Serbian Roulette in Apatin.

On 10 August 1996, 1,500 citizens of Apatin- locals and refugees- gathered at a public party organized by local people living abroad. There was singing and dancing, and a tug-a-war competition. A whole ox was being roasted on open fire while the local priest baptized a few volunteers. Around 11pm, there was an explosion. Sixty one people gathered around the fire, amongst which was a large number of children, were injured. Stevo Skoric (57), a refugee from Donji Lapac was the only casualty.

Day after the accident, at the scene of the explosion, the police found a fuse from a hand-grenade. Unofficial sources say it was a fuse from a M-75 hand grenade, Made in Yugoslavia. The grenadier has still not been found. None of those present at the scene of the accident could identify the culprit. After examining a number of amateur video tapes of the party, the police arrested five suspects all of whom were later released.

Dr. Vladimir Buscev of the Children's Hospital in Novi Sad, where four of the wounded kids are being treated (Darko Anicic, Nikola Damjanovic, Aleksandar Kecman and Bojana Kaurin), told "Vreme" that the children are feeling well, and are not in a life threatening condition.

The hand-grenade achieved cult-status in Serbia soon after the beginning of the Yugoslav conflict. Soldiers in the Yugoslav army, members of all kinds of paramilitary formations and Serbian soldiers across the river Drina were all given huge quantities of hand-grenades. The grenades were then thrown at the enemy, but also brought home, sold, given as presents to friends, relatives, wives, girlfriends and even passers by...

The front line was buzzing with individuals decorated with hand grenades. They were hanging by the handle from belts, hoops on waistcoats, and any other visible place on the body. Ordinary people and soldiers never ran out of ideas about how to put them to use. For example, the grenade can be jammed in a glass before the fuse is taken out. The glass is then placed on the top of a door so that when someone opens the door, the glass falls and breaks thus activating the grenade... Alternatively, the grenade could be placed in a water tank in a toilet in such a way that pulling the chain removes the fuse... Former soldiers also tell some sadistic stories: a number of prisoners, civilians or soldiers are tied together and placed in a cellar without a window. One of them is then given a hand grenade with a fuse taken out. Sooner or later, the hand gets tired and releases the handle...

At the beginning of the war, when the hand grenade appeared on Belgrade's black market, its price was 50 DM. During the siege of Vukovar its price fell to 5 DM. Today it can be bought for 10 to 30 DM depending on the financial situation of the refugee, member of some paramilitary force, former reservist or whoever else is selling it.

One of the first accidents in Belgrade involving a hand grenade took place in the night between October 2 and 3, 1991. In a sandwich shop in Trg Republike, a young man who was trying to sell a hand grenade was demonstrating to potential buyers how to operate it, when he made a mistake and pulled out the fuse. The epilogue: three dead, and three wounded.

The hand grenade also played a major role in the Serbian version of the "Vietnam syndrome". After being taken to the local police station for "confirmation of identity" Borivoje Stajic, a Serbian volunteer in Bosnia killed one policeman and wounded another with a hand grenade before being gunned down. Stanojlo Vukcevic Nojo returnee from the front was drunk when he threw a hand grenade in a coach full of passengers on 26. March, 1994. It was when the conductor asked him to pay for his ticket that he pulled out the fuse. Dobrila Stosic was killed, while nine other passengers were injured.

Hand grenades also became a fundamental part of every criminal's arsenal. Predrag Janjic was fleeing the police on 13 March 1995 when he got on a jam-packed public transport bus. He pulled the fuse out of a hand grenade and made the driver open the door and let him out. Janjic managed to kill a policeman with a gun and wound four officers with the grenade before being arrested.

Because of the war, hand grenades are easily accessible, cheap, and easy to operate. They also owe their popularity to the fact that they allow the user to bluff. Once the fuse has been pulled out, it is possible to blackmail business partners, family, police, and anyone else. The idea is simple: "I have made up my mind, I am suicidal. If you don't do as I say, we all go to hell". Such blackmails usually work. However, since this tactic is rarely used by mentally stable individuals, the above mentioned scenarios are bound to happen once in a while.

In a normal world, no one would need a hand-grenade. Thanks to the war lobotomy, it is seen as something that can be thrown through someone's window or in a crowd like in Apatin. It is available to a substantial number of lunatics, criminals, even terrorists. Thanks to all of them, ordinary citizens have hand grenades at their disposal as well. The borders between all above mentioned categories are not fixed...