The authorities in Bosnia’s Republika Srpska should publicly condemn threats made against Branko Todorovic, a prominent human rights defender, and his family, Human Rights Watch said today.
Todorovic is president of the Republika Srpska Helsinki Assembly, a leading human rights organization in Republika Srpska, the Serb-led entity of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Staff there said he received several anonymous phone calls on July 23, 2008, threatening him and his family. According to RS Helsinki Assembly, the police have opened an investigation into the threats and are providing protection to Todorovic and his family.
“The Republika Srpska authorities need to ensure that human rights defenders can work safely,” said Wanda Troszczynska-van Genderen, Western Balkans researcher at Human Rights Watch. “It’s good that police are protecting Todorovic but Prime Minister Milorad Dodik should also speak out in support of civil society groups and condemn threats made against them.”
Helsinki Assembly staff told Human Rights Watch that the recent threats against Todorovic may be linked to his activism on war crimes prosecutions. Todorovic has been a vocal critic of the limited progress in prosecuting war crimes in the Republika Srpska. He and his organization have long been active in favor of greater accountability for crimes committed during the war, especially in Bijeljina, where RS Helsinki Assembly is based. They have accused Republika Srpska authorities of failing to investigate and bring these cases to trial.
In February 2007, RS Helsinki Assembly co-founder Dusko Kondor was murdered in a machine-gun attack that also severely injured his daughter. Though this attack seems to have been unrelated to Kondor’s work, at the time of his death his colleagues accused the police of having denied his repeated requests for protection after receiving threats.
The RS Helsinki Assembly is not the only civil society organization under pressure in Republika Srpska. In July 2008, Transparency International Bosnia and Herzegovina temporarily closed its office in Banja Luka following what the Office of the High Representative in Bosnia called a “propaganda campaign” against the organization by RS authorities.
Dodik accused Transparency International of racketeering and extortion, and offered “full witness protection” to citizens who came forward with information on its alleged wrongdoing.
Dragomir Babic, a human rights activist in Republika Srpska, sent an anonymous letter to the Office of the High Representative in February 2008 detailing plans for a campaign by Republika Srpska officials against Transparency International. Babic came forward as the author following the July office closure, and has since been receiving anonymous death threats.
The European Parliament’s Bosnia rapporteur, Doris Pack, has criticized the pressure on Transparency International. Respect for the rule of law and civil society are among the criteria for accession in the stabilization and association agreement signed between Bosnia and Herzegovina and the European Union.
The prosecution of wartime abuses remains a sensitive topic in Republika Srpska. Local (district) courts and prosecutors’ offices in Republika Srpska have jurisdiction to investigate and try a number of cases dating from the 1992-1995 war, although the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo has had primary jurisdiction over such cases since 2003. A recent report by Human Rights Watch found serious obstacles facing the investigation and trial of these cases and noted that progress on them has been much slower in Republika Srpska than in the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, the country’s other entity.
