COMMITTEE AGAINST TORTURE HEARS RESPONSE OF BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA
The Committee against Torture this afternoon heard the response of Bosnia and Herzegovina to questions raised by Committee Experts on the initial report of that country on how it was implementing the provisions of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.
Responding to a series of questions raised by the Committee members on Tuesday, 8 November, the delegation, which was led by Slobodan Nagradic, Assistant Minister in the Ministry of Human Rights and Refugees of Bosnia and Herzegovina, said that since the report was completed in late 2003, part of the measures of implementation of the Convention had not been adopted at the time, and therefore could not be included in the report. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, some progress had been achieved on the prosecution of those who were guilty of war crimes, and progress had been made in achieving reparation for the victims of torture. Many of those guilty had gone before the tribunals voluntarily. Within the courts of Bosnia and Herzegovina, there was a chamber for war crimes, and the first trials before it had already started.
Answering a question on how the State structure influenced the successful implementation of the Convention, the delegation said the Constitution had certain set procedures included within it. All the structures of governance were fully aware of the fact that international documents had to be implemented, and there was less and less resistance to the commitments made by the State and asked for by that body. There was no integral system regulating reparation to victims of torture of the war. There was a law referring to compensation, and this had been harmonised with European standards.
The protection of victims of torture, their status and their rights were regulated individually by entity legislation prepared by the different ministries, the delegation said. The opinion was that the implementation of article 14 of the Convention required systemic solutions at the level of Bosnia and Herzegovina by developing an umbrella strategy or law that would allow victims of torture to receive compensation, including funding for rehabilitation. However, there was still no specific response to the question.
The Committee will release its conclusions and recommendations on the report of Bosnia and Herzegovina towards the end of the session on 25 November.
As one of the 140 States parties to the Convention against Torture, Bosnia and Herzegovina is obliged to provide the Committee with periodic reports on the measures it has undertaken to fight torture.
When the Committee reconvenes at 10 a.m. on Thursday, 10 November, it is scheduled to take up the second periodic report of Sri Lanka (CAT/C/48/Add.2)
Response of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Responding to a series of questions raised by the Committee Experts on Tuesday, 8 November, Slobodan Nagradic, Assistant Minister in the Ministry of Human Rights and Refugees of Bosnia and Herzegovina, said from the questions asked, it was clear that the Experts had closely read the reports, and the delegation would try to provide a synthesised answer. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, some progress had been achieved on the prosecution of those who were guilty of war crimes, and progress had been made in achieving reparation for the victims of torture. Many of those guilty had gone before the tribunals voluntarily. Within the courts of Bosnia and Herzegovina, there was a chamber for war crimes, and the first trials before it had already started. The Police Force of the Federation and the security agencies at the state level over the past year and the current one were still bringing many of those indicted for war crimes to justice. Based on the sentences and judgements of the Chamber on Human Rights, committees had been established in local Republics to take their own steps and make local progress.
The report of the Srebrenica Committee described a period in July 1995, and included the number of those killed, who had perpetrated war operations, and who had been the commanders, and it remained to be seen what the prosecutor’s office would do, Mr. Nagradic said. A memorial complex had been built as a symbol and warning to present and future generations as to what had happened, so that a similar crime never took place again. Compensation to the families of the victims of the crimes in Srebrenica was currently being examined, and a law had been adopted in 2004 that foresaw several outstanding elements, including the Institute for Missing Persons. Another responsibility was the setting up of a fund or financial agency to help the families of the victims. The number of these persons was quite extensive, and the establishment of the fund was a major preoccupation of the authorities; a full report on its establishment would be finished by the end of the year, and the final decision would be taken shortly thereafter by the Council of Ministers. The rules of procedure for marking the places where the victims lost their lives were also being developed, and this was motivated by the fact that whatever was done should be done with the aim of maintaining peace, stability and true reconciliation among the peoples and ethnic groups that were waging war.
