. The guards would put the Serb men prisoners in the van and torture them while driving the van in circles around the building in which women were held, so that the women heard terrible screams and moans from the van.

Evidence: 793/95-3, 878/95

7.7.27. Witness 38/96-8 has his beard and moustaches burned with a candle by Zvonimir Bijeliš.

Evidence: 38/96-8

Responsible: Zvonimir Bijeliš

7.7.28. The camp staff ordered the Serb prisoners to eat the grass that they had pulled out, and while the prisoners were bent down the guards would kick them and hit them with truncheons and any other weapon at hand.

Evidence: 445/94-1

7.7.29. On one occasion the Serb prisoner B. R. was repeatedly hit on the head with a bottle, until the bottle broke. Other Serb prisoners too were beaten in this way.

Evidence: 445/94-1

7.7.30. On one occasion Mirsad Repak tortured the Serb man 445/94-2 in various ways. Among other things, he pushed the barrel of his pistol in the prisoner's mouth, pressed it hard against his palate and pulled the trigger (the prisoner did not know that the firing chamber was empty). After several hours of torture this Serb was dragged to his cell, as he was unable to walk.

In connection with this torture the prisoner stated: "I sincerely wished that he would kill me, so the torture and beating would stop. However, that was just the beginning of what I had to go through." They also tortured the prisoner by telling him that they would pluck out and boil his eyes and make him eat them, that they would cut off and boil his ears and make them eat them too, that they would cut his penis off, and the like. They also told him that they would cut his head off and throw it in the Šurmanci pit, as they knew that this Serb had taken part in the removal of the bones of the Serbs thrown in that pit by Ustashas on 6 August 1941 (of the 500 Serbs thrown in the Šurmanci pit in 1941, about 160 bore the family name of this witness).

Evidence: 445/94-2

Responsible: Mirsad Repak

7.7.31. On one occasion, Zvonimir Bijeliš tortured Witness 445/94-2 by placing him before ten other prisoners and telling them that each of them had to kick the witness in the crotch ten times and then punch him ten times in the eye, ten times in the nose and ten times in the teeth. At one point he concluded that prisoner B. M., a good friend of the witness, did not hit the witness hard enough, so he took an empty brandy bottle and hit the witness on the head so hard that the bottle broke; then he took another bottle and smashed that one against B. M's head.

Evidence: 445/94-2

Responsible: Zvonimir Bijeliš

Evidence: 445/94-2

Evidence: 445/94-5

Evidence: 445/94-5

7.7.35. Witness 445/94-37, a woman imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp since 1 July 1992, stated that they beat her and squeezed her throat so hard that it swelled terribly, she had difficulties in breathing and she was unable to take food.

Evidence: The Finding and Opinion of the Commission of Physicians T-15 of 7 October 1994.

7.7.36. Witness 445/94-38, a man born in 1935, imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp since 21 July 1992, stated that already on his first evening in the camp he was taken to the window and ordered to stick his arms through the bars, whereupon the guards beat him (as well as the rest of the prisoners) with truncheons, rifle butts, pickaxes and other objects until he fainted. He was given the hardest beating by Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max), born in Dubrava.

Evidence: 445/94-38, 793/95-3, The Finding and Opinion of the Commission of Physicians T-19 of 7 October 1994

Responsible: Ahmet Makitan, AKA Maks (Max)

7.7.37. Witness 445/94-39, a man born in 1936, stated that at night the guards called one Serb prisoner after the other to come to the window and then hit him on the head with all sorts of objects, even with bottles. They also broke a bottle against the witness's head and burnt his hair and beard.

Evidence: 445/94-39, The Finding and Opinion of the Commission of Physicians T-20 of 7 October 1994

Evidence: 445/94-39, The Finding and Opinion of the Commission of Physicians T-20 of 7 October 1994

Responsible: Vinko Primorac

7.7.39. The prisoner 445/94-39, a former policeman, was forced to put a priest's robe on and wear it in the camp for several days. That is why he was called Pop (Priest). Dressed like that and exposed to the sun and great heat, the man had to do everything that the rest of the Serb prisoners had to do.

Evidence: 445/94-39

Evidence: 445/94-40

7.7.41. Witness 231/95-2, a Serb man born in 1935, retired Colonel of the Yugoslav People's Army, described several cases of torture of him and of other Serb prisoners.

Evidence: 231/95-2

7.7.42. The guards forced the Serb prisoners to drink old motor oil.

Evidence: 231/95-2

7.7.43. The guards would urinate in beer bottles, bring them to the Serb prisoners, tell them that they had brought them some beer, and force them to drink the urine.

