LOCAL PRESS

Vucic: Opening of chapters perhaps in June (RTS)

Speaking about the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue with reporters in Subotica, Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic said he believed that the decision on whether we will open in June the negotiations on the first chapters with the EU will be made in May, when the dialogue with the Pristina side resumes, because he thinks that Serbia had fulfilled all obligations from the Brussels agreement. “What we are concerned about is the fact that we still don’t have an agreement on the Union of Serb Municipalities and when somebody speaks about the non-fulfillment of everything from the Brussels agreement, in fact speaks of what should be the implementation of the rights of Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija as not fulfilled,” said Vucic. Everything that we needed to fulfill from the Brussels agreement, we fulfilled, even though, he says, there are “some other papers, mostly unofficial, from which we are still fulfilling conditions”. “That has nothing to do with the Brussels agreement. As regards the agreement, there are only six points of a total of fifteen that concern the Union of Serb Municipalities. These talks are very difficult,” explained the Prime Minister. Vucic announced that the talks on telecommunications will resume in Istanbul, on energy in Vienna, and again in Brussels in mid-May, when the dialogue with the Pristina side will resume. “I think that the final decision will be made at that time as to whether we will open the first chapters in June or in September,” concluded Vucic.

Commenting the request of the European Parliament Rapporteur for Kosovo Ulrike Lunacek for the arrest warrant for Kosovo Minister Thaqi to be withdrawn, Vucic says that this issue is decided by independent state organs. “I see that Serbia’s legal order is regulated by everybody. This is becoming, to our misfortune, usual practice,” noted Vucic. He said that he respected Lunacek, but that this issue was a matter for the state organs that have full independence.

Dacic satisfied with extension of EULEX mandate (Tanjug)

Serbia greatly appreciates the work of EULEX on the promotion of human rights and protection of rights of Serbs in Kosovo and Metohija, Serbian Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic said Wednesday. In a meeting with the EULEX Head Gabriele Meucci, who is on a visit to Belgrade, Dacic underlined that Serbia supports the presence of international missions in Kosovo and Metohija and commended the decision of the EU Council to extend the mandate of the EULEX mission to 14 June 2016, in view of its importance for the process of strengthening the rule of law, the Serbian Interior Ministry said in a release. Meucci pointed out that, in addition to its regular tasks, the EULEX mission is committed to the implementation of the points agreed in the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, and voiced satisfaction with the results achieved so far. Significant progress was made with regards to the rule of law, Meucci said, adding that the local population shows more trust in the judicial and police authorities, the release states.

Report on Belgrade-Pristina dialogue adopted (Tanjug)

The Serbian parliamentary Committee for Kosovo and Metohija adopted today the Progress Report on the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, submitted by the Office for Kosovo and Metohija. In the report, distributed to Committee members, it is stressed that Serbia confirms its commitment to normalization of the Belgrade-Pristina relations, implementing consistently all agreements and obligations arising from the political dialogue. The report, whose main parts were presented to Committee members by the Head of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija Marko Djuric, stresses readiness for continuing joint work with Pristina representatives on improving the quality of life on the territory of Kosovo and Metohija. Djuric pointed out that Serbia fulfilled all obligations within the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, noting that Pristina is obstructing the fulfillment of their part of the obligations, especially in regard to the formation of the Union of Serb Municipalities. His opinion is that a more active role of the international community is necessary in this segment in order to implement what had been agreed and signed. Djuric once again rejected the allegations of certain political leaders in Pristina that the Union of Serb Municipalities will be something like an NGO, wondering where in the world is there a structure that deals with issues of healthcare, education, infrastructure, development, judiciary that resembles an NGO. Pristina in a series of other agreed matters does not respect other issues it had committed to do, said Djuric, noting as an example the agreement on the judiciary, because it didn’t undertake a single step to adapt the facility in the southern part of Kosovska Mitrovica where the court should be located, nor did it provide a building for the prosecution. According to him, instead, Belgrade received a proposal for the prosecution building to be located in the northern part of Kosovska Mitrovica in the facility of the Office for Kosovo and Metohija, “which we will not accept, because it represents a provocation”. There is also the problem of recognition of diplomas from the University in the northern part of Kosovska Mitrovica, which Pristina refused, warned Djuric, explaining that this directly discriminates Serb students. Committee members supported the report, especially because it was for the first time presented to the public in detailed form and with a number of details. Committee member Borislav Stefanovic from the Democratic Party (DS) also positively assessed this fact, but had a verbal conflict with Djuric, asking where it exactly states that they will continue to finance healthcare in northern Kosovo and Metohija from the Serbian budget. Committee members Zvonimir Stevic from the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) supported the report, but warned that departure and selling of properties of Serbs was present in Kosovo and Metohija. The report stresses that Belgrade also hopes that it will have a sincere partner primarily in the EU, who understands the needs of the Serb people to ensure conditions for sustainable development, return and survival in Kosovo and Metohija. It is also stressed that all this refers to political, security and institutional social frameworks that could guarantee this to them.

