Kenjalo and Balaban sentenced to a total of 19 years in prison for crimes in Bosanski Novi

The Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina sentenced Stojan Kenjalo, Zoran Kenjalo and Dragan Balaban to a total of 19 years in prison after accepting a plea agreement in which they pleaded guilty to murders, forced displacements and torture of the Bosniak population in the area of the Bosanski Novi municipality in June 1992.

Stojan Kenjalo was sentenced to seven years in prison, Zoran Kenjalo to five, and Dragan Balaban to seven years in prison.

According to the verdict, Stojan and Zoran Kenjalo and Balaban, together with other persons, from May to September 1992, as part of a widespread and systematic attack on the civilian population, participated in the persecution of Bosniaks from the hamlets of Ekići and Alići (Bosanski Novi municipality).

As stated in the verdict, on June 22, 1992, Stojan and Zoran Kenjalo and Balaban, together with over twenty other armed persons, launched an attack on the civilian population of Alići and Ekići, hamlets of the village of Maslovare, and on the way killed one person who was driving a tractor, while upon arrival in the settlements they drove civilians out of their homes, during which they killed two more persons.

The Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina also established that most of the bodies of the killed were exhumed in 1996 and thrown into the confluence of the Japra and Sana rivers, BRIN reported, as carried by Patria.