Bijeljina

The Batkovic camp was established by the Yugoslav People’s Army (JNA) on 1 April 1992 and closed at the end of January 1996. It was one of the largest camps in Bosnia and Herzegovina. More than 4,000 prisoners from all over the country were held at the premises of the agricultural cooperative in the village of Batković twelve kilometres from Bijeljina. Men, women and children were interned. The conditions in the camp were extremely difficult. Hygienic and medical care as well as food and drink were completely inadequate. Visits were not allowed.

The camp was registered by the International Red Cross, but this did not improve living conditions. In addition to severe psychophysical torture and forced labour, women and girls were raped on a daily basis. Women were forced to do agricultural work as slaves on the estates of Serbian peasants. NN from Cerska, a Bosniak, reports that she was deported to Batkovic from another camp after two months of imprisonment. In her statement she describes her experience: ‘They took me into the room where there were about 100 girls between the ages of thirteen and twenty-five. Along with all these girls, I survived all sorts of humiliations there...’

The Serbs took them to various farms for at least nine hours a day to do heavy farm work, often forcing them to strip off all their clothes and continue digging naked. From the testimony of a Bosniak from the Batkovic camp, one can only guess what situation the women were exposed to. ‘Girls and young women were taken almost every night. About every third or fourth night they came to pick me up. They took us to a separate, empty room. There were always a few people, mostly new ones, so I couldn’t remember everyone. They were Chetniks from Serbia and from Zvornik and Bijeljina.

The worst were Ilija Prodanovic, Jovan Lazic and Ratko Simic. I remembered them because all the women and girls remembered them for their bloodthirsty cruelty and hatred towards us Bosniaks. Every time I experienced it, it was like going to the hanging. The rapes continued throughout my imprisonment in the Batkovici camp.’