Joksimovic: Serbia may open first chapters in June (Radio Serbia)

“In the best case, there is a possibility for Serbia to open the first negotiating chapters with the EU in June this year, if it meets the technical and political conditions,” Serbian Minister without portfolio in charge of EU integration Jadranka Joksimovic told a press conference after the signing of the Agreement between Serbia and Sweden on development cooperation from 2014 to 2020. Having signed the Agreement, Sweden has confirmed its long-term commitment and support to Serbia in the development and on its path towards the EU membership, said Swedish Ambassador to Serbia Christer Asp. Serbia is completing action plans for Chapters 23 and 24, and last year already, it was ready to open Chapter 32, which relates to the financial control, said Joksimovic. On the other hand, she added, in addition to the technical, there is a part of the process relating to the political conditions and Chapter 35, that is, dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina and reaching an agreement. If the EU is to assess the progress has been made, it may be possible to open chapters 35 and 32 in June, explained Joksimovic, stressing that Serbia will do what it can to have chapters opened as soon as possible. The agreement, which was signed by Minister Jadranka Joksimovic and Ambassador Christer Asp, extends the long-term development cooperation between the two countries. Sweden’s support to Serbia, envisaged by the Agreement, amounts to about 12 million euros per year and focuses on democratic governance, human rights and environmental improvement. Thanking Sweden for successful cooperation, Minister Joksimovic said that Sweden is one of the largest bilateral donor in Serbia and an important partner and friend of our country in the EU accession process. Since 2000, Sweden’s development grant to Serbia has amounted to around 210 million euros, said Joksimovic.

“Although we often talk about European integration in the context of numerous political conditions, potential obstacles, enlargement fatigue, etc., first I want to tell citizens once again, though it may sound too enthusiastic, that Serbia’s European course primarily aims to improve the daily lives of our citizens,” said Joksimovic. Noting that many of our citizens see Sweden as one of the best-regulated countries in the EU, Joksimovic said that Sweden has earned that title because it is a country that has provided safe life and a high standard of living, improved basic human, minority and other rights, and it should be a role model for Serbian terms of reforms and regulation of the state
Stressing that the agreement, which was just signed, confirms the excellent cooperation between the two countries, Ambassador Asp said that Sweden is proud of the fact that it is the third bilateral donor in Serbia. The Government of Sweden believes that Serbia’s accession to the European Union is a way to improve living conditions for citizens, and that Serbia’s EU accession will benefit the entire region. Sweden supports projects that have one goal – to facilitate the entry of Serbia into the EU and we will continue to stand by Serbia on this path until its full membership, the Swedish ambassador underlined.

Meucci: We are ready to offer assistance to Belgrade and Pristina (RTS)

The EULEX Head Gabriel Meucci explains in an interview to Radio and Television of Serbia (RTS) why Oliver Ivanovic is not allowed to be released pending trial, when the Serb judges and under what conditions will start working in courts in Kosovo, and why the report on EULEX’s work denies corruption but reveals many other problems.

EULEX’s judges and prosecutors are independent and pass decisions according to their conscience, says Meucci responding to the question why aren’t they accepting Serbian government guarantees for releasing Ivanovic from detention, unlike the processes in which the defendants are Albanians. “I know what you have in mind. There are similar cases. I can only make a comparison. That process has just commenced, 21 witnesses have been interrogated, and 38 remain. The judge has decided that there are no conditions for the suspect to be released pending trial until all witnesses are interrogated. There are cases that went further, the witnesses had been interrogated and there is no technical risk for evidence. In such cases they usually release them,” says Meucci.

But they usually don’t have even government guarantees. 

“I understand, but a judge is a judge, and he/she decides whether the guarantees are good. It is not up to the head of the mission to decide on that.”

The vacancies for Serb judges in Kosovo have opened; EULEX is receiving applications and it will select candidates, but it doesn’t know the conditions under which the judges will work and to whom will they take oath.

“We are ready to offer assistance to Belgrade and Pristina in implementing the agreements reached. It is not up to us to look at the content of this agreement, including the conditions for judges. We are here to assist the sides. For the time being, the agreement is not final.”

About ten days ago, an independent rapporteur submitted a report on corruption allegations in EULEX.

“I can say with relief that the report shows that the corruption allegations are unfounded. The report states that the mission has not worked against the law, that it didn’t attempt to prevent the publishing of charges, that internal investigations were opened in a timely manner. The report says that the prosecutor who brought forward the case before the media had not been a victim of discrimination.”

The report too often uses the word “failure” when it mentions the EULEX mission.

“The report was drafted not only because of the corruption allegations, but also in order to see the situation regarding the implementation of the mandate. Our mandate is to enable the Kosovo institutions to build a legal system that is completely independent from politics and other pressures.”

And efficient?

“Jacques’ report says that what EULEX needs to introduce doesn’t exist in all member states, so that the mandate is very ambitious. The report really states that corruption is very present.”

Not in EULEX?

“No, of course, but in Kosovo in general, and that the mission should make some set of rules that will be valid in the future. I think that we are trying to do this and sometimes it seems to me that we are like a doctor in a hospital. Do you, for example, blame the doctor for a flu epidemic?”

But, since you are already using the metaphor, are you curing your patient? Are you efficient in this job?

“When you are dealing with criminal law, you are really like a doctor. You see the pathological side of a man, and not the normal one. The doctors would tell you that the world is mostly ill, because they only see the ill all day long.”

Are you successful?

“I would say that we are, because we see progress every day. The people are coming every day, asking questions, reporting those violating the law, witnesses are more courageous. The system is changing. We have many complaints, but they are better reasoned, meaning they are even more prepared than us to fight for a better judiciary, which gives good hope. There is progress and we see it every day.”

Is this progress small or satisfying?

“It depends on the sector. If we look at the police and how they treat human rights now and with how much professionalism it resolves difficult situations, then the progress is enormous. If we look at criminal processes, there are many weak points here.”

As regards the allegations presented in Dick Marty’s report, EULEX will not deal with them, but a newly established legal entity. Yet, many unresolved cases of crimes against Serbs are in EULEX’s drawers.

“All cases can be re-opened, and they will be opened when new evidence and new witnesses appear.”

