Leskovac,
2007 ANNUAL REPORT - HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION REPORT IN JABLANICA
AND ONE PART OF PCINJA DISTRICT FROM THE ASPECT OF UN DECLARATION ON HUMAN
RIGHTS BY THE COMMITTEE FOR HUMAN RIGHTS, LESKOVAC
In 2007,
the Committee for human rights was asked for legal help or advice by 612
persons, or 51 average each month. These people found out about the work of the
Committee from the media, their friends, our former and current users or
through our website.
From the total number of 612, 513 people or
about 42 persons each month came directly to our office, whereas 73 or average
6 per month contacted us by a telephone or fax.
Within the reporting period 545 people or about 45 per month addressed us
with cases from the area of our interest and monitoring, and 67 people or about
5 per month with cases that are not from the field of our interest.
In 2007 legal help in cases from the area of
our interest got 519 people or about 43 each month, whereas help form the area
which is not of our interest got about 50 people or about 4 each month.
In the reporting period we took into consideration
for representation 48 cases, or 4 each month, whereas for representing we took
105 cases or over 8 each month.
In 2007 for the needs of our users we wrote 4 indictments,
29 charges or 2.41 per month, 1 legal charge, 1 investigation demand, 58
criminal charges or 4. 83 per month, 59 appeals or 4. 91 per month, 11
complaints, 2 demands for access to the information of public importance, 1
objection to the indictment, 4 proposals to repeat proceedings, 3 appeals for
review, 1 demand for legality protection, 1 demand to the Constitutional court
to evaluate the conformity of a law with the Constitution, 2 petitions to the
EU court in Strasbourg, 21 petition requests of different kinds or 1.75 per
month and 4 suggestions to allow carrying out of a sentence.
In 2007, Committee for human rights lawyer
represented our users in 336 appearances in court in lawsuits or 28 per month,
and in 93 court appearances in criminal charges proceedings or 7.75 per month.
National structure of people who asked for our
help and legal advice in 2007 is: Serbs – 584 or 48.66 per month, Romas – 13,
Albanians – 5, Bulgarians 5, Montenegrin- 1, Macedonians – 1, Austrian- 1, Muslims-
2.
The structure of rights that were violated,
denied or endangered from the aspect of UN GA Declaration on human rights in
2007 was:
-
art. 3 of
the UN Declaration, the right to life, freedom and personal safety – 6 cases
-
art. 5 of
the UN Declaration , prohibition of torture – 78 cases or 6.5 per month
-
art. 7 of
the UN Declaration, the right to be protected from the discrimination - 6 cases
-
art. 8 of
the UN Declaration , the right to be protected by national courts from
violation of basic rights guaranteed by the constitution and law – 88 cases or
7.3 per month
-
art. 10 of
the UN Declaration, the right to a fair trial before an impartial court, 124
cases or 10. 3 per month
-
art. 12 of
the UN Declaration, prohibition of arbitrary interference in personal and
family life - 3 cases
-
art. 17 of
the UN Declaration, the right to possess and enjoy personal property- 19 cases
or 1.58 per month
-
art. 19 of
the UN Declaration, the right to freedom of thinking and expressing - 3
cases
-
art. 23 of
the UN Declaration, the right to work and and have satisfying work conditions
- 222 cases or 18.5 per month
-
art. 25 of
the UN Declaration, the right to satisfactory living standard – 6 cases
By analyzing the numerical part of the report
we can establish the fact that during the reporting period the biggest number
of people addressed us
because of violation or endangering of the right from the art. 23 of the UN
Declaration – the right to work and have satisfactory working conditions. This
is a consequence of the fact that the right to satisfactory working conditions
is declaratively recognized by the Working Law, but in practice is rarely
applied. On the contrary, it is often violated by employers, whereas the
administration of justice, operating as privatized, and work inspection, which
is directly influenced by employers; do not provide adequate protection of the
rights. For years, people are not being paid, or their social insurance is not
being paid, and legal proceedings in courts are extremely long and with an
uncertain outcome. It is especially interesting that the applied Work Law of
the
Employees
are left to themselves on mercy and
disfavour of employers, corrupted and privatized courts, resourceless work
inspections which for unknown reasons do not want to provide adequate
protection. To illustrate this, we shall state a very characteristic case of 96
employees of the company “Retex” from Vlasotince. Their employer gave them a
notice. After three years of court proceedings, the court made a verdict that
it annuls the dismissal notices, that the employees must be returned to work,
that their social insurance must be paid and that they must be given
compensation for the salaries during the proceedings. The employer did not want
voluntarily to execute the verdict, so the lawyer of the Committee brought
criminal charges against the director of the employer for the criminal act of
Nonexecution of court Decision. Even though 5 months have passed, the
Municipal court in Vlasotince has not
conducted the procedure of court verdict execution, so the employer has not
paid the social insurance or the compensation. In order to avoid the claim that
the employees have towards him, the employer has fictitiously transferred his
property on another of his companies. He also bans the employees to work, he
makes them impossible to enter the factory and the work inspection in Leskovac
does not take any measures neither towards the employer nor to enable the employees
to work and earn their living.
