This month:

• National jurisdictions
• International(ized) jurisdictions

National jurisdictions

Bosnia

• A wartime commander of the Bosnian Serb Army has been convicted for giving orders forcing non-Serb civilians to do hard labour and putting them in life-threatening situations on the front lines in besieged Sarajevo during wartime;
• A first instance decision was upheld sentencing a former member of the Croation Defence Council to one-and-a-half years in prison for the inhumane treatment of a Bosniak civilian;
• An indictment for further crimes against humanity at a detention center -amongst which the participation in the killing of 8 prisoners- was issued against a person already serving an 18 year prison sentence for related crimes against humanity.

Croatia

• A Serb was charged with committing war crimes. He is suspected of not taking the necessary actions to prevent killings and violence by his subordinates against the Croatian population. He is also suspected of encouraging deadly violence and cases of (attempted) rape;
• A former special forces policeman convicted of killing 13 unarmed Yugoslav Army soldiers is to hand over more than 350,000 euros to the state in reimbursement for compensation paid out to the victims’ families;
• A Serb paramilitary fighter was sentenced in absentia to 12 years in prison for committing a war crime by killing a female civilian and attempting to murder of her husband;
• Two elderly Serb commanders were charged with committing war crimes against civilians in Croatia. The commanders failed to prevent the killing of 35 civilians and the serious wounding of five others. Furthermore, great material damage was caused through the destruction of property.  One of them is also suspected of failing to prevent an attack at a holiday camp where refugees from the area had taken refuge.

France

• On 14 April 2021, a Rwandan priest living in France was arrested on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity committed during the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi.

Germany

A German citizen has been convicted for participating in a terrorist organization and other offenses, amongst which crimes against humanity. She was accused of joining the ISIS in Syria after traveling there with her daughter. In Syria, she married a high-ranking ISIS-member. The woman used a Yazidi slave -held by a friend- to work for her when her friend would visit her. Furthermore, she neglected her duties of care for a minor. She was sentenced to four years and three months in prison.

Netherlands

A Syrian citizen was convicted for membership of a terrorist organisation and war crimes committed against victims of the terrorist organisation.

Serbia

• A trial started against a Kosovo Albanian accused of participation in war crimes against civilians.  He is accused of involvement in the killing of seven people and burning and looting houses as a member of the Kosovo Liberation Army;
• A police reservist was convicted for committing a war crime against imprisonned civilians. He was sentenced to seven-and-a-half years in prison.

International(ized) jurisdictions

International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals

Hearings were concluded in the retrial case against Jovica Stanišić and Franko Simatović. In due course the court will schedule the pronouncement of the trial judgement. Both suspects remain on provisional release. Both man are charged – in their offical capacities- with having directed, organised, equipped, trained, armed, and financed special units which were involved in the commission of murder, persecution, deportation, and forcible transfer of non-Serb civilians from large areas of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina between 1991 and 1995. In first instance (2013) both man were acquitted, while in second instance this decision was quashed and a retrial was ordered.

Kosovo-tribunal

On 19 April, Pjetër Shala appeared  in the courtroom. He was arrested on 16 March by the Belgian authorities and transferred to The Hague on 15 April 2021, on the basis of a request by the Kosovo-Tribunal. He is held responsible, under various forms of individual criminal responsibility, for the war crimes of arbitrary detention, cruel treatment, torture and murder committed in the context of and associated with a non-international armed conflict in Kosovo (between 17 May 1999 and 5 June 1999) against persons detained at the Kukёs Metal Factory (Albania) allegedly used by the Kosovo Liberation Army.