Dragan Obrenović (born 12 April 1963) is a former Bosnian Serb senior officer and commander in the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) and the Bosnian Serb Army (VRS).
In 2001, Obrenović was indicted for war crimes and crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague for his involvement in implementation of the VRS leadership's plan to kill the mostly Bosniak civilians and prisoners of war in the Srebrenica genocide during the Bosnian War in July 1995.
In 2003, Obrenović pleaded guilty to one of the counts of persecution and in exchange agreed to allocute to his crime and witness for the prosecution he was sentenced to 17 years in prison. He served out his sentence in Norway and would be eligible for release in April 2018. He was released by orders from the ICTY in 2012 for good behaviour. The decision to release him was made in September 2011 but was kept a secret until May 2012. He was deported from Norway in 2012, after his release from prison.
Early life and education Obrenović was born on 12 April 1963 in the village of Rogatica on Matino Brdo, in the Rogatica municipality in eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina. He attended primary school in Rogatica and secondary school at a military gymnasium in Belgrade. Upon graduation at age of 18, Obrenović attended the military academy for ground forces of the JNA, specializing in armored and mechanized units. He graduated in 1986 at the age of 23, receiving a commission as an officer.
Career Obrenović's first assignment was a tank platoon command at the Jastrebarsko garrison in Croatia. After six months he was promoted to tank company commander in the same brigade. This post he held until 1990 when he was promoted to deputy command of the armored battalion. In October 1991, during the Croatian War of Independence, the JNA started its withdrawal from Croatia and Obrenović's unit was relocated to the Dubrava Airport in Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina, where he was promoted to acting commander of the armored battalion. On 28 February 1992, his battalion was relocated to Mali Zvornik and Zvornik when the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina began to deteriorate as well.
Role in the Yugoslav wars JNA attack on Zvornik In early April 1992, with the international community rapidly approaching recognition of the independence of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina along former Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito's old boundaries, Serbia-controlled JNA forces began preparations to invade and conduct ethnic cleansing campaigns in the Bosanski Šamac, Prijedor, Vlasenica and Zvornik regions of the Drina Valley in Eastern Bosnia.
Until this point, the Bosnian Muslim (Bosniak) population in the city of Zvornik enjoyed a 59.4% majority.1991 Census of the SFRY Captain Dragan Obrenović appeared on public radio to assure the citizens of that area that the JNA's only mandate was to protect all citizens of Yugoslavia: "There is no reason for panic. The JNA, as a legal military force, is here disable those that would eventually try to threaten the security of all citizens and the entire nation."
Five days later the JNA, including Obrenović's battalion, launched a massive simultaneous assault, starting with the attack by the Serb Volunteer Guard paramilitary forces on Bijeljina. The attacks soon spread to Foča, Zvornik, Bosanski Šamac, Vlasenica, Prijedor, Brčko, and was punctuated by the blockading of the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo to the southwest.
Non-Serbs had their property confiscated, were deported en masse, and many men of military age or of political, community, religious or cultural importance were murdered on sight or in mass executions in villages such as Kozarac, Gornja Grapska in Doboj, the Hotel Posavina in Brčko, the Crkvina warehouse in Bosanski Šamac, and detention centers such as the Brčko Partizan sports hall. Many other non-Serb men were interred at infamous concentration camps such as Omarska and Keraterm, while the women, children and elderly fled south toward the towns of Srebrenica and Žepa.
Transfer to the VRS On 19 May 1992, two weeks after the JNA established a total blockade of the Bosnian capital and began the now-infamous Siege of Sarajevo, the JNA began withdrawing from Bosnia while personnel and equipment from the second military district remained behind to be absorbed into the forming Bosnian Serb rebel army. Obrenović's unit was relocated the following day to the garrison in the Vršac municipality in Serbia. On 1 December 1992 he was given orders to report to the newly formed Army of Republika Srpska (VRS).
Obrenović reported to Crna Rijeka, whereupon he was appointed acting Chief of Staff of the 1st Zvornik Infantry Brigade under the 17th VRS Corps at Tuzla. Initially, the armored vehicles still carried the emblems of the JNA and it was only later that they sported the Bosnian Serb flag and badges showing the Bosnian Serb coat-of-arms. At the same time, the members of the units - officers and soldiers alike - had been wearing Bosnian Serb badges on their uniforms from the beginning. In April 1993 Obrenović was promoted to the post of permanent Chief of Staff of 1st Zvornik Infantry Brigade.
On 16 April 1995 Obrenović was wounded in his left leg during combat operations. He was evacuated and underwent surgery as well as extensive post-operative treatment. A few months later, a commander and another officer visited him at his house while he was still on sick leave, asking him to interrupt his leave and return to brigade command, as preparations were under way to attack the besieged Srebrenica enclave, then designated a United Nations-protected "safe area". Srebrenica was a base of operations for largely ethnic Bosniak Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (ARBiH) 28th Mountain Division - an undisciplined, untrained, poorly armed and totally isolated Bosnian government force, now leaderless after Naser Orić and most of his staff left Srebrenica on the orders from Sarajevo. Obrenović returned to duty at Zvornik Brigade command on 1 July.
