Abstract
There was limited progress in human rights protection in Serbia in 2014. War crimes prosecutions are slow and lack political support. The Roma minority continue to face attacks and harassment. The situation for journalists remains precarious, including attacks, threats, and lawsuits for reporting on sensitive issues. Hostility towards members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community continued and included threats and attacks.War crimes prosecutions progressed slowly in 2014 due to a lack of political support, resources, and staff at the Office of the War Crimes Prosecutor. Few highranking former military and civilian personnel have been prosecuted for war crimes. During the year, the War Crimes Chamber reached judgments in six cases, including two appeals. The Office of War Crimes Prosecutor indicted five people for crimes against civilians, including former Yugoslav Army General Dragan Zivanovic for war crimes in Kosovo in 1999. At time of writing, 6 trials were ongoing, indictments had been issues in 16 cases awaiting trial, and 20 cases were under investigation.In February, the chamber sentenced nine former members of the Yugoslav Army to a total of 106 years of imprisonment for the killing of over 120 Albanian civilians in Kosovo in 1999. Also in February, the chamber sentenced Djuro Tadic to 10 years for participating in the killings by Bosnian Serb forces of 18 people, including a 13-year-old girl, in northwestern Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) in September 1992. Two co-defendants were sentenced to 11 and 10 years respectively.At time of writing, the February 2013 war crimes protocol signed between BiH, Serbia, Croatia and Montenegro that details information sharing and cooperation, had not led to new prosecutions or convictions derived from case transfers.In February 2014, a first instance court in Belgrade dismissed 12 Croatian ex-prisoners’ civil lawsuits against Serbia for torture in detention in 1991 on the grounds the claim was time-barred and there were no criminal convictions for the alleged abuse on which to base the civil claims.
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