Bill on Rights of Civilian Victims of War should be withdrawn
On 23rd December 2014, the public consultation on the Bill on the Rights of War Veterans,
Disabled War Veterans, Civilian Invalids of
War and their Family Members (the Bill) prepared by the Ministry of Labour, Employment, Veteran and Social Policy (the Ministry) was closed. The Humanitarian Law Center (HLC) believes that this Bill should be withdrawn from the adoption procedure, because it does not reflect the real needs and diversity of victims who live in Serbia, violates the constitutional principle of equal protection before the law for every citizen, and is deeply inconsistent with international and generally accepted norms relating to the protection of victims of human rights abuses.
The Court of Appeals in Belgrade has modified the judgment rendered by the Higher Court in Požarevac, by which the accused, Boban Petković, was found guilty of a war crime against a civilian population and sentenced to five years of imprisonment, and decreased his sentence to three years of imprisonment. The Humanitarian Law Center (HLC) holds that three years of imprisonment is an inappropriately mild sentence and that the mitigating circumstances that the Court of Appeals considered in the case of the accused are unacceptable from the standpoint of justice for victims of war crimes. 
