The Humanitarian Law Center believes that the Niš District Court, which is conducting the trial of Miloš Simonović, an active police officer, and Dragiša Marković, a former reserve officer in the Serbian Ministry of Interior, for the criminal offence of murder of an Albanian [during the armed conflict in Kosovo – added by HLC] is being unnecessarily stalled, thus preventing justice from being served.
On 18 December 2008, the Humanitarian Law Center (HLC) received a judgement rendered by the First Municipal Court in Belgrade, which obliges the Serbia to pay 185,000 RSD to Albert Nebih Domanek/Damanek [Glogoac/Gllogovc municipality] and Skender Isufi from Novo Čikatovo/Qikatove e Re [Glogovac/Gllogovc municipality] each for the state’s responsibility for the illegal detention of Albert Nebih and Skender Isufi of six and 11 months respectively in 1999 and 2000.
The Humanitarian Law Center (HLC) has conducted an investigation into the deaths of Ljiljana Salim and Mirjana Paunović, wards of the Special Care Institute in Štimlje, Kosovo, and in response to the allegations of illegal organ trafficking, published in articles in Politika (11, 15, 16 and 22 November 2008), Večernje novosti (22 November 2008) and Kurir journals (11 November 2008), HLC has established that both of these women, who were living with severe mental disabilities, died of natural causes and were not victims of organ trafficking.
Concerning the trial of journalist Florence Hartmann conducted before the Hague Tribunal for the alleged publication of confidential Appeals Chamber decisions in the Slobodan Milosevic case, human rights organizations from the successor states to the former Yugoslavia would like draw attention to the fact that the content of these decisions was the subject of many press reports and public debates after the International Court of Justice delivered it judgment in February 2007 in the case of BiH versus Serbia on charges of genocide and it is not clear why Ms. F. Hartmann has been singled out by the Hague judges.
On Wednesday, 22 October 2008, it will be 16 years since 16 Bosniaks from Sjeverin, citizens of the Republic of Serbia, were kidnapped and murdered. Their mortal remains have not yet been found. The state of Serbia does not participate in the commemoration of the death of these Bosniaks from Sjeverin and is not ready to grant pecuniary compensation to the victims’ families for the suffering they have endured all these years.
In view of the HLC information on the number of killed and the missing in Kosovo that the Serbian media have falsely relayed, we are making the following statement:
By 15 October 2008, HLC had individually registered a total of 13,472 victims [9,260 Albanians, 2,488 Serbs, 470 victims of other ethnic background, and 1,254 victims whose ethnic background has not been determined] of murders and disappearances in Kosovo prior to, during the armed conflict, and immediately after the deployment of international troops in Kosovo (January 1998 – December 2000). Of the total number, HLC has confirmed the circumstances in which 8,879 victims were killed, or went missing by at least two independent sources. Of these 8,879 victims, 7,707 are Albanians, 822 are Serbs, and 350 victims are of another ethnic background.
The Serbian Supreme Court verdict in The Scorpions case showed once more that the Serbian Supreme Court, deciding in the second instance in war crimes trials, was guided by political and not legal considerations. Namely, in the first instance verdict rendered by the Belgrade District Court War Crimes Chamber on 10 April 2007, defendants Slobodan Medić, Pero Petrašević, and Branislav Medić were found guilty of a war crime against the civilian population, Aleksandar Medić was found guilty of abetting the same crime, while Aleksandar Vukov was acquitted of all charges. Slobodan Medić and Branislav Medić were sentenced to 20 years imprisonment, Pero Petrašević to 13, and Aleksandar Medić to five years of imprisonment.
We the undersigned human rights organizations are alarmed at the expression of support of the Government of Serbia for the Islamic Community, which used pressure and threats to force the publisher of The Jewel of Medina to withdraw it from shops, thus showing ignorance and disrespect for human rights, and disregard for the state’s obligation to provide guarantees for the freedom of expression as “one of the essential foundations of a democratic society and one of the basic conditions for its progress and for each individual’s self-fulfilment.”