The Constitution of Serbia stipulates that a foreigner can be expelled only where he is not threatened with persecution. But it is not respected
Case Andrej Gnjot, Belarusian journalist, director and oppositionist activist who is under house arrest in Belgrade awaiting the final decision of Serbia on extradition to Belarus, once again brought up the question of who Serbia is ready to deliver.
The latest available data, published by the Belgrade Center for Human Rights, say that from the beginning of 2017 to the end of 2021, 563 extradition proceedings were initiated before the higher courts in Serbia.
Until mid-May 2022, when requests for access to information of public importance were requested from higher courts for anonymized copies of extradition case files for the needs of analysis by the Belgrade Center for Human Rights, 528 extradition proceedings initiated from the beginning of 2017 to the end of 2021 were legally binding. completed, and only 35 remained unfinished until that moment.
Out of the total number of completed procedures, 125 did not result in extradition due to various reasons, such as court findings that there were no prerequisites for extradition, due to decisions of the Minister of Justice not to allow extradition, due to withdrawal of extradition requests and suspension of extradition proceedings, and in 17 cases, extradition was postponed in accordance with the Law on International Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters.
In the largest number of analyzed cases, the question of the prohibition of return, the so-called principle non-refoulement was not even set.
principle non-refoulement is a basic principle of international law established in the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees which prohibits a country from deporting (refoulement) any person to any country where his life or freedom would be threatened because of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion .
Photo: Fonet / Ivana SanjevićAndrej Gnjot before the Serbian court
Cases in which Serbia was wrong
However, two cases of extradition, due to which the United Nations Committee against Torture declared Serbia responsible for violating the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Punishments or Procedures, show that Serbia could also violate the Convention in the case of Andrej Gnjot.
The first case is the extradition of Kurdish political activist Cevdet Ayaz to Turkey in December 2017.
In its decision, the Committee found that the authorities responsible for the implementation of the asylum procedure and the extradition procedure violated the Convention, because when deciding, they did not examine the existence of the risk of ill-treatment in the case of extradition of Ajaz to Turkey. A whole series of irregularities in the work of the authorities responsible for the implementation of the extradition procedure were established, which led to the violation of the principle of principle non-refoulement.
The second case is from January 2022, and it is an even more dramatic example of human rights violations, when Serbia extradited a citizen of that country to Bahrain.
despite the temporary measure imposed by the European Court of Human Rights for that extradition procedure.
That citizen of Bahrain has been in extradition custody in Serbia since November 2021 and has expressed his intention to seek asylum in Serbia, claiming that he is at risk of torture, political and religious persecution in Bahrain.
The authorities in Serbia were aware of the current circumstances regarding the state of human rights in Bahrain, that is, that the regime in that country often violates the political rights and civil liberties of the Shia population, to which the man whose extradition was decided in the proceedings belonged.
Despite the temporary measure of the European Court of Human Rights, which requested the competent authorities in Serbia to refrain from extradition until the end of the asylum procedure, Serbia extradited that man, and as in the case of Ajaz, violated not only the temporary measure, but also a series of of confirmed international treaties and rules of customary international law.
The Constitution of Serbia also protects the human rights of foreigners
The Constitution of Serbia stipulates that a foreigner can be expelled only on the basis of the decision of the competent authority, in the law
provided for the procedure and if he is provided with the right to appeal, and only where he is not threatened with persecution because of his race, gender, religion, nationality,
citizenship, belonging to a certain social group, political opinion or where he is not threatened by a serious violation of the rights guaranteed by the Constitution.
The Constitution also guarantees that a foreigner who has a well-founded fear of persecution because of his race, gender, language, religion, nationality or belonging to a group or because of his political beliefs has the right to asylum in Serbia.
Photo: Pexels/MADDOG Video CreationsCourts in Serbia very often uncritically accept the diplomatic guarantees of the country requesting extradition
Asylum seeking procedures are too long
Vladica Ilić from the Belgrade Center for Human Rights tells "Vreme" that when someone requests asylum in Serbia, the extradition procedure should not be completed before the final conclusion of the asylum procedure.
He recalls that in Serbia there were cases where people were extradited, but they went through the process of seeking asylum, which was not completed.
Ilić points out that the problem is that the procedure for seeking asylum often takes a long time, so our authorities need several months - sometimes longer than a year - to make a decision.
If the asylum request is rejected, the asylum seeker can file an appeal with the Asylum Commission, which also takes months to decide on appeals.
If the asylum seeker is not satisfied with the decision of the Commission, he can file a complaint with the Administrative Court, and in that court the cases remain unresolved for several years.
On the other hand, the extradition procedure takes place much faster, because there is a maximum period during which the state can keep a person in so-called extradition detention.
"That is why it would be logical that the procedure for seeking asylum in such cases should be conducted with particular urgency, but that this should not be at the expense of the thoroughness and fairness of the procedure, and this should be appropriately resolved by law," says Ilić.