From the numerical part of the report we can
establish with certainty that in 2007 citizens asked for our help continuously,
average 17.66 per month,
about courts’ endangering
and violation of rights set in articles
8 and 10 of the UN declaration, which is a paradox characteristic for the
imitation of legal state which, human
rights as set by the international humanitarian laws, declaratively and
normatively acknowledges, but in practice do not apply them. Here we have an
opposite situation – courts that are supposed to protect according to the
constitution and law break them.
This statement is backed by the fact that in
2007 police and citizens brought criminal charges, for the most difficult
criminal acts that carriers of legal functions can commit, against 7 judges of
the municipal and district courts in Leskovac and the president of the district
court Jovica Ilic. Against a lawyer,
Stojan Djordjevic from Leskovac, who worked with the judges there is also a
criminal proceeding in progress, and one judge is suspended for starting
criminal proceedings. These all point out that the administration of justice in
Leskovac is privatized.
The facts that after the denunciation only one
criminal proceeding against one judge and one lawyer who “worked” in
cooperation with the judges has been started and the other denunciation are put
“on hold”; and not against one single judge the process of discarding from the
function has been done; the participants
of this administration of justice affair are still working, tell us that the administration of justice is
in hands of certain carriers of the judiciary functions i.e. oligarchy groups
and individuals on local and republican levels, and that the state has a
function of an “adapter” creating conditions for oppression over citizens by
paying from the budget and tax collected from the very same citizens.
Figurative Serbian administration of justice
has been turned into a huge market on which judiciary gangs are free to trade
with human freedom, property and complete destinies on a unique market of human destinies. Since carriers of judiciary functions are not
responsible to the state that is paying them and provides them working
conditions but to oligarchy groups and individuals on the local and republican
level there is no fear of any responsibility. The state has a role of a passive
spectator and this is helped by a resourceless and incapable minister of
justice who was brought according to the “find
a place for the man in stead of find the man for the place” method which is
a strategic personnel problem in the minister’s party since after the murder of
Dr Zoran Djindjic.
The utmost measures of privatized and corrupted
administration of justice are shown in the fact that the District prosecutor in
Prokuplje dismissed the criminal charges against the president of the District
court in Leskovac for the criminal act of Law violation by a judge although
that judge, himself made a decision to prolong the pre-trial confinement of a
prisoner which, according to the Law about criminal proceedings, has to be a
decision made by a board of three-man judges. He also stated in the decision
that it was made by the board of judges although at that time the members of
the board of judges were on a conference in Vrnjacka Banja. In a letter sent to
the President of the Supreme Court of Serbia he confessed having done this and
thus, he really confessed committing a criminal act. However, according to the
District prosecutor in Prokuplje, the Criminal Law obviously does not apply to
the carriers of judiciary functions even when they commit the most difficult
acts since we are dealing with a case when the prisoner was denied right to
freedom for 60 days.
Or the case in which the judge of the Municipal
Court in Vlasotince Slobodan Kocic and the judge of the District court in
Leskovac Nikola Pesic consciously brought an illegal verdict according to which
the state of
In the Municipal court in Leskovac there is a
criminal proceeding against the lawyer Stojan Djordjevic from Leskovac for 11
criminal acts of forging documents and frauds, in which he damaged the state
and his clients for huge amounts of money. However, the state does not lead any
criminal proceedings against the two judges who made him possible to lead
imaginary lawsuits based on forged proxies since it would have been enough if
they had summoned the proxy givers for hearing.
The Municipal court in Surdulica has on trail a
victim of police torture for denouncing the deputy district prosecutor in
Surdulica who, he believes, participated in his torture and they bound the
victim to pay the compensation to the deputy prosecutor for alleged violation
of honour and reputation. This was done against art. 13 of the UN Convention
against torture. The court decision about publishing the criminal verdict in
newspapers brought by the Municipal court in Vranje which needs to be done according to the Law
on execution of criminal sanctions, has been executed by the Municipal court in
Surdulica according to the rules of civil executive proceedings even though it
is not its jurisdiction and it is approved by the municipal court in Vranje. On
the other hand, the municipal court in Surdulica even after 7 years has not
executed a verdict by the Supreme court of Serbia by which a police officer was
sentenced to 18 months imprisonment which is a never recorded case in the history of the administration of justice and
they have not suffered any consequences which, again, proves that the state as an
ordered system of governance does not exist.