Evidence: 445/94-23, 445/94-38, 231/95-2

Evidence: 434/95-3

Evidence: 364/96-7

7.7.46. Witness 364/96-8, a Serb man born in 1934, prisoner of the Dretelj Camp since 22 July 1992, stated that already on his second night in the camp all the prisoners, one after the other, had to come to the window of the hangar in which they were confined and that at the window the camp staff beat them with police truncheons and hands and pulled their hair out, and that on that occasion they badly beat up P. R. and K. from Nevesinje and P. S., knocking out several of his teeth.

Evidence: 364/96-8

7.7.47. The camp staff broke a mineral water bottle against the head of the Serb prisoner G. P. and two bottles against the head of D. R., nicknamed Pop (Priest).

Evidence: 364/96-12

7.7.48. The guards brutally beat up a Serb man in the camp and forced him to stand at attention and look at the sun for about an hour and a half, until the man fainted and fell down.

Evidence: 444/96

7.7.49. The guards forced the Serb prisoners of the Dretelj Camp to eat insects, as well as to drink detergent soap liquid for dishwashing, motor oil and urine.

Evidence: 295/94-1

7.7.50. When the Serb prisoners would be taken out to work outside the Dretelj Prison Camp, the camp staff would say to the local people crowding around them that they were Chetniks taken prisoners in battle, which was not true. The locals reacted to that by insulting the prisoners, swearing at them, spitting at them and throwing stones at them.

Evidence: 445/94-1

8. MURDERS

The following prisoners of the Dretelj Camp were murdered or died from the injuries suffered in the camp, or are missing, so that there is a reasonable ground to consider them murdered:

Evidence: 9/94, 31/94, 595/95, 38/96, 40/96, 208/96, 856/96-7

Numerous Serbs – former prisoners of the Dretelj Camp described the suffering of Božo Balaban and their statements prove that he died of the injuries suffered in the Dretelj Camp.

8.1. Witness 9/94, the wife of the late Božo Balaban, stated: "… I saw with my own eyes that they were beating him in front of the camp. There were more than fifteen of them… They stuck his head through the wires on the hangar window. I heard him screaming and saying, "I cannot get through this", and them saying, "Yes, you can, you motherfucking pilot".

The witness stated that Božo Balaban was beaten with shovels and spades and that they said, "hit him with these, so we won't dirty our hands".

8.2. One of the first prisoners murdered in the Dretelj Camp was Božo Balaban from Mostar.

Evidence: 313/94-1

Evidence: 878/95

Evidence: 38/96-8

Evidence: 674/95-1

Evidence: 31/94

Evidence: 434/95-3

Evidence: 437/94-1

8.9. Witness 445/94-8 gave a similar statement, differing in some details, as well as did the witnesses 437/94-1, 445-94-1, 445/94-2, 445/94-5, 445/94-23, 445/94-37, 445/94-38, 445/94-39, 231/95, 364/96-7, 84/96-3, and 660/95-6.

Evidence: 445/94-23, 445/94-37, 445/94-38,445/94-39, 231/95, 660/95-6, 84/96-3, 364/96-7, 437/94-1, 445/94-1, 445/94-2, 445/94-5, and 445/94-6.

8.2. The Murder of Nenad Markoviæ

8.2.1. Numerous Serbs who had been imprisoned in the Dretelj Camp witnessed to the torture to which Nenad Markoviæ was put and stated that they never saw him after the torture and therefore supposed that he was liquidated.

8.2.2. Witness 208/96 stated: "… They beat Nenad Markoviæ particularly cruelly and probably broke his ribs, as after the beating he was screaming with pain. They took him to the "emergency ward" and later on we heard that he was liquidated…"

Evidence: 445/94-39

Responsible: Ahmet Makitan, Aka Maks (Max)

Evidence: 264/96

8.2.6. The Serb prisoner M. E. stated: "Nenad Markoviæ, from Mostar, died of the consequences of beating in the Dretelj Camp."

Evidence: 445/94-6, 445/94-39, 264/96, 364/96-7

8.3.1. Several Serbs – former prisoners of the Dretelj Camp witnessed that Jovan Pejanoviæ was brutally tortured and that they did not know anything about his further destiny after the torture; all of them believed that he was murdered after then torture in the camp.

