Bosnian Camp Survivors Describe Random

Death
By ROGER COHEN,
Published: August 2, 1994

(Republished with Permission)

VLASENICA, Bosnia and Herzegovina— He has been described as a tall slim figure with a nasal
voice, a Serb in his mid-30's named Dragan Nikolic, and he appears to have displayed a singular
brutality as the orchestrator of the proceedings at Susica, the Serbian concentration camp just outside
this eastern Bosnian town.

Each night throughout the summer of 1992, witnesses say, Mr. Nikolic would come into the barracks
and point to men or read out a list of names. Shortly afterward, people inside the building would hear
shooting. The men selected never returned. According to Pero Popovic, a former guard at the camp,
they were generally lined up against an electricity pylon just outside the barracks and shot.

Zijad Zemic, who entered Susica on June 2 as one of the camp's first prisoners, said "Nikolic and his
cronies often seemed drunk. There was a deathly silence when they came in and we had to put our
faces down. It did not seem like there was much of a system. They just came in drunk and pointed to
people."

Susica (pronounced sue-SEE-chah), where about 3,000 Muslims died and thousands more were
imprisoned before exile, began its work in June 1992. Within a month, the pace of killing and expulsion
of Muslims accelerated, and by the end of September, there were no Muslims left in Vlasenica and
scant evidence of the savagery they had suffered.

But now, two years later, a Serbian guard at the camp and dozens of Muslim survivors have come
forward to provide the first account of a camp's operation to be corroborated by both sides in the
Bosnian war. Their convergent portrayals, conveyed in separate, independent interviews, establish
Susica's function as the systematic elimination of Muslims from the area. Until now, full details of how
such camps worked remained cloudy, their true nature repeatedly denied by the Serbs.

Mr. Popovic, the 36-year-old former guard, who deserted from the Bosnian Serb army in January 1993,
made clear in three interviews with The New York Times that executions at the camp were a nightly
occurrence and that a unit of the the Serbian-dominated Yugoslav Army opened the way for the
"cleansing" of Vlasenica (pronounced vlah-seh-NEET-sah) by surrounding and disarming its Muslim
population a few weeks before the camp opened.

Mr. Popovic, who said that his remorse over the eviction and killing of his former neighbors led to his
decision to talk, has been interrogated by investigators preparing for war-crimes trials in The Hague.
Convinced of his credibility, they have recommended him for political asylum in the United States.

One of those guarded by Mr. Popovic was Fikra Atalov, a 60-year-old Vlasenica woman who is now a
refugee in Kladanj. She was held in Susica between July 5 and July 12, 1992. Every day, she said, more
civilians were coming in, and room had to be made for them -- either by the removal of women and
children to Kladanj or through executions of men.

She said she was terrified every time Mr. Nikolic came in. She estimated that he would usually take
about eight men. They did not return.

Sometimes, young women were selected, she said, and when they came back they said they had been
raped. "It was the silence that was so eerie," she said. "Even little children had to keep absolutely quiet
as we heard shooting nearby."

When she was removed from the camp, she left her 37-year-old son, a mechanic named Naser Atalov,
inside Susica. She has never heard from him again.

Mr. Popovic, the guard, said he believed that Mr. Atalov had ultimately been released and might be in
Tuzla. Mass Deaths in a Ravine

Executions of small groups took place within the camp, just outside the hangar used as a barracks, Mr.
Popovic said. But large-scale executions -- which generally happened in reprisal for the killing in the
war of a local Serb -- were carried out at a nearby ravine called Han Ploca on the road south toward
Han Pijesak.

Men were loaded into the back of a truck, taken up to the edge of the ravine, about five miles away, and
then shot as they got out of the vehicle, he said. Groups of young soldiers were brought in to perform
the executions. The bodies fell into the ravine and bulldozers were later used to cover them over.

These acts, like so many in the Bosnian war, echoed atrocities that took place during World War II,
when a brutal Yugoslav civil war was fought within the broader conflict. Then, the ravines of
Herzegovina were littered with the bodies of Serb civilians massacred by Croats, sometimes fighting in
alliance with Muslims.

"For example," Mr. Popovic said, "in mid-June I witnessed the execution at the ravine of 26 people.
One man got away by running down into the woods as he got out the truck. In all, at least 1,000 people
were executed up there. At first the executions took place during the day, but later they were all at
night.