REGIONAL PRESS

Zvizdic: Activation of SAA is an important step forward for B&H (Fena)

Chairman of the B&H Council of Ministers Denis Zvizdic stated at a press conference in Sarajevo that he is pleased that the Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA) with B&H has been activated and will come into force on June 1, which is a very important step forward on the B&H’s European path and raises relations between B&H and the EU on a much more constructive level. He said that B&H and the EU are establishing truly formal political dialogue, which, through series of bodies that will be formed, will be done according to dynamic of implementation of the Stabilization and Association Agreement. The key body will be the Council of Stabilization and Association, which will be assembled by representatives of the EU, the European Commission and representatives of the B&H Council of Ministers. “Stabilization and Association Agreement will strengthen position of B&H in Europe, especially in the region because it requires special relations and regional cooperation” said Zvizdic. He added that will send very positive signals to foreign investors and make B&H an attractive area for new foreign investments. “Of course its implementation will raise the level of rule of law, security, safety of citizens and entire state to a higher level. It is truly an important moment for B&H on its European path” said Zvizdic. “Not each one is simple, some are very difficult, painful and demand changes of routines, habits and patterns that have been used, but ultimately they bring great benefits to each state. B&H needs accession, not the European Union and that is how we need to look at all the processes” said Zvizdic. He emphasized that accession to the EU also means liberalization of market. He added that “we will need to work on increasing competitiveness of our products, so they can handle similar products in the European market”. “He added that when it comes to export of milk and animal products, amendments to the laws will be made soon that will meet the required standards. “Our task is to seriously work on implementation of the Stabilization and Association Agreement. According to one article of the agreement we have an obligation to implement it within six years. I call all institutions of B&H, entities and Brcko District, entire society and citizens of B&H to work together and do it before the deadline, because our key task and goal will be getting candidate status during the mandate of this government, which opens completely new perspective of B&H” said Zvizdic. He said that national program of economic reforms will be agreed with the entities. “Very soon we will hold a meeting with the entity prime ministers to establish basic guidelines for making such economic program on level of B&H, each entity, which need to be completely compatible. Then we will ask representatives of international financial institutions to participate with us in defining such a program. Commissioner for Neighborhood Policy and Enlargement of the EU Johannes Hahn promised yesterday he will attend a final session when we finally adopt those documents, so we will work on complete consensus within B&H on key economic reforms” said Zvizdic.

Turkey denies it prevented Dodik from reaching Armenia (Tanjug, Ankara correspondent)

The Turkish Foreign Ministry has denied that the country on Wednesday blocked its airspace for an airplane carrying the RS President Milorad Dodik. The ministry’s spokesperson Tanju Bilgic was quoted by the Hurriyet daily as saying that the claim to the contrary that came from the office of the Bosnian Serb leader “does not reflect reality”. “No request from diplomatic channels was conveyed for the plane carrying Mr. Dodik. No application was filed to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation either. On the other side, the required permission was timely given by our air traffic control units to the pilot of a private plane who asked for flying from Bulgaria to Yerevan. However, it is being understood this plane hasn’t used our airspace although it got the permission,” Bilgic said, and added: “With any blocking on this issue being out of question, over-flight authorization required for Mr. Dodik’s transfer to Yerevan will naturally be given if it is requested”. Dodik on Wednesday failed to reach Yerevan where he was to attend commemorative events to mark the 100th anniversary of the genocide committed against Armenians. His cabinet said that the Turkish authorities did not issue a permission for the airplane to fly over Turkey. Dodik yesterday waited for four hours in Bulgaria for Turkey to allow the plane to use its airspace, after which he returned to Banja Luka

Wigemark: B&H needs leaders for making difficult decisions (Srna)

Head of EU Delegation to B&H Lars-Gunnar Wigemark believes that B&H is now, more than ever, in need of the leaders who can overcome “their narrow political, party, national, ethnic, and perhaps even some business interests”, that should start to think about the common good of the whole country. “The impression I gained so far is that citizens are ready for change. The real question is whether the political leaders are ready for change. It is not going to be easy. It will take a lot of courage, but we are ready to provide support to those who are brave,” said Wigemark. He said that now, after the decision on the entry into force of the Stabilization and Association Agreement with the EU, everything is in the hands of local political leaders who should be quickly to seize the “unprecedented opportunity”. Wigemark announced a strong personal commitment in following months, noting that he is confident in the success of B&H, and that this optimism is shared by the politicians in B&H who confirmed the readiness to implement social and economic reforms. He stressed that the establishment of a coordination mechanism, regardless of the model, does not in any way affect the jurisdiction. “It is not institutional, but a political issue,” said the head of the EU Delegation to B&H.

Wigemark warns that this process, including the reforms, requires painstaking and professional work as well as making the difficult decisions.

You can’t have your ratings and name your victims, too (Srna, commentary by Nenad Tadic)

Croatian President Kolinda Grabar Kitarovic paid a visit to Jasenovac and paid her respects to the victims of the Ustasha Independent State of Croatia (NDH) without any media escort or state delegation, as if she were going on a private visit.

As a civilian, Kolinda Grabar Kitarovic surely has the right to go like that to the site of one of the worst crimes (crime of genocide) in this part of Europe. But, as the President of Croatia, Ms. Kitarovic had to do it (also) at the ceremonial, that is, official level. This way, all victims bestially killed in that death camp became some sort of political tokens in diplomatic and party games on Croatia’s public stage.

It is well-known, for example, that the Croatian right are constantly revising history when it comes to NDH crimes. The new Croatian president has recently thrown out the bust of Josip Broz Tito from Pantovcak (Croatian presidential palace), which was applauded by her voters. If she had waited a few days, Ms. Kitarovic would have been in Jasenovac together with her political rivals and heard speeches and numbers that are not least liked by neither the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) of Tomislav Karamarko nor those who are willing to give them their vote. That is why Kolinda Grabar Kitarovic did her duty “in a peaceful and quiet manner,” like some Croatian media have reported, surprising even the Memorial Centre’s management.

