prijava
SARAJEVO, June 11 (FENA) - The verdict of the Appeals Council of the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Courts (IRMCT) in the case against Jovica Stanišić and Franko Simatović, who were high-ranking members of the State Security Service of Serbia, is extremely significant because it confirms that they, together with other leaders, were part of a joint criminal enterprise with a plan and common intention to forcibly and permanently remove, by committing the crime of persecution, murder, as well as deportation, non-Serbs from the territory of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
This is an assessment by a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southern Connecticut and a member of the Board of Directors of the Program for the Study of Genocide at Yale University in an interview with FENA, David Pettigrew.
"Establishing that the leadership of this joint criminal enterprise was located in Serbia, the judgment of the Appeals Council provided another key confirmation that the crimes committed in BiH had the character of an international armed conflict, and not a 'civil war', as revisionists or genocide deniers have tried to claim," added this distinguished US professor.
Also, the verdict stated that Stanišić and Simatović "shared the intention of the advocates of the common criminal goal to forcibly and permanently remove the majority of non-Serbs from large areas of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina".
Although the judgment of the Appeals Council does not use the word genocide, the conclusion about the existence of an elimination plan to "permanently remove the majority of non-Serbs" speaks of the genocidal dimension of the criminal plan.
"This is an important realization for future analyses and strategies for transitional justice and state building. The lack of actual prosecution and conviction for genocide in this case, as well as in many other ICTY cases, despite the recognition of the aforementioned elimination plan, remains deeply problematic," he noted.
He says that in light of this verdict, the Mothers of Srebrenica, as well as other associations of victims and individual survivors, have the right to seek compensation from Serbia and Republika Srpska, in a manner similar to the proceedings initiated by the Mothers of Srebrenica against the Netherlands.
"The mothers of Srebrenica have already announced their intention. There is also an important connection with the genocide in Srebrenica, which was determined by the verdict of the Appeals Council because the Serbian "Scorpions" unit under the control of Stanišić and Simatović murdered Srebrenica civilians in Trnovo," underlined Pettigrew.
In addition to the right of Mothers of Srebrenica and other victims to seek justice by suing Serbia and Republika Srpska, the professor points out that the finding of the existence of a joint criminal enterprise based in Serbia, along with the international character of the armed conflict, suggests that international aggression was committed by Serbia from 1992 to 1995 in the pursuit of "Greater Serbia".
Moreover, the Prlić cases already indicated the existence of an international armed conflict in which Croatia was involved, which also indicated international aggression in search of a "Greater Croatia", which is why Pettigrew emphasizes that this realization should guide the representatives of the United States, the European Union and the international community in their involvement in the region.
He, therefore, urged that the judgment of the Appeals Chamber in the Stanišić and Simatović case regarding the joint criminal enterprise, the implication of international aggression and the elimination dimension of the plan for the permanent removal of non-Serbs from the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina should be a call to the international community to once and for all protect the territorial integrity of BiH and provide support to the survivors in their efforts to seek justice while resisting genocide denial and seeking the right to memorials and reparations.
(FENA) S. R.
