Reports

TORTURE IN THE CAMPS FOR SERBS IN THE FORMER BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA

- FORENSIC MEDICAL AND PSYCHIATRIC ASPECTS -


Committee for the Collection
of Data on Crimes
Committed against Humanity
and International Law

Date: March 15,1995
Belgrade, 10, Vlajkoviceva st.
Telephones: 330-369, 341-107
Fax: 334-133



METHODS OF TORTURE YES NO

MOSTLY CORPORAL TORTURE

beating 91.99% 1.1%
firearms 21.23% 71.77%
forcing to eat repugnant substances 22.24% 70.76%
forcing to stand for long hours in the sun and/or in water 8.9% 84.91%
burning a part of the body 17.18% 75.82%
putting out cigarettes on the body 27.29% 65.71%
torture with the use of electricity 13.14% 79.86%
knocking out/extracting teeth 16.17% 76.83%
breaking bones 33.36% 50.64%
stereo torture 9.10% 83.90%
torture through starvation and thirst 49.52% 44.89%
cutting/pricking 36.30% 56.61%
pulling out nails 7.8% 85.92%

MOSTLY MENTAL TORTURE

cursing, shouting, insulting in different ways 84.91% 8.9%
false execution 40.43% 52.57%
prevention from falling asleep 10.21% 73.79%
false reports on the death of next of kin 5.5% 87.95%
witnessing torture and killing of other detainees 20.22% 72.78%
witnessing rape of next of kin 2.2% 90.98%
making victims commit perjury 12.13% 80.87%

COMBINED TORTURE

individual and group rapes 10.11% 82.89%
forcing detainees to perform mutual fellatio and to have anal intercourse 10.11% 82.89%
forcing detainees to beat one another 18.20% 74.80%
defecating and urinating in detainees' mouths 3.3% 89.97%
forcing detainees to lick the floor stained with faeces, blood and beating them as they do so 6.7% 86.93%
forcing to dig trenches on frontline or sweep mine-fields 16.17% 76.83%

SPECIFIC CASES

asphyxiation in a hermetically sealed manhole,
had to eat his plucked-out hair twice during detention
pressing on the throat with the hands, rape
had to run bare-foot in heavy soldier's boots
until the soles of his feet got sore
chained to the old bridge in Mostar
his testis taken out with spiked gloves
attempted a suicide in the camp
and then treated for "conjunctivitis"
burnt with hot-red tongs
burnt with a hot-red wire
forced to eat meat of a roasted newborn
chained, beaten and starved
enucleation of eyeballs
jumping from a-high onto the ground "as if into water",
beaten by children
they applied salt on his shrapnel wounds
his penis tied with a wire and stretched
his ear bitten off
his neck broken
amputation of arms and legs