Angelina Pikulic, defence witness of Radovan Karadzic

Angelina Pikulic testified that ‘Alija’s army’ attacked Pofalici on 16 May 1992, set Serb houses on fire and deported civilians to Velesici. In line with their previous order, the judges didn’t allow Karadzic to examine the witness about the crimes committed by the other warring side. The witness nevertheless managed to recount that she saw Alija Izetbegovic in front of her house in Pofalici. ‘Don’t say how many people you’ve killed’, the witness heard Izetbegovic say to his soldiers.

Karadzic read out a part of his letter to the UN Secretary General Boutros Ghali, in which he claimed that the Muslim forces held about 40,000 to 50,000 Serbs as ‘ethnic hostages’ in Sarajevo. In line with the judges’ decision, the witness didn’t comment on the document. However, in her replies to Karadzic’s questions, the witness managed to say she ‘was not free’ to leave her house when she wanted and that she felt as a hostage.

In the cross-examination, the prosecutor noted that the witness spoke about the purported sighting of Izetbegovic the first time today in court, and never mentioned it in the written statement she gave to the defense. As the prosecutor said, in the statement the witness claimed she left her house where she was allegedly ‘detained’ several times in order to get food and water and that she went to visit her weekend cottage once.

Karadzic’s next witness was Radojka Pandurevic. Before the war, Pandurevic was a member of the SDS municipal board and a delegate in the Hadzici municipal assembly. According to the summary of the statement that Karadzic read out in court, the witness was arrested on 28 May 1992 and was taken to the Silos prison in Tarcin.

The witness said she was arrested because ‘I worked in the municipal parliament, I was an SDS delegate and a Serb’. In line with the judges’ previous decision on the tu quoque evidence, the witness didn’t speak about the details of her detention in the Silos facility.

In her written statement, Pandurevic said that the Serb crisis staff in Hadzici had not yet been established by the time of her arrest on 28 May 1992. Prosecutor Edgerton showed the witness a document of 26 May 1992, signed by Ratko Radic as the crisis staff president.

The witness also claimed that she didn’t follow Karadzic’s instructions and orders as she did her job in the municipality. This prompted the prosecutor to quote from the minutes of the Serb Assembly of 24 March 1993. At the session, Karadzic announced that Serbs would seize power in Serb municipalities in the following two to three days, that the police force would be split along the ethnic lines and the resources seized. The witness claimed that she didn’t remember the Assembly meeting at all.

After Radojka Pandurevic completed her evidence, Karadzic called his next witness, Nikola Mijatovic, who will continue his evidence on Friday, 30 November 2012.