Human
Rights Watch World Report 2003
Table of Contents
> Europe & Central Asia
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Human
Rights Developments
Defending
Human Rights
The
Role of the International Community
In April, constitutional
amendments entered into force giving the three major ethnic groups the status
of constituent peoples on the whole of the
Elections were held on
October 5 for the Bosnian central Parliament and presidency, as well as for the
assemblies in the Bosniac- and Croat-controlled Federation of Bosnia and
The year saw continued
incremental progress toward war crimes accountability. The NATO-led
Stabilization Force (SFOR) arrested four Bosnian Serbs indicted by the
International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY): Momir Nikolic
(on April 1), Darko Mrdja (June 13), Miroslav Deronjic (July 7), and Radovan
Stankovic (July 9). On February 28 and March 1, SFOR troops twice attempted to
arrest Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic in remote mountain villages
in the east of the country. On August 14 and 15, SFOR conducted a new operation
in the area, purporting to investigate the network of persons who were helping
Karadzic hide. In falling short of bringing Karadzic to justice, however, SFOR
efforts drew criticism from the ICTY Prosecutor, Carla Del Ponte, who
characterized them as "public relations operations." Pasko Ljubicic,
a Bosnian Croat accused of persecution of Bosniacs in central Bosnia in 1993,
surrendered voluntarily to the tribunal on November 21, 2001. Wartime prison
commanders and guards in Serb-run camps near Prijedor, Dusan Fustar, Momcilo
Gruban, and Dusan Knezevic also surrendered on January 31, May 2, and May 18,
2002 respectively.
The authorities in
Republika Srpska continued to refuse to cooperate with the ICTY. They denied
having knowledge of the presence of Radovan Karadzic or any other Bosnian Serb
indictee in the entity's territory. Republika Srpska President Mirko Sarovic
and Prime Minister Mladen Ivanic condemned the SFOR actions in eastern Bosnia
in March and August. In the beginning of September, the Republika Srpska
Government Bureau for Liaison with the ICTY issued a report concerning the 1995
events in Srebrenica, during which the Bosnian Serb Army was believed
responsible for the killing of more than seven thousand Bosniac men and boys.
The report claimed that only one hundred Bosniacs were killed in violation of
law, and 1,900 died in combat or of exhaustion.
Domestic war crimes
trials continued in the Federation, sometimes marred by judges' ethnic bias and
inadequate witness protection measures. No war crimes trials were conducted in
Republika Srpska, but in November the ICTY authorized Republika Srpska
authorities to proceed in a case against eighteen Bosnian Serbs on war crime charges.
In both entities, public prosecutors initiated dozens of war crimes cases
against persons belonging to the local ethnic minority.
Between January and the
end of August, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
registered 69,550 minority returns to pre-war homes, a 30 percent increase over
the same period in 2001. The year also saw improvements in the return of
property to its pre-war owners. As of the end of August, housing authorities
had solved 62 percent of property claims in the Federation and 54 percent in
Republika Srpska, while at the end of 2001 the respective figures had been 49
and 31 percent.
Property rights
violations remained widespread, however. Many people, including public
officials, continued to occupy others' property. Authorities in Republika
Srpska encouraged or tolerated Serb construction of houses on land owned by
displaced non-Serbs.
Violent incidents
against returnees in Republika Srpska continued. In Prijedor, Zvornik, Doboj,
Bratunac, Derventa, Modrica, and other locations, unknown perpetrators planted
bombs under returnees' cars or hurled explosives into their yards and houses. A
sixty-six-year-old Bosniac returnee to Srpsko Gorazde was shot at on September
16. Also in September, during a celebration of a Yugoslav national team victory
at the World Basketball Championship, local Serbs vandalized houses and
business premises of Bosniac returnees in Prijedor and Bijeljina. During the
year, unknown perpetrators planted explosives or threw bombs at Muslim religious
shrines in Bijeljina, Gacko, and Kozarska Dubica. In most cases the police
failed to identify and arrest the perpetrators.
