Of 12 Prijedor criminals convicted in The Hague, 11 are already free

Of the 12 Prijedor criminals convicted before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, all have been released to date, with the exception of criminal Miomir Stakić, who was sentenced to 40 years in prison and is still in custody, writes the BiH news agency Patria (NAP).

From 1992 to 1995, the Army and police of Republika Srpska killed more than 4,000 Bosniaks and expelled more than 50,000 from their homes. The crimes against Bosniaks in Prijedor are considered the greatest crimes against the Bosniak population during the last aggression against BiH, after the genocide in Srebrenica, where more than 10,000 Bosniaks were killed.

For the crimes in Prijedor, the International Tribunal convicted Radoslav Brđanin (32 years in prison), Zoran Žigić (25 years), Mlađo Rodić (20 years), Duško Tadić (20 years), Duško Sikirica (15 years), Predrag Banović (8 years), Miroslav Kvočka (7 years), Miroslav Kos (6 years), Dragoljub Prcać (5 years), Damir Došen (5 years), Dragan Kolundžija (3 years).

All convicted criminals have been released to date, after serving two-thirds of their sentence, with the exception of criminal Stakić.

Victims say they do not feel comfortable in a city where they are still second-class citizens and where murderers walk the streets.

Sudbin Mušić, president of the Association of Camp Detainees Prijedor '92, told Patria:

- It often happens that I meet convicted war criminals at traffic lights. One of them recently stopped his car so that I could pass. It is a very unpleasant situation.

During the aggression against BiH, Serbian authorities opened three concentration camps in the Prijedor area: Keraterm, Trnopolje, and Omarska, through which thousands of people passed. The camps were closed after foreign journalists discovered them, but they were briefly reopened afterwards.

No one has yet been held accountable for the crimes in the Trnopolje camp.

For the crime in Prijedor, Drago Radaković (20 years in prison), Draško Krndija (20 years), Željko Bulatović (14 years), Siniša Teodorović (12 years), Radoslav Knežević (10 years), Zoran Gajić (10 years), O. D. (10 years), Ismet Žerić (7 years) have been convicted before the BiH judiciary.

A larger number of investigations into crimes in Prijedor are currently underway before domestic judiciary, NAP reports.