8.3.2. Witness 221/94-11 stated: "… I remember that one leg of Jovan Pejanoviæ was injured from the beating and that gangrene developed in it, so that they took him away, allegedly to be operated on… He never came back. I do not know what happened with him…"

8.3.3. On one occasion a group of HOS soldiers headed by Vinko Primorac came to the camp and took Jovan Pejanoviæ away. Jovan said that he was being taken to a hospital and that they had told him that he would be cured. However, no one ever heard anything about him since then and the Serb prisoners concluded that he was murdered that night.

8.3.4. The guards beat Jovan Pejanoviæ so much that as a consequence he had wounds all over the body; the wounds festered and he got sepsis. On one occasion, while they were standing on parade for the roll call, a Serb woman prisoner pointed out Jovan Pejanoviæ to Witness 878/95 – a woman who knew him well – but the witness could not recognise him, because the man was totally deformed from the beating. Later on the witness heard that he had been beaten so badly that he was unable to stand on his feet. An ambulance came for him, allegedly to take him to a hospital, but no one ever saw him after that and the Serb prisoners concluded that he was murdered.

8.3.5. One night the Serb prisoner Jovan Pejanoviæ, former Head of Police Department, was taken out of the camp, allegedly for medical treatment, and nothing was heard of him since then.

Evidence: 221/94-11, 445/94-2, 878/95, 364/96-7

Responsible: Vinko Primorac

8.4.1. Witness 313/94-1 stated that the body of the imprisoned Serb man Ðuro Škoro was covered with burns because he had been burnt with a candle and that he believed that Ðuro Škoro was murdered.

8.4.2. Witness 445/94-2 stated that among the prisoners of the Dretelj Camp was Ðuro Škoro, a man from Slipèiæi. A tumour "the size of a telephone set" developed on his chest as a consequence of the beating. When Blaž Kraljeviæ, the then Camp Administrator, saw that, he ordered that the prisoner be taken to a hospital in Split, but no one ever heard of him since, so the witness believes that Ðuro Škoro was murdered.

Evidence: 313/94-1, 445/94-2

8.5.1. "I know that Evgenije Samardžiæ was brutally beaten, that he was taken out of the camp and that he simply disappeared. Later on they found him dead in River Neretva."

Evidence: 313/94-1

9. THE PERPETRATORS OF THE CRIMES IN THE DRETELJ CAMP

5. BIJELIŠ Zvonimir, AKA Crvenkapa (Little Red Riding Hood), from Opuzen

6. BLAGAJAC Hasan

7. BROZOVIÆ Slavko

8. BULJUBAŠIÆ Edib

12. VIDOVIÆ Tomislav

14. GLOGOVAC Damir, AKA Vampir (Vampire), of Serb father and Croat mother

18. GRUBIŠIÆ Marina, from Èapljina

19. ZELENIKA Ivan

21. ZORAN, AKA Zoki, from Konjic

22. JADRANKA, AKA Rambo

Ordered the Serb men prisoners B. and M. to perform mutual fellatio and laughed while they were doing it (445-94/6);

41. PRIMORAC Vinko

42. RAJIÆ Ilija

42. RAJIÆ Toni, from Polje

43. REPAK Mirsad, Chief HOS Inspector for Herzegovina

44. RUŽEK Boris, from Rijeka

46. SALKO, from near Tuzla

48. SUZANA, from Zagreb

52. HERCEG Sreæko, Camp Administrator for some time

53. HRANILOVIÆ Dr Zoran, a physician from Zagreb

57. CHICAGO (Chicago)

60. JOE, citizen of the U.S.A.

63. ŠEŠELJ Ivica

64. ŠEŠELJ Luka, from Opuzen

65. ŠUTA Zerina

2. SEIZING THE PROPERTY OF THE SERBS

TAKEN TO THE DRETELJ CAMP 5

3. ACCOMMODATION, FOOD AND HYGIENIC CONDITIONS

IN THE DRETELJ CAMP 11

3.4. Prisoners Relieving Themselves

under Inappropriate Conditions 14

4. HUMILIATION OF SERB PRISONERS 15

4.2. Forcing Serb Prisoners to Imitate Animals 16

4.3. Forcing Serb Prisoners to Graze and Swallow Grass 16

4.4. Forcing Serb Prisoners to Kiss Animals 17

4.5. Spitting in Prisoners' Mouths 18

4.7. Imitating Aeroplanes 20

5. THE RAPE OF SERB WOMEN 21

6. FORCING PRISONERS TO HAVE HOMOSEXUAL

INTERCOURSE OR INTERCOURSE WITH ANIMALS 27

7. THE WAYS OF TORTURING THE SERB PRISONERS 30

8. MURDERS 61

9. THE PERPETRATORS OF THE CRIMES

C O N T E N T S 90

FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF YUGOSLAVIA

The Committee for the Collection of Data

on Crimes Committed against Humanity

and International Law

RECORD OF INTERROGATION

OF WITNES M. (313/94-2)

