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TITLE: SERBIA/MONTENEGRO HUMAN RIGHTS PRACTICES, 1993
DATE: JANUARY 31, 1994
AUTHOR: U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
SERBIA/MONTENEGRO*
Serbia and Montenegro, two of the constituent republics of the
former Yugoslavia, proclaimed the establishment of the "Federal
Republic of Yugoslavia" in 1992. The United Nations and the
Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), as
well as the international community, rejected the "FRY's" claim
to be the sole successor to the former Yugoslavia and suspended
Yugoslav participation in their organizations.
Serbia/Montenegro's formal federal governmental structure is
subsumed under an authoritarian state apparatus controlled by
Slobodan Milosevic, reelected for a second 5-year term as
President of the Serbian Republic in a December 1992 election
that was judged by CSCE observers to have been neither free nor
fair. He dominates the political scene through his Socialist
Party of Serbia (SPS), which holds the key administrative
positions in both the Federal and Serbian Governments, and has
generally succeeded in circumscribing Montenegrin autonomy.
Serbia has two provinces--Kosovo and Vojvodina--but their
political autonomy was abolished in 1990, and all significant
decisionmaking authority is centralized in Belgrade.
Because of Serbian responsibility in instigating and
propagating violence on the territory of Bosnia and
Herzegovina, including human rights abuses on a massive scale,
the United Nations imposed sweeping economic and political
sanctions in 1992 and tightened them in 1993. Despite claims
to the contrary, the Belgrade regime sustained military,
economic, and political support for ethnic Serbs responsible
for massive human rights abuses and acts of genocide in
Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1992-93 and similarly aided Croatian
Serbs occupying nearly a third of Croatian territory.
Milosevic also wields absolute control over the Serbian police,
a heavily armed force of some 70,000-80,000 which is guilty of
extensive, brutal, and systematic human rights abuses,
including extrajudicial killing. It continued a pattern of
gross human rights violations and systematic repression of
ethnic Albanians in the Kosovo region.
The economy, already under serious strain due to the cost of
proxy wars in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina and the breakup of
Yugoslavia, deteriorated markedly in 1993 under the impact of
* The United States does not recognize the Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia.
U.N. sanctions. The massive printing of money to keep the
economy afloat resulted in hyperinflation of historic
proportions. By year's end, many goods, including food
staples, had disappeared from stores and were available only on
the black market for foreign currency.
Human rights violations increased in Serbia during 1993, but
Montenegro's human rights record was not as poor. Ethnic
minorities continued to suffer most. Systematic police
repression in Kosovo, where some 90 percent of the population
are ethnic Albanians, included killing suspects allegedly while
they were fleeing or resisting arrest, beating detainees and
prisoners to death, arbitrary arrests, and widespread
harassment. Paramilitary attacks and threats tolerated by the
Belgrade regime resulted in the murder and dislocation of many
Muslims in the Sandzak region. Selective intimidation by
police and others of members of the Croatian and Hungarian
minorities in multiethnic Vojvodina spurred the emigration of
non-Serbs. This situation worsened after Belgrade authorities,
over Montenegrin objections, expelled CSCE human rights
monitoring missions at the end of July, despite a U.N. Security
Council resolution calling for the missions' continuation.
The police also used heavy-handed violence against Serbian
opponents of the regime. During a spontaneous protest in
Belgrade in June, police arrested and maltreated several dozen
people, including opposition leaders Vuk and Danica Draskovic
who were both severely beaten while in police custody. More
than a dozen Kosovar Albanians died at the hands of police,
either while allegedly resisting arrest or in custody. Police
responsible for abuses are rarely prosecuted. However, two
Serbian police officers in Prizren were sentenced to short
prison terms in December for the beating death of Aif
Krasniqui, a Kosovar Albanian, while in police custody.
Freedom of the press is greatly circumscribed. One Serbian
journalist was briefly kidnaped by unknown individuals, thought
to be agents of the Government. Belgrade authorities refused
to renew the accreditation of two long-time foreign
journalists, without official explanation. The police
sometimes interfere with peaceful assembly and travel and
regularly enter homes and offices without warrants. They
monitor and harass opposition leaders and dissidents.