In Pirot and Babusnica the courts have become
“family” and “friendly” matters under a direct control of a monopoly company
“Tigar” from Pirot, which is a consequence of the fact that the key functions
in the administration of justice are still in hands of the people from
Milosevic’s regime.
That except an intellectual hangover and
provincial complainer nothing is sacred for this state can be proven in the
fact that none out of three final verdicts of the
The fact that to such a condition the highest
organs of the administration of justice contribute, although according to the
law they should take measures to overcome the condition, like for example the Supervising
Committee of the Supreme court of Serbia, which works ‘pro form’ not indulging
in the core of the complaints that citizens send against the carriers of
judiciary functions. According to the findings of the Supervisory Committee the
complaints are not sustainable even in the situation when a judge brings
verdict in cases when a board of justice should judge. The president of the
Supreme court, Vida Petrovic-Skero who is familiar with these problems also
does not want to do her job of impose order in the administration of justice
and thus, becomes a mentor and protector of such a condition, most likely
preparing herself optimal conditions for retirement or a future lawyer career.
In this we see a sad picture of a person who during Milosevic’s and Djindjic’s
time had the courage to say “As long as
I am the president of this court , the court will judge according to the law”
and now lacks the revolutionary sprit obviously for some pragmatic reasons.
To the whole story of corruption, privatization
and decay of the administration of justice we should add the role of the Republic prosecutor, who
although familiar with the complete problem still allows lower prosecutors
under his control not to take any legal actions like criminal prosecution and
to reject criminal charges brought against the carriers of judicial functions
even in cases when the state is damaged for huge amounts of money and when
material proofs exist.
From the numeric part of the report we can see
that in 2007 a number of people asked our help for the violation of prohibition
from article 5 of the Declaration. These people were victims of torture, cruel,
inhuman and degrading conducts or punishment. The number of cases was 78 or 6.5
average in each month which is an alarming and worrying fact. The biggest percentage
of these cases are prisoners from the Penitentiary in
Also from the numeric part we can see that
people came to us for the violation of the right to possess and
enjoy their property from article 17 of the UN Declaration. This
right was mostly violated by the stately owned monopoly companies such as Electricity
supplies, telecom, public companies which the state in the Constitution article
84, paragraph 2 gave the right to be monopolistic although monopoles are
forbidden in the same Constitution.
Here, we should point out the cases of taking
away real estates – civil building land to people bu the Municipal government
without any compensation against art 1 of the Protocol number 1 with the
European Convention. What worries here is the fact that in the report of the Ministry of Finance
which was in the reporting period in the hands of 2 “proeuropean” political
parties, G 17+ and DS, stated that the decisions to take away real estates of
people without any compensation is legal, which is another proof that this
government does not respect International humanitarian law norms and that
citizens’ property in this country does not have any protection.
The imitation of the legal state will have to
pay the compensation for illegally taken away properties only after the
European court orders to do so and the state officials who damaged the
reputation of our state and ruined our citizens will remain working and being
paid by the same state. So far the state executed three requests done by our
Committee.
It is very interesting that today in the 21st
century, the decisions by municipal ‘democratic’ authorities have the same
content as those after the World War II in which the state took away the
property from “people’s enemies”. The only difference we see is the lack of
“death to fascism, freedom to people” and a seal with a five-pointed star.
From the numeric and analytical parts of the
report we evidently establish that we live in a state in which property
relations, as the basics of any society, are not structured enough. The
property is normatively granted but in practice has no protection; the administration
of justice as an element of the political system is completely destroyed;
courts as organs of authorities that should protect human rights are privatized
and corrupted; state, through its monopolistic companies enables a direct
robbery of its citizens who in stead of being a ‘subject of rights’ have been
turned into an ‘ object of domination and manipulation’ which further proves
that this state exists only on paper and is definitely not a stabile and
organized political system.
Citizens clearly see this and feel consequences
of such a disorder and thus, majority of people does not believe president
Boris Tadic that he will lead our country into the EU. Majority of people sees
a “façade of state’ supported by someone as a sad civilization side effect.
President of the Committee for Human Rights,
Leskovac
Doborsav Nesic