In a pertinent text written on the occasion, after she laid the flowers, she stated a few humane and kind sentences, with a political undertone, of course, expressing a negative opinion about the NDH and the crimes committed under the regime. What is striking is that Kitarovic did not mention which people were killed in Jasenovac and above all why. She simply translated the Serbs, Jews and Roma into – the people who lost their lives there.

However, genocide is not committed against an amorphous mass of “people” but against ethnic groups, which were outlawed, by name, by the NDH. The children of Kozara were not killed just because they were people but because they were Serbs and Orthodox Christians, in order to wipe up the biological reproduction of the people. Like criminals do in every genocide. Of course, nobody disputes that Ustashas also killed the people of other nationalities who stood up against such a regime. But, being silent on historical facts about the eradication of entire populations for the sake of political and national “domestic peace” simply leaves an ugly impression and does not contribute to the solving of the long-lasting Serbian-Croatian dispute at all.

Both the victims and the killers have their names, but they also have roots and the reasons why they were what they were. The former were in pits, the latter were above the pits. If she had had the strength to write that down, Kolinda Grabar Kitarovic could have been the president of the little remaining Serbs in Croatia (Serb minority, as they are called these days). But, this was a half-hidden visit of a politician who wanted to carry out the duty as soon as possible and have as little talked and reported about it as possible.

You can’t have your ratings and name your victims, too.

INTERNATIONAL PRESS

Serbia to Probe Suspected Kosovo War Mass Grave (BIRN, by Ivana Nikolic, 22 April 2015)

In the latest search for Kosovo war victims, an investigation will begin on Thursday at a suspected mass grave near the southern town of Novi Pazar, Serbia’s missing persons commission told BIRN. Veljko Odalovic, the head of Serbian Commission for Missing Persons told BIRN that preliminary excavations will take place on Thursday and Friday at the site near Novi Pazar. “We will be checking the information we received from Pristina. They [Kosovo’s government commission on missing persons] have information that there might be a mass grave. We received a request from them and are now acting on it,” Odalovic said on Wednesday. So far, mass graves containing the bodies of more than 1,000 Kosovo Albanians killed during the war have been found in four locations in Serbia – at a police training centre in the Belgrade suburb of Batajnica, in Lake Perucac, at a police centre in Petrovo Selo and at the Rudnica quarry near the southern town of Raska. The most recent to be discovered was the mass grave in Rudnica last summer, when 54 bodies of Kosovo Albanians killed during the war were found. Odalovic said that both countries’ commissions have already visited the site near Novi Pazar together several months ago in order to locate the potential grave. He said however that he could not give any further information about the bodies thought to be buried there, the year they were buried or their ethnicity. “We will check everything, and if there is something [there], we will continue with the excavations,” he said. Representatives of Serbia’s War Crimes Prosecutor’s Office and the EU’s rule-of-law mission in Kosovo, EULEX, will also be present at the excavations, together with representatives from both Serbia and Kosovo’s missing persons commissions. In January, the Belgrade-based Humanitarian Law Centre published a report accusing current Serbian Army chief Ljubisa Dikovic, as a commander of the 37th Brigade of the Yugoslav Army during the Kosovo conflict, of being responsible for the removal of the bodies of Albanians killed in the Kosovo villages of Rezalle, Staro Cikitovo, Donji Zabelj and Gladno Selo in 1999 in an attempted cover-up. Forty-seven of the 54 bodies found in the Rudnica mass grave were from these villages. Dikovic has denied the allegations. So far no one has been prosecuted in Serbia for the operation to remove the bodies. Only former Serbian assistant interior minister Vlastimir Djordjevic has been convicted by the Hague Tribunal of transporting the bodies from Kosovo to Serbia, among other crimes during the Kosovo war.

Serbia’s Kosovo Cover-Up: Who Hid the Bodies? (BIRN, by Marija Ristic, Milka Domanovic, Petrit Collaku, 23 April 2015)

The Belgrade officials and policemen who took hundreds of murdered Albanians’ corpses from Kosovo to Serbia and concealed them in mass graves have never been prosecuted in their home country. On April 4, 1999, a fisherman in the eastern Serbian village of Tekija made a macabre discovery in the River Danube – a refrigerator truck, dumped in the waters, had risen to the surface.The truck had no licence plates, just a logo suggesting that it belonged to the PIK Progress Export Slaughterhouse from the Kosovo town of Prizren. A frogman sent down to explore reported that driver’s seat was empty and a stone had been placed on the accelerator pedal. Crime scene technician Bosko ‘Bole’ Radojkovic from the nearby town of Kladovo and his police superior Milan Stevanovic both initially assumed it had been some kind of accident. But when Radojkovic investigated further, he found the truck’s grisly cargo – not slaughtered animals, but scores of decomposing human bodies. “At one point [the frogman] told me: ‘Bole, something like a human leg is sticking out, what should I do?’” he told Serbian police in 2001. Inside the truck were the corpses of 86 Albanians killed by Serbian forces during President Slobodan Milosevic’s military campaign in Kosovo in 1999. They had been dumped in the Danube in what appeared to be a botched cover-up attempt. Local police and state security officers initially tried to continue the cover-up by repainting parts of the truck and putting Serbian license plates on it. “I suggested preparing a story for the public, that those were bodies of Kurds and that the truck slid off the road after a gunshot from some soldier,” Radojkovic said. Two days later, the problem was referred to a higher authority. A more senior police chief in the town of Bor, Caslav Golubovic, called the head of the Serbian interior ministry’s Public Security Department, Vlastimir Djordjevic. Djordjevic ordered him to conceal the incident from the public and then to send the bodies to Belgrade. “The removal of the bodies was supposed to be done during the night in order not to be noticed,” Golubovic told police. The covert operation started that night, when Radojkovic, his colleagues and utility workers provided by the local municipality removed 30 bodies and loaded them into a truck. “Among the bodies there was a body of a boy aged five or six years and a girl of seven or eight years old, as well as a body of a boy of 18 to 20 years old with his hands tied behind his back and a wound from a firearm,” Radojkovic recalled. They were acting under orders from the Serbian interior ministry – “because nothing could have been done without the interior ministry”, Milan Stevanovic, the chief of the crime department of the Kladovo police, told BIRN. The truck was driven to the capital Belgrade early the next morning and handed over to the state security services. The next day, another truck was loaded with “53 bodies as well as three heads separated from their bodies”, Radojkovic said. It was taken to a police training centre in the Belgrade suburb of Batajnica. The refrigerator truck in which the bodies were found was transported to a firing range at the police training centre in Petrovo Selo, near Kladovo, where it was blown up, according to Stevanovic. “I did what I had to do, we did what we were ordered to, not just me, but all of us, including the [municipal refuse collection] workers who were engaged there,” he said. A total of 744 bodies were uncovered two years later in mass graves at the Batajnica police training centre. A further 75 were found at a police training centre in Petrovo Selo and 84 in Lake Perucac in western Serbia, while 54 more were exhumed last year from a quarry near Raska in the south – all victims of Milosevic’s Kosovo offensive. They came from villages like Izbica, the scene of one of the worst massacres of the war in March 1999. Demush Xhemajli’s elderly father was one of the dozens of Albanians who were killed in Izbica: “God, they did not spare anyone. Imagine this – they killed an old man who was an invalid. His crutches were found near him,” Xhemajli recalled. The surviving villagers hastily buried the bodies of their relatives and neighbours and fled Kosovo to Albania to escape the Serbian offensive. But when they returned after the war ended, the bodies had disappeared. It was only in 2001 that Xhemajli found out that they had been removed by Serbian forces and secretly reburied in Petrovo Selo. “This was like another murder for us,” he said.