RESPECT FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
Section 1 Respect for the Integrity of the Person, Including
Freedom from:
a. Political and Other Extrajudicial Killing
Political violence in Serbia/Montenegro, including killings,
resulted mostly from direct and indirect efforts by Serbian
authorities to suppress and intimidate ethnic minority groups.
Leaders of minority communities in the Sandzak, Vojvodina, and
Kosovo reported numerous acts of violence and intimidation, the
express aim of which was to disrupt and terrorize non-Serbs and
Muslims to the point that they would flee their homes and the
ultimate objective of "ethnic cleansing" would be achieved.
During the war in Croatia, Yugoslav army (JNA) soldiers and
Serbian paramilitary forces were stationed throughout
neighboring Bosnia and Herzegovina. When sporadic outbursts of
violence there escalated into full-scale war in April 1992, as
Serbian nationalists attempted to establish an independent
state within Bosnia and Herzegovina, the JNA armed Bosnian Serb
irregulars and fought on behalf of Serbian forces until its
nominal withdrawal in mid-May. At that time, federal and
republic authorities claimed that the personnel of the JNA in
Bosnia, 80 percent of whom were Bosnian Serbs, were free to
remain in Bosnia and Herzegovina to fight. Approximately
80,000 "volunteers" who "left" the JNA formed the core of the
newly formed Serbian army of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The
federal and Serbian authorities continued to provide fuel and
other materiel support to that army.
Violence was most severe in the Muslim-populated region of
Sandzak and the Albanian-populated region of Kosovo.
Paramilitary groups regularly crossed the border from
Bosnia-Herzegovina into Serbia and Montenegro to attack local
Muslims without opposition from units of "FRY" army reservists
stationed in border villages. During these raids, paramilitary
forces beat to death at least five elderly Muslims. The
Humanitarian Law Fund, a Serbian human rights organization,
charged in a February report that "FRY" reservists
intentionally allowed groups of armed Bosnian Serbs onto the
territory of the State of Serbia and did not prevent the
mistreatment and abuse of its non-Serb residents.
In Kosovo at least 15 ethnic Albanians died at the hands of
police during 1993, of which 7 took place after the CSCE
monitoring missions left the area in late July. In most cases,
the authorities claimed that those killed were shot while
fleeing or resisting arrest. Police, however, appear to have
resorted to deadly force with little or no attempt to apprehend
the alleged suspects by other means. During a raid on the
market in Pristina, police arrested two brothers, shooting both
of them as they broke away, and one died instantly. In late
August, during a raid on a house in the village of Cernille,
also in Kosovo, police waiting to question two brothers shot
and killed their 16-year-old brother as he and his two older
brothers tried to run away.
In other cases, persons died while in police custody as the
result of torture and other mistreatment. In February police
arrested, imprisoned, and subsequently beat to death Adem
Sequiri, an ethnic Albanian from Djakovica, Kosovo. The
official report of death cited blows all over his body as the
cause of death. In August Arif Krasniqi, an ethnic Albanian,
died at the police station in Prizren 24 hours after his
arrest. His body showed clear signs of torture to his head,
feet, and genitals. Two policemen were charged in Krasniqui's
death and sentenced to 3-year prison terms. The convictions
represented an exception to the general rule of official denial
and failure to investigate police abuses.
In a series of incidents along the Serbian-Albanian border,
Serbian border guards were responsible for the death of 14
Albanian citizens in Albania. Serbian authorities defended
their behavior, claiming that those killed were on the Serbian
side of the border and had crossed it illegally, possibly for
acts of terrorism. Smuggling is rife in the area, but the
authorities appear to have used deadly force with little effort
to apprehend the suspected border violators. In an effort to
excuse the killings following one incident, a senior Serbian
official said that the Serbian border guards involved were
inexperienced.
The Yugoslav Democratic Party of Gypsies complained that police
had harassed and beaten Gypsies in the village of Strazilo,
resulting in one death.
b. Disappearance
Bosnian Serb paramilitary forces operating with impunity in
Serbia/Montenegro were responsible for disappearances in the
Sandzak region. In one case, paramilitary forces abducted at
least 19, and possibly 24, Muslims from a Serbian train when it
was forced to stop while in a Serb-controlled area of
Bosnia-Herzegovina en route from Belgrade to Montenegro.
