Odbor za ljudska prava

Committee for Human Rights

SERBIA

16000 Leskovac

office:Svetozara Markovica br.37

tel/fax:+381 16 215 922

www.humanrightsle.org

e-mail:nesic@eunet.rs

 

 

 

 

 

Leskovac, 14 February 2009

 

2008 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 2008,  the Committee for human rights was asked for legal help or advice by 695 persons, or 63 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 657 people or about 59 persons each month came directly to our office, whereas 18 people per month contacted us by a telephone and 13 by letters.

Within the reporting period  634 people or about 57 per month addressed us with cases from the area of our interest and monitoring, and 61 people or about 5 per month with cases that are not from the field of our interest.

In 2008 legal help in cases from the area of our interest got 613 people or about 55 each month, whereas help form the area which is not of our interest asked about  22 people or about 2 each month.

In the reporting period we took into consideration for representation 114 cases, or 10 each month, whereas for representing we took 98 cases or over 8 each month.

In 2008 for the needs of our users we wrote 14 complaints, 5 charges, 1 investigation demand, 6 criminal complaints, 38 charges, 31 complaints, 3 suggestions for process repetition, 4 appeals for review, 14 requests to the EU Court in Strasbourg, 23 petition requests of different kinds, 4 appeals for permission to carry out sentences, 2 appeals for legality protection, 1 objection to Indictment and 1 demand for access to the information of public interest.

In 2008, Committee for human rights lawyer represented our users in 259 appearances in court in lawsuits or 23 per month, and in 102 court appearances in criminal charges proceedings or 9 per month.

National structure of people who asked for our help and legal advice in 2008 is: Serbs – 679 or 61 per month, Romas – 12, Albanians – 7, Bulgarians 2, Libyan 1 and Vlah 1.

In the reporting period we visited prisoners in the prison in Nis on several occasions and we saw the poor conditions for life in that facility. Also we saw for ourselves the bad treatment of the prisons authorities towards the convicts which borders cruel and inhuman conduct. On two occasions we visited our clients in the prison Zabela, once in the prison in Sremska Mirotvica and one in the district prison in Subotica.

The structure of rights that were violated, denied or endangered from the aspect of UN GA Declaration on human rights in 2008 was:

-          art. 3 of the UN Declaration, the right to life, freedom and personal safety – 3 cases

-          art. 5 of the UN Declaration , prohibition of torture – 42 cases or 3.81 per month

-          art. 7 of the UN Declaration, the right to be protected from the discrimination  - 3 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 – 173 cases or 15 per month

-          art. 10 of the UN Declaration, the right to a fair trial before an impartial court, 330 cases or 30 per month

-          art.11 of the UN Declaration, the right to assume innocence, 2 cases

-          art. 12 of the UN Declaration, prohibition of arbitrary interference in personal and family life - 7 cases

-          art. 17 of the UN Declaration, the right to possess and enjoy personal property- 190 cases or 17.27 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  have satisfying work conditions -  160 cases or 14 per month

 

By analyzing the numerical part of the report we can see the continuum of violation of rights to efficient court protection art. 8 and the right to a righteous trial before an independent court art. 10 of the Declaration. This is the consequence of the fact that the Ministry of Justice is led by a woman who has never been known in the legal circles neither as a theoretician nor as a practical worker, so being a total layman she does not seem capable of understanding the problems in the justice system not to mention solving them. Instead of solving the problems by affirmation the mentality of the righteous trials, she arms courts and thus, shows that she is not capable of protecting the integrity of judges and judicial system by trust and respect. Another fact that we can see in the geographical area of our interest is that the administration of justice is completely privatized and under the direct control of  oligarchy groups both on  local and republican levels. There is a feeling that carriers of judicial positions instead of applying the laws use ‘private justice’ in the interest of oligarchs and their own whereas the country has a role of the ‘masochist adapter’ who organizes and finances a huge market of the judiciary and police gangs who trade freely with human freedom, property and destinies without any kind of responsibility, totally relieved of any fear, since the country which has chosen them and paid them has no control but passively watches the events on the market of human fortunes.

Such a situation as a result had in people something like ‘ non-regulated private civilian justice’ and led to  a murder of the president of Municipal Court in Knjazevac, putting a bomb on the car of the president of Municipal court in Leskovac, burning the archive in a small court in Vojvodina, 77 tips on bomb treats and the same number of interruption of work in the Justice Palace in Belgrade. So people’s response is similar to the one in Columbia, and thus, the Committee for Human Rights of the UN did not elect Serbia as a member although a candidate and this fact remained hidden from the public here.

The catastrophic situation in the administration of justice is supported by a Supervising committee of the Supreme Court which is not capable and does not fulfill its role assigned by the Law on judges and the Republican Prosecutor’s office.

The conclusion is that in the Republic of Serbia there is no legal security for people and juristic persons.

