January 2004
Human rights progress in Serbia and Montenegro has been stymied by government failure to cooperate fully with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), inadequate efforts to prosecute war criminals before domestic courts, continuing police mistreatment of criminal suspects, and failure to vigorously combat discrimination against ethnic minorities.
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ICTY
Serbian authorities transferred five (http://www.un.org/icty/glance/index.htm) indicted war crimes suspects to the ICTY during 2003. A dozen indictees remain at large, however, either in the territory of Serbia and Montenegro, or frequently crossing the porous border with Republika Srpska (Bosnia and Herzegovina). The most prominent among them are former Bosnian Serb General Ratko Mladic and leader Radovan Karadzic. Serbia and Montenegro authorities also display a limited willingness to provide access to documents requested by ICTY investigators.
Domestic Courts
The prosecution of war crimes cases before domestic courts is hampered by a generalized lack of political will and the failure of the police to provide evidence to the prosecutor's office. The trials held so far have suffered from an absence of adequate witness protection measures, poor preparation of the prosecution's cases, and a lack of procedural rules facilitating testimonies of key witnesses from other parts of the former Yugoslavia (Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina).
The Serbian government has not made serious efforts to address these obstacles. A new law on war crime trials, enacted by the Serbian parliament on July 7, 2003 (http://www.osce.org/documents/fry/2003/07/446_en.pdf), contains rudimentary witness protection mechanisms, but the usefulness of the law remains to be assessed. The office of the special war crimes prosecutor, established in July (http://www.serbia.sr.gov.yu/news/2003-07/22/330234.html) 2003, is reportedly preparing several high-profile war-crime cases, including indictments linked to discovery of mass graves in Serbia, exhumed in 2001 to reveal up to six hundred bodies of Kosovo Albanians.
Police Abuse
The commitment of authorities in Serbia and Montenegro to the rule of law has been called into question by their response to the assassination of Zoran Djindjic in March 2003. During the post-assassination investigation, known as Operation Sabre, approximately 10,000 people were detained and held without access to lawyers or family members, in some cases for up to two months. Consistent reports from those released suggest widespread ill-treatment of detainees, in some cases amounting to torture. Police torture had been a major human rights problem even before the Operation Sabre. Prosecutions against police officers for the illegal use of force are extremely rare. Police disciplinary tribunals do not deter police officers, and courts fail to provide adequate remedies to victims.
Minority Rights
In the area of minority rights, Serbia and Montenegro has seen some progress in the implementation of the 2002 Law on the Rights and Freedoms of National Minorities. Most minority groups have now established national councils under the law, which play a consultative role in minority education and the cultivation of cultural identity. Nonetheless, tensions and discrimination with regard to some ethnic groups remain.
The fragile peace in southern Serbia was tested during 2003. This predominantly ethnic Albanian area bordering Kosovo was the scene of armed conflict in 2001. Bomb attacks against moderate Albanians in January and February led to the arrest of seven Albanians. Police enraged local Albanians by referring to those arrested as "terrorists." Of the seven detained, only two were found guilty in subsequent trials. In August, members of the self-styled Albanian National Army shot at the posts of the Serbian police and the army, but the authorities this time refrained from resorting to indiscriminate repressive measures in response. Discrimination in employment in the public enterprises, and a school curriculum that ignores Albanian culture and history are persistent problems.
Roma continue to face widespread discrimination. Thousands of Roma families – many of them displaced from Kosovo –live in makeshift settlements in the vicinity of towns, without electricity, running water, sewers, or access to public health and education services. Authorities have attempted on several occasions to evict the families from one such settlement in Belgrade, without providing them with adequate alternative accommodation.
Key International Actors
The assassination of Zoran Djindjic strengthened the significant international support enjoyed by the post-Milosevic leadership in Serbia and Montenegro. The Council of Europe backed off from its previous requirements regarding the constitutional arrangements between the two republics and accepted Serbia and Montenegro into membership on April 3, 2003, three weeks after Djindjic's assassination. On December 26, 2003, Serbia and Montenegro ratified the European Convention on Human Rights and the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
The OSCE mission has played a useful role in monitoring war crime and organized crime trials in Serbia, helping the Serbian government improve the draft legislation on war crime trials, and assisting Serbian legislators in developing key pieces of new media legislation. In April 2003, however, the statements of the head of the mission were widely seen as supportive of the government's denial—all indications to the contrary—that it had ill-treated persons arrested under the state of emergency.
The European Union has not used the association and stabilization process to leverage improvements in Serbia's performance on human rights issues.
