[A-PAL] a-pal newsletter

[Alice Mead]

A-PAL -RELEASE OF FLORA BROVINA REJECTED !!!!!!!!
                        October 25, 2000
         Human Rights Awareness Week in Europe
     ***** PLUS   POSSIBLE RELEASE OF PRISONERS--?????
WE NEED YOUR HELP TO PUSH FOR THE RELEASE OF THESE PEOPLE. THEY ARE
POLITICAL PAWNS CAUGHT IN A POWER STRUGGLE BETWEEN INTERNATIONAL AND SERB
FACTIONS.
THEIR IMPRISONMENT AND BEING HELD FOR RANSOM IS AN INTERNATIONAL DISGRACE.
          **********************************
PLEASE TAKE THE TIME TO READ THIS WHOLE NEWSLETTER!
 AND JOIN THE EMAIL ACTION  CAMPAIGN ORGANIZED BY DIVI BEINECKE/GERMANY


-------- Original Message --------
Betreff: PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT
Datum: Thu, 26 Oct 2000 14:51:28 +0200
Von: "IDEMO KUCI-GOING HOME" <hocukuci at idemokuci.org.yu>
Firma: IDEMO KUCI-GOING HOME
An: "Wolfgang Plarre" <w.plarre at kosova.nu>, "Wolfgang Plarre"
<wplarre at bndlg.de>

PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENT

Federal Ministry of Justice has today rejected Yugoslav President's,
Mr.Vojislav Kostunica, appeal for release of Ms Flora Brovina.

IDEMO KUCI-GOING HOME holds strong opinion that this unacceptable act,
committed by Yugoslav FMJ, already known for it's outrageous decisions,
sentences and way of communication, will only foster and speed up
everyone's efforts and demands for an instant release of all political
prisoners in Yugoslavs prisons.

IDEMO KUCI-GOING HOME, Group of RESISTANT MOTHERS and RESISTANCE FROM
NEIGHBORHOOD-DORCOL, also give their full support to an initiative,
launched by Civil Alliance of Serbia, for destroying of police records
of OTPOR activists, and other brave citizens who helped beginning of
Milosevic's regime downfall.

It is those young academic people, who will be needed in a process of
reconstruction and development of our country. Their police records may
be spots in their biographies, but are decorations for promoted civilian
conscience and courage.

IK-GH
__________________________________


Kostunica Moves To Release Jailed Ethnic Albanians

By R. Jeffrey Smith
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, October 25, 2000 ; Page A20

