Trial for Wartime Murders of 45 Villagers Opens in Bosnia

"Twelve fathers and 13 sons were killed" in the attack on the village of Novoseoci in September 1992, the prosecutor said as the trial of nine Bosnian Serbs began at the Bosnian state court in Sarajevo on Friday.

The defendants are accused of committing a crime against humanity in Novoseoci, near the town of Sokolac, as part of a joint criminal enterprise, through their involvement in the attack that left 45 Bosniak civilians dead.

The men on trial include Milan Tupajic, wartime president of the Sokolac Crisis Committee; Dragomir Obradovic, alias Dragan, commander of the police's Public Safety Station in Sokolac; Momcilo Pajic, alias Paja, commander of the Military Police Company of the Bosnian Serb Army's Second Romanija Motorised Brigade, and his deputy Aleksa Gordic, alias Aco, and Miladin Gasevic, alias Cirko, deputy commander of the Reconnaissance Squad of the Second Romanija Motorised Brigade.

They also include several members of the Reconnaissance Squad - Momir Kezunovic, alias Keza, Branislav Kezunovic, alias Miki, Zeljko Gasevic, alias Gaso, and Jadranko Suka.

According to the charges, on the night of September 21-22, 1992, members of the Military Police and Reconnaissance Company surrounded Novoseoci and then entered the village.

Pajic ordered the local residents to hand over their weapons, although they had already done so, and one member of the Reconnaissance Squad killed a villager.

Women and children were then separated from men and taken to a bus near the local mosque to be transported towards Sarajevo, while 44 men were taken in two military vehicles to a landfill at Ivan Polje.

The men were brought to the edge of a hole and killed with automatic rifles. A member of the Reconnaissance Squad then...