Legal Analysis of the Directive and the Regulations on Access to Information by the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina
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This is how, once the latest directive on the anonymization of court verdicts of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Court of BiH) comes into force, a hypothetical judgment against Radovan Karadiæ would look like. Karadiæ is, of course, indicted for genocide in Srebrenica as president and supreme commander of Republika Srpska army and police while acting as part of an organized criminal enterprise together with Slobodan Miloeviæ and others in their positions as heads of the army and police of Republic of Serbia.
Yet no one reading the above hypothetical verdict would be able to determine where exactly the genocide took place and which institutions were envolved, and the victims would be eventually erased from the memories of the general public and history.
The Directive of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina (hereafter the Directive) on The Methods of Anonymization of Court Verdicts, Audio/Video Records of Sessions and Other Informational Content of March 21, 2012, prescribes the rules of anonymization. According to the Directive (para. II), personal names of all involved will be replaced by initials or initials with numbers in the case of multiple people.
The names of private legal entities will be replaced by the first letter of the name of the company followed by an abbrevitation signifying legal status (for example, Klas Liability Limited becomes K. LLC.), while the titles of public institutions will be replaced by a generic title for the institution (for example, Municipality of Srebrenica becomes the Municipality S. while Ministry of Justice becomes the Ministry).
In another sweeping move, the Regulations of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina (hereafter the Regulations) on Access to Information under Court Control and Co-operation of the Court with the Community of March 20, 2012, de facto severely restricts access to information about the trials either online, in video or in audio form. The Regulations prescribe time limits and the procedures for deciding on the access to information applications made by the press or interested parties.
The decision in almost all cases is made by the judge presiding over the trial or the presiding judge in the case of chamber trials. This takes the form in which the proper transfer of information to the public or the parties becomes impossible and untimely, therefore resulting in indirect censorship. For example, Article 13(3) of the Regulations allows, in urgent cases, for the release of audio and video records of parts of the trial totalling just ten minutes, and only after the material has been anonymized and edited by the trial judge or in the case of chamber trials, the presiding judge.
It is important to note, nevertheless, that anonymization is not an entirely uncommon judicial practice amongst the member countries of the Council of Europe in cases of need; and the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (hereafter the Convention) in Article 6(1) recognises that public and the press may be excluded from the trial for specific reasons.
However, sweeping anonymization as ordered by the Directive and the Regulations of the Court of BiH appears to be an odd example which runs counter to the practice of the ECHR and international law, especially taking into account that they will be applied to the coverage of trials for the gravest crimes, such as war crimes, ethnic cleansing and genocide trials.
Neither the Directive or the Regulations gives reasons for the anonymization that are in line with exceptions provided for in Article 6(1). Rather, as the legal grounds for the Directive and Regulations, the Court cites Article 11(g) of the Law on Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Offical Gazzete of BiH 49/09, as ammended), which regulates the responsibilities of the President of the Court and gives powers to administer the work of the court personnel to the President of the Court. Also cited is Article 1(3) of the Rules of Conduct of the Cou