ROME, Oct. 24 -- Some or all of the more than 900 Kosovo Albanians
imprisoned in Yugoslavia may be freed in coming weeks, according to
officials in Yugoslavia and Kosovo.
     The exact timing and mechanism of the release has not been worked
out, but Yugoslav officials said that President Vojislav Kostunica plans
to propose a general amnesty for ethnic Albanians accused of illegal
involvement in last year's Kosovo war. He would then seek parliamentary
approval of the measure, possibly as early as late next week.
     If that happens, it could resolve one of the most nettlesome
disputes arising from the conflict in Kosovo--a province of Serbia,
Yugoslavia's dominant republic, which is now occupied by NATO-led
peacekeeping troops and under U.N. administration.
     Kostunica has been making other gestures of conciliation. In an
interview with the CBS News program "60 Minutes II," he acknowledged
that Serbian and Yugoslav forces had committed "crimes" in Kosovo,
according to a partial transcript. He also said they had been victims of
crimes.
     Most of the prisoners are young men who were arrested as the
Belgrade government of President Slobodan Milosevic tried to purge
Kosovo of its ethnic Albanian majority--a campaign that triggered an
11-week NATO air offensive against Yugoslavia. The captives were then
taken under armed guard to Serbia proper as government forces retreated
from Kosovo.
     Such a release also would help allay international frustration over
Belgrade's prosecution of ethnic Albanians based on what foreign experts
say has often been flimsy evidence of involvement in the province's
separatist guerrilla movement.
     In Kosovo, the jailing of the ethnic Albanians--often under harsh
conditions--has provoked fury among relatives and community leaders.
U.N. officials had accused Milosevic of holding the prisoners primarily
to provoke tensions and instability in Kosovo.
     But Kostunica--who succeeded Milosevic on Oct. 7 following a
popular uprising to back his election victory--already has attempted to
arrange a pardon for one of the most prominent ethnic Albanians in a
Yugoslav prison, Flora Brovina. But Brovina, a physician who is beloved
in Kosovo because of her stoic resistance to Serbian authority, has
refused to leave jail unless all other ethnic Albanians are released,
officials and a family member said.
     Her decision has provoked enormous frustration among Kostunica's
advisers, who are attempting to persuade prison officials in the Serbian
city of Nis to release her with or without her approval. "I don't care
if she wants to stand in front of the gates," said one official, who
asked not to be named. "We are absolutely determined to see her
released."
     Oliver Ivanovic, a leader of the Serb National Council in the
Kosovo city of Mitrovica, met with Kostunica Monday in Belgrade and
formed the impression, he said in an interview, that some ethnic
Albanians "will be released" in the next week or so. He also said that
he asked Kostunica to request that Serbs now held in Kosovo at U.N.-run
jails be released as well, on the grounds that many had been convicted
through improper court procedures.
     The 55-nation Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
recently released a report sharply criticizing the U.N. judicial system
in Kosovo, saying it had failed to meet European human rights standards.
     Also today, Kostunica scored a carefully negotiated victory in his
efforts to dismantle Milosevic's power. The Serbian parliament appointed
a power-sharing government in which Milosevic's Socialists and
politicians allied with Kostunica will jointly run the republic until
elections in December.

Special correspondents Zoran Radjen in Belgrade and Linda Gusia in
Pristina, Yugoslavia, contributed to this report.

© 2000 The Washington Post
http:/



Is ransom money the reason President Kostunica and his new Parliament won't
release the Albanian prisoners?????? Are the corrupt and incompetent judges
discussed in the article by IWPR part of the ransom racket??  FOLLOW THE
MONEY!
          ***************************************
Ransoms for Albanian prisoners----so far an estimated 8 to 10 million DM--
have been collected by Serb police, lawyers, and judges--for family members
to obtain the release of loved ones. A-PAL has learned that in some cases,
ransom money of 11,000 Dm has been paid to SwedBank in Sweden to an account
that is used for this purpose by Serb police. This is not an allegation, but
confirmed fact. At the usual 10,000 DM rate per prisoner (some ransoms are
as high as 45,000 DM) that would be another 8 million DM of income for the
Serb justice ministry. Many mothers visiting their sons in Serb prisons have
to pay 40 or 50 DM at every police road block and sometimes at the prison.
One 15 minute visit per month (all that is allowed) can cost a mother over
200 DM. None of this is any secret to Western leaders who are well aware
that only the 37 minors (there are 2 more at Srm. Mitrovica) have been
released without a ransom. REMIND THEM THAT JUDGES ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR
PROTECTING HUMAN RIGHTS AND FOR PROSECUTING VIOLATIONS OF INTERNATIONAL AND
CONSTITUTIONAL LAW---see article below on Ministry of Justice. The Ministry
of Justice is the work-engine of repression.

****************************************************
Advocates of the Albanian Prisoners can do two things this week: 1. write to
President Kostunica and your foreign minister about the ransoms of these
hostages AND THE OBLIGATION OF THE JUSTICE SYSTEM TO BEHAVE LAWFULLY AND
RELEASE THE PRISONERS. 2. Join the Email Action campaign of Wolfgang Plarre
and Divi Beinecke at www.kosova.de/APP.  The action is explained on the
site. We currently have 31 advocates--we need 878.
_________________________________________
MILOSEVIC JUDGES FACE RETRIBUTION

Serbia's new authorities are about to overhaul the country's corrupt
judiciary

By Sinisa Stanimirovic in Belgrade

The downfall of Slobodan Milosevic has left Serbia's judicial system in
tatters with few judges in office apart from stooges of the old regime who
are now afraid of looming retribution.

