A SUSPECT DEPRIVED OF LIBERTY IN VLASENICA FOR WAR CRIMES COMMITTED IN CAPARDE

Upon the order of the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina, in the area of Vlasenica, police officers of the State Investigation and Protection Agency deprived of liberty the following suspect:

-      Predrag Marjanović, born in 1968 in Živinice, a citizen of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

This suspect is under investigation by the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina as he is suspected of acting in violation of the Geneva Conventions relative to the protection of civilian persons in time of war, in June of 1992, during the war and armed conflict between the RBiH Army and the Republika Srpska Army, as a member of the Birčanska Brigade of the RS Army known as the “Šekovići Guard”, in Caparde, in the Municipality of Osmaci. 

He is suspected of coming to a facility in Caparde, on 21 to 22 of June 1992, where Bosniak women expelled from the area of Brčko were illegally detained, and of using force and threats to commit rape and sexually abuse one Bosniak victim, all of which was done in an extremely cruel manner. 

In view of the fact that multiple rape of more than 25 victims was committed in that facility in which women and underage girls were singled out, and that those victims were taken out by force to be raped and sexually abused in abandoned houses in that place, the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina is working intensively to identify other suspected perpetrators and to prosecute them for the war crime they committed.

Predrag Marjanović is suspected of the commission of the criminal offense of War Crimes against Civilians, as referred to in Article 173 of the Criminal Code of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

After the suspect has been deprived of liberty, he will be handed over to the Prosecutor in charge of this case, and the Prosecutor will question the suspect and subsequently decide whether to put forward a motion for custody or a motion seeking prohibiting measures against this suspect, in accordance with the law.