The authorities were ready and willing to undertake other measures with regards to the victims of torture, Mr. Nagradic said. There were some tensions among the peoples of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and these had existed in the past, but today they were expressed with significantly less intensity than they had been only five years ago. Neither police forces nor law-enforcement agencies nor the courts were monolithic any longer in terms of their ethnic composition. There were 17 national minorities in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and work was being done to ensure that they were represented in most institutions.
Those who were arrested or surrendered themselves almost ten years ago went to The Hague almost as national heroes. Today they went to the tribunals escorted by police officers, and this was an important turn, as awareness had been upgraded with regards to the crimes committed in the past war, and this was also confirmation that a perpetrator of crimes would always be identified, and the people would not be blamed as a whole. Bosnia and Herzegovina was witnessing continuous efforts with tangible results with regards to the situation. The Hague Tribunal was transferring ever more cases to the domestic courts, and nowadays the cases amounted to over 1,000, which was a confirmation of the efficacy of the domestic judiciary, which, after reforms, had the capacity of addressing these challenges, Mr. Nagradic said. It was hoped that in the next report, Bosnia and Herzegovina would be able to present numerically how many cases had been lodged and completed, how many had been indicted and acquitted, and what were sentences for the guilty.
Responding to a question on how the State structure influenced the successful implementation of the Convention, the delegation said the Constitution had certain set procedures included within it. All the structures of governance were fully aware of the fact that international documents had to be implemented, and there was less and less resistance to the commitments made by the State and asked for by that body. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, there was no single opinion about the role of the international community overall, in particular in the process of implementation of the Convention, however, all agreed that the presence of the international community in the first two years after the war had been indispensable. It was felt that the responsibility for Bosnia and Herzegovina should today be left to its own domestic institutions.
There was increasing harmonisation of laws between the different entities of Bosnia and Herzegovina, but at the same time, the process of harmonisation of laws was underway in the context of European standards, the delegation said. There were more and more common institutions and administrative bodies. In the past few years in Bosnia and Herzegovina, joint efforts in the governmental and non-governmental sectors as well as in the media had contributed to organizing a wide number of different meetings, round-tables and conferences on human rights in general, and torture in particular. These had included the entities at all levels, and many public figures had gone through such training sessions, and the media had covered extensively the implementation of the Convention. Significant improvement in collecting data had taken place in 2005 when the State Statistical Body had been launched, and this had contributed significantly to providing concerned bodies with necessary data. Nevertheless, methodologically, there were still shortcomings and problems.
There was no integral system regulating the reparation to the victims of torture of the war. There was a law referring to compensation, and this had been harmonised with European standards. The protection of victims of torture, their status and their rights were regulated individually by entity legislation prepared by the different ministries, the delegation said. The opinion was that the implementation of article 14 of the Convention required systemic solutions at the level of Bosnia and Herzegovina by developing an umbrella strategy or law that would allow victims of torture to receive compensation, including funding for rehabilitation. However, there was still no specific response to the question. With regards to domestic violence, a law against domestic violence had been adopted at entity level this year; there was no umbrella law, but there were activities and projects of the non-governmental sector with regards to this issue.
Since the report was completed in late 2003, the delegation said that at the time, part of the measures of implementation of the Convention had not been adopted, and therefore could not be included in the report. Criminal legislation had been changed in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and criminal investigations were no longer in the charge of the courts, but under the charge of the prosecutor only. On the War Crimes Tribunals, the proceedings against the war criminals could be instituted in the Federation before the cantonal courts. On the other hand, the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina had a separate chamber for war crimes that was set up based on amendments to the laws that entered into force after the report was written. Its purpose was to deal with the most serious reports.
There had been isolated cases of judges being threatened - and those persons had received police protection, the delegation said. Within the report period, there were no criminal applications made by judges as a result of being threatened once the new Criminal Code and criminal procedure laws were adopted in 2003. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, judges and prosecutors were entirely independent in their work, and there had been no reports of them being put under pressure by any political structure. On whether there were special War Crimes Prosecutors within the War Crimes Court in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the delegation said that within the Prosecutor’s Office there was a special unit set up for war crimes. There was a possibility to use all the evidence that had been collected by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and to use it in the proceedings before the courts, and the first case had taken place in the context of this evidence.