Despite a meeting between Milosevic and families of the
disappeared, no progress was made in finding the men. Police
held Milan Lukic, a Serb paramilitary leader in Bosnia, for 2
days in Serbia in connection with the disappearances but
released him after his troops threatened to blow up the
Belgrade-to-Bar railway. The paramilitary forces are presumed
to have murdered the Muslims, although their bodies have not
been found.
In February Bosnian Serb soldiers entered the predominantly
Muslim village of Seliste (Montenegro) and took away two women,
a 16-year-old youth, and two small children, returning the
following night for more members of the same family. Six of
those taken, all over 60, were released after 3 weeks.
According to some reports, Bosnian Serbs continued to hold the
others, including a mother and two children under 5 years of
age, in Cajnice, Serb-held Bosnia. Those released described
their treatment as brutal.
In April two Muslims, Hasan Mujovic and Mustafa Pulinac, who
had abandoned their homes in Sjeverin (Serbia) following the
kidnaping of some of its residents from a bus passing through
Bosnian Serb-controlled territory in 1992, returned to check on
their property. Four masked men attacked Pulinac, but he
escaped into the woods when Mujovic ran to his aid. Mujovic
has not been seen since. Bosnian Serb officials in nearby Rudo
reportedly had information as to his whereabouts but stated
they were not responsible for the safety of citizens of another
country.
c. Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading
Treatment or Punishment
Federal law prohibits torture, but reports that police in
Serbia severely beat people, whether under detention or at
police checkpoints, numbered in the thousands. Police
routinely used violence indiscriminately against ethnic
Albanians, justifying such repression as necessary to quell
Kosovar Albanian demands for independence. While overt police
violence against Serbian opponents of the regime was
comparatively rare, some cases occurred.
In a highly publicized instance, police violence was directed
against Vuk Draskovic, leader of a major Serbian opposition
party, and Danica Draskovic, a member of the party's executive
committee. Police arrested them at their party headquarters
following a demonstration during which violence broke out in
front of the Federal Parliament building on June 1. Police
severely beat them while dragging them from the party
headquarters to police vans, where at least 10 policemen
subjected them to further beatings. During the initial 20 days
of their detention, the Serbian Ministry of Justice denied that
the couple had any serious health problems. After a panel of
medical experts examined them, however, Serbian authorities
felt obliged to transfer them to a special clinic because of
the severity of their injuries. Mounting international
pressure and domestic support for a hunger strike by Vuk
Draskovic led President Milosevic to pardon the couple on
July 9.
Police brutality contributed to and exacerbated the violence
which erupted at the June 1 rally that provided the excuse for
the Draskovics' arrest. Police conducted sweeps, detaining
some 30 opposition party members and 5 journalists; eyewitness
reports confirmed that police clubbed and detained innocent
bystanders, including journalists who identified themselves to
the police. One policeman died, and several others were
injured as a result of the fracas.
Police also badly beat a Serbian woman in Belgrade in October
when she protested economic conditions while waiting in a
ration line for flour. The middle-aged woman was shown on
television with severe bruises on her face. The Serbian
Minister of the Interior later apologized to the Serbian
parliament and said the policemen who had beaten the woman were
suspended and under investigation. An opposition party called
for the Minister's resignation, citing a growing pattern of
police brutality and disregard for the law.
In Kosovo indiscriminate beatings of ethnic Albanians took
place routinely, with a marked increase following the expulsion
of the CSCE missions in July. One Albanian human rights group
took statements from 804 people beaten by police during a
12-month period. Many times that number were also reportedly
beaten but did not register the assaults with human rights
groups. Those victimized included professionals associated
with Albanian demands for independence, human rights monitors,
and people without any discernible political affiliation. In
June the principal of a secondary school in Pristina, after
being warned against continuing his work in the local Albanian
private school system which Serbian authorities considered
illegal, was arrested and badly beaten, likely suffering
permanent damage to his hearing.
Confident of their impunity and with no fear of reprisal,
police brazenly abused and beat their victims in public view.
For instance, in late August, during a raid on an ethnic
Albanian village near Kamenica, Serbian police, conducting a
fruitless search for weapons, allegedly badly beat two brothers
in front of their family, causing the pregnant wife of one of
them to collapse and miscarry. A few days later, during a raid
on the village of Cabra, Kosovo, an 80-year-old woman
reportedly collapsed and died after witnessing the beating of
her sons. Victims of the raid were interviewed 3 days later,
and witnesses saw evidence of severe beatings of several
villagers.
