Prosecutor's Office of BiH confirms: Ćazim Hasanspahić hid war crimes case against Dragan Čović in a drawer for years

By Avdo Avdić/Istraga.ba

"I emphasize that the information provided is incorrect and for the purpose of truthfully informing the public, I deny your text as incorrect. I emphasize that I was never in charge of the war crimes case against Dragan Čović, and I consider the information in the text itself to be arbitrary and stated with the previously stated goal of discrediting my person.

I expect the media to report responsibly, with fact-checking and respect for the basic principles of professional journalism", wrote two days ago state prosecutor Ćazim Hasanspahić, reacting to an article by Istraga in which we stated that he had been hiding a war crimes case against the leader of HDZ BiH, Dragan Čović, in his drawer for years.

And we emphasize that state prosecutor Ćazim Hasanspahić lied again. Here is the official response from the Prosecutor's Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina to Istraga's inquiry about prosecutor's case number T20 0 KTA 0014998 17, which was handled by Ćazim Hasanspahić until his recent transfer.

"Dear Sir/Madam, in March 2017, the Prosecutor's Office of BiH received a report-submission from a political entity (political party) which alleged criminal offenses of organized crime, connected with several other criminal offenses, in the post-war period in BiH, where among several other individuals, Čović Dragan* is also mentioned.

The report contained a small segment at the very end concerning allegations of committed war crimes. Given the content of the submission, a KTA case with prosecutor number T20 0 KTA 0014998 17 was formed, assigned to prosecutor Hasanspahić.

Two more received submissions were subsequently added to the case, submitted by individuals, relating to allegations of war crimes, one of which was forwarded in 2018 from the Cantonal Prosecutor's Office of Zenica-Doboj Canton, to which it was originally submitted, as well as a citizen's submission from 2019 directly submitted to the Prosecutor's Office of BiH, which alleged events during the war and the Soko company in Mostar in the war year of 1993.

No investigation activities or verification of the allegations from the report are recorded in the case. Prosecutor Hasanspahić was in charge of the case under number T20 0 KTA 0014998 17 from its formation in 2017 until March 6 of this year, when it was reassigned to another acting prosecutor", reads the response of the Prosecutor's Office of BiH to Istraga's inquiry.

Although everything is more or less clear, we will break down the response of the Prosecutor's Office of BiH below to make it all clearer. The Prosecutor's Office of BiH confirms that Ćazim Hasanspahić, as a prosecutor in the Terrorism Department, was assigned the case against Dragan Čović.

One part of that case, the Prosecutor's Office of BiH confirms, relates to war crimes with which Dragan Čović is associated. Although he was obliged to immediately separate that part of the case and transfer it to the War Crimes Department, Hasanspahić did not do so.

Furthermore, two or three years later, two reports against Dragan Čović were submitted to the Prosecutor's Office of BiH. One report was forwarded from the Prosecutor's Office of Zenica-Doboj Canton, and the other was directly submitted to the Prosecutor's Office of BiH. Both reports relate to war crimes with which the leader of HDZ BiH, Dragan Čović, is associated.

One of the reports, as Istraga learns, was even addressed to the War Crimes Department of the Prosecutor's Office of BiH. However, the then Chief State Prosecutor Gordana Tadić decided to forward these reports to the Terrorism Department, i.e., to prosecutor Ćazim Hasanspahić, who was at that time controlled by the then Deputy Minister of Security of BiH, Mijo Krešić, for the needs of HDZ.


Ćazim Hasanspahić and HDZ's Mijo Krešić

Although the two reports against Dragan Čović related to "war crimes", Ćazim Hasanspahić decided to put them in his file under the designation T20 0 KTA 0014998 17, regardless of the fact that he was obliged to forward them to the War Crimes Department, where they would be assigned a different designation.

Namely, in 2015, the HJPC adopted the Rulebook on the System for Automatic Case Management in Prosecutor's Offices, which clearly states how cases are designated by specific areas. Here is one of the points of this Rulebook.



Therefore, even if it was an "undetermined criminal offense or perpetrator", Hasanspahić had to forward the reports relating to war crimes and Dragan Čović to the War Crimes Department, where they would be assigned the designation KTARZ.

It is unknown why he did not act in accordance with this HJPC Rulebook. Just as it is unknown why Hasanspahić did not act on the instructions of his superiors a year and a half ago to transfer the part of this file relating to war crimes to the Department responsible for prosecuting war crimes.

Namely, a year and a half ago, the Prosecutor's Office of BiH conducted an analysis of cases held by certain prosecutors and it was determined that Hasanspahić's KTA file contained reports of war crimes. Although he received instructions from his superiors to forward the case to the War Crimes Department, Hasanspahić followed the instructions from circles close to HDZ not to do so. And he did not.

The report against Dragan Čović for war crimes thus languished in a drawer for almost a decade. And here's what it's about. Dragan Čović, namely, in 1993, requested that the prison warden, where Bosniaks were held, send him labor for the Soko company in Mostar.

"I kindly ask you to allow us to take ten prisoners for the needs of ZI Soko, for the purpose of performing certain tasks - erecting and installing a protective fence around ZI Soko… The security of the prisoners will be provided by the Security Function of ZI Soko Mostar", reads the disputed document from June 22, 1993, signed by Dragan Čović.



After that, Dragan Čović appeared on the show Nedjeljom u 2 on HRT. When asked by the editor and host of the show, Aleksandar Stanković, if the document was authentic, Čović said: "Possible, you will never find my signature or anything incriminating that is linked to me (…) everything I did from 1992 to 1995 was more than honorable".

When told that people were brought there forcibly and for free, he replied that in wartime "no one worked for money" and that "in no way did they experience any discomfort or were treated dishonorably".

Given that the Criminal Code of the SFRY was in force in the territory of BiH at the time, "forced labor" was treated as a war crime against the civilian population.

"Whoever, by violating the rules of international law during war, armed conflict or occupation, orders an attack on the civilian population, settlement, individual civilians or persons hors de combat, which resulted in death, serious bodily injury or serious impairment of human health; an indiscriminate attack that affects the civilian population; that murders, tortures, inhuman treatment, biological, medical or other scientific experiments, tissue or organ harvesting for transplantation, causing great suffering or injury to physical integrity or health be carried out against the civilian population; displacement or resettlement or forced denationalization or conversion to another religion; forcing into prostitution or rape; applying measures of intimidation and terror, taking hostages, collective punishment, unlawful detention in concentration camps and other unlawful imprisonment, deprivation of the right to a fair and impartial trial; forcing service in the armed forces of the enemy or in its intelligence service or administration; forcing into forced labor, starving the population, confiscation of property, looting of population property, unlawful and arbitrary destruction or appropriation of property on a large scale not justified by military needs, taking unlawful and disproportionately large contributions and requisitions, devaluation of domestic currency or unlawful issuance of money, or whoever commits any of the aforementioned acts, shall be punished by imprisonment of at least five years or by the death penalty", it is stated in the Criminal Code of the SFRY, according to which a large number of war crimes were prosecuted in the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina.