Dodig's advisor Pero Simić refuses to accept court summons

(Patria) - Media advisor to the Serb member of the BiH Presidency, Pero Simić, refused a phone call from the State Court to testify at the trial for the murder of 67 Bosniak civilians committed in July 1995 in the village of Lokanj near Zvornik.

Attorney Duško Tomić, who is defending Goran Maksimović, one of the accused for the murders in Lokanj, told the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BIRN BiH) that he requested Simić, currently an advisor to the BiH Presidency Chairman Milorad Dodik, to be summoned for the third time for next Monday.

“He clearly does not recognize the BiH Court, he does not want to talk, and he does not want to appear in the BiH Court to tell the truth related to the reporting of events in Lokanj on July 14, when 67 Muslims were captured and killed. Pero Simić first reported this news on ‘SIM radio’ in Bijeljina. (...) And now he is running away from this news and does not want to come to confirm this news,” Tomić said.

According to Tomić, Simić is thus “mocking, evading, and ignoring the BiH Court.”

Simić did not respond to calls and messages from BIRN BiH journalists regarding why he did not respond to the summons. He was summoned as a defense witness in the case being heard before the State Court for the war crime committed in the Zvornik village of Lokanj on July 14, 1992, when 67 Bosniak civilians were killed.

Goran Maksimović, Ljiljan Mitrović, Slavko Perić, Mile Vujević, Vukasin Drašković, Gojko Stevanović, Rajo Lazarević, and Mićo Manojlović are on trial for the attack on the convoy that left Teočak on July 14, 1992, and for the escort and guarding of 76 civilians, of whom 67 were killed in the village of Lokanj.

According to the indictment, Maksimović was the commander of the Intervention Unit of the Public Security Station (SJB) in Ugljevik, Mitrović his deputy, while Slavko Perić was the commander of the Lokanj Company of the Zvornik Brigade of the Army of Republika Srpska (VRS), and the other accused were members of this unit.

At the previous hearing before the BiH Court, on Monday, January 28, Judge Staniša Gluhajić, who presides over the Panel, said that when summoned for the previous hearing, Simić told court officials that “he does not want anyone to contact him.”

Tomić then requested that Simić be brought in for the next hearing, but Gluhajić stated that Simić had never been served a written summons, which is why his apprehension could not be ordered.

As attorney Tomić said, the fact that Simić is avoiding court summons is “scandalous.”

“They can bring him in, but the prerequisite for the Court Police to bring him in is that he receives the summons. But he avoids receiving the summons because it is powerful. He tells the postmen in Bijeljina: ‘Return that summons.’ Then they return it and play ping-pong, and in a way, it is a message to all other witnesses – that they do not have to come to court,” added Tomić.

Attorney Tomić announced that he would make a public statement on this matter and write an open letter to Dodik.

By the time this text was published, BIRN BiH had not received a response from Milorad Dodik to its inquiry for a comment on this case.