Police were exceptionally brutal after several attacks against
security forces by unknown assailants. An ethnic Albanian
former policeman provided details of torture during
investigations into the ambush of Serbian police in Glogovac in
May, during which two policemen died. One of several hundred
Albanians rounded up after the ambush and taken in for
questioning, he described how police beat and threatened some
150 men. A policeman hit a man next to him in the head with
such force that it looked as if he would lose an eye. Similar
instances of mass arrests and police beatings occurred after
other attacks on police (several policemen were wounded but
none killed) in Pec and Prizren. No one was charged with the
attacks on the police.
The victims themselves, usually through ethnic organizations,
provided accounts of police brutality carried out against
minority members. Human rights organizations independently
confirmed many of these reports. The sheer number of such
reports, represented here by illustrative examples, is evidence
of pervasive, systematic police brutality.
Most allegations of harsh interrogations and police brutality
stem from incidents in police stations rather than in prisons.
However, abuses were also known to occur after sentencing. In
July prison officials rejected the requests of ethnic Albanian
prisoners serving sentences in Nis to be transferred to prisons
in Kosovo, placed them in solitary confinement, beat them, and
did not allow them parcels or family visits. With the
exceptions noted below, conditions in prisons generally meet
minimum standards. Prison facilities are for the most part
built for that purpose and reasonably maintained.
Prisons are divided into three categories: open, low, and
high-risk. Due to the extremely low number of female inmates,
lower category facilities for women are not available, and
instead all female prisoners are confined in high-risk
facilities, with far greater restrictions. Female prisoners
have reported that, although they are permitted writing
materials, they are not allowed to keep what they write,
whereas the men are. Female prisoners are not given any
opportunity for further education, though mandated by law, nor
are their recreational facilities as well supplied as those of
the men. A new draft law to correct this situation was drawn
up but not enacted by year's end.
The number of political prisoners in Serbia/Montenegro is
unknown. At the end of 1993, there were at least 60 prisoners
who had been convicted of political crimes. The International
Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) was able to visit political
prisoners after sentencing but not to gain access to those in
pretrial confinement. Numerous Albanian political activists
were arrested because of their political activities in support
of Kosovo independence and were detained briefly under
misdemeanor laws.
d. Arbitrary Arrest, Detention, or Exile
Federal law permits police to detain suspects without a warrant
and hold them incommunicado for up to 3 days without charging
them or granting them access to a defense attorney. After this
period, police must turn a suspect over to an investigating
judge, who may order a 30-day extension and, under certain
legal procedures, subsequent extensions of investigative
detention up to 6 months. During investigative detention,
detainees theoretically have access to legal counsel, although
in practice access is only occasionally granted.
In May and June, there was a wave of arrests of Muslims in Novi
Pazar (Sandzak) for illegal possession of weapons. Many of
those arrested had close ties to the Muslim Party of Democratic
Action (SDA), which publicly advocates autonomy for Sandzak
through peaceful means. In September, while he was out of the
country, a warrant was issued for the arrest of the leader of
the SDA, Dr. Ugljanin. The prosecutor later brought formal
charges of fomenting rebellion against SDA members. SDA
leaders admit that some of those charged may have possessed
weapons but point out that Serbian police as a rule have not
prosecuted ethnic Serbs for violations of weapons laws, despite
the proliferation of arms within the general population and the
threatening activities of organized Serbian paramilitary groups.
Police arrested several dozen former political prisoners and
activists of Albanian political parties and associations in
Kosovo in August and September. Some were later charged with
threatening the territorial integrity of Serbia. According to
their attorneys, police had severely beaten them all during
detention. Police detained Salajdin Braha from Prizren, member
of the ethnic Albanian Kosovo parliament, for 5 weeks,
repeatedly beat him during this time, and then released him due
to lack of evidence.
Exile is neither legally permitted nor routinely practiced. No
specific instances of the imposition of exile as a form of
judicial punishment are known to have occurred.
e. Denial of Fair Public Trial
The court system comprises local, district, and supreme courts
at the republic level, and a Federal Supreme Court to which
republic Supreme Court decisions may be appealed. There is
also a military court system.
According to the Federal Constitution, the Federal
Constitutional Court rules on the constitutionality of laws and
regulations, relying on the republic authorities to enforce its
rulings. The Federal Criminal Code of the former Yugoslavia
still applies.
