MILANOVIĆ: AMERICAN INVESTIGATORS SHOULD ALSO INVESTIGATE CRIMES AGAINST SERBS AT VISOKO CAMP

DERVENTA, JULY 20 /SRNA/ - Milenko Milanović from Bijeljina, who was a detainee at the Visoko camp during the past war, arrived in Derventa to hand over a book, documentation and evidence of the suffering of Serbs in Visoko in 1992 and 1993 to American investigator-prosecutors.

Milanović said that around 1,000 Serb detainees were held at the former barracks that served as the Visoko camp, while women, children, and elderly people were detained in two other facilities. "It is important that the American investigators and prosecutors take this book and listen to my account so that the investigation into war crimes against Serbs can be expanded to the entire territory of BiH, because Serbs did not suffer only in Derventa and Visoko," Milanović told SRNA today in Derventa. Milanović explained that the book is based on the diary he kept during his detention at the Visoko camp and contains the names of guards and torturers, as well as a list of detainees. He stressed that the camp commander was Zijad Kadrić, who had been his secondary school teacher in Visoko. Kadrić has since died, while proceedings are being conducted against five other individuals. "The main torturer at the Visoko camp was Hajrudin Halilović, the brother of Muslim general Sefer Halilović," Milanović stressed. He said that the most horrific thing for him in the camp was witnessing the death of his best friend Milivoje Bajić, who was killed in August 1992, followed by the killing of two more Serbs in Room No. 4 the next day. "The worst thing was the psychological torture we endured when they looked at us as if we were dogs, as if we were less worthy as human beings and as if we were worth absolutely nothing," Milanović said. He testified before the Court of BiH in Sarajevo, where proceedings are being conducted against six persons of Muslim nationality accused of killing and terrorising Serbs at the Visoko camp. He said that it is difficult to achieve justice for Serb victims, but that he believes it is attainable and that the arrival of American investigators in Republika Srpska will begin to unravel the truth about war crimes committed against Serbs throughout the territory of BiH. Milanović recalled that he had published the fifth edition of his book "A Slow Death: The Visoko Camp 1992–1993, Diary and Memories," which, as he stated, was published by the Ministry of Culture of Serbia; in 2023, it was printed by the State Archives of Serbia, and in January 2012 it was published in the United States in English. Five American investigator-prosecutors arrived in Derventa to take statements from eight former camp detainees about the horrors they endured in the notorious camp for Serbs at the Rabić military warehouse in 1992. During the past war, before the Army of Republika Srpska had even been formed, Croatian and Muslim forces attacked the local Serbian population in Derventa. Camps for Serbs were established, the most notorious of which were those at the Army Hall and the Rabić site. The Rabić camp, established in April 1992, held 120 Serb detainees, while several hundred Serb civilians passed through the camps in the Derventa area overall.