One Indictment Enough to Fulfil the Norm

The High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council, HJCP, does not consider the work results reflected in filing of 19 indictments by 19 prosecutors of the War Crimes Section of the Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina in the past year disputable.

This Institution says that state prosecutors have fulfilled their norm, according to the Rulebook used for evaluating their work, which was adopted in December last year.

“The Rulebook stipulates that, besides the number of indictments filed, prosecutors’ work results include other types of decisions, such as orders on non-conducting or discontinuing investigations, reports solved in other ways, identification of unknown perpetrators,” the HJPC says.

According to the Rulebook, State prosecutors dealing with war crimes are supposed to render four such decisions in order to fulfill their annual norm.

It is prescribed that entity prosecutors should render five decisions, which solve a certain case. Some of these prosecutions exceed their norms considerably.

Two prosecutors working with the War Crimes Section of the Bihac Prosecution filed ten indictments last year. Since the beginning of this year they have already filed eight indictments, in addition to other decisions and orders prescribed under the Rulebook.

Cantonal Prosecutor Jasmin Mesic points out that field visits by prosecutors represent one of the key aspects of achieving success in their work.

“It is necessary to discuss, with the Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the possibility of dispersing prosecutors, establishing offices outside the seats and having people present in the field, where certain events happened, where witnesses live and where crimes were committed. Our results are based on that,” Mesic explains.

The Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina considers that the efficiency of work should be improved in order to accomplish better results. It says that certain steps have already been taken in that direction.

“From the beginning of his work with the Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina the Chief Prosecutor has insisted on speeding up the processing of war crimes. Certain decisions have already been made with the aim of speeding the work to a maximum extent in the technical sense. Also, the cooperation with judicial institutions is being strengthened. Cases, whose processing has been blocked for a long time, are being initiated,” said Boris Grubesic, Spokesperson of the Prosecution of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

This Institution expects that 12 new prosecutors, whose recruitment was approved by the HJPC in April, should be appointed by November 1.

“The HJPC approved recruitment of additional prosecutors in order to ensure processing of war crimes within the deadlines set under the State Strategy for Processing of War Crimes,” the HJPC says.

According to the Strategy adopted in 2008, it was foreseen that the most complex cases would be solved in seven years, while all the remaining ones in 15 years.

Boris Grubesic says that war crimes cases are extremely complex.

“Lists containing tens of witnesses and hundreds of pieces of evidence are often filed with those indictments. Investigations last rather long. Besides filing of indictments, many other processing activities have to be undertaken and prosecutorial decisions made,” Grubesic said.

The Bihac Prosecution says that they do not try to avoid complex cases.

“This year a trial of six indictees from the Kljuc area will be conducted. The indictment, which contains ten counts, charges them with murders, two rapes, several cases of inhumane treatments, so we can consider them complex cases. We are ready to deal with the most complex cases,” Mesic said.

He explains that the passage of time has an adverse effect on those cases, so it is necessary to deal with them in an efficient manner.

“Most of the witnesses live outside Bosnia and Herzegovina. They abstain from testifying. Twenty years have passed. People want to forget that. We should bring those witnesses to the country, but our laws stipulate that we can only cover their travel costs, although they have to take leave from their jobs in order to come here,” Mesic said, adding that many cases were being solved in co-operation with judicial institutions in the region.

Besides the Bihac Prosecution, most of the other prosecutions in Bosnia and Herzegovina have “exceeded” their norms, bearing in mind the number of prosecutors dealing with war crimes cases. Among them are the Prosecutions in Mostar, Banja Luka, Bijeljina, Livno, Zenica, Doboj and Eastern Sarajevo.