Under federal law, defendants have the right to be present at
their trials and to have an attorney, at public expense if
needed. Both the defendant and the prosecutor may appeal the
verdict. The judiciary is not free from political influence or
ethnic bias, as evidenced by the dismissal of ethnic Albanian
judges in Kosovo following their refusal to take an oath of
loyalty to Serbia, and judicial handling of charges against the
Draskovics. Serbian courts continue to sentence ethnic
Albanians, reportedly including some minors, for political
actions to terms of from 1 to 20 years.
Sandzak Muslims and ethnic Albanians and Hungarians still avoid
military service. Prosecution is rare, but force is sometimes
used in mobilizing troops. The draft is sometimes used as a
means of harassing opposition figures. In Vojvodina in late
December, Sandar Balint, editor in chief of the Hungarian
language publication Magyar Szo, was called up for military
duty. Balint is in his mid-forties. However, ethnic Serbs in
Vojvodina have reportedly been subjected to similar treatment
by the military authorities.
f. Arbitrary Interference with Privacy, Family, Home, or
Correspondence
Federal law gives republic ministries of interior sole control
over the decision to monitor potential criminal activities, a
power routinely abused. Authorities routinely monitor
opposition and dissident activity, eavesdropped on
conversations (see Section 2.a. re Dusan Reljic), read mail,
and tapped telephones. A Serbian minister boasted in
Parliament about the wiretapping of the leader of the main
ethnic Hungarian party. Although the law includes restrictions
on searches, officials paid scant attention to such
restrictions.
In Kosovo, police routinely subjected ethnic Albanians to
random searches of their homes, vehicles, and offices on the
pretext of searching for weapons.
Police at checkpoints throughout Kosovo, both between
localities and within cities and towns, systematically stopped
private vehicles and searched them and the passengers with no
probable cause. In a round-trip journey of 40 miles,
independent observers noted four separate checks of a single
vehicle. Police often confiscated foreign currency from
drivers and passengers, although it is not illegal to possess
foreign currency. Similar confiscations occurred in Sandzak.
Police deliberately timed raids on Albanian private schools in
Kosovo to disrupt entrance tests for children to secondary
schools. Police subjected all those suspected of any form of
involvement with private Albanian schools to searches of their
homes and offices and often confiscated personal documents.
g. Use of Excessive Force and Violations of Humanitarian
Law in Internal Conflicts
Despite their denials, the Governments of Serbia/Montenegro and
Croatia were deeply involved in the extensive and egregious
violations of humanitarian law and abuses of basic human rights
in Bosnia committed by Serbian and Croatian paramilitary forces
there. The Government of Serbia/Montenegro armed the Serbian
forces in both Bosnia and Croatia, its citizens participated in
the wars as members of paramilitary formations with government
sanction, and it permitted regular troops to remain in Bosnia
after May 1992 in the renamed "Serbian army" there. In
addition, it continued to supply the Bosnian Serb forces with
fuel, food, and other supplies, even while these items were in
critically short supply in its own territory. The authorities
in Belgrade have not sought to prosecute former regular army
personnel for suspected war crime activities in either Croatia
or Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Members of ethnic minorities in Serbia were frequently
subjected to intimidation, with the goal of provoking the
emigration of non-Serbs. The army and the police did not
interfere with or try to prevent paramilitary forces and other
extreme nationalists from carrying out numerous attacks and
harassment against minorities designed to drive them from their
homes. In Vojvodina, paramilitary forces associated with such
extremist groups as the Serbian Radical Party (SRS) led by
Vojislav Seselj openly threatened Croats, Ruthenians,
Hungarians, and others and waged a campaign to replace the
non-Serbian population with Serbian refugees from Croatia and
Bosnia.
In the multiethnic Serbian province of Vojvodina, following the
defeat of Prime Minister Panic in the December presidential
elections, there was a resurgence of the campaign of harassment
against non-Serbs. In Hrtkovci, Vojvodina, the local mayor and
his deputy, who had been imprisoned for incitement to violence
against non-Serbs, were convicted on May 5 and given suspended
prison sentences. Harassment began anew of non-Serbs and of
Serbs who defended them, as well as of Serbian refugees from
Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina who refused to return to fight
alongside local Serb paramilitary forces.
