Bosnian Entity Courts Sentenced 34 Individuals For Wartime Sexual Violence

Courts in the Bosnian federation, Republika Srpska and Brcko district have acquitted seven suspects of wartime sexual violence over the same time period, while 20 cases are still ongoing.

All of the 34 convicted defendants are men. Former soldiers make up 26 of the convicts, while two are civilians. None of the convicts were charged with command responsibility.

Sarajevo courts have completed most of its eight cases of wartime sexual violence. The Banja Luka court has five ongoing cases of wartime sexual violence, those of Bijeljina and Brcko have four ongoing cases, Trebinje has three ongoing cases, Tuzla and Bihac has two ongoing cases, and other courts have one. This data was presented by the OSCE at the launch of a report on wartime sexual violence.

“There are many cases of sexual violence which haven’t been prosecuted and there are many cases which haven’t been reported,” said Jonathan Moore, the head of the OSCE Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina.

According to OSCE legal advisor Nela Sefic, 50 ongoing criminal cases contain elements of sexual violence.

OSCE research has revealed that in many cases the testimony of victims remain unutilized, with injured parties refused to testify despite promises that they will be protected.

Prosecutors said there are many cases of wartime sexual violence which go unreported, due to the shame experienced by the victims.

Branko Mitrovic, a prosecutor from Republika Srpska, described his experience working on cases of wartime sexual violence.

Mitrovic said it was important to speak to victims during the investigation and support them. If a prosecutor has the right approach, he added, a survivor can be the key to a conviction. Mitrovic said he knew of case in which a prosecutor had never met the victim. The case resulted in an acquittal.

The OSCE said that in some cases prosecutors didn’t qualify rape as a war crime. Nefic said cases against some suspects were dropped after the federal criminal code was adopted.

“Maybe a perpetrator wouldn’t have been acquitted of these charges – wartime sexual violence – if the cases were qualified as war crimes,” the report read.

British ambassador Edward Ferguson said the report was based on OSCE research and that the recommendations should be taken into account in order to achieve better results in future cases.