Osmanovic’s Attorney Insists on Case Transfer from Serbia to Bosnia and Herzegovina

Crnovrsanin said he had visited his client, adding his condition was bad, “the medical staff could not calm him down” and they were keeping his condition under control due to deprivation of liberty and detention.

According to Crnovrsanin, the case against his client should be transferred to Bosnia and Herzegovina. He reiterated that the Bosnian State Prosecution and the War Crimes Prosecution of the Republic of Serbia had signed a protocol on cooperation in persecution of war-crimes perpetrators, which clearly defines that they will put evidence and information at each other’s disposal. As he said, on the basis of the mentioned protocol the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina has already referred certain cases to Serbian judicial bodies following investigations by the State Prosecution.

Based on the signed protocol, the War Crimes Prosecution of the Republic of Serbia will provide the Bosnian State Prosecution with information and evidence related to proceedings for war crimes committed on the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina or the Republic of Serbia whose perpetrators either have Bosnian citizenship or dual citizenship and a place of residence in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

As for Osmanovic, Crnovrsanin says there is not a single condition for which the War Crimes Prosecution of the Republic of Serbia should be in charge of conducting an investigation against him, given that he is a Bosnian citizen, he committed the crime in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the only witness and injured party is also resident in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

“The crime under investigation in Serbia is the same as the one investigated in Bosnia, so all conditions for referring the case against Osman Osmanovic have been met,” Crnovrsanin said.

Crnovrsanin said it was necessary for the Bosnian State Prosecution to undertake measures and actions within its competence as soon as possible and urgently in order to ensure mutual respect of international law, as well as the signed protocol.

“The previous practice of transferring war-crime cases and evidence exclusively from the Bosnian judiciary to the War Crimes Prosecution of the Republic of Serbia cannot be tolerated without ensuring reciprocity,” he said, adding that the protocol signed by the two prosecutors’ offices should be a two-way road for exchange of evidence.

Boris Grubesic, spokesman of the Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, said that “an official act, proposing the referral of the case, has been transmitted to the Justice Ministry”.

Osmanovic was arrested in Serbia in late November. He was ordered into one-month custody due to a danger that he might flee.

According to Crnovrsanin, an additional problem in this case was the fact that the War Crimes Prosecution of the Republic of Serbia initiated the investigation against Osmanovic for crimes against civilians and prisoners of war at Rasadnik detention camp on the basis of a complaint filed by one witness, while the investigation was opened one day after his arrest.

Former judge and longterm attorney Miodrag Stojanovic explained that “a warrant may not be issued and custody ordered unless an investigative judge has issued a decision to conduct an investigation, according to provisions of the then laws on criminal proceedings”.

If that was done after the revision of the Criminal Proceedings Code, as Stojanovic explains, “investigations are not conducted by investigative judges, but prosecutors, in which case there must have been an order to open an investigation.”