Prosecutions of the most significant war crimes, corruption and organised crime cases slowed last year, but the head of Bosnia’s High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council insists that the focus in 2018 will be on dealing with high-level suspects.
The Bosnian state-level judiciary achieved “significantly poorer results” in prosecuting war crimes, corruption and organised crime cases in 2017 compared to previous years, Milan Tegeltija, the president of the High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council, the country’s judicial overseer, admitted to BIRN in an interview.
But despite this, Tegeltija said that he was a “moderate optimist” about 2018 being a better year.
He explained that he expected the state-level prosecution to focus on high level perpetrators and to send the remaining, lower-level cases to entity-level prosecutions, adding that he was encouraged by a flurry of indictments issued in late December by the state prosecution.
“We are witnesses that in the last few days – this is in the media – a lot is happening in war crimes cases; a lot of arrests, a lot of indictments. I think that is a good sign,” said Tegeltija.
The Bosnian prosecution also raised a large number of indictments in previous Decembers – something seen as just an attempt by prosecutors to complete an annual quota before the year’s end.
But Tegeltija, who was born in Pancevo in Serbia in 1971, has been a lawyer since 1997 and was appointed president of the HJPC three-and-a-half years ago, said that he could see a difference this time.
“What I can see from the media, I don’t think these are arrests and indictments just to fill a quota… I think these are more commanding officers, not just guards in camps… I think these are cases from the sphere of the most serious war crimes cases and I think this is not the same case as the practice that has certainly existed before to fill a quota,” he insisted.
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