Asked about Mr. Nikolic's motives, Mr. Popovic said he believed he was inebriated by Serbian
nationalist propaganda and was also making a lot of money from his victims.

"Nikolic was taking everything of value from the Muslims," Mr. Popovic said. "One woman offered me
18,000 German marks to arrange her release. There were nearly 20,000 Muslims in the county. So you
can imagine the money that was being made."

The Terror When Neighbors Become Enemies

The Serbian concentration camp of Susica near this eastern Bosnian town had been functioning for just
over a month when, on July 8, 1992, a Serbian soldier came to the home of Rafija Hadzic and ordered
her to undress.

About one hour before, her husband, Ejub Hadzic, had been arrested and taken away. Like many other
young Muslim women from Vlasenica, she has never seen her husband again.
"My 8-year-old daughter was standing in the room, but the soldier beat me with the butt of his gun and
cut me with a knife," Mrs. Hadzic, who is now a refugee in the town of Kladanj said.

After being beaten and humiliated, Mrs. Hadzic and her daughter were taken to the Susica camp, where
they arrived at about 7:30 in the evening. Inside a large hangar, she said she found about 700 Muslim
residents of the Vlasenica area -- men, women and children -- massed on a concrete floor. A Microcosm
of Cruelty

"I was there for 10 days," she said. "During that time, I saw one man's ear cut off by the Serbs, and two
others killed. The men killed were Ismet Dedic and Galib Music. People were beaten every day.
Sometimes a dead body would lie in the hangar for hours, before the guards came with a bag and took
it away.

Eventually, Mrs. Hadzic and her daughter were taken up to the front line near Kladanj and made to
walk down into Government-held territory.

The treatment of Mrs. Hadzic reflected the worsening situation for the Muslims of Vlasenica at the
beginning of July. Although just six months earlier, there had been only small hints of ethnic tensions in
this mixed Bosnian town, the outbreak of war in April had unleashed a pent-up fury among heavily
armed Serbs that left Muslim civilians helpless.

On July 5, however, the emergent forces of the Muslim-led Bosnian Government hit back, killing a
local Serbian hero in Vlasenica, Dragoljub Stojisic, whose nickname was "Kalimero," a popular
Serbian cartoon character.

"Kalimero was loved by all the Serbs," Mr. Popovic said. "He was a brilliant auto electrician and a very
brave fighter. He and his cousin, Danilo, died in an ambush at Barica, about two miles from town. After
that, in reprisal, about 300 Muslim prisoners were killed by firing squad. One of those killed was a man
called Ibrahim Zlatic."

Another Muslim apparently executed at this time was Rasim Hodzic. His wife, Hadzira Hodzic, and
two small children, are now refugees in Kladanj.

They share a mattress on the floor of the town kindergarten and survive on soup and bread distributed
twice a day by the local authorities.

"Serbian military police took my husband from our home early in the morning on July 1," said Mrs.
Hodzic. "He was taken to the police station, and for five days I was able to visit him and give him food.
But the day after Kalimero died, I was told my husband had disappeared. I was crying and screaming
but they pointed automatic weapons at me and told me to get out. I have never seen my husband again."

She added that four other Muslim men had been taken from her apartment building after the death of
"Kalimero" and had disappeared: Mahmut Ambeskovic, Murat Dautovic, Meho Bonsiacovic and
Behara Davtovic.

Shock Is Unfaded

Like other refugees whose husbands have disappeared, Mrs. Hodzic and Mrs. Hadzic still appear
stunned and incredulous. Unlike Nazi camps during World War II, Susica was a camp in which torture
and death were meted out by soldiers on people who had been their immediate neighbors.

In testimony to the depth of pathological hatreds in the Balkans, the former Muslim friends of Serbs in
Vlasenica were suddenly demonized as fellow Slavs whose ancestors had committed "treason"
centuries ago by converting to Islam during the long rule by the Ottoman Turks.

The Muslims of Vlasenica -- virtually indistinguishable from the Serbs over the previous four decades
of Communist rule -- abruptly became contemporary "Turks" -- the word now most often used by Serbs
to describe them.

"A complete wall came down on Vlasenica in early May, 1992," said Fikra Atalov. "The Serbs would
not even say hello to us any more.

