34 years ago, Bosniaks were killed in Čajniče, criminal Kornjača still unavailable to BiH judiciary, found refuge in Serbia

(Patria) - The Association for Social Research and Communication (UDIK) reminds the public of the anniversary of war crimes against Bosniaks in Čajniče. According to the verdicts of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, in the period from mid-April to mid-May 1992, in the municipality of Čajniče, as part of a wide and systematic attack by members of the Territorial Defense of the municipality of Čajniče, members of the "Blue Eagles" unit, and the Public Security Station police of the municipality of Čajniče, supported by paramilitary formations coming from Serbia and Montenegro, persecution of non-Serb civilian population in the Čajniče area was carried out on a national and religious basis, through imprisonment and other inhumane acts of a similar nature, committed with the intent of causing great suffering.

At the hunting lodge locality in Mostina near Čajniče during May 1992, Bosniak civilians who had previously been captured in the town or surrounding villages were killed, as well as on the road towards Pljevlja while they were trying to escape the war. The Institute for Missing Persons of Bosnia and Herzegovina states that the largest grave in Čajniče was found in the place called Mostina, from which the mortal remains of 18 victims were exhumed in September 2002.

This locality hid six more mass graves from which the bodies of a total of 60 victims were exhumed. The mass grave in the Čudanj forest, found in 2006, in which the mortal remains of the Mahmutović family were hidden, also testifies to the monstrosities committed against the Bosniaks of Čajniče. First, the mortal remains of the mother Hajrija and her two children, one-and-a-half-year-old Amrudin and four-year-old Amra, were found. Only a few hundred meters away at this location, in an individual grave, the mortal remains of Amir Mahmutović, Hajrija's husband, were also found.

UDIK's publication "War Crimes in Čajniče – Verdicts" presents the cases of the Court of BiH which sentenced Milorad Živković, Milun Kornjača, Milosav Jovanović, Marijan Jovanović, and Slavko Jovanović to prison sentences ranging from six to eleven years.

Duško Tadić and Stevo Jovanović were acquitted of the charges. More than ten years ago, the Court of BiH confirmed an indictment charging the accused Duško Kornjača with having "as president of the Crisis Staff, later commander of the war staff of the Serb Municipality of Čajniče, and president of the Municipal Assembly and Minister of Defense in the Government of the Serb Autonomous Region of Herzegovina, as a conscious participant in a joint criminal enterprise, planned and ordered the persecution of the non-Serb population from the municipality of Čajniče".

Despite being located in neighboring Serbia, Kornjača still remains unavailable to the judicial authorities of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Serbia knowingly continues to provide refuge to war criminals, thereby participating in obstructing their prosecution and providing legal satisfaction to the families of the murdered. We call on the Serbian authorities to cease the policy of hiding murderers and criminals and finally show a sincere will for good neighborly relations. On the occasion of the thirty-fourth anniversary, we remember the murdered Bosniak civilians of Čajniče and its surroundings.