veličina fonta

verzija za štampu

copyright

pošalji komentar

Amnesty International: Suffering in Silence

30 September 2009  
"Whose Justice? Bosnia and Herzegovina's Women Still Waiting" is the latest report by Amnesty International dealing with problems facing victims of wartime sexual abuse 14 years after the end of the war.

On September 30 in Sarajevo, Amnesty International, AI, the global movement for human-rights protection, presented a report entitled "Whose Justice? Bosnia and Herzegovina's Women Still Waiting", which gives an overview of the difficult position of rape victims in this country and a range of problems they face every day.

"Wartime crimes of sexual abuse still represent a sensitive issue in Bosnia and Herzegovina. There is little, if any, public discussion on those crimes despite the size of the problem and the large number of affected individuals. Many survivors still feel stigmatized and excluded from Bosnian society. Many continue to live quietly with their trauma because they are afraid of talking about their experiences," according to one of the Report's conclusions.

Lisa Gormley, Legal Advisor for International Law and Women's Rights and one of the Report's presenters, pointed to this problem, noting that society often blames rape victims for what happened to them, making them guilty of the crime committed against them.

Among other things, the Report contains an overview of the longstanding efforts by victims to confirm their status in Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as the ways in which the definition of rape has been "circumscribed" in international and domestic law through various verdicts and court practices.

AI points to different practices and treatment of rape victims applied in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska, and also describes the problems facing victims, who receive financial support worth between 100 and 500 KM per month, but sometimes have to spend up to 140 KM for medication.  

Amnesty International

The AI research has generated a number of recommendations for different levels of authority in Bosnia and Herzegovina on how to address rape victims and their needs and provide them with better access to justice and long-term psychological and social support.

"Rape is a war crime. Rape is a way of torturing someone. This is clear. Women do not ask for pittance. They ask for their right to reparation and justice," Gormley said.

The comprehensive research conducted by AI in Bosnia and Herzegovina indicates that wartime rape victims are dissatisfied with the fact that many perpetrators continue to live freely.  

"Despite recent efforts, impunity still predominates and most perpetrators have not been tried," the Report states, pointing out that just 12 cases pertaining to wartime rape had been completed and 15 were ongoing before the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina as of the middle of this year.  

In the Report, AI cites success stories and mistakes made in trying sexual abuse before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, ICTY, and the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as the way in which witnesses-victims have been treated in these cases.

The Report states that survivors consider that the ICTY has failed to recognize their needs fully, and has shown little understanding of their personal situations. AI says that local NGOs have filled gaps in the absence of support from the ICTY and the BiH authorities.

"One of the biggest concerns identified by survivors and NGOs within the support system is the ICTY's failure to deal with long-term psychological, social and economic needs of individuals who experienced wartime crimes of sexual violence," the Report says.

The Report slams the witness protection system applied before courts in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Despite the fact that AI has already warned about this issue, it says that adequate protection of witnesses has still not been put in place, adding that this has affected, to a great extent, the willingness of witnesses to appear in court.

"AI considers that, in cases pertaining to rape and other types of sexual violence, the lack of adequate protection of witnesses continues to be a major barrier to access to justice for the survivors in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The relevant institutions are still due to find an adequate solution to the problem".

AI calls for cases of sexual violence to be tried before the State Court until the Entity Courts have resources and capacity for trials to be conducted in accordance with international standards.

In addition to inadequate support for and protection of witnesses, AI expressed concern over current public perceptions of rape in Bosnia and Herzegovina, resulting in "stigmatization and social exclusion of rape victims".

The AI Report articulates the dissatisfaction of victims and NGOs with the fact that certain rape trials conducted before the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina are closed to the public, even in cases where witnesses do not ask for the trials to be closed.   

"Conducting open trials might have a positive effect on public discourse on rapes committed during the war," AI argues.

Wartime victims of sexual violence in BiH to whom AI researchers spoke expressed dissatisfaction with the way the Bosnian authorities have treated them, adding that their basic human rights have been neglected.

"Successive governments in Bosnia and Herzegovina have failed to guarantee the rights of persons who survived wartime crimes of sexual violence, not offering them any meaningful indemnity measures, including restitution, compensation, rehabilitation, satisfaction or guarantee of non-repetition. The AI research indicates that many survivors continue to suffer in silence," the Report reads.

Illustrating the problem, AI notes that 14 years after the end of the war there are still no reliable official statistics on the number of raped women, despite the fact that during the war rape was "widely prevalent" and organized in a systematic way.

"The exact number of raped women during the armed conflict from 1992 to 1995 will probably never be determined. (...) The evidence collected by the ICTY and local courts and information published by local and international NGOs firmly points to the fact that there are at least several thousand rape victims".

For this reason, one of the recommendations made by AI to the Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina is to form a state-level commission to gather information on the scale of rape and other crimes of sexual violence.

A large part of the Report "Whose Justice? Bosnia and Herzegovina's Women Still Waiting" is dedicated to the lack of social support for rape victims. AI says women who experienced wartime crimes of sexual violence are "subject to discrimination in the level of social benefits available to them in comparison to war veterans".

Among other things, the Report notes that budget resources allocated for pensions for war veterans in the Federation in 2008 were nine times higher than resources allocated for civilian war victims.

"AI calls on the Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina to undertake urgent measures to develop a strategy for reparation to victims of wartime sexual violence. (...) The Strategy should also include provisions that offer guarantees to those who ask for access to psychological help and other types of support".

Nicola Duckworth, AI Programme Director for Europe and Central Asia, said that members of Amnesty International had met representatives of the local authorities and the judiciary during their visits to Bosnia and Herzegovina and had conveyed to them the problems identified by their research, also informing them that when they leave BiH they will "continue lobbying at the international level".

Presenting the Report, Duckworth said she was disappointed that AI had not been able to arrange a meeting with the BiH Prime Minister, "considering the fact that we have identified a number of activities that should be tackled at the highest level of authority".