Obligations of domestic courts
He points out that, when people appear before them who claim that they are at risk of torture, persecution or the death penalty in the country that is seeking their extradition, the courts should teach these people about the right to request asylum and how they can exercise that right. come true.
Courts should state in the minutes of the hearing that the person has expressed his intention to seek asylum or that he has already submitted an asylum request.
In addition, the courts should also ascertain whether such a person enjoys refugee status somewhere.
"It is forbidden to extradite someone to a country where he is at risk of torture, persecution and the death penalty, and for that reason, that principle should be an obligation, not just a recommendation, for the authorities in Serbia that participate in the extradition procedure," says Ilić.
Photo: Pexels/Harry SheltonOn the psychological level, judges believe that the final responsibility for a decision on extradition lies in the hands of the minister
Uncritical acceptance of guarantees
He notes that the courts in Serbia very often uncritically accept the diplomatic guarantees of the country requesting extradition.
"Imagine a country where the death penalty is widely used for a crime, or there is a widespread practice of torture against convicts, or a situation where all those convicted of serious crimes are held in prisons where the conditions are very bad and so on, and you have a request for extradition some person who fits such a profile. Then the country requesting extradition states that in the case of the one whose extradition it is requesting, it will respect human rights or not execute the death penalty on him. The basic question is whether you can rely on the given diplomatic guarantees," says Ilić.
He points out that diplomatic guarantees should not automatically be considered sufficient, just because the country requesting extradition has promised so.
"If you have a situation where extradition is requested by a state that in earlier cases violated the given guarantees or a state that massively violates human rights, then there is reason to suspect that that state will not respect the guarantees it gave in the extradition procedure," says Ilić.
He says that the courts in Serbia act incorrectly in extradition proceedings insofar as they apply the wrong evidentiary standards.
"When a country requests the extradition of a person accused of a criminal offense, and that person claims that in that country, for example, they will be subjected to torture, then it does not have to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the person will be subjected to torture." It is sufficient and necessary to point out the facts that indicate a serious suspicion or risk of this happening. If there is a serious risk, it is enough for the court to refuse extradition based on the principle of non-refoulement (non-refoulement)", says Ilić.
Insufficiently sensitized judges
He points out that judges in Serbia are primarily not sufficiently sensitized to human rights issues, and that the question is how well all judges who work in extradition proceedings know international standards in the field of human rights, how well they know the rules related to the prohibition of torture and the like.
"I have the impression that there is a kind of diffusion of responsibility, because after the court the Minister of Justice has to make the final decision on extradition, so psychologically the judges believe that the final responsibility for a decision on extradition is in the hands of the minister." There is no accountability either. If a judge, after making a decision on extradition that is clearly wrong due to human rights violations, would suffer some consequences, maybe that would bring about some changes," says Ilić.
He concludes that in matters of assessment it is certainly possible that the court can make a mistake, but that sometimes things are quite clear, and that sometimes the obvious cannot be overlooked.
What is happening in the country and the world, what is in the newspapers and how to pass the time?
Every Wednesday at noon In between arrives by email. It's a pretty solid newsletter, so sign up!
Aleksandar Vučić commented on bot attacks on social networks and the case of an attack on the account of the weekly "Vreme" in the Albatros news podcast. And lied
Andrej Premović, a student at the Faculty of Computing from Raška, had his house searched by the police because of the website ocisti.net, which records more than 32.000 accounts of alleged SNS bots. Who is the young man who is suspected of exposing the illegal activities of the progressives
KRIK reveals that SNS official Uglješa Mrdić bought two apartments with a total value of around 170.000 euros in the middle of the year. Previously, he did not own any real estate. He did not take out a loan
CINS announced that in the construction of the residential complex for Expo 2027 in Surčin, failures were observed which, according to experts, could have led to a collapse. The building directorate claims that the changes were approved by an independent inspection and the construction professors claim that the slab is still unsafe
Prosecution offices in Serbia will have to form cases based on reports of criminal offenses against electoral rights within 24 hours and start the first actions within the next 48 hours, according to the instructions of the Supreme Prosecutor Zagorka Dolovac
There is, literally, no difference between the one who claims it is day in the middle of the night, or the one who claims to be a giraffe, from the claims we read on billboards: that Vučić is working to unify Serbs and that Serbia is doing better and better day by day.
The pre-election arrests due to the alleged "overthrow of the state" testify to the regime's panic. The bad news for them is - they can't arrest the whole people who decided to defend themselves from progressive beatings and election theft
The ring that tightens around Ćaciland Student list is getting narrower. Because there are more and more spoiled people who see the false prophet for what he is: a street obscener who is fighting Serbia
The archive of the weekly Vreme includes all our digital editions, since the very beginning of our work. All issues can be downloaded in PDF format, by purchasing the digital edition, or you can read all available texts from the selected issue.