Although freedom of
expression was largely respected, independent journalists faced defamation
suits and threats from public officials and other individuals. Between February
and September, the Free Media Help Line, operated by the international
community's high representative, registered forty-eight cases of abuse suffered
by journalists, in line with rates in 2000 and 2001.
Roma continued to suffer
discrimination and other forms of abuse, while the authorities failed to
undertake adequate measures to address these problems. The newly established
National Advisory Commission on Romani Issues, a body consisting of
representatives of relevant ministries, the Romani community, and international
organizations to elaborate a coordinated response to problems faced by Roma,
had the potential to bring about some positive change, but it was too early to
assess its effectiveness as of this writing.
Trafficking of people
into Bosnia continued unabated in 2002, as did the corruption that allowed it
to flourish. The United Nations Mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina (UNMIBH)
de-authorized eleven local police officers in October for using sexual services
in nightclubs. In several of the cases the officers had tipped off bar owners
to upcoming raids; one of the officers, a team leader in the anti-trafficking
force, faced one month's imprisonment for using his position to sexually abuse
a number of women. In a letter submitted to a United States (U.S.)
Congressional committee on the eve of an April hearing on United Nations (U.N.)
complicity in trafficking into Bosnia, the U.N. admitted that eighteen officers
of the International Police Task Force (IPTF, part of UNMIBH) faced
repatriation for "incidents of sexual misconduct." In February, a
U.N. spokesman announced that an Office of Internal Oversight report found no
evidence of "widespread or systematic involvement of U.N. police monitors
in trafficking activities." Nongovernmental organizations criticized the
U.N.'s public pronouncements on the report for failing to address allegations
that a small number of police monitors had purchased trafficked women from
brothels. The report was not publicly released.
A new demining law was
approved in February 2002. With donor mine action funding of U.S.$16.6 million,
demining operations in 2001 cleared 5.5 to 6 million square meters, and
surveyed 73.5 million square meters.
Refugee associations and
human rights groups continued to be active. The ombudsmen of the Federation and
the Republika Srpska continued to receive thousands of requests for assistance,
the majority relating to violations of the right to housing; discrimination
complaints ranked second. The Human Rights Chamber, Bosnia's human rights
court, had over ten thousand cases pending as of October 2002. On January 17,
the chamber issued an injunction to halt removal of six Algerians sought by the
U.S. for alleged involvement in terrorism, but the Bosnian government ignored
the chamber decision and handed over the six on January 18. (See also below.)
The Bosnian human rights movement suffered a blow when differences over the
surrender to the U.S. led to a split in the Helsinki Committee for Human
Rights.
THE ROLE OF THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY
Office of the High Representative
On May 27, Paddy Ashdown
succeeded Wolfgang Petritsch as high representative overseeing civilian aspects
of the Dayton Peace Agreement. While the priorities of the former high
representative had been accelerated refugee return, institution building, and
economic reform, the new high representative declared that the fight against
organized crime and regeneration of the Bosnian economy would be his main areas
of focus.
United Nations
On June 30, the U.S.
vetoed U.N. Security Council renewal of the UNMIBH mandate. The veto followed
failed U.S. demands for a Council resolution that would exempt U.S.
peacekeepers from the jurisdiction of the nascent International Criminal Court
(ICC). On July 12 the mandate was extended until December 31, along with a
resolution that suspended for one year any ICC investigation or prosecution of
U.N. peacekeepers from countries such as the U.S. that have not ratified the
ICC treaty.
UNMIBH continued the
certification process for Bosnian police. The procedure involved a check of
police officers' performance, wartime conduct, and housing status, as well as
verification of their citizenship and academic qualifications. Between November
2001 and September 2002, UNMIBH withdrew authorization for 130 police officers,
due in nearly half of the cases to their wartime conduct. By the U.N.
secretary-general's own admission, however, the officers often moved to
administrative positions outside the authority of UNMIBH, or to positions in
public companies. UNMIBH also continued its efforts to increase minority
representation within the police. As of May, however, only 15.5 percent of the
police in the Federation were minorities, and the respective percentage in
Republika Srpska was 4.9.
