Amnesty International Report 1997 - Croatia

Journalists were prosecuted for publishing articles critical of the authorities. Scores of prisoners, mostly Croatian Serbs, tried for crimes connected with the armed conflict in former Yugoslavia may have received unfair trials. There were reports of soldiers and civilians taking part in ill-treatment and deliberate and arbitrary killings of elderly Croatian Serbs in the Krajina. Military and civilian police ill-treated civilians, including human rights defenders and refugees, or failed to protect them from ill-treatment. The fate of around 5,000 people, Croats and Serbs, who "disappeared" during the war remained unclear. The authorities obstructed the return of Croatian Serb refugees and ill-treated and forcibly returned Bosnian Muslims to Bosnia-Herzegovina, where they faced ill-treatment (see Bosnia-Herzegovina entry). In January, the UN Security Council established the UN Transitional Authority in Eastern Slavonia, which was to oversee the peaceful reintegration of the territory which remained under rebel Serb control after the Croatian military actions of 1995 (see Amnesty International Report 1996). Political tension between the government and opposition continued throughout the year as a result of President Franjo Tudjman's refusal to accept opposition nominations for the Mayor of Zagreb after the opposition's victory in the October 1995 municipal election in the city. In April, the Criminal Code was amended so that when the President or certain other public figures were "slandered" the State Prosecutor would be obliged to initiate criminal charges, with a possible custodial sentence. The authorities harassed the independent media, using such methods as the arbitrary application of tax and other regulations. In July, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe established a mission to provide "assistance and expertise" in, among others, the field of human rights. Croatia enacted implementing legislation in April to enable cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. The authorities arranged the voluntary surrender to the Tribunal of one of those indicted and arrested another, who had not been transferred to the Tribunal's custody by the end of the year. However, the Tribunal complained of the authorities' refusal to secure the arrest of Bosnian Croat suspects residing in Bosnian Croat-controlled areas of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Amnesty laws applying to individuals (mainly Croatian Serbs) who participated in the armed conflict against Croatia (see Amnesty International Reports 1992 to 1996) were passed in May and September. The second law was enacted after pressure from the UN as the first was restricted only to residents of the eastern Slavonia region. About 100 people were released as a result of amnesties, although a number were immediately rearrested for war crimes which were not covered by the amnesty laws. In October, Croatia and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia established full diplomatic relations. Croatia was admitted to the Council of Europe in November after twice being refused admission earlier in the year because of concerns about human rights. In November, Croatia signed the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and its Protocol No. 6 concerning the abolition of the death penalty, and the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. In September, two journalists, Viktor IvanFiD and Marinko EuliD, of the independent weekly Feral Tribune were acquitted of "slandering" or "insulting" the President. The charges, which carried a possible custodial sentence, had been brought under the amended Criminal Code. An appeal against the acquittal was outstanding at the end of the year. The editor of another weekly, Nacional, was prosecuted in April for "spreading false information" after his paper suggested that poor equipment had caused a plane crash in which a US government official was killed. They all remained at liberty during the proceedings. A series of trials were held on charges relating to the armed conflict in former Yugoslavia. Charges included "armed rebellion" and war crimes. Those accused only of the former were granted amnesties. The authorities failed to provide adequate protection for elderly Croatian Serbs who had remained in the Krajina after the military offensive of 1995 (see Amnesty International Report 1996). They were threatened and attacked by both civilians and soldiers – in some cases with explosives, rocket-propelled grenades or incendiary materials. Two elderly Croatian Serbs were reportedly killed in such incidents in June and August and several others were seriously injured. Those responsible were reported to include uniformed Bosnian Croat soldiers. The police, some of whom reportedly complained of inadequate resources early in the year, were criticized for failing to prevent incidents and for ineffective investigations. The authorities made little progress in investigating human rights abuses against Serbs in the Krajina in 1995 and prosecuting those responsible. The government reported large numbers of investigations and trials which it claimed answered demands placed upon it to act to protect the remaining Croatian Serb population in the Krajina under UN Security Council Resolution 1019 (1995). However, the information it provided was incomplete and failed to confirm that the majority of human rights abuses had been investigated or that suspects had been brought to justice and punished where found guilty. In one of the few trials for serious criminal acts committed against Croatian Serbs in the Krajina, eight Croatian soldiers were acquitted at a trial in Zadar in July of the killing of 16 Croatian Serb civilians in the villages of Varivode and Go›iD in August and September 1995. The judge reportedly complained of serious deficiencies in the investigations by the authorities and some of the defendants claimed that they had been beaten or otherwise ill-treated in order to extract confessions. Two of the defendants were found guilty of a murder and an attempted murder respectively in other villages in proceedings which were held concurrently with the above trial. They were sentenced to six years' and 18 months' imprisonment respectively. Activists in human rights or humanitarian organizations and journalists who were repeatedly subject to human rights abuses were not adequately protected by the authorities. For example, the summer house of Ivan Z. EiFak, President of the Croatian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights, was attacked by a bomb in July while he and relatives were in occupation. No one had been brought to justice for the attack by the end of the year. In other cases, human rights activists and journalists were threatened and physically attacked. Military police were responsible for ill-treating civilians, including a conscientious objector. The military and military police also failed to protect civilians from violence perpetrated by serving soldiers, former soldiers, or others purporting to represent the military authorities. Most of these incidents were associated with attempts to evict people illegally from apartments which soldiers or ex-soldiers wished to occupy as part of a tacit policy on the part of the authorities. Cases of ill-treatment by police were also reported. Some progress was made towards resolving cases of people who had "disappeared" in previous years as mass graves were exhumed by both the Croatian authorities and the Tribunal, and exchange of information with the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia increased. However, at the end of the year there were still around 5,000 missing persons. Fear for their safety, and bureaucratic obstacles imposed by the Croatian authorities, meant that during the year few Croatian Serb refugees returned to Croatia and fewer still to their homes. Estimates varied, but it appeared that no more than 10,000 to 15,000 of the 200,000 Croatian Serb refugees who fled the Krajina in 1995 were able to return to Croatia during the year. Many of them did not return to their homes in the Krajina. Amnesty International addressed the authorities on a variety of human rights concerns during the year, including the forcible return of Bosnian Muslim refugees to Bosnia-Herzegovina and their reported ill-treatment by Croatian police; the prosecution of journalists for exercising their right to freedom of information; ill-treatment by police and military personnel; and the lack of adequate protection from the authorities for human rights defenders and members of national minorities. In many cases the authorities responded, but failed to address fully Amnesty International's concerns.