Many of these incidents were instigated by SRS chief and
paramilitary leader Seselj and his followers. In October
Milosevic's ruling party denounced Seselj as a Fascist and a
war criminal, guilty of paramilitary attacks and war crimes in
Croatia and Bosnia. Serbian authorities recently brought
criminal charges against nearly 40 members of Seselj's
paramilitary organizations, including accusations of smuggling,
racketeering and rape. Although the authorities described the
charges as related to war crimes, press reports indicated that
only one case was specifically connected to activities in
Bosnia. The timing of the charges had a highly political
flavor, growing out of Seselj's conflict with Serbian President
Milosevic, and do not appear to have been motivated by justice
or the rule of law. As of year's end, no legal action had been
brought directly against Seselj or his Serbian Radical Party.
In December Seselj and Zeljko "Arkan" Raznatovic, a
paramilitary leader and a candidate in the elections for the
Serbian Parliament, traded accusations of criminal activity on
state-run television. The charges included war profiteering
and murder.
Officially sanctioned violence and intimidations directed
against the Croatian population of Vojvodina, which peaked in
the summer of 1992, continued in 1993. Conditions eased in the
last months of the year following the arrest of some Seselj
supporters directly implicated in these crimes. Early in 1993,
Croatian families in the Vojvodina town of Srijemska Kamenica
received threatening telephone calls to move out or be killed.
These calls were usually followed by visits from men offering
property exchanges in Croatia. Fearing for their lives, many
families moved out. Local authorities did not intervene and in
at least one case actively participated. In July in Kukujevci,
Vojvodina, one prominent Croat, his wife, and elderly aunt were
found shot dead. He had been warned many times that he should
move. Several people, all of them members of the Serbian
Radical Party, were arrested and charged with the crime.
Significant numbers of ethnic Hungarians left the Vojvodina due
to the prevailing atmosphere of fear, economic collapse, and
insecurity. Estimates range as high as 50,000, out of a total
Hungarian population of 350,000.
Local Serbian authorities reportedly threatened and intimidated
Albanian inhabitants in northern Kosovo into leaving their
homes near the town of Leposavic, which is a mostly
Serb-inhabited area, according to an international human rights
organization.
Ceko Dacevic, a local Radical (SRS) and paramilitary leader,
was the main instigator of attacks on Muslims in Montenegro.
He enjoyed immunity from prosecution for a time as a member of
the Federal Assembly. In late March, members of his group
burst into a local restaurant, forcing the owner at gunpoint to
remove a picture of former President Tito and ordering him to
close down the restaurant, which they said would be converted
into an Orthodox church. At the end of August, Serb extremists
demolished a Muslim-owned cafe under the eyes of the police,
who intervened only when a crowd of Muslims demanded they
prevent the rape of the owner's daughter. A week later police
arrested a Muslim bystander as well as three of Dacevic's men,
who were only briefly detained. Harassment of Muslims in the
Montenegrin Sandzak district of Pljevlja lessened following the
arrest and trial of Dacevic.
In 1993 more than 800 Bukovica (Sandzak) Muslims were forced to
leave their homes and villages following threats from "FRY"
army members and the kidnaping of some villagers during a
violent attack by the Bosnian Serb army during cross-border
sorties. Many claimed they fled to escape "FRY" reservists,
putatively stationed in the area to protect them but in
practice making no attempt to do so, who in some cases beat and
accused them of working for the Bosnian Government of President
Izetbegovic. The last three Muslim families in the village of
Dekare moved to Pljevlja in April, following a late night
incident at the home of one of them when "FRY" army members
burst in and questioned them about weapons.
A group of armed civilians opened fire on a Canadian company of
the United Nations Protective Force (UNPROFOR) that was stopped
at a police checkpoint in Serbia near the Bosnian border. A
French soldier with the Canadian company was wounded in the
leg. Serbian police were on the scene but did nothing to
prevent the shooting or to pursue the attackers. It was noted
that SRS leader Seselj was attending an SRS meeting nearby and
drove past the UNPROFOR convoy shortly before the shooting,
rolling down the window of his car to shout obscenities at the
UNPROFOR troops.
On at least one occasion, armored personnel carriers, trucks,
and armed troops of the Serbian militia prevented a
humanitarian aid convoy from proceeding through Serbia to
Srebrenica, Bosnia, claiming that the United Nations did not
have permission to use that road.
