Trial resumes for group accused of IS links

Trial resumes for group accused of IS links

BELGRADE -- A witness in the trial of a group accused of terrorism-related activities has told a Belgrade court he joined one of the accused in order to fight in Syria.

The trial of the group indicted for plotting terrorist attacks and financing departure of citizens of Serbia to training camps of Islamic terrorists in Syria continued on Thursday before the Special Court in Belgrade.

The defendants include Abid Podbicanin, Sead Plojovic, Tefik Mujovic, and Izudin Crnovrsanin from Novi Pazar, in Serbia's southwestern Raska District (known also as Sandzak), and Ferat Kasumovic from Belgrade.

Witness Irgan Licina today confirmed that he went to Syria in order to fight in the war there with the accused Tefik Mujovic.

He described himself as always having an interested in "the original Islam" and as attending Islamic religious services in Novi Pazar since the 7th grade of elementary school.

"I on saw on the internet that Muslims were being tortured and killed, this awakened emotions in my as a believer and as a person, which is why I decided to go there and fight," Licina told the court, denying the allegations from the indictment that he had been recruited.

The witness said that he "made inquiries for a long time" among his university friends about how he should go to Syria, and that a man named Hamza Adamovic told him that Tefik Mujovic would be "his contact."

According to Licina, he went to Syria by bus via Istanbul, Turkey, carrying with him EUR 1,000 and personal belongings.

Mujovic was waiting in Istanbul, where the witness said he spent a few days before departing for Syria, where he first underwent training, and was then sent to the...