GIVING TESTIMONY ABOUT HER CONFINEMENT

IN THE DRETELJ PRISON CAMP

No. KRI. 39/94

Taken on 21 July 1994 before the Investigating Judge of the District Court in Zrenjanin, in the criminal proceedings upon request of the Committee for the Collection of Data on Crimes Committed against Humanity and International Law

The witness was warned of the obligation to speak the truth and not to withhold anything. The witness was warned about the consequences of a false statement, as well as that the witness was not obliged to answer a question if answering it would expose the witness or a close relative of the witness to grave disgrace, considerable material damage or criminal proceedings (Article 229 of the Law on Criminal Proceedings). To the general questions the witness answered:

1. Family name and given name: M.
2. Father's name: …
3. Occupation: …
4. Residence: …
5. Place of birth: …
6. Date of birth: …
7. Relation with the defendant

The witness, duly warned pursuant to Art. 229 and 231, Para. 2 Of the Law on Criminal Proceedings, stated:

I confirm the entire statement which my husband gave to the Investigating Judge today and I have nothing in particular to add to it; I only want to describe what was happening with the women in the Dretelj Camp, where I was confined.

On my first day in the camp there were no problems and nobody hurt me. A couple of days later, D. and myself were taken to a cell with bars, 2 by 2 metres, and there we were alone. The two of us spent ten days there. Later on they brought B. V., Ž. R. and V. A., who was sixty-eight years old, and put the in the cell with us. Like the two of us, they were from Èapljina.

During the ten days that D. and I were alone, I was not molested, while D. was taken out and raped 5 – 6 times a day. This was mainly done by the same men that tortured and murdered the prisoners, the men whose names my husband told you today. D. was an extremely beautiful woman of about thirty, mother of three children and… They accused her that… and also accused her that her husband was a leader of SDS (Serb Democratic Party) in…, which he was. They did not hurt me, but they accused me that I was the secretary of Dr Radovan Karadžiæ, showed me a video cassette from Pribilovci about the removal of the bones of the Serbs that Ustashas had thrown in a pit in that village, where a special funeral service was held and where I was present together with my husband because my father, mother and seven brothers and sisters were killed by Ustashas. I attended the ceremony because I held my late father in reverence.

After ten days I too was raped 2 – 3 times a day by the above-mentioned HOS soldiers. The first time I resisted, but then they knocked my teeth out and after that I had no more strength left to resist them.

All us women had to be completely naked while they would interrogate us; we had to keep our hands on our knees; they extinguished cigarettes on our breasts, beat us with truncheons and put us to incessant torture, drove needles under our fingernails, put bayonets to our throats and so on.

The women that were exposed to the worst maltreatment were… and myself.

I remember the most repulsive thing that I have ever seen:

Once they took a woman prisoner – she was a medical doctor – out to the camp ground. She was stark naked. There were about thirty soldiers around her. They made her lie down, gave her a rubber truncheon and forced her to put it in her vagina and self-abuse herself, which she had to do. This lasted about half an hour. The Ustashas enjoyed watching this and jeered al the time.

About the material damage that we have suffered, I state that we have lost the property as stated by my husband and that I have lost a family house and land in Prebilovci.

I have nothing more to state.

I have no questions or objections.

I do not want to read the record, as I have listened to it being dictated and as everything was entered in it as I have stated. I have no objections to the record and I am signing it.

FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF YUGOSLAVIA

The Committee for the Collection of Data

on Crimes Committed against Humanity

and International Law

RECORD OF INTERROGATION

OF WITNES B. R. (445/94-2)

GIVING TESTIMONY ABOUT HIS CONFINEMENT

IN THE DRETELJ PRISON CAMP

445/94-2 No. Kri-57/94

Taken in Trebinje on 29 September 1994, in the criminal proceedings against N.N.

PRESENT:

The witness was warned that he must speak the truth and that he must not withhold anything. He was also warned about the consequences of giving false testimony (Art. 244, Para. 2 of the Law on Criminal Proceedings).

