Category: News and Events

During a meeting held in Sarajevo on Wednesday, September 12 AIS members repeated their earlier allegations that they found it more difficult to report from war-crimes trials than before, because the State Prosecution no longer provided indictments to public and because the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina adopted a Rulebook in March, restricting access to information.

As said at this meeting, a complaint about the violation of the Law on Access to Information, which AIS and the Balkans Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN, filed with the Human Rights Ombudsmen of Bosnia and Herzegovina, was in its final phase and the mentioned institution would announce its conclusion soon.

AIS participants said that they believed that the conclusion would be favourable for transparency and journalists and that the reporting from courtrooms in Bosnia and Herzegovina would be made easier.

AIS members said that, in case of need, they would file a suit with the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, pointing to insubstantiality of “the Rulebook on access to information under the control of the Court and cooperation with the community” of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina and “Instructions on anonymization of court decisions, audio/video recordings from trials and other informational material” adopted earlier this year, which limit access to war-crimes trials.

Considering the fact that these decisions fully anonymize verdicts for war crimes, AIS members have agreed to prepare an analysis, in the upcoming period, on how many verdicts have been pronounced during this year, which only contain initials, instead of full names of convicted persons, making it impossible to determine who the war crimes perpetrators are.

Also, AIS members have agreed to visit four local communities – Orasje, Brcko, Trebinje and Eastern Sarajevo, in the coming three months. Meetings between journalists and judicial institutions will be convened in those towns in order to discuss the anonymization of court decisions.

The meeting concluded that those meetings would be of great use, considering the fact that they would help improve the collaboration between entity judicial organizations and journalists and find out whether courts in Republika Srpska, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Brcko District intended to anonymize their decisions as well.

As agreed, the first meeting will be held in Orasje in late September this year. Besides representatives of judicial organizations from the Posavina area, representatives of courts and prosecutors’ offices from Tuzla Canton will be invited to attend.

A meeting with the media and judicial institutions from Brcko District will be convened in October, while similar meetings will be held in Trebinje and Eastern Sarajevo in November.

At the end of the year AIS, with the help from BIRN, will organize an annual conference to which representatives of state judicial institutions will be invited. The conference participants will exchange arguments about the anonymization and recommendations arising from the decision of the Ombudsmen of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

During the workshop held on October 30 this year it was concluded that journalists faced major problems as they were unable to obtain information about the work of the Basic Court of Brcko District and the Appellate Court of Brcko District.

Several recommendations were made with the aim of improving the existing co-operation. Journalists, as well as representatives of judicial institutions and police, agreed with those recommendations.

Journalists would like to see hearing schedules uploaded on the Court’s website, so they can be familiarize themselves with the timing and attend the hearings. Also, announcements issued by the Court should not be overloaded with legal terminology. Besides that, journalists request that second instance verdicts also be published on the website. 

Judicial institutions in Brcko have had to deal with the anonymization issue for nearly two years. Representatives of the Brcko District Prosecution have tried to solve the problem by revising the relevant legislation in an attempt to facilitate the work of both the media and prosecutors.

However, the initiative has not been a successful one. They had to conform to the rules set by the Agency for Protection of Personal Data, which stipulate that all official documents, including verdicts and indictments, can only mention initials of individual’s names, instead of the full first and last names of indictees and convicts, as well as other parties mentioned in them.  

Despite the anonymization, the Brcko District Prosecution says that the media can obtain indictments confirmed by the Court, so they could report more easily and know what charges are pressed against a certain person.

Additionally journalists pointed out that they also need copies of a second instance verdict – even though they contained initials only – particularly when they conducted  research or analysis.

The electronic media in Brcko face problems with obtaining audio or video recordings, because no possibility for obtaining them from judicial institutions exists.

The President of the Basic Court sometimes approves a request for recording at the beginning of the trial, but the recording can last for a couple of minutes only. Journalists say that, in most cases judges keep quiet while the cameras are in the courtroom. They point out that this causes problems from them, as they are not able to produce quality reports from judicial institutions. 

Journalists commended their co-operation with the police spokesperson, but they consider that police should hire “a professional” to make recordings during police operations, because the current recordings are most often not usable.

Representatives of judicial institutions consider that they need to be trained on the collaboration with the media. At the same time, journalists say that they require additional knowledge, given the fact that reporting on court processes is a specific field. Journalists point out that editors should be trained as well, because they frequently fail to understand some of the legal terms they use, so they replace them with incorrect terms while editing the articles. 

