Tag Archives: Bosnia

Naser Oric Will Be Extradited to Bosnia

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Naser OricFormer Bosnian army commander Naser Oric will be extradited to Bosnia and Herzegovina following an order from the Swiss Federal Office of Justice (FOJ) on Thursday.

“Oric stated at the hearing on this request that he agreed to be extradited to Bosnia and Herzegovina. This permitted the FOJ to approve the extradition immediately in simplified proceedings,” the FOJ said in a statement.

Oric’s extradition was initially requested by Serbia, who had issued a warrant for his arrest last year accusing him of the murder of 9 Serb civilians in Srebrenica in July 1992. Swiss authorities arrested Oric on the 10th of June on this Serbian warrant, but on Monday, the Prosecutors Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina called on Switzerland not to extradite Oric, a Bosnian citizen, to Serbia. The Bosnian authorities urged Switzerland to return Oric to them instead.

According to the FOJ, “The decisive points here are the same criminal acts on which both requests are based were committed in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and that Oric is a citizen of Bosnia and Herzegovina.”

During the 1992-1995 war, Naser Oric was the commander of Muslim Bosniak forces in the Srebrenica region of Bosnia. The region fell to Bosnian Serbs in July 1995 and 8,000 Muslim men and boys were killed by Serb forces. Continue reading →

Bosnian Court Grants Compensation to War Time Rape Victim

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A Bosnian court has granted compensation for the first time to a war crimes victim in criminal proceedings in a case against two former Bosnian Serb soldiers who raped a teenage girl during the 1992-95 war.

Courts have jailed hundreds of war criminals but have always directed victims to pursue compensation in expensive civil procedures which many victims avoided because it required them to reveal their identities.

Bosiljko Markovic and Ostoja Markovic were sentenced to 10 years in prison on Wednesday and ordered to pay 13,520 euros ($15,160) to a Croat woman they raped during the Serb attack on her village in 1992.

Experts say the verdict paves the way for adjustments in legal practice that would compensate victims and bring criminals to justice in one trial.

Swiss Arrest of Former Bosnian Military Commander Without Legal Basis?

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Naser Oric

Naser Oric

Swiss authorities followed improper procedure in their arrest of former Bosnian Muslim military commander Naser Oric in Geneva on Wednesday, said Bosnia’s Prime Minister Denis Zvizdic on Friday in Sarajevo.

Oric’s arrest is based on an international warrant issued by Serbia which alleges his participation in war crimes in the 1990’s. However the Bosnian authorities were surprised by the accusations, having received no information from Serbia. Moreover, Oric’s name had been deleted from the Interpol wanted list long ago.

In 2006, Oric was sentenced by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia to two years in prison for not doing enough to prevent crimes committed against Serbs during the Balkan conflict. He was acquitted of all charges two years later.

The Bosnian Prime Minister urged Serbia on Friday to observe the provisions of a bilateral agreement dating from 2013, which calls for the process to be conducted in the suspect’s homeland – in this case Bosnia.

Bosnia: No Release until Retrial for War Crime Convicts

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©AP/Press Association Images

Refugees from the eastern Bosnian enclave of Srebrenica wait for transportation on 12 July 1995 ©AP/Press Association Images

Bosnia’s constitutional court has ruled against the further release of war crimes convicts whose verdicts were quashed for misuse of criminal provisions. More than 20 war crimes cases were found to be invalid as it was ruled that the Bosnian criminal code was wrongly used at their trials, instead of the Yugoslav criminal code, which was in force at the time that the crimes were committed.

The retrials were ordered by the Bosnian Court after the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in Strasbourg ruled in July 2013 that the Bosnian court used the wrong criminal code in Maktouf and Damjanovic. Following the ECtHR decision, several appeals were filed to the constitutional court, leading to the controversial release of convicts. Novak Djukic, one of these convicts originally sentenced to 20 years in prison for ordering an artillery strike on the town of Tuzla that killed 71 people, shortly absconded to Serbia after his release, therefore eluding from retrial.