1. Family name, given name and father's name: B. R., son of …

2. Occupation: …

3. Residence (with address): Trebinje, …

4. Place of birth: …

5. Age: …

6. Relation with the defendant and the plaintiff: Damaged party

I was born in Èapljina and I lived there, where I was employed as …

On 10 April 1992 I was arrested for the first time and taken to the HVO (Croat Defence Council) Police Station in Èapljina, where I was interrogated by Mile Žiliæ and Sead Tabakoviæ. After the interrogation they released me, but I had to report at the HVO Police Station three times a day – at 8.00, 12.00 and 18.00 hours every day. This lasted for a month, every single day. I would report, they would ask me a few questions, write it down and let me go.

In April 1992 members of the HVO armed forces searched all the Serb apartments in Èapljina. The apartments of those who were absent were broken into and ransacked. The same happened with my apartment, as I was absent from it. When I returned to the apartment, I found that the front door was broken and everything in the apartment was turned upside down; I found that they had taken away my passport, the military identity card from the time of my compulsory military service, my identity card and some other papers and that they had also found one hand grenade and two bullets.

My apartment was ransacked again on 6 June 1992, by a HOS patrol comprising Mirsad Repak, Dragan Dujmoviæ and Ivan Mediæ, who turned everything upside down, broke furniture, cut up armchairs and shot up the apartment. On that occasion they seized from me between 400 and 500 DEM in cash. They did not beat me then. They took me straight to the Dretelj Camp, where I was to be confined from 6 June 1992 till 17 August 1992.

After Dretelj, I was moved to a camp in Grabovina, where I stayed till 15 September, to be moved from there to the Ljubuški camp for a couple of days, till 20 September 1992, from where I was taken to Pakovo Selo near the towns of Knin and Drniš to be exchanged, but the exchange was unsuccessful. From there I was taken to Split and after one or two days I was moved from Split to a prison camp within the helicopter sector of the military airport in Rodoè near Mostar and confined in the building of the former military school, where I stayed till 30 October 1992, to be exchanged in Zelenika the day after.

During the 71 days that I spent in the Dretelj Prison Camp I suffered so much beating that I think it would have been too much for a hundred men. I did not know that a human being could endure all that. Until then I would have been unable to believe anyone telling me about the atrocities of the kind that I had to experience in the Dretelj Camp. I simply would not believe it.

When they took me to the Dretelj Camp, they threw me in a small room in which there were some men, but no-one would or dared speak to me, and as it was dark, I could not see them.

About 3 o'clock in the morning a guard came and said: "The man who came in last, step out!" I came out and he took me to the three men that had arrested me.

I was one of the first prisoners of the Dretelj Camp and I stayed there until the camp was closed down. I was confined in a small room in the administration building. The size of the room was 4 by 1.70 metres, and beside myself there were seven prisoners in it: M. V., M. K., P. P., M. Lj., G. M. and G. D. On that first day I was taken to the office of the Camp Administrator. Repak, Dujmoviæ, Mediæ and Milan Vego were already in the office.

All four of them began to beat me simultaneously. They kept asking me, "You Chetnik motherfucker, where are your firearms?" Without waiting for my answer, they kept beating me with rubber and wooden truncheons, and extinguished cigarettes on my neck. While one of them kept hitting me from behind, I had to kneel down and put my hands on the table, whereupon Mirsad Repak drove safety pins and small nails under my fingernails. He drove the safety pins and nails under al ten of my fingernails. He did it by driving a nail or a safety pin under a fingernail, roughly halfway, and then he would take it out and drive it under the next fingernail. He repeated this several times on each of the fingers of my both hands. I suffered unbearable pain. I did not weep, but screamed at the top of my voice. At a point, Repak pushed his pistol in my mouth and shoved its barrel all the way to my palate, so I could not speak, and asked me to tell him where I kept my firearms. After that he pulled the trigger, with an empty firing chamber.

This torture went on until daybreak, at least between an hour and a half and two hours. I was in such a state that I could hardly walk, so I was dragged back to my cell.

I was in such a terrible state that I sincerely wished that they would kill me and stop torturing and beating me like that.

However, this was just the beginning of what I had to go through.

During the torture on the first night they told me that they would pluck my eyes out, boil them and make me eat them, that they would cut off my ears, boil them and make me eat them too, as well as that they would cut my penis off, etc.

They said that in the end they would cut my head off and throw it in the pit in Šurmanci, as they knew that I had taken part in the removal of the bones of the Serbs thrown in that pit by Ustashas on 6 August 1941. People were thrown in that pit alive. In addition to 500 people from my village thrown in the pit, Ustashas threw my closest relatives in it, 160 of them bearing my family name B. Women and children were also thrown in that pit and the oldest child was only about thirteen years of age.