Section 2 Respect for Civil Liberties, Including:
a. Freedom of Speech and Press
Although freedom of press and speech is provided for under law,
this right is not respected in practice. The regime controls
frequency allocations for broadcasters and has enormous
influence on supplies and revenues for the print media.
Although the regime continued to tolerate the critical
independent but low-circulation print media of Borba and Vreme
in Belgrade, most of the population nationwide is dependent for
their news on electronic media firmly under government
control. The Government blocked the attempts of independent
television station Studio B and independent radio station B-92
to expand transmission of their broadcasts. Republic
authorities use provisions of the Federal Criminal Code to
restrict freedom of speech.
Shortages of newsprint and the deteriorating economy due to
international sanctions enabled the Government selectively to
direct supplies to favored publications and to reduce financial
support to independent journals. In Vojvodina, the Hungarian
independent Magyar Szo resisted an attempt to have it merge
with a Serbian publishing house, fearing financial
mismanagement would force it to close. The paper struggled on,
overcoming a stoppage in March, but ceased publication
temporarily in October due to financial problems and a shortage
of newsprint. At year's end, Magyar Szo was appearing twice
weekly.
Proposed press regulations to regulate foreign investment in
domestic media would make illegal Serbian press connections
with foreigners or foreign support of Serbian media under most
circumstances.
Despite a precarious existence, Bujku, the only Albanian-
language newspaper, continued to be published. It was forced
to miss two issues in October because of their Serbian-run
publishing house's alleged inability to obtain newsprint. The
publishing house itself had previously been in Albanian hands
but was transferred to Serbian control by various financial and
legal measures over objections from the Albanian management. A
hunger strike by Albanian writers in June failed to prevent
control being tranferred into Serbian hands. The paper is
prepared independently and uncensored and clearly reflects the
views of the ethnic Albanian democratic movement in Kosovo. As
such, it is the main source of information for the Albanian
community.
Publication of material critical of the Government, however,
was tolerated, with a few notable exceptions. A political
cartoon deemed to incite ethnic, religious, and racial hatred
resulted in the confiscation of all copies of an issue of
Sandzak, a publication of the Muslim cultural society in Novi
Pazar; the prosecutor brought criminal charges against its
editor in chief. Serbian police seized Rexhep Ismaili's book
"Kosovo and the Albanians in the Former Yugoslavia" from a
private printing house and confiscated all copies of it. They
also temporarily blocked distribution of "Thema", published by
the Kosovo Association of Sociologists and Philosophers.
On February 9, satirist Mihajlo Radojcic was sentenced to 5
months in prison, with 2 years suspended, for "exposing the
President of the Presidency of the Republic of Montenegro,
Momir Bulatovic, to ridicule." The President of the
Association of Professional Journalists of Montenegro
criticized the conviction and accused the Government of trying
to eliminate free thought.
Both local and international journalists were harassed and
intimidated. Dusan Reljic, foreign editor of the independent
Vreme, a publication consistently critical of Milosevic, was
kidnaped and questioned while blindfolded for 2 days in late
September, shortly after the Serbian Minister of Information
warned of "fifth column" elements among Serbian journalists.
Reljic believed his interrogators were police or state
intelligence agents.
Progovernment media in January accused Roy Gutman,
correspondent for Newsday, of being a spy involved in a Western
media conspiracy against Serbia. They made these charges on
the same day that the Government threatened restrictions on
certain foreign journalists. During the June 1-2
demonstrations in Belgrade, police confiscated or destroyed the
equipment of many journalists whom they beat and threatened.
The authorities expelled the Belgrade correspondent of the
London-based, Saudi-owned Al Hayat from Serbia/Montenegro after
13 years in residence, with 2 weeks' notice and no official
explanation. In early December, the Government refused,
without explanation, to extend the accreditation of long-time
London Times correspondent Desa Trevisan.
Milosevic's control of the media and particularly state
television is vital to the strength of his regime. Through
Serbian Radio and Television (RTS), the Government exerts
editorial control over all news programming, which is used to
spread ethnic hatred. Blatant anti-Muslim or anti-Albanian
propaganda, fanning the fires of religious and ethnic hatred,
constituted a substantial portion of the regular news programs
which RTS broadcast.