In a report presented to
the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in March, Jose Cutileiro, special
representative on the situation of human rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina and
the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (F.R. Yugoslavia), described Bosnia's human
rights progress as "slow and limited." Cutileiro concluded that
genuine inter-ethnic reconciliation in the country had not taken place, and
that there would be no real progress while the country depended on foreign civilian
executives and foreign military to hold it together.
On April 19, the
Commission on Human Rights passed a resolution on the situation of human rights
in parts of southeastern Europe, welcoming progress and urging the states in
the region to effectively enforce minority rights. The commission also called
on the authorities in Bosnia, particularly in Republika Srpska, to cooperate
fully with the ICTY.
In February, the ICTY
commenced the high-profile trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan
Milosevic, facing charges including for crimes against humanity and genocide
committed during the Bosnian war.
On June 12, the ICTY
Appeals Chamber upheld the convictions and sentences of Bosnian Serbs Dragoljub
Kunarac, Radomir Kovac, and Zoran Vukovic for rape, torture, and enslavement
committed in Foca during the war. On October 17, the tribunal sentenced Milan
Simic, a Bosnian Serb, to five years in prison for crimes against Bosniacs in
1992 in the area of Bosanski Samac. The sentence followed Simic's May 15 guilty
plea to two counts of torture charged as crimes against humanity.
In June, the tribunal
devised a plan to focus on prosecuting only the highest-ranking political and
military figures, while referring cases of the lower-ranking accused to
national courts. A report by the Office of the Prosecutor, the Judges, and the
Registrar concluded that Bosnia and Herzegovina was the only country in the
territory of the former Yugoslavia to which the tribunal could consider
referring such cases.
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
The Organization for
Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Office for Democratic Institutions
and Human Rights (ODIHR) organized international monitoring of the October 5
elections and concluded that they were "largely in line with international
standards."
The OSCE Bosnia mission
tackled areas of persistent discrimination, embarking in July on a project on
fair employment practices aimed at promoting principles of equal opportunities
regardless of national origin, gender, political affiliation, or a person's
status. The OSCE also acted as a coordinator for education matters in Bosnia.
Council of Europe
On January 22, the
Parliamentary Assembly gave a favorable opinion on Bosnia's application for
membership in the Council of Europe. The assembly's decision was conditioned on
Bosnia's acceptance of an exhaustive set of post-accession commitments,
including implementation of the Dayton Peace Agreement, cooperation with the
ICTY, ratification of a number of international conventions, respect for human
rights, legislative reform, and the proper functioning of state institutions.
On March 20, the Committee of Ministers invited Bosnia to join, and accession
took place on April 24.
European Union
In February, E.U.
foreign ministers decided that in January 2003 the E.U. would deploy a police
mission to Bosnia to take over the international policing operation in the
country. The E.U. planned a mission of five hundred officers, whereas the
U.N.-led IPTF it would replace numbered 1,800 in 2002. In an April 4
Stabilization and Association Report, the European Commission assessed that
Bosnia was yet to satisfy ten out of eighteen conditions--including four of the
five human rights conditions--identified in the commission's March 2000 Road
Map toward European integration. The commission donated €71.9 million
(U.S.$70.2 million) in 2002 to finance democratic stabilization, administrative
capacity building, socioeconomic development, environmental protection, and
justice and home affairs. It continued to be the principal donor for the
reconstruction of housing destroyed in the war.
United States
After seven years of
laudable efforts on the part of the U.S. to foster peace and the rule of law in
Bosnia, some of its actions in Bosnia during 2002 seriously undermined the rule
of law. In January, the U.S. put intense pressure on Bosnia to hand over six
Algerians sought for alleged links to terrorism. Bosnia revoked the citizenship
of five of the six suspects and turned over all six, although a day earlier the
Supreme Court of the federation had ordered the release of the detained
suspects due to lack of evidence, and the Bosnian Human Rights Chamber had made
an interim order halting their removal from Bosnian jurisdiction. The U.S.
transferred the six to its detention camp at Guantánamo Bay.
At the end of August,
the
On a visit to
DynCorp, Inc., the