As I have said, all this made me wish that it would be better if they would kill me, just that the torture would end.

On that occasion they had before them my military identity card, my passport and all the rest that they had found during the breaking into and ransacking of my apartment by HVO.

This, however, was just the beginning of what I had to suffer in the Dretelj Prison Camp. The following morning, while I was lying all beaten up, Šime from Metkoviæ came into my room and called my name. I was unable to get up, so that other prisoners help me stand up. Then Šime booted me in the head with full force and this was the first time that my nose was broken. Blood ran from my nose and he forced me to lick the blood off the floor, commenting that Serb blood must not dirty the ground upon which he walked. After that he left and I was returned, or, to be exact, carried back to the cell.

The beating was repeated every hour or two, until 6 o'clock in the afternoon.

All the twenty men attacked me at the same time, hitting me with metal bars, clubs, hoe handles, steel cables, and whips made of four – five electric cables woven together. They hit me all over my body, but the most painful blows were those they dealt me with rifle butts on the kidneys and on the backbone. Each of the blows knocked me down and then they would kick me wherever they could, stand me up and start all over again, and that must have lasted for two hours. On that occasion they shaved my head and took photos of me, saying that they wanted to show the people what a Serb soldier looked like (and I have already explained to you that I was arrested as a civilian and that I was not a member of the military at that time).

I was unconscious when I was eventually carried to my cell. It was only after one or two days that I came to and then I asked my roommates to give me a piece of glass or a razor blade, because I really wanted to kill myself.

D., a woman prisoner of the Dretelj Camp, said to me once that watching what was happening to me was worse for her than all that she had gone through.

This beating rendered me immobile for ten days. I could not stand up. During all that time I was unable to urinate without help and I did not have a stool for as many as eighteen days.

About ten days later, when I got on my feet again, they went on beating me every day.

I was exposed to all sorts of things. On one occasion, Zvonko Bijeliš placed me in front of ten other prisoners, friends and acquaintance of mine, and each of them had to kick me in the crotch ten times, and then punch me ten times in the eye, ten times in the nose, and ten times in the teeth. They took turns hitting me like that and at a moment B. M., who was a good friend of mine, did not hit me hard enough, so Bijeliš took an empty brandy bottle and hit him on the head so strongly that the bottle smashed. Then he took another bottle and smashed that other bottle against my head.

As for the rape of women, I only heard the crying and screaming of the women in a room on the upper floor of the building in which I was confined. They were the first women put in the camp: J., A., O., and V. I could only conclude what was going on with them, but I did not see it with my own eyes.

All that I have told you so far happened in the Dretelj Camp in the period till 20 June 1992.

I also want to tell you that they had a special pique against me, probably because I am a man of a very large frame and can endure a lot – I am 194 cm tall and at that time I weighed about 117 kilos. They particularly enjoyed torturing me because they knew that I was a member of SDS (Serb Democratic Party) and because my family B. was in a way a symbol of the suffering of Serbs in World War II at the hands of Ustashas, as was generally known among Croats.

In the beginning of July 1992 the number of Serb prisoners of the Dretelj Camp began to grow with the arrival of new prisoners from Mostar. At that time my position was somewhat improved, as the old staff was mainly sent to the front and the new staff would say about me, "He has had his fill", and would concentrate on new prisoners.

Were already moved to a hangar, as by mid-July there were as many as 150 – 170 men and women in the camp, so we had to be put in two hangars.

By then the guards started taking some of us old prisoners – i.e. those who had been in the camp for a longer time, including me – to work in Dretelj, Èapljina, Ljubuški and the nearby villages.

However, the purpose of this was not that we should do any work, but that we should be humiliated. By then I had already grown a beard, as we were not permitted to shave. Wherever they took us, they would present us as Chetniks taken prisoners. For instance, in Èapljina, where we were taken to work, they told the local people, with whom I had lived together, that I was a Chetnik who had killed Croats and Muslims, and said all sorts of other things, and also allowed the local people to insult and beat us.

They took us to a wasteland overgrown with weed, and there we had to pull out various thorny shrubs with our bare hands. As we mainly did that bent over or kneeling down, the staff would take the opportunity to suddenly charge at us and kick us.

Once they made me eat my own identity card. Ivan Mediæ showed me my identity card and asked me whether it was mine, and then he began to tear off one leaf after the other and I had to eat them.

They often forced us to go down on all fours, graze grass and bleat like sheep.

They went on beating me every day, but I repeat, it was no longer so brutal as it used to be.

Dr S. M., who was in charge of sorting out their medicaments, helped me very much by stealing some painkillers and passing them to me.

One day they brought a boy of thirteen – Ivica Jelèiæ, a pupil who was in the same class as my son M. They asked the boy whether he knew me – I think that the question was asked by Pero Šutalo. He asked, "Do you know this Chetnik?" The boy answered, "He is M's father". Then Šutalo asked him what he would like best and the boy said, "To kill M's father" (meaning me), but that he would prefer to slit the throat of my son M, who was then the best pupil in the school and, being an athlete, very popular among his schoolmates.

After the death of the Camp Administrator Kraljeviæ, the new Administrator Sreæko Erceg kept persecuting me and asking me to admit the things that I had actually never did: that I was the leader of SDS, that I had been throwing hand grenades in the town, that I had guided artillery shells, and that I had armed the inhabitants of the town. Several times every day he asked me to admit this, and every time I refused and told him the truth. Because of this, Erceg beat me three times a day, with the assistance of the camp staff. Once I thought that I was going to die when a guard persistently beat me on the head and chest, until Erceg stopped him; if he had struck me just once more, I think I would have died.

On one occasion Erceg took me to his village of Lipno near Ljubuški and told me that when we got to the village I would have to say that he had personally taken me prisoner. I did as he ordered me, and so he bragged before the villagers of his merits.

On one occasion Administrator Kraljeviæ brought a group of journalists to the camp and showed them only the selected prisoners that did not have visible injuries. They picked Evgenije Samardžiæ from Mostar to talk with the journalists, as he had worked as a tourist guide and spoke foreign languages. At one point he said something in French, something that was not to Kraljeviæ's liking, so Kraljeviæ interfered and interrupted the interview, saying that Samardžiæ was lying. A couple of days later Samardžiæ was taken out of the camp and a few days after that he was found dead in the Neretva River, with a bullet hole in the back of his head.

One of the men who were badly beaten and tortured in the Dretelj Camp was Ž. R. They even scalped him.

Another prisoner that suffered a lot of beating was S. S., who screamed so much while Dr Hraniloviæ operated on him that blood froze in our veins. Because of this torture Blaževiæ said to Dr Hraniloviæ that if the kid died, he would have Dr Hraniloviæ join the group of Serbs to be exchanged and that Dr Hraniloviæ would end up in Serbia.

One day Zerina Šuta, a fairly attractive girl, approached this S. B. and asked him straightforwardly: "Would you fuck me?" S. B. tried to avoid a straight answer, but she was so persistent that he eventually answered affirmatively, whereupon the guards flew at him and beat him up so badly that he was unable to either speak or walk. The following day Zerina Šuta asked him the same question, to which he promptly gave a negative answer, but that too was a pretext for the guards to beat him up brutally.

I shall give you one more example. One day we were cutting bramble. We had been given sickles to work with. At a point, a guard beat up the prisoner K. so badly that he fainted and was carried back to the camp. His sickle remained in the field. In the evening they found out that the sickle was missing and insisted that the prisoners tell what had happened with it, but nobody knew where the sickle was. Then someone remembered that it must have remained in the field and a prisoner went out with a guard and took the sickle back. Then they said that we had intended to slay some of the guards with that sickle and that this was the reason for our leaving it behind, so they lined us up and asked a prisoner to name a number; they said that the prisoner whose number was named would be shot right away. The first number named was 39 and they started counting the prisoners. The count came to R. D. and he was carried away, because he was so terrified that he was unable to walk. Incidentally, this prisoner was larger than I am. We heard a shot and we all thought that he had been killed.

There were two more counts and two more prisoners were taken out, shots were heard and we all thought that they had been killed. Then we were told that it was enough for the day and that they would go on killing the following morning, but that I was the first one to be shot, without a count. I believed that this would really happen and therefore could not sleep all night, but in the morning I found out that they had actually taken those three prisoners to the women's pavilion and that they had fired shots to make us believe that they had killed them.

I could write a whole book about all that I and the rest of the prisoners have experienced in the Dretelj Camp.

Z. M. from Mostar was arrested on 30 April 1992 and taken straight to the Dretelj Camp, together with Ð. Š., S. B. and M. S. On the way, in the village of Lipnje, an Ustasha wanted to liquidate all three of them. He opened fire at them and shot Ð. Š., whereupon they took Ð. Š. out of the group, saying that he was being sent to Split for medical treatment. He has never been heard of since then.