For the time being though, these judges cannot be removed without
Milosevic's approval and they retain power to throw up formidable obstacles
in the path of newly-elected President Vojislav Kostunica.

Shorn of all popular respect, the judges are faced with vilification and
hostile street demonstrations. The difficulty is that the judiciary is still
controlled by a parliament dominated by Milosevic supporters. Courts and
prosecutors' offices are headed by people who received flats and cheap state
loans in reward for their loyalty to the regime. And they cannot be thrown
out until a new Serbian assembly emerges with an anti-Milosevic complexion.

Signs are that this will come about with elections scheduled for 23 December
.

Meanwhile, the discredited judges do their best to thwart reform. One
example was a move by the District Prosecutor's office in Belgrade to
investigate mine workers from Kolubara whose strike against rigged election
results contributed to the fall of the old regime.

A judge who refused to send the mineworkers to jail was taken off the case
and replaced by another, more compliant judge.

Another example was the quashing of an appeal for the pardon of Belgrade
journalist Zoran Lukovic, sentenced to five months in prison because he
published a story unfavourable to Milosevic crony Milovan Bojic.

The First Municipal Prosecutor's office in Belgrade, which brought charges
against the journalist, has ignored criminal charges against the Federal
Electoral Committee that falsified election results.

For all their rearguard resistance, a state of unmistakable apprehension
prevails among the old guard judges.

Recently, Judge Pavle Vukasinovic failed to show up for the trial of members
of the "Spider" gang, a group of bounty hunters that has been accused of
abducting suspected war criminals from Serbian soil and (for reputedly rich
rewards) turning them over to NATO troops for trial at The Hague war crimes
court.

The gang's success in smuggling its captives out of Serbia has struck terror
into those on the tribunal's wanted list.

The judge showed up three days later, saying he could not come to court
earlier because his son had been beaten up. A colleague commented, "somebody
attacked the boy in revenge against Vukasinovic who was a member of the
Federal Electoral Committee which stands accused of rigging election
results."

Revenge attacks have been reported from all over Serbia. Citizens of
Vladicin Han threw eggs and stones at the building where the president of
the local municipal court lives. In Prokuplje, judges organised symbolic
public trial for their president and sentenced him to six years in prison!

An officer of the District Prosecutor's office said, "Since 5 October when
the regime fell, we have all been living in nervous anticipation. The public
prosecutor is aware that he will have to leave office after the change of
power and now he is taking his frustration out on us, making life
impossible. "

Upheavals in the judiciary have left it too weak to carry out any internal
restructuring. Only the Commercial Court in Belgrade has managed a
reorganisation since the downfall of Milosevic. The court was a mechanism
through which the United Yugoslav Left party, JUL, of Mirjana Markovic,
managed to control numerous companies.

The recently sacked president of this court, Milena Arezina, would order
certain companies to be proclaimed bankrupt, after which the JUL would seize
control of them. Even firms with considerable assets were "declared"
bankrupt due to temporary insolvency, the lawyer said.

Other Belgrade courts in recent years have presided over many trumped up
cases. They included those against the journalists of the paper Dnevni
telegraf whose owner Slavko Curuvija was assassinated last year; Zoran
Djindjic, leader of the opposition Democratic Party; and former State
Security Service officers Vladimir Nikolic and Bozidar Spasic.

Until some 10 years ago, the Serbian judiciary enjoyed a high reputation and
widespread respect. When communism was replaced by a multi-party system at
the beginning of the nineties, Serbian judges were allowed to be independent
for the first time in 45 years.

While most judges had been members of the Communist Party, many didn't
bother transferring to the post-communist Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS)
which under Milosevic became the ruling party.

Then came the hyperinflation of 1993, when a judge's entire salary bought a
box of matches. More than a third of judges went back to being lawyers.
Inexperienced and non-qualified members from the ruling party were recruited
to take their place, sending judicial standards plummeting.

Court members who had spent years waiting for promotion were ignored, while
politicians handed jobs to men who had never set foot in a courtroom.

The Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia revealed that most new
'judges' used to work on farms, in community centres, or in the special
forces units of the Yugoslav army.

The extent to which the bench had been politicised stood out glaringly in
1996, when judges close to JUL and the SPS annulled an opposition victory in
local elections. After 88 days of opposition protests and international
pressure, the results were restored.

At that point, the remaining independent-minded judges formed a professional
body - the Association of Serbian Judges (ASJ) - which has since been a
thorn in the side of the regime.

The ASJ has appealed for replacements in the Federal Court, the Federal
Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court of Serbia and the Constitutional
Court of Serbia.

Lawyer Vida Petrovic-Skero said the first step towards the eventual return
of sacked judges should come from a new Serbian parliament. "One should
annul the illegal decisions and create conditions for the return of judges
who were sacked," she said.

Similar sentiments are being expressed by sacked judge Miroslav Todorovic,
now a lawyer and a member of the presidency of the student protest movement
of Otpor, "It is too early to talk about changes in the judiciary as most of
the honourable and respectable people who the regime had chucked out have
become lawyers," he said.

People who kept silent amid all the abuses are still sitting in courts, so
reorganising the system will prove to be a big challenge. The current court
presidents and their deputies will probably remain in position until the
forming of the new parliament of Serbia is constituted after the elections.

Provided that its deputies act in accordance with the present mood within
the anti-Milosevic opposition, new independent-minded judges will be
appointed. Then the recovery of the judiciary will begin. But the
restoration of its reputation and respect, as well as faith in court
institutions, will be a slow and painful process.

Sinisa Stanimirovic is an IWPR contributor

------------------------------------------------------


New evidence in Pauk case

24 October 2000
The Humanitarian Law Center (HLC) has delivered to the Belgrade District
Court evidence which could help to establish the truth about allegations
that members of the Pauk (Spider) Group were implicated in the murder of two
civilians and extorting money for the release of two prisoners in Kosovo in
May 1999.

In light of the new evidence, the HLC requested the court to open the trial
to the public and ensure its fairness and impartiality.

According to press reports, the members of the Pauk Group are charged with
espionage and the murder of two unidentified persons in Kosovo during the
state of war.  The defendants’ lawyers have asked for their release,
alleging that they were put on trial for political reasons.
______________________________________
   RE: SERB PRISONERS IN KOSOVA
Vuckovic, Bisevac trial to resume in Kosovska Mitrovica

24 October 2000
The trial of Miroslav Vuckovic and Bozur Bisevac on the charge of genocide
resumes in Kosovska Mitrovica on 25 October.  Bisevac is being tried in
absentia.
The two men are accused of creating together with other unidentified persons
“an atmosphere of fear by shooting off firearms in Gusgavac and Gornji Suvi
Do villages and making death threats” in the period between 22 March and
early May 1999, “with the intent of forcibly displacing the Albanian
population and completely or partly destroying the Albanian community.”
According to the indictment, after forcing the villagers to leave their
homes, the defendants divided between themselves valuables from the
abandoned houses and then set the buildings on fire.  The prosecutor alleges
that they torched a house although they knew an elderly woman, Hazire
Sahiti, was in it.

During the investigatory proceedings, Vuckovic denied setting fire to any
houses or murdering anybody, saying he worked for the ambulance service
during the war and helped Albanians.  He confirmed that some houses in Suvi
Do were torched but said he did not know by whom.

Witness Semsa Sahiti identified Vuckovic during the first session of the
trial as one of the men who torched the house in which his mother died.
Sahiti told the court that he watched the incident from behind a wall some
fifty meters from the house, a nd said Vuckovic was in police uniform at the
time.  According to this witness, Bisevac stood guard while Vuckovic, armed
with an automatic rifle, went into the house. Gunshots were heard a few
moments later.

Nenad Vukasovic, Miodrag Brkljac, Miro Delevic and Igor Pantelic, counsel
for the defense, called into doubt the impartiality of the panel presided by
Judge Mahmut Halimi and including Judge Christer Karphammer of Sweden, and
disputed the legality and legitimacy of the court.

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