Gruesome evidence emerges

Public Security Department chief Vlastimir Djordjevic was sentenced to 18 years in prison by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in The Hague for the murder and persecution of Kosovo Albanians, including direct involvement in the cover-up.

Djordjevic was convicted of being part of a ‘joint criminal enterprise’ that was responsible for various crimes during the Kosovo war – as were three top Serbian officials who were also jailed by the UN-backed tribunal last year. They too were found to have been involved in the cover-up.

The Hague Tribunal trials helped to reveal the brutal methods used by Milosevic’s regime to hide his forces’ atrocities during the Kosovo war. But many of those who also were identified by the international court as being part of the joint criminal enterprise with Milosevic have not been indicted and live freely in Serbia. None of those directly involved in removing and reburying the corpses has ever been prosecuted for it. News about the mass graves at Batajnica started to emerge after Milosevic was overthrown. By 2001, the deposed leader was already wanted by the international war crimes tribunal, but the majority of Serbs opposed the idea of sending him to The Hague to stand trial, so the recently-elected democratic government revealed the information to help justify its case for extradition. One of the first to speak out at Milosevic’s trial was Ali Djogaj, a worker from the municipal refuse collection service in the Kosovo town of Prizren. Djogaj said his boss visited him one evening in April 1999 and drove him and some other employees to a nearby firing range, where he saw a group of uniformed police officers, two excavators and three trucks. Under cover of darkness, the excavators dug up the bodies and his boss told the men to load them onto the waiting trucks. “The excavator would use its scoop to grab several bodies, two or three of them. It would unload the bodies next to the door of the trucksand the four of us would then throw each of the bodies individually to the refrigerator trucks,” Djogaj said later in a statement to Serbian prosecutors in 2005. Djogaj said that the bodies looked like they had been decomposing for several weeks in the ground. After they were put in the trucks, the police officers locked the doors and took them away. Several others who were involved in moving the bodies from Kosovo to Serbia also testified at Milosevic’s trial in The Hague, mostly as anonymous protected witnesses. Bozidar Protic, a former driver at the Serbian interior ministry, was the first who decided to give evidence openly at the trial of the three top Belgrade officials who were jailed last year. Protic testified that his superior officer told him that he had spoken to assistant interior minister Petar Zekovic about “a task which was very important and which was in the interests of the state”, and told him to find a truck. The task was taking the bodies that had surfaced from the Danube in Tekija to Batajnica on April 7, 1999. It was to be the first of several such missions, Protic said. A second truck full of bodies was dispatched from the Kosovo town of Janjevo to the police training centre in Petrovo Selo and a third from Kosovska Mitrovica, again to Petrovo Selo. The fourth and last time, Protic said he transported bodies from Pristina to Batajnica. “Every time I set out… I received all my instructions from General [Petar] Zekovic,” he testified. “There were always verbal orders containing instructions as to how and where I should pick up the truck, which truck it would be, and where I should go to collect the bodies.”

Clearing up the terrain

After a Serbian journal called the Timok Crime Review published more details in May 2001 about the cover-up operation which was codenamed ‘Dubina 2’ by its instigators, the interior ministry set up a working group that questioned around 30 people who were directly involved.

