Helsinki Committee publishes a monthly magazine in 3000 copies which covers all the issues we work on. It has become a valuable way of communication with different with different groups of population from refugees to minorities and individuals facing legal and other problems.
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Keywords: Serbia;rights and freedoms; minorities; round-table; multicultural; cohabitation; autonomy;
In view of the key importance of inter-ethnic relations and status of national minorities in Serbia for development of democracy, Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia, Centre for Regionalism, the Vojvodina Club and Centre for Multiculturality have organised the round-table "National Minorities in Serbia" on 8 and 9 September 2000 in Novi Sad. Participants in this round-table were representatives of several dozen NGOs from Vojvodina and Serbia, representatives of political parties, prominent public personalities and experts for minority rights and ethnic relations. In a two-day debate participants in the round-table underscored that peace, tolerance and democratization of the society represent the basic prerequisite of the exercise of individual and collective rights and freedoms in the Republic of Serbia. Considering that a social community in the Republic of Serbia has a markedly heterogeneous cultural character and the fact that it is faced with pronounced ethnification of politics and intolerant nationalism, our discussion confirmed that the majority nation, that is, the ruling political establishment, were to be blamed for such a poor status of inter-ethnic relations. Hence the current political authorities cannot be relieved of responsibility from catastrophic consequences of internal conflicts and external and internal isolation. After analysing institutions and real social and political processes and actions of the most influential political protagonists, it was established that we all must insist on comprehensive implementation of ideas and legal-constitutional norms determining the Republic of Serbia as a state of equitable citizens, and the one guaranteeing corresponding standards in attainment and exercise of collective rights of national minorities in Serbia. Unfortunately during our discussion we identified through a host of examples a pronounced gulf between proclaimed norms and concrete reality in the sphere of protection of national minorities rights, notably in development and expression of their cultural identity. After the SFRY disintegration, the problem of "new minorities", notably Croats, Bosniaks, and Macedonians, emerged in Serbia. This problem entails official recognition of those minorities and concrete legal regulation of their status and rights. During preparations for the 2001 census scientific and cultural institutions and representative bodies should lay the groundwork for facilitating the free declaration of nationality by citizens. This particularly applies to Bosniaks, who have been deprived of that right to date. It is also expected that the democratic opposition of Serbia shall take a clear public stand on manner of resolution of minority problems, and incorporate pertinent proposals into their program of changes, offered as an alternative to the current regime. We brought into prominence the need to revive earlier initiatives for adoption of the Act on National Minorities in the Republic of Serbia, aimed at removing current shortcomings and imprecise points, and boosting harmonisation of domestic legal and political practice with the European standards on the Protection of Minorities. Our discussion indicated that the Republic Serbia in its relations with almost all neighbouring countries disregards the issue of minorities, and that this negligence is in turn reflected in the status of minorities and has a negative impact on relations between the majority and minorities. The role of ecological issues was discussed in the context of good-neighbourly relations, for they alike the minority issue clear the way for establishment of broad and efficient communications. Considering regional trends within the context of Europe those two issues can play an important role in the inclusion of Serbia in the project of European regions. Participants think that the Stability Pact is a conceptual framework for analysis of the most important problems and devising models of their resolution.
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Keywords: legal responsibility; authoritarianism; past; rule of law; Serbia; regime; personal data; protection; exceptions; state security service; legal system;
Societies in whose present time the authoritarian past is still a socially relevant thing may be placed in two opposing manners in front of this morally, politically and legally compromising past: there is a distinct difference between the policy of coping with the past and the policy of non coping with the past. In German, the only language with a specific expression for the complex phenomenon of the former, for ‘cope with’ the past (Vergangenheitsbewältigung), one can also use the synonym Vergangenheitsaufarbeitung. However, ‘to cope with’ is a bet-ter expression. The expression, as well as ‘to prevail over’ the past and ‘to get control over’ the past – indicates more clearly that at issue is a process by which the past is dealt with: to im- pose over, to get control over the past that imposed over us, and it would impose over us again, if we do not impose over it. The extreme patterns of the reactions to the authoritarian past by which it cannot be prevailed are on one side retaliation and pure vendetta and on the other side the 'as-if-nothing-has-happened' pattern: closing your eyes before the authoritarian past. By neither method, it must be emphasized, can the past be prevailed over. Retaliation is an authoritarian fight with the authoritarian past, but not the prevailing over it. Fire cannot be fought with fire here. The authoritarian fight with the past, even if it was authoritarian, is just a repetition, but with the opposite roles.
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Keywords: Serbia; constitution; constitutionality; political society; politics; law; violation of constitution; legal act; constitutional Court; president of the Republic; human rights;
U knjizi SRBIJA IZME ĐU USTAVA I USTAVNOSTI iznela sam svoj pogled na ustavno pitanje u Srbiji. Srbija je jedina među zemljama koje su pošle putem evropske integracije, koja nije izmenila temeljni akt koji definiše osnovne vrednosti na kojima počiva politička zajednica, nije izmenila Ustav koji simbolizuje režim autoritarne vladavine. Šta je tome razlog i zašto Srbija toliko dugo traga za svojim ustavnim identitetom? Koje prepreke stoje na putu uspostavljanja ustavne države u Srbiji? Odgovor na ova pitanja već dugo vremena s pravom očekuju građani i građanke Srbije. Kao građanka Srbije i sama sam želela da saznam odgovor na ta pitanja. Profesija kojom se bavim i uža oblast mog naučnog interesovanja obavezivali su me da i sama pokušam da na neka od pitanja odgovorim. Ova knjiga ilustruje moja traganja za odgovorima. Da li sam u tome uspela i u kojoj meri, ostavljam čitaocima ove knjige da prosude sami. Kontinuirano sam pratila ustavni proces u Srbiji, posebno ustavne kontroverze koje prate ovaj proces. Sudelovala sam aktivno u tom procesu, prvenstveno na profesionalnom planu, na stručnim raspravama, ali i u široj javnosti.
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Keywords: Vojvodina; identity; ethnic group; minority; human rights; multi-ethnicity; politics; protection of minorities; multi-culture;
(Serbian edition) Isticanje etničkog pluralizma Vojvodine predstavlja opšte mesto u retorici pokrajinskih političara, medija i predstavnika civilnog društva. Činjenica da na području Vojvodine žive pripadnici velikog broja nacionalnih manjina u toj se retorici uzdiže kao prednost i vojvođanska vrednost. Ovo naglašavanje višeetničnosti nije slučajno. Tokom raspada bivše Jugoslavije, multietnički karakter vojvođanskog društva često je bio na udaru. U sudaru sa heterogenom prirodom društva, novi politički ideal - nacionalna država - vrlo brzo je oslobodio svoje destruktivne potencijale. Nacionalistička histerija, nasilje, reduciranje prava i omalovažavanje vodile su marginalizaciji i izolaciji manjina, njihovom zatvaranju u uske granice vlastite etničke grupe, povlačenju iz sfere javnosti, iseljavanju u matične, odnosno treće države. Nakon 5. oktobra 2000. godine učinjeni su stanoviti pomaci u saniranju posledica Miloševićevog režima. Ti su pomaci, međutim, bili i ostali polovični. Donet je, recimo, zakon o Zaštiti prava i sloboda nacionalnih manjina, ali ne i zakon o načinu izbora i nadležnostima nacionalnih saveta. Na nivou republike i pokrajine formirani su, nakon zaoštravanja međuetničkih odnosa u Vojvodini, saveti za nacionalne manjine, ali oni, lišeni bilo kakvog realnog uticaja, vegetiraju pretvoreni u fasadne institucije. Spremnost države da se obračuna sa govorom mržnje i etnički motivisanim napadima je, najčešće, izostajala, što je kod manjina stvorilo utisak o selektivnoj primeni krivičnih paragrafa. Kampanja koju je, u cilju protežiranja tolerancije, svojevremeno vodilo Ministarstvo za ljudska i manjinska prava završila je neuspehom. Ni sadašnji projekat koji sprovodi Pokrajinski sekretarijat za upravu, propise i nacionalne manjine, neće uspeti ako njegovi napori na afirmisanju tolerancije i multikulturalizma ne budu snažno podržani od strane važnih društvenih podsistema.
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Keywords: Sandžak; European perspective; politics; marginalization; ethnic minority; Islam; Muslims; identity; integration; society; discrimination;
Sandžak, deo Srbije na tromeđi sa Bosnom i Crnom Gorom, gde živi najveći deo bošnjačke manjine u Srbiji, više od dve decenije je na udaru državne represivne politike u cilju marginalizacije te manjine. Odnos prema islamu i Muslimanima u Jugoslaviji počeo je da se zaoštrava i dobija neprijateljski prizvuk još osamdesetih godina prošlog veka, kada srpska elita pokreće kampanju protiv Muslimana i iznosi tezu o „islamskom fundamentalizmu koji preti da uništi Jugoslaviju“. To je bila priprema za genocid u Bosni, čije su posledice osetili i Bošnjaci u Sandžaku. Odnos prema muslimanima nije se suštinski promenio, ali se pod pritiskom evropskih organizacija kao što su Savet Evrope, OEBS i EU, država uzdržava od otvorene represije. Međutim, sada primenjuje druge metode poput kriminalizacije pojedinaca ili grupa (vehabije), ali pre svega, konstantnim podrivanjem Islamske zajednice (IZ) kao jedine institucije koju Bošnjaci imaju i koja je inače, od ključnog značaja za njihov identitet. Značaj Islamske zajednice za Bošnjake je izraz potrebe za religijom koja doprinosi jačanju vlastitiog identiteta i doprinosi integraciji društva. Potreba za jačanjem identiteta je i razumljiv odgovor na dugogodišnju diskriminaciju i „nevidljivost“, kao i policijski teror, otmice i likvidacije tokom rata u Bosni. Islamska zajednica je takođe, ključna identitetska matrica za bošnjačku zajednicu u odsustvu drugih institucija. Zbog toga je i bila na udaru Beograda i beogradskih „službi“, sa ciljem da se temeljno destabilizuje. To je dovelo do cepanja Islamske zajednice i podizanje tenzije unutar bošnjačke zajednice što može, ako bude potrebno, da se brzo pretvori u kriznu tačku.
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Keywords: extremism; social evil; anti-fascism; Serbia; woman; politics; crime; hatred; law; minority; radicalization; hooliganism; social norms;
Pojava ekstremne desnice i desničarske ideologije u Srbiji posledica su strukturalnih promena nakon razgradnje socijalističke države. Ratovi devedestih vođenih sa idejom o prekomponovanju Balkana, odnosno s idejom o Velikoj Srbiji (Memorandumu Srpske akademije nauka i umetnosti, 1986), samo su jedan od ideoloških osnova na kojima još uvek opstaje desna misao. Njene osnovne karakteristike jesu: etnička homogenizacija, težnja za stapanjem državnih i etničkih granica, antikomunizam i negiranje antifašizma, jačanje tradicionalizma i autoritarnosti, pravoslavlje tretirano kao superiorna religija u odnosu na ostale etničke i religijske grupe (posebno Hrvate, Muslimane i Albance), otpor idejama multikulturalizma i kosmopolitizma i netrpeljivost prema “novim” (LGBT popuacija) i tradicionalnim manjinama (Romi). Zajedničko svim desničarskim pokretima koji se pozivaju na ekstremni srpski nacionalizam i fundamentalističke interpretacije pravoslavlja, odnosno svetosavlja, jeste i izrazita islamofobija i neprijateljski stav prema svemu što je islamsko.
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Keywords: mental health; human dignity; human rights; Serbia; psychiatry; mental illness; law; de-institutionalization; disability; NGO;
This collection of papers broaches some of the biggest stumbling blocs in the way of mental health reform and effective deinstitutionalization in the Republic of Serbia Analyses, opinions and recommendations presented in it refl ect the years-long advocacy by several non-governmental organizations and independent experts for mental health reform and transformation from institutional to community-based care. This is about a long-term campaign of committed individuals, organizations and associations for gradual shutdown of residential institutions catering for psychiatric patients, and children and adults with mental disabilities, and, moreover, for dignifi ed lives of and equal opportunities for these most vulnerable groups of population.
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Keywords: Serbia; Montenegro; Sandžak; youth; Islamic extremism; Wahhabis; religious radicals; opinion poll;
The crucial question here is: Are the Muslim youth in Sandžak imbued with religious extremism or not? Hardly any interethnic and inter-religious incident has been registered in this part of the Republic of Serbia. On the other hand, fighters from Sandžak are being involved in the Iraqi and Syrian wars. Depending on the answer to the question above, the authorities could take appropriate actions aiming at young people in Sandžak. Both domestic and international stakeholders – and there are many of them, including the non-governmental sector – could develop plans and take a variety of concrete steps depending on the answer to this very question. Fahrudin Kladničanin wrote about the influence of Wahhabi Islamic extremism on the youth in Sandžak: “Wahhabis are usually focused on recruiting young people 19 – 27 years old with little education, who are poor and often come from dysfunctional families. The youth are being indoctrinated in private places of worship (masjids), which are either rented or owned by Wahhabis, and in certain religious objects (mosques) whose imams support Wahhabi teaching, and prayers in these mosques are always led by Wahhabis. (Kladničanin, 2013: 130) Marija Radoman analyzed the reasons driving young people in Serbia towards extremist ideologies. Two citations from an earlier research of the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia will thus be mentioned: „Regarding the period after 2000, surveys show that the family remains the mainstay of its young members, that young people’s life patterns lack individualization, and that they normatively accept the traditional sequence of events in a person’s life (i.e. completion of education, getting a job, entry into marriage and only then having children). What intrigues me is the sphere of influence between the respondents to this survey and their families. I tried all the time to keep a picture in my head of the families in which they grew up. I wanted to find out whether the respondents’ attitudes would reflect that background, which is hardly bright and optimistic, or whether the differences would be more than conspicuous.” (Radoman, 2011: 12). Family is the primary mechanism by which extremism is interiorized. However, it is not a cause, given that the changes stemming from structural circumstances also occurred within the family. Radoman wrote that “Today’s efforts to establish a stable democratic society in Serbia are being sabotaged, conditionally speaking, by the second generation of the nationalist current (i.e. by the circles close to the Serbian Orthodox Church, the remaining appointees of political parties who served the Milošević regime and members of Russophile conservative options, notably the Democratic Party of Serbia and New Serbia, but also the Serbian Progressive Party), as well as by the extreme right-wing reactionary Russophiles, i.e. the Serbian Radical Party. The efforts to establish a democracy are also hindered by the economic crisis.” (Ibid: 10) The analysis is based on the survey the Helsinki Committee conducted with the youth in Sandžak in May 2016. The focus was on their attitude towards religious extremism, whereas the goal to contextualize the findings: to see how to recognize and understand Islamic extremism and what could be done – preventively and concretely – considering the factors that have influenced the Sandžak youth. No doubt, interviewees’ attitudes towards extremism – or their everyday experience – differ from theoretical considerations of the phenomenon. The very notion of extremism is indisputable. In 2013 I wrote that mainstream social forces of individual societies were arbitrarily determining the notion of extremism. Official codification of political extremism and radicalism make it possible for governments and other political factors to place all those opposing the values such as equality, freedom, democracy, rule of law, etc. under control or control those advocating these values in the manner that contradicts a government’s interests. On the other hand, radicalism (or extremism) gauged by “political correctness” is being determined, as a rule, by the manner or scope in which a certain value is considered either unquestionable or unacceptable. And in all this, decision makers and the majority of population need not see eye to eye. For instance, according to many opinion polls, the majority of Serbia’s population discriminates sexual minorities, national minorities, some religious minorities and, especially fenced off communities such as Roma. By the standards of political correctness decision-makers term such stands – notwithstanding its predominance – extremist and “expel” them from media space. Extremism is deep-rooted in social structures. “The emergence of extreme right-wing and rightist ideology in Serbia derive from structural changes following on the disintegration of the socialist state. The 1990s wars, inspired by the idea of recomposition of the Balkans – or the Greater Serbia idea – are only one of many ideological bases on which the right-wing thought still lives; and its basic characteristics are: ethnic homogenization, wish to have ethnic and state borders ‘merged,’ anticommunism and denial of antifascism, the growingly stronger traditionalism and authoritarianism, the Eastern Orthodoxy seen as superior to other religions and ethnic groups (especially Croats, Muslims and Albanians), resistance to multiculturalism and cosmopolitanism, and intolerance of ‘new’ (LGBT population) and traditional minorities (Roma),” writes Sonja Biserko in 2014. To what extent is Islamic, religious extremism spread in Sandžak? In June 2015 in Novi Pazar Snežana Ilić quoted the ICG report “Serb Sandžak still Forgotten” saying that there were some 300 Wahhabis in Sandžak who were not exactly organized, that only some 50 of them were active, but the movement was spreading anyway. According to the said report, Wahhabism emerged in Sandžak in 1997, triggered off by an imam wanting his believers in a mosque to pray in a different way. The believers had opposed the imam and sent him away. However, over the past couple of years Wahhabis have better organized themselves in Sandžak, while getting more and more funds from abroad for their movement. Many of them were going to work in Vienna; apparently to be recruited in a way, since they dressed and behaved like true Wahhabis once back home. Snežana Ilić believes that the highest authorities of the Islamic Community in Serbia have been using Wahhabis in several ways. For instance, they have been presenting themselves internationally as someone capable of controlling Bosniaks’ religious radicalism by the principle of Islamic legitimacy. The message they have been putting across to Western diplomats and governments runs, “Give us a free hand, we must advocate Islamization of the society as that is the only way of keeping religious radicals under control.”
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Keywords: Serbia; Montenegro; Sandžak; youth; Islamic extremism; Wahhabis; religious radicals; opinion poll;
(Serbian edition) The crucial question here is: Are the Muslim youth in Sandžak imbued with religious extremism or not? Hardly any interethnic and inter-religious incident has been registered in this part of the Republic of Serbia. On the other hand, fighters from Sandžak are being involved in the Iraqi and Syrian wars. Depending on the answer to the question above, the authorities could take appropriate actions aiming at young people in Sandžak. Both domestic and international stakeholders – and there are many of them, including the non-governmental sector – could develop plans and take a variety of concrete steps depending on the answer to this very question. Fahrudin Kladničanin wrote about the influence of Wahhabi Islamic extremism on the youth in Sandžak: “Wahhabis are usually focused on recruiting young people 19 – 27 years old with little education, who are poor and often come from dysfunctional families. The youth are being indoctrinated in private places of worship (masjids), which are either rented or owned by Wahhabis, and in certain religious objects (mosques) whose imams support Wahhabi teaching, and prayers in these mosques are always led by Wahhabis. (Kladničanin, 2013: 130) Marija Radoman analyzed the reasons driving young people in Serbia towards extremist ideologies. Two citations from an earlier research of the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia will thus be mentioned: „Regarding the period after 2000, surveys show that the family remains the mainstay of its young members, that young people’s life patterns lack individualization, and that they normatively accept the traditional sequence of events in a person’s life (i.e. completion of education, getting a job, entry into marriage and only then having children). What intrigues me is the sphere of influence between the respondents to this survey and their families. I tried all the time to keep a picture in my head of the families in which they grew up. I wanted to find out whether the respondents’ attitudes would reflect that background, which is hardly bright and optimistic, or whether the differences would be more than conspicuous.” (Radoman, 2011: 12). Family is the primary mechanism by which extremism is interiorized. However, it is not a cause, given that the changes stemming from structural circumstances also occurred within the family. Radoman wrote that “Today’s efforts to establish a stable democratic society in Serbia are being sabotaged, conditionally speaking, by the second generation of the nationalist current (i.e. by the circles close to the Serbian Orthodox Church, the remaining appointees of political parties who served the Milošević regime and members of Russophile conservative options, notably the Democratic Party of Serbia and New Serbia, but also the Serbian Progressive Party), as well as by the extreme right-wing reactionary Russophiles, i.e. the Serbian Radical Party. The efforts to establish a democracy are also hindered by the economic crisis.” (Ibid: 10) The analysis is based on the survey the Helsinki Committee conducted with the youth in Sandžak in May 2016. The focus was on their attitude towards religious extremism, whereas the goal to contextualize the findings: to see how to recognize and understand Islamic extremism and what could be done – preventively and concretely – considering the factors that have influenced the Sandžak youth. No doubt, interviewees’ attitudes towards extremism – or their everyday experience – differ from theoretical considerations of the phenomenon. The very notion of extremism is indisputable. In 2013 I wrote that mainstream social forces of individual societies were arbitrarily determining the notion of extremism. Official codification of political extremism and radicalism make it possible for governments and other political factors to place all those opposing the values such as equality, freedom, democracy, rule of law, etc. under control or control those advocating these values in the manner that contradicts a government’s interests. On the other hand, radicalism (or extremism) gauged by “political correctness” is being determined, as a rule, by the manner or scope in which a certain value is considered either unquestionable or unacceptable. And in all this, decision makers and the majority of population need not see eye to eye. For instance, according to many opinion polls, the majority of Serbia’s population discriminates sexual minorities, national minorities, some religious minorities and, especially fenced off communities such as Roma. By the standards of political correctness decision-makers term such stands – notwithstanding its predominance – extremist and “expel” them from media space. Extremism is deep-rooted in social structures. “The emergence of extreme right-wing and rightist ideology in Serbia derive from structural changes following on the disintegration of the socialist state. The 1990s wars, inspired by the idea of recomposition of the Balkans – or the Greater Serbia idea – are only one of many ideological bases on which the right-wing thought still lives; and its basic characteristics are: ethnic homogenization, wish to have ethnic and state borders ‘merged,’ anticommunism and denial of antifascism, the growingly stronger traditionalism and authoritarianism, the Eastern Orthodoxy seen as superior to other religions and ethnic groups (especially Croats, Muslims and Albanians), resistance to multiculturalism and cosmopolitanism, and intolerance of ‘new’ (LGBT population) and traditional minorities (Roma),” writes Sonja Biserko in 2014. To what extent is Islamic, religious extremism spread in Sandžak? In June 2015 in Novi Pazar Snežana Ilić quoted the ICG report “Serb Sandžak still Forgotten” saying that there were some 300 Wahhabis in Sandžak who were not exactly organized, that only some 50 of them were active, but the movement was spreading anyway. According to the said report, Wahhabism emerged in Sandžak in 1997, triggered off by an imam wanting his believers in a mosque to pray in a different way. The believers had opposed the imam and sent him away. However, over the past couple of years Wahhabis have better organized themselves in Sandžak, while getting more and more funds from abroad for their movement. Many of them were going to work in Vienna; apparently to be recruited in a way, since they dressed and behaved like true Wahhabis once back home. Snežana Ilić believes that the highest authorities of the Islamic Community in Serbia have been using Wahhabis in several ways. For instance, they have been presenting themselves internationally as someone capable of controlling Bosniaks’ religious radicalism by the principle of Islamic legitimacy. The message they have been putting across to Western diplomats and governments runs, “Give us a free hand, we must advocate Islamization of the society as that is the only way of keeping religious radicals under control.”
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