Bosnian War Victims Still Waiting for Compensation

The legal analysis published on Wednesday by TRIAL (Track Impunity Always), a Sarajevo-based NGO, said that Bosnian war victims are being subjected to “continued victimisation and re-traumatisation”.

TRIAL said that the Bosnian authorities have obligations under international treaties to allow war victims to get compensation from those suspected or convicted of committing criminal acts that harmed them.

TRIAL’s legal expert Adrijana Hanusic suggested that the impact of gaining compensation is often more significant for war victims than the actual payment, which can never make full amends for the damage they suffered.

“Getting compensation within the actual criminal trial can help strengthen victims, their integration into the criminal procedure and their identification with this process, which is not the case now. It would also build trust in the legal system and have a positive effect on reconciliation,” said Hanusic.

In Hanusic’s analysis for TRIAL about the Bosnian state court, she said that even though the criminal procedure law contains a detailed framework which allows victims the possibility of getting compensation from perpetrators, it is never implemented.

“As a rule, courts just tell victims to file lawsuits in civil courts as their request for compensation, explaining that deciding on their requests within the actual trial would draw out the proceedings,” she explained.

One particular problem is that protected witnesses have to give up their protected status in order to file civil lawsuits for damages, she said.

“TRIAL was contacted by a wartime rape victim who filed a damages suit before the municipal court in Sarajevo after the perpetrator was found guilty. The municipal court, however, did not recognise the protected witness as a party under the law, so she had to forgo the protected status, which brought her and her family into danger,” Hanusic said.

Bakira Hasecic, the president of the association Women – Victims of War told BIRN that because of this, very few women file suits for damages.

“Victims say: ‘If I have to go to court again and speak again, I won’t do it for the entire world.’ They only agree in some cases in which their identities are not protected and if they have the power to speak about it again. Most of them, however, will never opt for the civil lawsuit system,” said Hasecic.

Hanusic said that compensation claims should be dealt with within criminal cases, which would be simpler and cheaper for victims. The legal obligations of courts to decide on these requests should also be clarified, she said.