Mr. Popovic said: "I grew up there. I was watching all these people I knew who could not take a
shower." The Cover-Up Serbs Prevented Inspection of Camp

Throughout July, there was considerable movement at the Susica camp. At the beginning of the month,
Batkovic camp, near Bijeljina, was opened. Unlike Susica, this camps was to be used by the Serbs as a
base for prisoners to be exchanged.

Minors and other Muslims considered politically innocuous went to Batkovic, where executions of the
kind taking place at Susica appear to have been very rare, people who were at both camps said.

Among those transferred to Batkovic was Halil Mustafic, then aged 16. He said he was arrested in his
Vlasenica home on June 30 and taken to Susica camp in a bus along with 73 other men of all ages,

On arrival, he said, they were all made to kneel on the ground with their hands clasped behind their
necks, as if they were about to be executed. Then they were searched and their money and documents
taken.

"We waited in Susica for about two hours," said Mr. Mustafic, "and were sorted into groups. My group
was then told we would go to Batkovic by bus. As we went out, we had to file through a row of
Chetniks on either side, who kicked and beat us as we passed. If you fell you did not make it."

Chetniks is the term universally used by Muslims for Serbian nationalist forces in Bosnia. No Record
of Camp

Batkovic camp, unlike Susica, was eventually visited by the Red Cross in August 1992, where men like
Mr. Mustafic were presented by the Serbs as "prisoners of war," or captured combatants. Mr. Mustafic
was formally registered by the Red Cross on March 3, 1993, and finally released on Aug. 21, 1993 --
14 months after his arrest in Vlasenica.

Antonella Notari, the senior Red Cross official in Tuzla, said the organization had no record of Susica
camp. "Our experience of tracing Muslims who have disappeared is that the trail just vanishes,"she
said. "We should not give up, but most probably these people were killed."

Lyndall Sachs, an official with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, said the
organization had virtually no access to eastern Bosnia until the spring of 1993. "By then," she said,
"refugees were scattered to the four winds and it was very hard to reconstruct what had happened."

The United States had also tried to monitor events in Bosnia, but it was extremely difficult. The
Belgrade Embassy lost access to eastern Bosnia in May, 1992, because it became too dangerous, and
Muslim refugees were fleeing the other way -- westward into central Bosnia.

On Aug. 6, 1992, after the discovery of the Omarska camp in northwestern Bosnia, President Bush
ordered United States intelligence services to do "everything in their power" to discover whether the
Serbs were operating concentration camps in Bosnia. Their efforts were inconclusive, and the killing at
Susica continued for two more months. The Search Survivors Hunt For Relatives

By September, 1992, the only Muslims in Vlasenica left were old people or invalids whom the Serbs
had refrained from shifting before. Now it was their turn.

On Sept. 15, 1992, the Serbs came to the home of Tima Handzic. Aged 93, she was lying on a bed
when a Serbian soldier kicked in the door of her Vlasenica home and ordered her to come with him.

"Kill me at my door," she said. "I can't move."

The soldier replied: "I don't want to kill you. But you have to come with me."

Mrs. Handzic's daughter, Meira, was also in the house. "We had no shoes on," she said, "so I asked to
be able to get some shoes. But the soldier said no."

The two women were driven down to Susica concentration camp, where they found several hundred
people sprawled on the concrete floor of the hangar. "I thought, 'Oh, my God we're dead,' " Meira
Handzic said.

A surprise awaited her. Among the prisoners was her son, Suljo Handzic, who had been arrested on
June 1. As Meira Handzic recalled, her son approached her, embraced her and said:

"Now that you are here, I see that it's finished. There is no hope for me."

Tima and Meira Handzic were loaded onto a bus the following afternoon and driven, in the usual
procedure, to a village near Kladanj. "Go to your Alija," was the parting order from their Serbian guard,
referring to the Muslim President of Bosnia, Alija Izetbegovic.

In Kladanj, Meira Handzic found another of her sons, Abdulah Handzic, a passionate chess player
whose friendship with the Serbian president of the Vlasenica chess club had saved him. On May 17,
1992, armed with a special pass provided to him by the president of the chess club, Abdulah Handzic
had escaped Vlasenica.

Now he is a soldier in the 1st Muslim Brigade of the 11 Corps of the Bosnian Army. A few months ago,
he trod on a mine and now walks with a slight limp. But he is determined to return to fighting as soon
as possible. "There is no doubt that Vlasenica will be liberated," he said.