“Interior minister Vlajko Stojiljkovic and the chief of the Public Security Department, General Vlastimir Djordjevic, declared the whole case to be a state secret and launched operation Dubina 2 to deal with it,” the head of the working group, Captain Dragan Karleusa, explained at a press conference on May 25 that year. When the corpses arrived at the Batajnica police training centre, they were dumped into pits on a training field and burned. “As soon as the truck with the bodies came, a hole was dug by an excavator, petrol was poured on [the bodies], they were covered with tyres and set on fire, and after they burned, two or three hours later, the pits were covered,” a member of the Special Anti-Terrorist Unit who was involved in the reburial, Dusko Nenadovic, told the working group. “I knew that everything was a ‘state secret’ and if anybody opened his mouth, you would lose your head,” he said. The working group’s probe established direct links between the cover-up and interior ministry officials. It also found that there was an advance plan for “clearing up the terrain” after massacres by Serbian forces in Kosovo, which was agreed at the highest level and was intended to conceal potential evidence from the Hague Tribunal. “The first meeting in relation to this was held in the office of the then president, Mr. Milosevic. It was held in the month of March 1999,” Karleusa later testified at Milosevic’s trial. “According to the information we received, in addition to Mr. Milosevic, the meeting was attended by the then head of public security, Mr. Vlastimir Djordjevic, as well as General Radomir Markovic, the minister at the time Vlajko Stojiljkovic, and some other people,” he said. General Markovic confirmed what was discussed: “At the very end of the meeting, Vlastimir Djordjevic raised the issue of the removal of the bodies of Kosovo Albanians in order to remove all possible civilian victims who could be the subjects of an investigation by the Hague Tribunal,” he said in 2001. “[Interior minister] Vlajko Stojiljkovic gave the order for conducting those actions directly to [police general] Dragan Ilic and Vlastimir Djordjevic,” added Markovic, who is currently serving a 40-year sentence for the murder of former Serbian President Ivan Stambolic and other crimes. “Ilic told me that police colonel Goran Radosavljevic helped him significantly with his men, who helped him directly to implement this task. I remember Ilic complained about the way [it was done] and the methods that were used, and that he mentioned how a refrigerator truck was found in the Danube, which was a result of Djordjevic’s bad organisation,” he said. Djordjevic has denied receiving any direct order from Milosevic to conduct the clean-up operation, but during his trial in The Hague, he admitted that he took part in it. “Yes, I was involved when trucks with bodies were coming to Batajnica, but I didn’t know when the crimes were committed. I didn’t confront those who tried to mask and hide the crimes and I didn’t take any measures to find those responsible for war crimes, which I was supposed to do,” he told the court. Interior minister Stojiljkovic meanwhile killed himself in 2002 after he was charged by the Hague Tribunal.

A state-sponsored plot

The cover-up represents clear evidence of Serbian state-sponsored atrocities, believes Fred Abrahams, a senior advisor at Human Rights Watch who has extensively documented war crimes in Kosovo. “You cannot argue there was a random crime when afterwards the bodies were systematically removed,” Abrahams told BIRN. “Removing hundreds of bodies is not easy. You have to have transport, you have to have the security forces’ agreement… That is a pattern; clear evidence that this was an organised and deliberate attempt to hide the crime,” he said. Filip Svarm, editor at Serbian news magazine Vreme, said that it was clear that the Serbian interior ministry was trying to trying to destroy evidence which could have helped the Hague Tribunal prosecute Milosevic and other senior officials. “Most of those people were killed by police forces and then the police removed the traces of their own crimes,” Svarm told BIRN. Several former Serbian fighters have been prosecuted in Belgrade for massacres in Kosovo villages in 1999, but not for the subsequent covert removal of the victims’ bodies. Mustafa Radoniqi, a war crimes lawyer who has represented Kosovo victims’ relatives, alleged that the Belgrade prosecution has tried to avoid incriminating more senior interior ministry figures by not including the cover-up in its indictments. “The prosecution was covering up the evidence,” Radoniqi told BIRN. BIRN asked the prosecution to comment but received no response.

The accused deny everything

The police investigation revealed the names of more than 20 people involved in the cover-up – both low-ranking and senior officials. But most of the Serbian officials accused of involvement have insisted that they are innocent. Former assistant interior minister Petar Zekovic has been named by several witnesses as the person who coordinated the operation to take the corpses from Kosovo to Batajnica. Zekovic told BIRN that he was innocent but did not want to comment on the allegations any further. He is currently on trial for the alleged abuse of public funds during the Milosevic era. Slobodan Borisavljevic, the former head of Public Security Department chief Vlastimir Djordjevic’s office, was in charge of paying the men who were involved in the removal operation. In a statement to police in 2001, he said he got the money from Djordjevic.

Borisavljevic is currently a senior official at the Serbian interior ministry and during 2006 was briefly head of its war crimes investigation unit. He also told BIRN that he did not take part in the operation but did not want to comment further. He too has never been indicted over the cover-up. Several witnesses including former interior ministry driver Bozidar Protic and a former police officer called Radomir Djeric have testified at the Hague Tribunal and in Serbian courts that police colonel Goran ‘Guri’ Radosavljevic, who was the head of an armed interior ministry forcecalled the Gendarmerie, was present several times when corpses from Kosovo were delivered to the Petrovo Selo police centre, where he was also the commander. Djeric testified at a murder trialat Belgrade’s special court in 2006 that he and Radosavljevic were in Petrovo Selo when driver Protic arrived with one of the trucks. “Only then I saw what it was about, I saw so many bodies, unknown corpses which had started decomposing, and their condition was so bad I couldn’t see if it was a man or a woman or a child,” Djeric said. The bodies were thrown into a garbage pit. Djeric said he asked Radosavljevic: “‘Guri, are you familiar with this?’ He said yes, all this is known to me… The boss knew everything.” Radosavljevic has also denied taking part in the cover-up, for which he too has never been indicted. The retired general now runs security companies in Belgrade and is on the executive board of Serbia’s governing Progressive Party.

‘No body, no crime’

Reburials of the bodies exhumed from the mass graves in Serbia have continued this year, and the hunt for further secret burial sites from the war in Kosovo is not over yet. But despite being named in the Hague Tribunal verdict convicting Vlastimir Djordjevic as members of a Serbian ‘joint criminal enterprise’ in Kosovo, two other senior police officials who allegedly took part in the cover-up operation in 1999 have also never had their professed innocence tested in court.