As a result, the Bosnian court decided to block further release until retrials are completed, including the ones of Milorad Trbić, convicted of involvement in the Srebrenica genocide, and Ante Kovac, jailed for war crimes in Vitez in 1993.

Meddzida Kreso, the president of the Bosnian court, stated that the quashing of these verdicts was the biggest challenge for her institution over the past year because “the legal framework for the execution of imprisonment sentences and custody measures ceased to exist in the case of persons who were sentenced for the gravest violations of the international humanitarian laws”.

Dutch Officials Knew Bosnian Men Would Be Killed in Srebrenica

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Dutch Peacekeepers Srebrenica

Dutch Peacekeepers in Srebrenica in 1995 [AP Photo]

In a recent op-ed in the New York Times, Liora Sion discusses the condemnation of the Dutch State for the deaths of 300 Bosnian Muslims, men and boys, in Srebrenica, Bosnia-Herzegovina, in July 1995. During the war, these Bosniaks sought refuge in a United Nations base where the Dutch peacekeepers were stationed. The Dutch subsequently handed the men and boys to the Bosnian army which decided to kill them afterwards.

For Liora Sion, the Dutch officials knew the danger they caused in Bosnia. She could experience the situation on the ground as she accompanied Dutch NATO peacekeepers in Bosnia and Kosovo as part of her field work for a PhD thesis.

She says that the soldiers she saw were men with little training and that holding them responsible for what happened in Srebrenica would be wrong.

However, she says that the commanders were responsible for the killings as they should have known that these Bosnian men would be killed because there was strong evidence of the Serbs commiting war crimes. Continue reading →

Dutch State Found Liable for 300 Srebrenica Deaths

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Mothers of Srebrenica

Mothers of Srebrenica

Today, a court in The Hague, Netherlands, ruled that the Netherlands is liable for the killings of more than 300 Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslim) men and boys at Srebrenica, Bosnia-Herzegovina, in July 1995.

During the 1992-1995 war, thousands of Bosniaks sought refuge in the UN base just outside Srebrenica, at Potocari, where the Dutch peacekeepers were stationed.

However, while the women and young children were transported to a Bosniak-majority area, the Dutch soldiers handed more than 7000 men and boys over to the Bosnian Serb army, telling them that they would be safe. All of them subsequently got killed by the Bosnian army.

The Hague court said that the Netherlands must accept some degree of responsibility for what happened and pay compensation to the families of 300 victims.

The Hague court did not hold the Dutch state liable for the death of the other men killed in Srebrenica, saying that many of the male refugees at the time had not fled to the UN compound in Potocari but rather to the woods in the vicinity of Srebrenica. As a consequence, many of the relatives of the victims won’t be entitled to compensation.

The case was launched by

relatives of the victims under the name “Mothers of Srebrenica”.

Many of remains of the victims still lie in mass graves in Eastern Bosnia.

Dutch Police Arrest Bosnian Suspected War Criminals

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Mostar Bosnia Dec 1995

Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina, on Dec. 18, 1995 (Pascal Guyot/AFP/Getty Images)

Today, the Dutch Public Prosecutor announced that the Dutch police have arrested two men who allegedly committed war crimes during the 1992-1995 war in Bosnia.

One of the unnamed men, a 43-year-old Bosnian, is accused of being a brutal prison camp commander at a school in Bosnia where Serbs were held.

The man, allegedly a member of the 103rd Brigade of the Bosnian Croat Army (HVO), was arrested in the southern Dutch city of Spijkenisse and is accused of murder, torture and psychological and physical violence against civilians.

“He allegedly shot dead a civilian who tried to escape and other prisoners were forced to watch,” the Prosecutor’s Office said.

“Another prisoner was then beaten and another man had a gun put in his mouth and then the camp commander fired several shots,” it said.

The other suspect, a 52-year-old man with Bosnian and Dutch nationality, was arrested in the eastern town of Heumen.

He is accused of being a member of an armed group who committed war crimes in 1992.

The group allegedly shot up a home in the village of Beslagici, killing a man.

Both men were arrested at the request of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Dutch authorities will now decide on whether they should be extradited.