|
|
|
 |
INTRODUCTION
Most
of the war crimes committed during the Bosnian war were
carried out either by Bosnian Serb paramilitary forces
or soldiers. But at points during the conflict, Bosnian
government forces also violated the laws of war. This
excerpt from The Key To My Neighbor’s House
focuses on what was the exception rather than the rule:
Serb victims of a concentration camp manned by Bosnian
Muslims and Croats.
Their case was important to the International Criminal
Tribunal for the Yugoslavia (ICTY) for several reasons.
First, the tribunal was scorned by Serbs and Bosnian Serbs
as an illegitimate court which delivered anti-Serb, victor’s
justice. Prosecuting a case in which Serbs were victims
would help convince Bosnia’s Serbs that the court
was not biased. Second, it was the Serbs’ own sense
of victimization, suppressed since their sufferings in
World War II, that helped stoke the Bosnian conflict.
It was important that Bosnia’s Muslims not develop
a similar sense of victimization and recognize that people
suffered even at their army’s hands.
The Celebici case, which began in March, 1997, pushed
back the boundaries of international law, becoming the
first case since the Tokyo military tribunal to test the
principle of ‘command responsibility’, in which
civilian or military leaders are held responsible for
crimes of those in their command. At the same time, the
case — the first to put multiple defendants on trial--
was beset by problems and delays, lasting for 19 months.
Two witnesses, Petko and Gordana Grubac, hoped the trial
would explain why, when war broke out in Konjic, a city
south of Sarajevo, they were imprisoned simply because
they were Serbs. Petko, a doctor, and Gordana, an accountant,
had always believed in Tito’s Yugoslavia, and their
closest friends were Croat and Muslim. Petko was imprisoned
at Celebici, a camp in a village south of Konjic, where
he treated inmates who were brutally tortured, beaten
and raped.
Those who committed such acts of brutality -- Esad Landzo,
Hazim Delic and Zdravko Mucic, all of whom had positions
of authority at the camp, were found guilty by the tribunal.
Their sentences–which are still under review-- ranged
from seven to twenty years. But the man in charge of military
logistics for the region, Zejnil Delalic, was acquitted.
By the trial’s end, both Petko and Gordana decided
that justice would have been served if they had participated
in a truth commission, which would have allowed them to
confront their neighbors, rather than a trial.
|
|
|
|