VRS attack on Srebrenica Believing that the UN-protected enclaves of Srebrenica and Žepa were never demilitarized, and that they hid what amounted to "five or six brigades" of ARBiH troops and weapons, the VRS Main Staff ordered the Drina Corps command to undertake an operation codenamed Krivaja '95.
On 2 July 1995 Obrenović's brigade was given operational orders related to the operation. Detailed orders from Drina Corps regarding his brigade's involvement arrived later that same day. Obrenović drafted Zvornik Brigade deployment details, and a combat group of command and two battalions were set up. The 1st Battalion comprised the Podrinje attachment and the mobile combat group called Drina Wolves. The 2nd Battalion comprised one intervention platoon from all battalions except the fifth, then split into two companies. Captain Vinko Pandurević was in command of the whole brigade involvement. His deputy, Captain First Class Milan "Legenda" Jolović, commanded the Wolves.
Ambushes on the ARBiH/civilian exodus column
From 4 to 15 July 1995 Obrenović acted as deputy commander of the Zvornik Brigade while the commander was gone to Srebrenica during the assault. Obrenović later testified that he heard about fall of Srebrenica on 11 July. At 05:00 on 12 July Obrenović's Gucovo group reported communication intercepts indicating large foot column of Bosniaks had formed, comprising parts of the ARBiH 28th Division as well as thousands of desperate refugees, and was heading northeast toward the city of Tuzla in the Bosnian government-held territory.
At 07:00 Obrenović had a conversation with duty officer of Captain First Class Radika Petrović, commander of the 4th Battalion of the Bratunac Brigade who briefed him on the details of the column passing between his area near Buljin and the Milići Brigade. Obrenović had concerns that the customary travel vector might bring the column close to engaging with Zvornik Brigade forces just north of the village of Jaglići. Obrenović went to the 7th Battalion headquarters in Memići to deal with an impending attack by the ARBiH 2nd Corps from Tuzla.
Needing more information on this column, Obrenović sent his assistant commander for intelligence affairs, one Captain Vukotić, to the 4th Battalion command in the Kajica village in Šekovići, and asked him to seek direct details on this column. Two VRS units in the area meanwhile blockaded the column; one battalion of the Protection Regiment in Kasaba and part of the units of the 55th Engineering Battalion in Konjević Polje. One company from Zvornik MUP were also present with one more preparing to head there. Obrenović received orders from Drina Corps to assist traffic regulation in Konjević Polje, he sent a detachment of a half squad of traffic police to assist.
Later on he began receiving requests for trucks and buses for transport in Potočari, where thousands of unarmed Bosnians were captured by the Serb forces at the base of UN Dutchbat peacekeepers. He received more intel reports regarding the disposition of prisoners to be interrogated as well as predictions on movement of the column. Early on the evening of 12 April he got word from Vukotić that units of the 28th Division were carrying out a penetration and evacuation through this space and that practically the entire area was overwhelmed by people from this column. There was also a second VRS blockade in front of the column between Kravica, Konjević Polje and near an asphalt road in Nova Kasaba. Small groups (about 150 men) from column broke through and were reaching Glogova and Cerska, so Obrenović was tasked to take all necessary measures in order to protect the elements of combat deployment of the brigade as well as populated Serb villages in the territory of Zvornik.
At midnight on 12 July Obrenović set out with some units north of Liplje to organize an ambush of forward components of 28th Division. The ambush was laid, but no ARBiH units arrived. Leaving some troops at Snagovo, Obrenović and the rest returned to Zvornik. When he arrived at brigade headquarters, he was informed that the column had been stopped on the road from Kravica, Konjević Polje, to Milići, and that there were no troops in their area. Shortly thereafter he received word from intercept groups that chatter was picking up in the area stretching from Cerska toward Kamenica, despite Drina Corps' reassurance that there was no troop presence there. 28th Division radio intercepts showed that their security slipped up and the Serbs were able to learn that their numbers were 1,000-1,500 in that area. Later on 13 July Obrenović strengthened the units that had stayed up there providing the ambush, and he decided to organise a provisional unit, grouping squad and platoon from the units at his disposal: 15 soldiers from the engineers company, five or six soldiers from the staff command, and about 15 to 20 soldiers from the logistics battalion, a remaining platoon from the 5th Battalion, and an intervention platoon; this formed a unit with the strength of a company.
Captain Milan Marić from the operations sector was made commander. Obrenović sent the military police platoon to perform reconnaissance of the Drinjača River canyon by the village of Glodi, concluding that the column would likely use the two bridges there. An ambush team was assembled from military police platoon at Široki Put and the other at Džafin Kamen, another military platoon, and the rest of the ambush team from above the village of Liplje. The column, which also went through a mine field and artillery shelling, would be ambushed by the Drina Wolves near Nova Kasaba on 13 July and then again by the VRS near Snagovo the next day.
Mass executions