Bosnian Croat Fighter ‘Shot Prisoner at School’

A witness told the trial of ex-fighter Nikola Maric, accused of the detention, persecution and killing of Bosniaks in the Prozor area, that he saw the defendant shoot a fellow prisoner.

The protected prosecution witness codenamed S-18 told the Sarajevo court that when he was arrested in July 1993 and taken to the secondary school in Prozor along with other Bosniak prisoners, he saw the defendant Nikola Maric, alias Nidzo, who he knew well.

“Nidzo had black trousers, a T-shirt, a hat and a gun… He was in charge of everything,” the witness recalled.

He said that the Maric brought a prisoner called Munib Grcic, who he also knew, to the school in August.

“Munib started climbing the stairs when Nikola shot him. I saw it from the stairs platform,” S-18 said.

Maric, a former member of the Croatian Defence Council, is charged with participating in murders, torture and other inhumane acts from November 1992 to October 1993.

He is charged, amongst other things, with the murder of Munib Grcic in August 1993 and the disappearance of six civilians from the secondary school in Prozor.

The trial continues on June 16.