Bosnian Serb commander convicted of war crimes

Former Serb army commander Predrag Kujundzic was convicted of crimes against humanity including murder and rape by Bosnia’s war crimes court on Friday and sentenced to 22 years in jail.

Judge Saban Maksumic said the court found Kujundzic, 48, guilty of “committing and coercing sexual slavery, rape, severe deprivation of physical liberty, persecution of non-Serb civilians and other inhumane acts.”

Kujundzic was the commander of the Bosnian Serb Army unit known as Predini Vukovi (Predo’s Wolves) that operated around the northern town of Doboj during the country’s 1992-95 war.

“Commanding over the Predo’s Wolves unit, he participated in inhumane treatment of 50 Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) and Croat civilians who were unlawfully detained and used as human shields during combat operations and 17 were killed,” the judge said.

Maksumic said Kujundzic went to the house of a woman in June 1992, armed and accompanied by five members of his unit. He raped the woman’s under-age daughter and incited other soldiers to rape the mother.

“After Kujundzic raped the minor female, he told her that as of that day she would comply with all that he requested from her or otherwise he would kill her mother and younger sister,” the judge said.

Kujundzic ordered the girl to wear a chain with a cross pendant and a Serb army camouflage uniform. He made her wear a red beret and changed her Muslim name into a Serb name without consent of her parents, Maksumic said.

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