European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights has published quarterly bulletin no 3 for 2020: Migration: Key fundamental rights concerns for the period from the 1 April to 30 June 2020. The report collects data on the state of fundamental rights of persons arriving to the EU member states. It lights on main trends in the majority of the EU member states in the field of asylum and migration. Additionally to the EU member states, the report gives up date on the key fundamental rights concerns in this area in the Republic of Serbia and North Macedonia.

Quarterly Bulletin no 3 mostly focused on key challenges in the context of COVID-19 pandemic including legal framework changes, restriction of movement, hindered access to the asylum procedure, overcrowding of the accommodation facilities, protection of children as well as hate speech and violence. Report points to slowdowns in the number of asylum seekers due to health measures and restrictions in traveling despite that the enforcement of measures was ease off to certain extent.

BCHR contributed to the report with analyses on the state of affairs in the Republic of Serbia. The report stresses that the Asylum Office resumed procedural actions and that the abolishment of the Government’s Decision on closure of all border crossing for entering into Republic of Serbia in May which led to opening of border crossings and restart of commercial flights. Attention is given to the physical abuse of unaccompanied children in the Asylum Centre Bogovađa and Order of the Ministry of Health from 7 May.

The Belgrade Centre for Human Rights (BCHR) has filed an initiative with the Serbian Ministry of Internal Affairs to draft amendments to the Police Act as soon as possible. 

The first half of July 2020 was marked by numerous cases of police ill-treatment of citizens protesting in Belgrade, Novi Sad, Kragujevac and other cities across Serbia. Dozens of police officers applied force against the protesters without cause, hitting them with their batons, kicking and trampling them, firing teargas at them, shoving them off their bicycles, etc., gravely damaging the reputation of the Serbian police both at home and abroad.

International monitoring bodies have over the recent years criticised compliance with the prohibition of torture and ill-treatment in Serbia, especially by the police. The widespread practice of police ill-treatment is followed by a high rate of impunity of public officials for these acts. BCHR’s perusal of prosecutorial and court cases regarding torture and ill-treatment and extortion of confessions showed that quite a number of public officials, predominantly police officers, went unpunished for these crimes because the statute of limitations expired, while others “paid their dues” by giving money for humanitarian purposes. Most public officials found guilty of torture and ill-treatment or extortion of confessions were sentenced to suspended prison sentences up to six-month.

Most police officers suspected of these crimes went on working not only during the proceedings, but after they were convicted by a final judgment as well. The European Court of Human Rights has on many occasions held that where a State agent has been charged with crimes involving ill-treatment, it is important that he or she be suspended from duty during the investigation or trial and dismissed if he or she is convicted, which is crucial for preserving public trust in the work of the state authorities.

This is why the Police Act must be amended to provide for the mandatory suspension of police officers, against whom disciplinary proceedings have been initiated on suspicion that they had intentionally used excessive physical or psychological coercion against individuals, and/or against whom criminal proceedings have been instituted on suspicion that they had committed the crimes of torture or ill-treatment or extortion of confessions. The BCHR also suggests that the amendments allow the public prosecutor to request the suspension of a police officer before the initiation of ordinary or summary criminal proceedings where a person raises an arguable claim or makes a credible assertion or where there are sufficiently clear indications that these crimes have been committed.

The officers should be suspended pending the adoption of a final decision in the criminal and/or disciplinary proceedings against them and dismissed ex lege in the event they are convicted. Serbian law will thus have fulfilled the above requirements under the case law of the European Court of Human Rights.

BCHR lawyers stand ready to assist the Ministry of Internal Affairs in drafting the amendments to the Police Act.

The Initiative is available in Serbian here.

The Belgrade Centre for Human Rights filed a criminal report with the Belgrade First Basic Public Prosecution Service against the police officers who took part in Stefan Miletić’s ill-treatment on 8 July 2020. Herewith the testimony of this young man, who was brutally beaten up on Terazije during the protest that evening: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EeM3GTY65Mo  

The BCHR also filed an initiative with the Protector of Citizens to launch a review of the Interior Ministry’s work and arranged Miletić’s examination by a court medical examiner, whose report will be forwarded to the Prosecution Service and the Protector of Citizens.

Stefan Miletić is just one of the many victims of police brutality who sought legal aid from the BCHR in the last few days.

Vojin Dimitrijević, a law professor, intellectual, eminent champion of human rights and democracy and long-standing Director of the Belgrade Centre for Human Rights, was born on this day 9 July 1932. We recall what he said in his book “Reign of Terror – A Study on Human Rights and State Terror,” which is just as topical today as it was when he wrote it in 1984.

“Having once written a book on terrorism as a method of political struggle against government, I was left with the impression that the terror exercised by those in power was in fact more dangerous, that it took much more innocent victims, that it diminished human dignity much more and that its existence was a permanent threat to society. This terror, however, remained for the most part neglected, not only by me – but in academic literature in general. Lawyers, in particular, due to dilemmas both contrived and real – an issue that will be discussed further – have done precious little in contributing to the understanding of and clarifying the existence of the reign of fear.

It is clear, beyond any doubt, that a study of this length can only concern the governance through and by introduction of fear and anxiety as a political method alone. Such analysis requires generalization, through identification of the common traits of modern reigns of fear, which are in the focus of this study, and their comparison to occurrences in the past. I recognize that this approach may be contested as ahistorical, since it does not always take into account all the specific and unique circumstances and causes. However, to fully yield to such a remark would mean that the science of politics, as an attempt to establish certain general concepts and determine universal rules, is impossible. That risk, therefore, is one that has to be taken.

Belgrade, 15 November 1984
V.D.”

We should read “Reign of Terror” and refuse to live in it! 

“Reign of Terror” is available in PDF at: https://www.fabrikaknjiga.co.rs/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/The-Reign-of-Terror.pdf