Former police general Dragan Ilic, who served as the head of Serbia’s criminal investigation unit in the 1990s, was named by several witnesses during the Djordjevic trial as one of the key people involved in the cover-up. Ilic, who was the head of Serbia’s criminal investigation unit, requested 10,000 Yugoslav dinars (about $900 at the time) for “operational expenses” for the operation, a request granted by Djordjevic, while the refuse collection workers and the frogman in Tekija were also paid for their work, police documents have established. Ilic is now retired and lives in Belgrade. Former assistant interior minister Obrad Stevanovic, a close associate of Milosevic and ex-commander of Serbia’s notorious Special Police Units, is now a professor at a police academy in Belgrade, where he teaches young officers about terrorism. Stevanovic has also denied any involvement in the cover-up, although his wartime diary was one of the key pieces of prosecution evidence at the Milosevic trial. In one diary entry recounting a meeting with Milosevic about what to do with the corpses of Albanians killed in Kosovo, Stevanovic wrote: “No body, no crime.” Sixteen years later, he too has never been prosecuted in Serbia.

Latvia supports Serbia’s reform process on its course toward integration with EU (Baltic Course, 23 April 2015)

On 22 April 2015, as part of his working visit, Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics visited Belgrade and met with high-ranking officials of the Republic of Serbia to discuss Serbia’s integration with the European Union, the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue, questions about the Western Balkans and EU enlargement, and bilateral relations, reports BC Latvian MFA.

At the meeting with the President of the Republic of Serbia, Tomislav Nikolic, Foreign Minister Rinkevics expressed support for Serbia’s course towards the EU and commended Serbia’s dedication and accomplishments in the reform process, which he said should be continued – especially the efforts at normalisation of relations with Kosovo and practical implementation of reforms in the justice sector, the protection of fundamental rights and the fight against corruption. “I am calling on Serbia to gradually achieve greater coherence and harmony with the EU on matters of foreign policy,” he said. The Foreign Minister also met with the Prime Minister of Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic, and expressed support for the integration of the Western Balkans with the EU, based on individual merit and performance of each country. Edgars Rinkevics emphasised that sound economic management and competitiveness are vital prerequisites for the process of EU integration. And one of the ways to develop these is through the strengthening of regional cooperation. In a conversation with the Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, Vladimir Marinkovic, Foreign Minister Rinkevics concurred that the parliamentary dimension of Latvian-Serbian cooperation should be expanded and business ties should be strengthened. Towards the end of the visit, the Latvian Foreign Minister met with Ivica Dacic, First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and positively evaluated the high-level dialogue meeting in Brussels on 9 February when an agreement was achieved on justice and judiciary matters in North Kosovo. “The normalisation of Belgrade-Pristina relations has a vital role to play in the negotiations between Serbia and the EU. Work should continue on the normalisation of relations at all levels, as the progress in these talks is in the interests of both sides,” the Latvian Foreign Minister said. In the context of developments in the east of Ukraine, Edgars Rinkevics noted that the OSCE is instrumental in the implementation of the Minsk agreements: the organisation should possess full information on the withdrawal of weapons and have unhampered access to the weapons-free territory. Regaining control along the whole length of the Ukraine- Russia border is, and will remain an issue of critical importance. Latvia will continue supporting the OSCE Monitoring Mission by sending observers.

Serbian Ombudsman Pressed on Friend’s Suicide (BIRN, by Gordana Andric, 23 April 2015)

As Serbian police publish documents about the 1993 suicide of the ombudsman’s friend, a pro-government media outlet has suggested the ombudsman was involved in the tragedy. Serbian police on Wednesday published documents about the suicide of a friend of Sasa Jankovic, Serbian ombudsman, which occurred in Jankovic’s own apartment and with Jankovic’s gun in 1993. The documents show traces of gunpowder were found on Jankovic hands. The ballistics expert’s report noted that there is no way to determine how the gunpowder ended up on Jankovic’s hands. “It is correct that traces of nitrate were found because I stroked the hair of my friend who lay dead. I entered the apartment 15 minutes after his death and at least three people were there before me,” the Ombudsman told N1 on Thursday. “All this has lost meaning. This is my last comment in public regarding this issue,” Jankovic added. The pro-government newspaper Informer on its front page on Thursday published that Jankovic was under investigation concerning whether he “set up a suicide”. Nebojsa Stefanovic, the Serbian Interior Minister, on April 21 claimed Jankovic did not have a gun licence, adding that the prosecution could not re-launch an investigation into the case because of its obsolescence. “Whether he killed himself, or something else happened, I cannot say,” Stefanovic added, concerning the suicide. Police documents have since revealed that Jankovic did had a gun licence, but that he did not have the relevant papers with him when he came to the scene of a suicide. Serbia’s main ruling party, the Progressive Party, and some pro-government media have been running a campaign against the ombudsman since he submitted his 2014 report to parliament on April 14, claiming that the state of Serbian human rights was not satisfactory. Progressive Party deputies called for his resignation and accused him of meddling in politics. The OSCE mission in Serbia, as well as the Serbian Bar Association, have expressed concerns over the campaign against the institution of ombudsman and Jankovic personally. The Policy Center, a local NGO, on April 20 launched an appeal for support for Jankovic, which almost 3,000 people, including professors, journalists and lawyers, have signed. The appeal said the authorities should only initiate proceedings for Jankovic’s dismissal if they are convinced of his incompetence and can support their arguments against him. Jankovic came under fire in January after he filed criminal charges against two members of the military police on suspicion that they attacked members of a special police unit, the Gendarmerie, while they were on duty. The incident occurred during Belgrade Gay Pride in September 2014, when members of the Gendarmerie clashed with two members of the military police, along with the Prime Minister’s brother, Andrej Vucic, and Predrag Mali, brother of the Mayor of Belgrade. At the time, some politicians from the Progressive Party accused Jankovic of undermining Serbia’s stability.