From the numeric part we can establish that a number of people turned to us because of the violation of the right to property from the art. 17 of the UN Declaration. This is seen in the fact the municipality takes away land and property or monopolistic companies though art. 84 paragraph 2 of the Constitution  forbids monopoly except in cases of stately owned monopolistic companies in the field of energetics, communications and similar. We see no traces of protection of people by courts  especially as suggested in the art. 1 of the Protocol with the EU Convention for human rights protection although our Constitution in the art. 58 protects the right to possess. It is especially noticeable that courts are not ready to provide adequate protection of the right to property both in cases of immediate endangerment of the property and in quick and efficient way to collect payment in property claims in the executive proceeding. This as a consequence has property and legal insecurity of people in the state of Serbia on one hand and on the other, the biggest numbers of cases before the European court in Strasbourg our citizens have against the state are for the violation of right to a righteous trial art. 6 of the Convention and the violation of right to property.

Going into further analysis of the numeric part, we see that the third reason the people turned to us are cases of the violation of right to work and have satisfying working conditions from the art. 23 of the Declaration. This happens as a result of  not finished privatization, lack of a strong system of Trade unions, poor work of the inspection services and courts which do not provide efficient court protection to people whose rights are endangered or violated.

Also within the reporting period we met cases of torture or other cruel and inhumane acts and punishments as opposed to the art. 5 of the Declaration. It is our pleasure to state that cases of police torture are put to minimum, but we do notice cases of torture and abuse of prisoners in prisons in Nis, Zabela and Sremska Mitrovica. The people there are exposed to inhumane treatment. We have to point out cases of Zoran Jotic, Igor Gajic and Goran Petrovic from Krusevac who were tortured by the police in the action “Sablja” and in which the police and prosecutors did not convey quick and impartial investigation with the aim to uncover the members of police who tortured them although there is an official report of the police about the abuse.

In the reporting period we notice 3 cases of violation of the right to life and freedom of the art. 3 of the Declaration. The case of Vucko Manojlovic from Leskovac deserves a special attention. He is serving the sentence in  prison in Nis. He was sentenced in 1985 by the District court in Nis to the maximal punishment which was 20 years in 1984 when Manojlovic committed his crime. After the prosecutors complaint the Supreme court changed his sentence to capital punishment. However, until August 2002 it was not executed so he waited for the death penalty for 17 years. In August 2002 he was pardoned by the President and changed into 40 years imprisonment which was not known in 1984 when he committed the crime and thus, he was violated the right to be punished according to the law. Since December 2004, the authorities of Serbia hold Manojlovic deprived of freedom against the previously stated principle, which represents generally acknowledged rule of the law and thus, violates his right to freedom. The Committee pointed out this fact to the president of Serbia, Boris Tadic, and suggested that he  uses the affirmation of principles about Punishing people based on the law, to pardon him and thus, overcome illegal status inherited from the previous president. However, we have not received an answer yet neither to the petition nor to the appeal filed on Manojlovic’s behalf as opposed to the point of view of the European court in Strasbourg in the case of Bejamin and Wilson against the United Kingdom.

The lawyer of the Committee brought charges against the president of Serbia to the first Municipal court in Belgrade with the demand to commit the president to bring a decision for pardoning as set in the art. 5 par. 3 of the EU Convention. Four months later the court dismissed the suit and proclaimed itself not authorized to decide in the demand for pardoning although we did not ask for it. The court that was under the direct influence of the ruling party, refused to judge the president and to commit him do his legal obligations by substituting thesis  of its jurisdiction which is another proof that all people in Serbia are not equal before the law and that judiciary is not independent and impartial.

In 2008 Ms Julia Babuzhina from the UN Committee against torture visited the Committee.

On the territory of our interest in 2008 we establish there is a property and legal insecurity and a very bad position of employed.

Also it is important to say that the Supreme Court in Serbia as related to the implementation of the art. 10 of the European Convention about the freedom of speech and regulations of the Declaration of Ministry Committee of the Council of Europe about the freedom of political debate in the media took in principle legal understanding that the public opinion about public persons should not be subject to Criminal law in cases of Slander and Insult. This was based on the verdicts of the court in Strasbourg in cases of Filipovic against Serbia and Lepojic against Serbia. The petitions to the court in Strasbourg in both cases were written for Filipovic and Lepojic by the Committee for human rights Leskovac. Filipovic was represented by the committee’s lawyer in the case whereas the case of Lepojic was finalized by the Belgrade center for human rights.

Another striking fact is that in 6 cases where the petitions were written by the Committee and accepted by the court in Strasbourg, violation of human rights was done by courts which is a paradox bearing in mind the fact that courts in Serbia are obliged to protect and affirm human rights. It is tragic that the Republic of Serbia has not started a single proceeding for establishing responsibility  in cases of judges whose decisions did not stand in the court in Strasbourg. Again we believe the state to be a masochist observer of the conditions in the administration of justice.

The report has been done for a period of 11 months since the personnel of the Committee had summer vacation in August.

 

The president of the Committee for human rights, Leskovac

Dobrosav Nesic