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The Hague, 31 January 2002
CVO/P.I.S./656e
Voluntary Surrender of Dusan Fustar to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia
Following his voluntary surrender, Dusan Fustar was transferred to the Detention Unit of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia on 31 January 2002. The date and time for his initial appearance, at which he will be asked to enter a plea to the charges against him, will be set in the coming days.
The accused
Dusan Fustar was born on 29 June 1954 in Prijedor, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
According to the indictment, Dusan Fustar was a shift commander at the Keraterm camp who supervised one of the shifts of guards that operated the camp. As a shift commander and when present in the camp, he was in a position of superior authority to all camp personnel (other than the commander or deputy commander) and most visitors.
The Indictment
Factual allegations
The indictment, Sikirica and others (IT-95-8) alleges that between 24 May 1992 and 30 August 1992, Bosnian Serb authorities in the Prijedor municipality unlawfully segregated, detained and confined more than 7,000 Bosnian Muslims, Bosnian Croats and other non-Serbs from the Prijedor area in the Omarska, Trnopolje and Keraterm camps. At the Keraterm camp, the majority of the detainees were military-aged males.
According to the indictment, detainees at the Keraterm camp were crowded together so badly in the various rooms of the camp that often they could not sit or lie down. There were little or no toilets or facilities for personal hygiene and the water supply was inadequate. They had no change of clothing, bedding or medical care and were fed starvation rations once a day. Interrogations were allegedly conducted on a daily basis and regularly accompanied by beatings and torture. The indictment states that killings, sexual assault and other forms of physical and psychological abuse were also commonplace at the Keraterm camp. The camp guards and others who came to the camps used all types of weapons and instruments to beat and otherwise physically abuse the detainees. Bosnian Muslim and Bosnian Croat political and civic leaders, intellectuals, the wealthy, and non-Serbs who were considered as extremists or to have resisted the Bosnian Serbs were especially subjected to beatings, torture and/or killed. At a minimum, hundreds of detainees, whose identities are known and unknown, did not survive.
Charges
The indictment charges Dusan Fustar on the basis of the following:
Individual criminal responsibility (Article 7(1) of the Statute of the Tribunal) and superior criminal responsibility (Article 7(3)) with:
Crimes against humanity (Article 5 - persecutions on political, racial and religious grounds; inhumane acts; murder, or alternatively, inhumane acts; torture) and
Violations of the laws or customs of war (Article 3 - outrages upon personal dignity; murder, or alternatively, cruel treatment; torture).
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International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia
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