Nenad Markoviæ from Bijelo Polje near Mostar, about thirty years old, was taken to the Dretelj Camp in the first week of August 1992. They started beating him right away, as well as they beat all the rest of the prisoners. As a consequence, two or three days later he died in the arms of R. D.

Božo Balaban was taken to the Dretelj Camp in the beginning of August 1992, together with his wife. He behaved somewhat oddly, because when the guards called his name, instead of coming to the window so that they would beat him through the bars, which was a way in which they beat all the rest of the prisoners, he refused to obey. Then they stuck a pole through the window and tried to hit him with it, but he took it away from them. That infuriated them, so they came in, beat him up and handcuffed him to the window. As they had broken his legs, he was unable to stand and just remained hanging there. All night long he kept calling the name of his wife, who was confined nearby. We all heard him calling her and at daybreak he died. In the morning they took him off the window and his body was whole. They had not cut his ears off while he was alive, nor did they cut his head off after he died. I have no knowledge of what happened with his body after they took it away.

I remember the following members of the staff of the Dretelj Camp:

2. Sajo Horoziæ, the first Administrator of the Dretelj Camp. After a while he was wounded and sent somewhere for medical treatment.

9. Edib Buljubašiæ, former commissioned officer of the Yugoslav People's Army, was also one of the administrators of the Dretelj Camp. He is one of those that beat the late Balaban.

14. Borislav Bijeliš.

15. Luka Šešelj, short in stature (about 165 cm). A very cruel man. Very primitive. About twenty-one or twenty-two years old. The youngest of the Šešelj brothers – his two elder brothers were in the camp too.

18. Miro Hrstiæ was not permanently posted in the Dretelj Camp, but came to the camp every day and interrogated the prisoners. He was a HOS officer. He comes from Ljubuški.

20. Ivan Petrušiæ was one of the commanders in the Dretelj Camp. He was very cruel. He was the one that ordered the "executions" because of the missing sickle that I told you about. He was about thirty years old.

21. To my knowledge, Hasan Toporan came from the village of Žulj near Nevesinje. He was one of the cruellest guards, especially after he heard that his father was killed.

22. – 14. Damir Glogovac and his father Milorad were first arrested as Serbs, and then Damir joined the HOS forces, and Milorad joined HVO. After that, Damir was one of the cruellest torturers. Damir comes from a mixed marriage – his father is Serb and his mother is Croat.

15. Zoran from Konjic, whose family name I do not know.

25. Toni Rajiæ, about twenty years old, an extremely stupid young man, drugged himself in public. He would swallow some sort of a powder, after which he would behave abnormally. To differ from him, his elder brother,

27. Ilija Rajiæ was a good man and never beat anyone.

30. Mile Artukoviæ (Artukoviæ is his family name and not a nickname), about fifty years old, was in charge of the camp's warehouse. He was fair towards the prisoners.

32. Boris Ružek from Èapljina, whose father was a military officer, about twenty years old, extremely short in stature. Very cruel, probably because of being so short.

28. Vinko Primorac, who in the meantime was killed with Kraljeviæ.

42. Marina Grubišiæ from the village of Struga, the Gorica hamlet near Èapljina. She was very nasty, she extinguished cigarettes on prisoners. She was between twenty-five and twenty-eight years old. Her younger sister,

47. Suzana from Zagreb, a pretty woman, about twenty-five years old.

51. Emina Oruèeviæ from Mostar, about thirty years old, secretary and lover of Sreæko Erceg. She only insulted Serbs, but did not beat them.

55. Dr Zoran Hraniloviæ, physician, about fifty-five years old. Grey, bearded, wore eyeglasses.

56. Joe from the USA, American, about thirty-five years old, about 185 cm tall, thick and long fair hair. He often went to his combat position and spent a little time in the camp, but to my knowledge, he raped some women in the camp. I heard that he was killed in the battle of Bosanski Brod.

59. Krasniæi. This was his family name, I do not know his given name, killed with Kraljeviæ. About 185 cm tall, dark. He was very cruel.

66. Kramer from Slavonia. He wore a necklace of human teeth and bragged that they were Serb teeth. About twenty-four years sold, some 170 cm tall.

I know some more men, but only by their nicknames Silver, Hak, Buco (Fatso), etc.

This is all that I have to state.

I do not want to read the record, because I have heard it dictated and have dictated some parts of it.

Court clerk Investigating judge

B. R.