With regards to a question on the definition of torture within the Constitution and the legislation, the differences between the laws at State level and entity level, and the definition of torture, as defined by Article 1 of the Convention, the delegation said that the Constitution protected people from being subjected to torture or inhuman or degrading treatment. On legislation, the new Criminal Code of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the respective laws from the entities did not have the definition as it was in the Convention, but it could be said that in the provisions and sanctions foreseen by the various laws, these criminal acts reflected the essence of the Convention. There was a provision dealing with extortion and also the abuse of the term of office and acting in an official capacity. When it came to adhering to standards at a trial, there was full moral integrity in the professional capacity foreseen for both prosecutors and judges. Thus, Bosnia and Herzegovina had made a systematic effort in order to resolve the issue of standards, including that of non-biased courts and judges that were acting with no prejudice.
In the case of disharmony between national laws and the text of international instruments, the international instruments would prevail, the delegation said. On the conduct of prison staff, their training and the results of this and any resistance to it that might have been encountered, the law stipulated that those imprisoned should be treated with dignity, taking into account law and order. The law prohibited any kind of torture or inhuman or degrading treatment by imprisonment officials on prisoners, and this was the first element of the training given to those officials. Officials who failed their human rights training were not passed and were not given employment. There was no resistance to training, but it had only been implemented for under a year, and thus could not be assessed yet.
In all the prison systems, the importance of prison staff was enormous, the delegation said. There were of course mistakes and oversights, and these were quickly discovered. Any incidents were rapidly sanctioned. Issues related to women and juveniles as perpetrators of criminal activities had been the topic of many questions. The legally prescribed standards for incarceration of women and juveniles were not met, and these groups, as well as psychiatric internees, were defined as "at risk" categories. At the moment, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, women served sentences in a separate ward of men’s prisons, and the two genders were entirely separated. Juveniles served their sentences in separate wards from adult prisons. Regarding the construction of a separate prison for women and juveniles, there was currently no facility for this, but it was agreed that it should be taken into consideration at a later date. Education for juveniles who were incarcerated was obligatory, and certificates did not show that the educational degree had been achieved in prison. The only time juveniles mixed with other detainees was during the day - at night they slept in separate wards.
Bosnia and Herzegovina followed a progressive system with regards to incarceration, and compliance with European standards was secured to a limited extent due to a limitation of funds, the delegation said. There were no individual risk assessments for each prisoner, and there were no maximum-security wards. There were different forms of abuse, racketeering and all forms of blackmail, and prison authorities were combating this as much as possible. Sexual harassment was not common in prisons in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and no case of sexual abuse had been registered. There was a detailed appeals process. There were provisions against which no appeals were granted, but with the new system, a modern appeals system and inspections system would be elaborated.
FELICE GAER, Committee Expert serving as Rapporteur, thanked the delegation, saying that its members had made considerable efforts to respond to the questions. Further time should perhaps have been allocated, as it had been an initial report, but this was due to working methods. Any additional information that any of the members of the delegation had prepared would be extremely helpful. The status of the acknowledgement of the victims of torture from the war-time period needed to be further clarified, as she had not understood the response, and she wondered if there was any possibility envisaged at present of establishing a law or decree covering all torture survivors, including those who had undergone aggravated conditions. Was there a possibility of full compensation and redress for them and would this be the subject of further action by the State, she asked. What safeguards had been adopted to prevent violations of international conventions, she asked, among other questions.
Other Experts then asked further brief questions, including whether there was an appeals system for victims outside the police system.
Mr. Nagradic responded to the questions, saying that the mandate of the Human Rights Chamber had not been terminated, and the mandate had been extended for another year as it could not complete all the cases it was deciding on. In most cases it dealt with property issues. Its role had been taken by the Commission on Human Rights. Some cultural issues stigmatised victims of particular crimes, in particular rape. Bosnia and Herzegovina was looking towards the protection of any human being, regardless their ethnicity, age, or gender, and was seeking a solution for all the victims of torture. This was not an easy task, even in the states with a much simpler structure than that of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
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