'Utterly Ruthless'

Mr. Handzic is driven by the hope that he will find his brother, Suljo. The family has no word of him
since he was last seen by Meira and Tima Handzic in Susica camp.

But Mr. Popovic, the Serbian guard, said that Suljo Handzic is dead. "He was executed," he said.

The death of Suljo Handzic is part of the story of the tragic end to Susica camp.

In the last month of its operation, day-to-day command of Susica camp was taken over by Maj. Mile
Jacimovic, an officer in the Bosnian Serb army, Mr. Popovic said. Major Jacimovic, he said, was utterly
ruthless in his determination to root out all Muslims from Vlasenica.

By the end of September, Major Jacimovic had decided to close the Susica camp. Asked if this was the
result of concern that the camp might be found, following the discovery in early August of Omarska
camp near Banja Luka, Mr. Popovic said:

"No, it was simply that there were no more Muslims in the Vlasenica area, and Jacimovic and Nikolic
had taken all the money they could from the Muslims."

Major Jacimovic decided that most of the surviving 200 prisoners should be executed, Mr. Popovic
said.

"Over half of them were taken up to the ravine and shot," he said. "The others were taken up toward the
front line to the west and put to work digging trenches near Palemica."

Among those made to dig trenches was Suljo Handzic, Mr. Popovic said. But when Muslim forces
attacked the Palemica area in November 1993, and the Serbs were forced to pull back, several Muslim
prisoners were executed. Mr. Handzic, who has a wife and two children now living in Spain, was
among them.

After its closure, Susica became what it had been before: a military depot.

Today, the situation in Vlasenica and Kladanj illustrates why the Bosnian war could continue for
decades and international mediators are continually frustrated in their efforts to bring peace.

Alongside Abdullah Handzic, commanding the 1st Muslim Brigade, fights Becir Mekanic, the last
peacetime mayor of Vlasenica. He, too, is determined to return home to Vlasenica, whatever the price.

Kladanj, a municipality that was 73.2 percent Muslim and 23.9 percent Serb before the war, is now
entirely Muslim. The Serbs were forced out by the Muslims who fled Vlasenica.

Among the Serbs who lost their homes were members of the family of Mirko Pejanovic, a Serb who is
a member of the Bosnian Presidency in Sarajevo.

"Angry Muslim refugees from Vlasenica burned their home and they had to run away to Serbian-held
territory," said Mr. Pejanovic. "But my family was not killed or murdered or put in a camp. We have to
realize that this is exactly what Karadzic has wanted -- that ethnic cleansing should become irreversible
and work both ways." Radovan Karadzic is the leader of the Bosnian Serbs.

Budimir Kosiutic, the head of a war crimes commission set up by the Yugoslav Government, said he
was determined that all crimes -- including those by Serbs -- should be punished and that history should
not be covered up. But up to now, awareness in Serbia of what happened in Bosnia remains minimal.

Mr. Popovic, the guard, has a more forthright view: "Those Serbs responsible for Susica camp should
be shot on the spot," he said. "And those trying to make peace should realize there will be no peace
until everyone in Bosnia gets back his home."

Photos: A VANISHED HUSBAND: RasimHodzic disappeared after his arrest two years ago. His wife,
Hadzira Hodzic, left, and her two daughters are refugees in Kladanj, west of the Vlasenica camp.; THE
SON WHO DIED: Tima Handzic, lower left, was reunited briefly with her son Suljo, lower right, at
Susica. As a refugee she found another son, Abdulah, center. An avid chess player, he had escaped
capture with aid of a Serb who headed the Vlasenica chess club. A former guard at Susica who deserted
from the Bosnian Serbs' army said Suljo Handzic was later executed at the concentration camp. (Roger
Cohen/The New York Times (Hadzira Hodzic, Tima Handzic, Abdulah Handzic) (pg. A12)
Map/Diagram: "THE SITE: The Susica Concentration Camp" Reprots of atrocities by Bosnian Serbs at
the Susica concentration camp near Vloasenica echo those of World War II. Muslim survivors say that
many residents of the camp were executed, small groups in the camp itself and larger groups in teh Han
Ploca ravine southwest of the camp. (pg. A12)