Jovica Stanisic, Franko Simatovic Frenki (Piroschka van de Wouw/Pool via AP)
The Hague court sentenced on June 30 the former heads of the State Security Service (SDB) of Serbia, Jovica Stanisic and Franko Simatovic Frenki, to 12 years in prison each for the crimes of the Red Berets against the non-Serb population in Bosanski Samac in spring 1992.
The court has established that Stanisic, 71, the then chief of Serbia's SDB, and Simatovic, the chief operative of the Service, were guilty of aiding and abetting the persecution, murder, deportation and forced relocation of Muslims and Croats from that municipality.
Presiding judge Burton Hall has announced that the trial chamber had established that the prosecution had not proven the guilt of Stanisic and Simatovic for the crimes in five other municipalities in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in Croatia, i.e. in the Knin Krajina and Eastern Slavonia, from 1991 to 1995.
According to the verdict, it has not been proven that Stanisic and Simatovic were participants in the joint criminal endeavor aimed at forcibly and permanently removing the non-Serbs form large areas of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
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