HISTORIC DECISIONS BY BANJA LIKA COURT

By Erna MACKIC: At the beginning of this month the District Court in Banja Luka rendered a second-instance verdict revoking the verdict handed down earlier in favour of the Islamic Community ordering payment of compensation for destroyed religious buildings. The reason given for overturning the verdict was that the suit had been filed too late. “The second-instance Court has invested much effort in explaining the lapse in this way. This is the shortcut for amnesty of Republika Srpska in a nice and generous way so it can avoid being held responsible,” said Esad Hrvacic, attorney of the Islamic Community in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in his statement to BIRN-Justice Report.

Within the next few days the Islamic Community of Bosnia and Herzegovina will file a request with the Supreme Court of Republika Srpska asking it to reconsider a verdict stating that Republika Srpska and the city of Banja Luka are not obliged to pay compensation for the destruction of 16 mosques.
At the beginning of this month the District Court in Banja Luka rendered a second-instance verdict revoking the verdict handed down earlier in favour of the Islamic Community ordering payment of compensation for destroyed religious buildings. The reason given for overturning the verdict was that the suit had been filed too late.
“The second-instance Court has invested much effort in explaining the lapse in this way. This is the shortcut for amnesty of Republika Srpska in a nice and generous way so it can avoid being held responsible,” said Esad Hrvacic, attorney of the Islamic Community in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in his statement to BIRN-Justice Report.
Andreas Riedlmayer, a US expert on the Ottoman cultural heritage in the Balkans, who has testified before the Hague Tribunal several times about the destruction of cultural and religious buildings in Bosnia and Herzegovina, said that all 16 Banja Luka mosques were destroyed in 1993, despite the fact that no military operations were conducted in the city.
“In most cases the destruction took place at night, during police curfew, while the Republika Srpka Army, VRS, and police forces patrolled the streets. In some cases, such as the Ferhadija or Arnaudija mosques, huge amounts of explosives were used for their destruction. After that, leading municipal authorities engaged in destroying the ruins and removing the construction material,” Riedlmayer said.

Deliberate Destruction of Religious Buildings
The exact number of cultural and religious buildings in Bosnia and Herzegovina that were destroyed has not been determined to date.
“If I was asked to assess how many mosques or mesdzids (small mosques, often without a minaret) were seriously damaged from 1992 to 1995, I would say more than 1,000, while the number of destroyed or damaged Catholic churches was almost 400,” Riedlmayer said, adding that most buildings were destroyed in the first year of the war.
He said that several tens of Orthodox churches were destroyed in the same year.
In 2000 the Islamic Community filed a suit with the District Court in Banja Luka over the destruction of mosques in that city. Seven years later the first, preparatory, hearing was held. This happened after the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina had rendered a decision ordering the Court to do so.
The compensation request, which was accepted by the District Court, was prepared on the basis of court experts’ findings. It was determined that the amount of KM 65.7 million was to be paid to the Islamic Community. One piece of evidence, presented by the Islamic Community in this case, was the fact that all the buildings were intentionally destroyed, i.e. either mined or set on fire between April and September 1993.
Representatives of Republika Srpska and Banja Luka town, who appeared at the hearings, said that the suit contained numerous disputable details, adding that the Islamic Community of Bosnia and Herzegovina had not proved that it was competent to participate in the case, because the case was managed by Vakufska Direkcija in Sarajevo (the directorate which manages the Islamic Community’s property).
Although the first-instance verdict was pronounced in favour of the Islamic Community, Republika Srpska filed an appeal with the District Court in Banja Luka, citing, among other things, the statute of limitations. The second-instance court accepted the appeal and revoked the first-instance verdict.

Ferhadija mosque was destroy by Serbian fascist at Maj 7. 1993

The Banja Luka Court said that the Islamic Community should have filed its suit between 1996, when the war stopped, and 1999, at the latest.
Despite the fact that the suit has been dismissed, Hrvacic said that both verdicts were “of historic significance” because they “confirm the responsibility of Republika Srpska”.
“It is undisputable that the second-instance court said that Republika Srpska is responsible for having failed to prevent the damage. It actually said that the body that did not prevent the damage from being made was responsible,” Hrvacic said.

Reconstruction for the Future
In his statement to BIRN-Justice Report, Hrvacic said he expected the Supreme Court to uphold the arguments made by the Islamic Community and “act in a proper way”. If this does not happen, he said he would file an appeal with the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“In case the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina refuses to consider our appeal, we shall go to the Human Rights Court in Strasbourg. Sadly, foreign institutions will be the force and the judicial instance which will decide on the justifiability of our suits,” Hrvacic said.
The Islamic Community said that, besides this suit, it is preparing a collective suit for all destroyed religious buildings on the territory of Republika Srpska and the whole of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“This suit can be used as a concept by all people whose property was destroyed for no reason. The army came to Eastern Bosnia and set everything on fire. The same thing happened in Serb villages where the Army of Bosnia and Herzegovina came, as well as in areas that were controlled by Croat forces,” Hrvacic said.
Riedlmayer said the destruction of cultural and religious buildings was done in stages. He said that it began before the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, adding that members of the Yugoslav National Army, JNA, who went to battlefields in Croatia in the autumn of 1991, destroyed some buildings.
“Most destructions of cultural and religious buildings happened in the first six months of the war. For instance, all the mosques in Foca, Cajnice, Visegrad, Prijedor and Bosanska Krajina, Zvornik, Bratunac, Gacko, Bileca, Doboj, Rogatica and so on,” Riedlmayer said, adding that most Roman Catholic churches and monasteries were destroyed in those regions as well.
The US expert said the reconstruction of destroyed buildings is of extreme importance, because, among other things, it helps the return process. A rebuilt religious building, Riedlmayer said, means “connecting the local community together, by creating a place where they can pray for loved ones who were lost, and socialize with each other in order to support each other, celebrate holidays, teach their children and make plans for the future.”
Erna Mackic is a BIRN – Justice Report journalist. [email protected] Justice Report is an online BIRN weekly publication.