“Which foreign and domestic officials, under pressure or otherwise, influenced prosecutor Romano to bring such a shameful decision and how is it possible for prosecutor Phillip Alcock of Great Britain, who was in charge of the Dobrovoljacka case till 2009, to meet with Romano in the capacity of a defence lawyer of one of the accused only a few days before the decision to halt the investigation against 14 persons was brought?” Kosarac asks.

Kosarac asks why the Prosecution has never officially responded to the objection to prosecutor Romano’s decision filed by the Republika Srpska Ministry of Internal Affairs.

He asked Salihovic to tell the public which prosecutor of the BiH Prosecution is now conducting the investigation into the Dobrovoljacka case, and what has been done since January, 2012 in the investigation.

Kosarac demands urgent answers on behalf of the families of the victims, who have been waiting for over two decades for justice and appropriate punishment for the perpetrators.

“The public in Republika Srpska expects answers from you, the public which long ago stopped believing in the impartiality of the judicial institutions at the BiH level,” says Kosarac.

Kosarac reminds him that on May 2 and May 3, 1992, 42 JNA soldiers were killed, 73 were wounded and 215 were imprisoned in various places in Sarajevo, including Dobrovoljacka Street.

“I believe you are familiar with the fact that in January 2012, the BiH Prosecution announced that after a thorough and long investigation during which 352 witnesses were questioned and 412 pieces of material evidence were processed, including documents, video footage, intercepted conversations and others, it was determined that seven people were killed and 14 wounded in Dobrovoljacka Street after they had been captured and ‘incapacitated’ to fight,” Kosarac says.

He noted that it is a fact that the investigation conducted by the BiH Prosecution determined that a number of JNA soldiers captured in the convoy in Dobrovoljacka Street was taken to several locations in Sarajevo, where they were tortured and mistreated, which also is a war crime.

Regardless of these facts, prosecutor Romano, Kosarac says, brought the astonishing and shameful decision to halt the investigation against 14 persons suspected of committing the crimes in Dobrovoljacka Street or having ordered them.

They are Ejup Ganic, Hasan Efendic, Zaim Backovic, Jusuf Pusina, Emin Svrakic, Dragan Vikic, Fikret Muslimovic, Dzevad Topic, Jovica Berovic, Resad Jusupovic, Jusuf Kecman, Damir Dolan, Ibrahim Hodzic and Gen. Jovan Divjak, who, wanting to wash his dirty conscience, on a number of occasions said that a crime against humanity was committed in Dobrovoljacka Street, but that there is no political will in Sarajevo to admit and prosecute it.

In January 2012, the BiH Prosecution announced that the investigation into the Dobrovoljacka Street crime continues due to reasonable suspicion that a war crime was committed, having in mind that fire was opened on the victims after they were incapacitated to fight or while they were in an ambulance.

Kosarac says that the BiH Prosecution then said in a press release that the investigation also continues into the torture and mistreatment of JNA personnel taken prisoner, with the aim of determining the responsibility of known perpetrators and identifying other perpetrators, as well as determining possible command responsibility for that crime.

(Srna/Frontal)