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Announcements

OFFICE FOR HUMAN AND MINORITY RIGHTS – TWO YEARS LATER

June 9th, 2008

ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE CENTER FOR DEVELOPMENT OF CIVIL SOCIETY (CDCS) REGARDING ANNIVERSARY OF ESTABLISHMENT OF OFFICE FOR HUMAN AND MINORITY RIGHTS

Exactly two years ago the Government of Serbia established the Office for human and Minority Rights by its Decree. It is a key national institution in the area of protection and advancement of human rights. When assessing the efficiency, competence, transparency in the two-year-long work of the Office, the following should be considered:

1. The Office lags in initiating the enactment and changes of domestic regulations in the area of human and minority rights. The most obvious example is a continuous absence of legislation in selection and authority of the councils of national minorities which have had no legal grounds for their work for almost two years.

2. The Office does nothing to institutionally strengthen the state organs competent in the field of human and minority rights, as well as the bodies of minority self-governments. A good example is non-functioning of the Council for National Minorities of the Government of Serbia whose secretary is director of the Office. The Council has met only on one occasion for two years. It is not clear whether the Office has done anything in institutional strengthening of minority national councils.

BRUTAL VIOLATION OF FREEDOM OF WORSHIP

April 16, 2008

The Center for Development of Civil Society (CDCS) informs everybody interested in endurance of elementary religious freedoms that Ministry of Religion has in no way whatsoever reacted to brutal violation of freedom of worship and threats to physical safety of worshippers on 22 March of this year. On that day several hundreds of citizens of Serbia and citizens of a neighboring country physically assaulted a house in the suburbs of Bajina Basta where a religious service of Jehovah’s Witnesses was held. Neighbors and the police saved the worshippers, among them there were children too, and the hooligans stoned the house where the service was held, broke the windows and burnt down all religious material.

Ministry of Religion refused the registration of Jehovah’s Witnesses and they appealed to the competent court. In other countries, like Croatia, they are registered as all other religious communities. All demagogic arguments by the Ministry of Religion about freedom of worship of unregistered religious communities in Serbia seem untrue when confronted with the absence of any public reaction from their part.

REGARDING THE INCIDENT IN NOVI SLANKAMEN

March 10, 2008

ANNOUNCEMENT REGARDING THE INCIDENT IN NOVI SLANKAMEN

The Center for Development of Civil Society (CDCS) alerts the Serbian public to the latest criminal offence in Novi Slankamen which encourages violent ethnic homogenization in Serbia.

The act of window breaking at Croatian Home in this place which happened on 5. March 2008 is a continuation of the trend which resulted in decrease of Croatian population’s share in total population of Novi Slankamen from 66% in 1991 to 22% in 2002.

The CDCS gives its strong support to the police and the prosecution in their attempts to discover and prosecute the perpetrators of this misdeed.

REGARDING THE SESSION OF THE COMMITTEE ON SECURITY

March 25th, 2008

ANNOUNCEMENT REGARDING THE SESSION OF THE COMMITTEE ON SECURITY

The Center for Development of Civil Society (CDCS) understands the conclusions reached by the Committee on Security of the Assembly of the Autonomous Province of Vojvodina and the statement of a representative of the Ministry of Interior given at the Committee’s session on further activities on preserving safety of all citizens regardless of their nationality, as responsibility taken by the state organs and the provincial administration to preserve stable interethnic relations. The absence of increased number of ethnic incidents after Croatia and Hungary recognized Kosovo is a guarantee for further advancement of these relations. The CDCS gives its strong support to the state and provincial organs to carry on with this policy.

THE MEETING BETWEEN Mr. PETAR LADJEVIC AND THE ALBANIANS AND GORANCI

February 26th, 2008

REGARDING INSUFFICIENT MEDIA COVERAGE OF THE MEETING BETWEEN Mr. PETAR LAĐEVIĆ AND THE ALBANIANS AND GORANCI IN ZRENJANIN

The Center for Development of Civil Society (CDCS) reminds of the fact that the Director of the Office for Human and Minority Rights of the Government of Serbia, Mr. Petar Lađević, met with the ethnic Albanians and Goranci on 23 February in Zrenjanin. Their shops had been target of attacks on previous days.

The news published by the national agency Beta gave a detailed account of Mr. Lađević’s meeting with these people; it was underlined that he had come to establish the facts, give support to the attacked people, convince them that they were equal members of the community, promise compensation for the damage and prevention programs.