The international human rights watchdog Amnesty International wants the European Union to exert pressure on Croatia so that it would remove omissions in the prosecution of war crimes and to take into consideration AI's remarks when deciding on the closing of policy chapters in Croatia's EU entry talks, AI's programme director for Europe and Central Asia, Nicola Duckworth, said in Brussels on Tuesday.
It is important that people in European institutions have complete information when making key decisions on when to close some policy areas, for example Chapter 23 (Judiciary and Fundamental Rights), in which we are particularly interested. We hope very much that those people will consider our recommendations when making important decisions, said Duckworth, who was heading an AI delegation on a visit to Brussels. The purpose of the visit was to acquaint EU officials involved in the accession talks with Croatia with the AI report "Behind A Wall of Silence: Prosecution of War Crimes in Croatia", released last December.
We know how much human rights are important to the European Union, the European Commission and the European Parliament, which have placed strong emphasis on human rights in various benchmarks for the closing of policy areas. We have come here to strongly advocate the removal of shortcomings in the Croatian legal system regarding the prosecution of war crimes, said Duckworth.
In its last report, released on December 9, AI called on Croatia to step up the prosecution of war crimes, underlining that the authorities have failed to open investigations into some high-level military and political officials even though there are publicly available court documents that could incriminate them.
"Despite the existence of publicly available information, including evidence from public court proceedings in Croatia, allegations against some high profile military and political officials have not been investigated," reads the report.
The Croatian Justice Ministry responded to the report, saying that AI was claiming without any verification or unbiased investigation, that allegations against some high-ranking military and political officials had not been investigated.
In its 19-page response, the Ministry described steps taken by the judicial authorities to prosecute war criminals in Croatia, dismissing AI's claims about omissions in that field.
European Commission officials declined to comment on the AI report. Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fuele's spokesperson Natasha Butler said on Tuesday that the EC was studying the document and that its opinion on the matter would be included in a report on the fulfilment of benchmarks for the closing of the Judiciary and Fundamental Rights chapter, to be released on March 11.
