The head of the SNSD caucus in Republika Srpska’s National Assembly, Željko Mirjanić, told press that the SNSD would “hold to account all those” responsible for violating the rights of war crimes defendants by inappropriately applying the BiH criminal code retroactively. The European Court of Human Rights ruled recently that such convictions under the criminal code, which was not in force at the time war crimes were committed, constituted a violation of human rights.
“We will hold to account the Court of BiH and its president Meddžida Kreso, as well as the judges who took part in it, and we will also demand that the HJPC take certain measures against them in line with its competence,” Mirjanić told reporters.
He emphasised that the SNSD will also demand a revision of such verdicts, and request that such practice be halted and the judgement of the European Court of Human Rights abided by even in the cases that have not been closed, in which the law is retroactively applied.
Since the publication of the ECHR judgement, the BiH Constitutional Court has overturned a dozen war crimes convictions and returned the cases to the BiH Court for retrial.