The workshop participants concluded that regular press conferences at which journalists could obtain information from judicial institutions or brief monthly meetings at which journalists could become familiarised with the results achieved in the judicial system should be held.

The workshop was attended by: Dragan Djukic, Edina Djogo, Branislav Ribar, Hakija Karic, Samir Beganovic, Halid Emkic, Zdravko Popovic, Mirsad Arnautovic, Admir Kadric, Rade Grbic, Novak Tanasic, Erna Mackic, Zlatan Music and Muamer Selimbegovic.

The meeting in Brcko is one in a series of meetings organized by BIRN BiH in collaboration with AIS in local communities throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina where war crimes are being processed. The meetings aim at improving collaboration between the media and judicial institutions, enabling objective and timely information to reach the general public.

Also, representatives of judicial institutions agree that they should increase their transparency, by announcing information even if the particular pieces of information have not been requested by the media.

Bojan Stevic, President of the District Court in Trebinje, said that no regular press conferences were held, but he had a yearly meeting with journalists, at which they could receive an explanation of certain issues of which they had not been previously aware.

Despite the good collaboration, Stevic points out that journalists and editors should be further educated in order to be able to report from courts in a correct, objective and professional manner.

The District Court in Trebinje does not have a spokesperson, but an information officer who decides whether certain pieces of information will be distributed or not. The Court President explains that a judge, who, at the same time, is President of the Crime Section, addressed journalists in most cases, because he is the one having most pieces of information that can be shared with the public.

Journalists admit that they often fail to follow a proceeding to its very end, which means that they lacked consistency in sharing information. Considering the fact that they claim to have very good collaboration with the spokesperson of the Safety Service Station in Trebinje, they say that the sharing of information about a certain case or proceeding usually ends at that point.

They think that this is caused by the fact that war-crimes trials should be followed by journalists working with public broadcasting stations, rather than those employed with commercial stations. However, they do admit that citizens are certainly interested in war crimes trials, as well as other trials closely related to their local communities.

When it comes to the District Prosecution in Trebinje, journalists point out that they can obtain limited information, but they are aware of the fact that the Prosecution is conducting investigations, which they do not want to undermine. Having all this in mind, they consider their co-operation with the Secretary, who also acts as an information officer, good.

The workshop in Trebinje was held on November 13 with the aim of increasing transparency of judicial institutions and responsibility of the media. The workshop was organized by the Balkans Investigative Reporting Network in collaboration with the Association of Court Reporters with support from Konrad Adenauer Stiftung.

The meeting held on November 20 this year concluded that the District Court in Eastern Sarajevo was ready to establish better co-operation with the media.

The meeting participants said that, in order to achieve better collaboration, it was necessary to educate representatives of the media and judicial institutions, so they would know what type of information they could share with the public and journalists would know how to convey the information in line with court, prosecutorial and journalistic codes of ethic.

In terms of the anonymisation of court documents and verdicts, the meeting participants agreed that it was not necessary to do it, particularly when it comes to verdicts, because the general public should know the first and last names of crime perpetrators with the aim of preventing such crimes from happening again.

As far as the District Court in Sarajevo is concerned, journalists can submit timely requests to the Court President, asking him to allow them to record hearings. These requests are very often approved, enabling journalists to have photographs from courtrooms.

Also, journalists can find public announcements about verdicts and similar documents on the webpage of this institution. The meeting participants agreed that those announcements should be published as soon as the verdicts have been pronounced, so media stations could convey them immediately.

Past co-operation between the media and judicial institutions deteriorated due to the negative experiences of judges and prosecutors from the Eastern Sarajevo area. So, the judges and prosecutors decided not to give interviews or statements to the electronic media, but to submit their responses in writing only.

Another reason for not giving statements to the media lies in the fact that the District Court in Eastern Sarajevo is not able to employ a spokesperson, because, as they say, no financial resources have been allocated for this purpose.

The Eastern Sarajevo Court says that the situation will probably not change in the coming years. Therefore, managers of judicial institutions should provide information to the media in order to ensure transparency of their institutions.

Representatives of the District Court in Eastern Sarajevo say that they are ready to change their practices, particularly those referring to grave crimes, but, at the same time, they expect journalists to prepare factual reports without twisting the facts and adding their personal opinions.

The workshop in Eastern Sarajevo is one in a series of workshops organized by BIRN BiH in collaboration with AIS throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina this year with the aim of increasing the transparency of judicial institutions and responsibility of the media.

The workshops have been organized with help from the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung.