IGK on the brutal attack on Osman Mehanović: The passive attitude of the Bratunac police is shameful

(Patria) - This, as well as a number of other attacks, is a result of the continuous denial of basic human rights and freedoms of returnees in the BiH entity of RS, states the Institute for Research of Genocide Canada, commenting on the attack on young Osman Mehanović in Bratunac.

"Anti-Bosnian policies of the political position and opposition in the BiH entity of RS, which are tolerated by the judicial bodies of BiH and the international community, are causing increasing fear, unrest, and distrust among returnees in the BiH entity of RS.

It is shameful, anti-civilizational, and dehumanizing that the Zvornik Police Administration did not report this incident in a timely manner. The passive attitude of the Bratunac police is shameful.

We consider the BiH Prosecutor's Office, which refuses to prosecute past murders and physical attacks on returnees, does not know or does not want to prosecute genocide deniers, crimes against humanity, and other war crimes in BiH, responsible for this and all other attacks on returnees in the smaller BiH entity of RS.

We warn that the passive attitude of the BiH Prosecutor's Office, with the full support of the deniers of the state of BiH and the denier of genocide, Milorad Dodik, and the indifferent attitude of the international community, gives perpetrators additional freedom to continue attacks on returnees in the BiH entity of RS freely and without fear of bearing any responsibility.

We have called on international officials in BiH: the UN, member states of the Peace Implementation Council (PIC), the EU, and the OSCE to visit returnees instead of verbally condemning attacks, and to act in accordance with the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and the 2007 UN Secretary-General's Action Plan.

We have called on the Government of Canada and the Canadian Ambassador to BiH, based in Budapest, to visit returnees in the smaller BiH entity of RS, and for Canada to request a special session of the Steering Board of the Peace Implementation Council dedicated to the dangerous endangerment of basic human rights and freedoms of returnees in the BiH entity of RS.

We call on the High Representative to use his powers to protect returnees.

We inform the world public that the attack on returnees is part of the regime's anti-Bosnian, anti-European, anti-civilizational policy in the BiH entity of RS, which is a continuation of the Greater Serbian nationalist policy of Slobodan Milošević and his followers in Serbia and BiH. We inform the world public that not a single murder, hundreds of physical attacks, thousands of verbal attacks on returnees, none have received a judicial epilogue, nor have the victims received any compensation for the damages suffered", the Institute's statement reads.