Turkey denies blocking airspace for Bosnian Serb leader (Public Radio of Armenia, by Siranush Ghazanchyan, 23 April 2015)

Turkish Foreign Ministry says the permission will be given to the president of Republika Srpska entity in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Milorad Dodik, upon request The Turkish Foreign Ministry has rejected news reports suggesting Turkey will not allow a Bosnian Serb politician to travel to Armenia through its airspace, Anadolu Agency reports. “The news reports claiming that the plane carrying to Armenia the president of Republika Srpska entity in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Milorad Dodik, is not permitted to use Turkish airspace does not reflect reality,” Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman Tanju Bilgic said Wednesday. Bosnian authorities have not requested Turkey to use its airspace for the concerned plane for Dodik, Bilgic said. He said that the Turkish authorities had recently given permission to use Turkish airspace to a private plane that wanted to travel from Bulgaria to Yerevan, the Armenian capital. “But despite the fact that the plane got the permission, it was understood that it didn’t use the Turkish airspace,” he added. But, Bilgic added that there was no inhibition on this issue, and that Dodik could use the Turkish airspace to go to Yerevan upon his request. “The permission to fly overhead will naturally be given,” he said. Milorad Dodik is expected to visit Yerevan to participate in the events commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Armenian genocide.

New Tapes Reveal Macedonia Govt’s Grip on Media (BIRN, by Sinisa Jakov Marusic, 22 April 2015)

The ruling party has been carefully selecting journalists for work in the public broadcaster while controlling the private media through ties to their owners, the opposition said on Wednesday, revealing its latest wiretapped conversations. At the opposition’s 24th press conference on the subject of government wiretapping, the Social Democrats presented new tapes that they say reveal the ruling party’s tight grip on the media. The content of the latest tapes explain why the national broadcaster, Macedonian Radio and Television, MRTV “has been turned into an electoral headquarters of the ruling [VMRO DPMNE] party,” Social Democrat leader Zoran Zaev told a press conference. Several conversations between what appears to be the voice of Interior Minister Gordana Jankuloska feature her telling Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski that she has a notebook full of names of eligible and ineligible journalists for hire. The Prime Minister asks her to check out several names that are about to be sent off as foreign correspondents. On a previous occasion, the opposition presented a tape in which Jankuloska’s voice could be heard speaking about a similar notebook containing the names of reliable judges. In another new tape, between Jankuloska and what appears to be the Prime Minister’s chef-de-cabinet, Martin Protugjer, the two cannot decide whether to continue employing people in MRTV who are recommended by the ruling party’s local branches but who seem incapable of journalistic work. Another option they mull is to employ professionals who are close to them. The adopted conclusion is to proceed along both paths. One conversation appears to feature Gruevski telling Transport Minister Mile Janakieski that they should take over Radio Gostivar, a local broadcaster. “Let one of ours apply and take over [the station]”, Gruevski says. Several other conversations appear to feature Protugjer calling Emil Stojmenov, owner of the private Kanal 5 TV,one of the most prominent TV stations in Macedonia, instructing him not to publish certain news items and interviews that are not favourable to the ruling party. Stojmenov willingly complies. In another tape, Protugjer calls Stojmenov to tell him that the TV’s main headline story should be about oil smuggling, as he aims to use against the opposition. Another tape reveals what seems to be a conversation between Protugjer and Janakieski in which Protugjer instructs Janakieski that a pro-government newspaper, Republika, must be procured and distributed to public institutions “to the maximum”. One other tape involves the alleged voice of secret police chief Saso Mijalkov telling Dragan Pavlovic, the chief editor at Sitel TV, another prominent pro-government outlet, that he plans to give him exclusive video footage of an apprehended person. He describes in detail where and when the person will be nabbed by the police, so that the TV cameras can capture the event for the cameras. The opposition played other tapes that they say highlight the clientelistic relationship between mainstream media owners and government. In one tape, what seems to be the owner of Sitel TV, Goran Ivanov, asks Transport Minister Janakieski to grant him a permit for a higher than originally predicted building in Skopje. It was intended for the headquarters of a small government party, the Socialist Party, led for decades by his father, Ljubisav Ivanov. Janakieski agrees to the request but says that local residents near the construction site have already complained about the plans. “F***k them!” the voice of Ivanov is heard responding. In another case, the owner of Kanal 5, Stojmenov, appears to ask Protugjer to ensure the State Revenue Office, UJP, turns a blind eye to unpaid taxes by the TV. Protugjer pledges to “find a way to fix that matter” and later tells Stojmenov that the Prime Minister has personally intervened, by summoning the chief of the UJP. In another tape, the opposition says Sitel TV editor Dragan Pavlovic can be heard asking for, and getting, advice from UJP chief Goran Trajkovski on how to re-program the debts of one of his firms, Total, so that he can later close it. In another case, the opposition said Pavlovic’s voice can be heard boasting about how he had found a job for his wife with a good salary in just five minutes, thanks to his good relations with the Prime Minister. The new tapes reveal the “vulgar occupation and criminal coalition of Gruevski with the public broadcaster and the private media outlets”, Zaev told the press conference, demanding that the above-mentioned media outlets allow him air time to confront them with the evidence that he possesses. The opposition started releasing its tapes of government officials’ conversations in February. It claims that Gruevski has orchestrated the illegal surveillance of some 20,000 people and that the material comes from sources in the Macedonian secret services. Gruevski has insisted that the tapes were created by unnamed “foreign secret services” in collaboration with the opposition in order to destabilise the country.

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Media summaries are produced for the internal use of the United Nations Office in Belgrade, UNMIK and UNHQ. The contents do not represent anything other than a selection of articles likely to be of interest to a United Nations readership.