In early 1993, RTS placed some 1,500 employees on involuntary
leave. The majority had publicly condemned RTS's encouragement
of nationalistic and religious intolerance. They were also
members of the independent RTS union. The director of Novi Sad
Radio-Television ordered stricter application of the Serbian
law on the official use of language and the alphabet, which
resulted in the immediate deletion of all references in the
Hungarian language from official programming.
Independent television station Studio B continued to struggle
for survival. It faced eviction from its premises in favor of
a proregime firm. Despite its having received frequencies
approved by the International Telecommunications Union for
repeater stations, Serbian authorities refused to approve them
on the grounds that only the Serbian government could allocate
frequencies on Serbian territory. This attitude, combined with
the hijacking in late 1992 of new equipment and its inability
to buy suitable land from the government to house its
transmitter, prevented Studio B from extending its range of
reception beyond Belgrade. Police broke into Studio B studios
and confiscated video footage of the June 1 protest (see
Section 1.c.).
A new compulsory tax was levied on citizens of Serbia/
Montenegro as part of their electric bills beginning on
October 1. Revenue is to be used to subsidize RTS, thus
further diminishing independent television's ability to
compete.
Reports continued of threats and, on rare occasions, instances
of physical violence directed against individuals or
organizations who expressed criticism of Serbia's extreme
nationalist ideology or of the "Yugoslav" army and security
services. For instance, a journalist who wrote for a Belgrade
daily a piece critical of the army subsequently received death
threats. Several Belgrade University professors who expressed
oppositionist views or simply failed to collaborate with the
regime received death threats.
In January Milosevic's government fired the Rector of Belgrade
University, as well as the directors of the Modern Art Museum
and the National Theater. Some teachers were removed from
their posts, and others reported receiving death threats.
Legislation granted the State direct control of public
enterprises. The Education Ministry used this power to fire
school principals.
The controversial university law was quietly modified by the
Serbian assembly in May to give more control to the government
regarding the founding of private and foreign universities and
minority language instruction, requiring that an "opinion" (in
other words, permission) be sought from the Ministry of
Education. The Government controls 50 percent of the
membership of the University Council, the supreme ruling body
of the University, as well as the chairman. On June 22, the
University Council elected the dean of the Agricultural faculty
and SPS representative in the Federal Assembly as Rector of the
University of Belgrade.
In June Rexhep Osmani, chairman of the Kosovo Association of
Albanian Teachers, was sentenced to 60 days in prison for
organizing peaceful protests on Albanian education in October
1992. Professor Ejup Statovci, rector of the underground
Albanian university of Pristina, was returned to prison in
February to complete serving a 60-day sentence growing out of
the same 1992 incident.
b. Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and Association
Although freedom of peaceful assembly and association is
legally provided for, these freedoms were severely restricted.
Authorities arbitrarily enforced regulations, permitting some
demonstrations and banning others. They permitted supporters
of National Peasant Party leader Dragan Veselinov to
demonstrate in Belgrade in July for the release of Vuk
Draskovic, whereas in late August police broke up a gathering
of milk producers in Belgrade organized by Veselinov's party to
protest the Government's pricing of milk. When violence by
protestors marred the spontaneous June 1 demonstrations at the
Federal Assembly building, police riot teams broke up the
gathering, indiscriminately beating and arresting participants
and bystanders alike (also see Section 1.c.).
Ethnic Albanians involved with political groups are subjected
to arbitrary arrest and detention, disruption and destruction
of their meetings and offices, and confiscation of
documentation and property. During one such raid on the
offices of the Democratic League of Kosovo, police arrested the
local vice chairman and party members. During their detention
at the police station, police beat them and instructed them not
to continue their political activities. In another incident,
the chairman and secretary of the office of the Democratic
Alliance of Kosovo (LDK) in Glogovac were beaten at a police
checkpoint. The branch chairman was sent to Pristina where he
was detained for 30 days for allegedly assaulting a police
officer, during which time police beat and tortured him. He
faces a possible 5- to 15-year sentence. During raids on
schools, police arrested ethnic Albanian teachers and released
them the same day as a form of harassment to discourage
employment in private Albanian schools. Police held many
others for longer than 3 days but subsequently released them
without filing charges or providing an explanation for their
detention.
Disruptive and violent police raids frequently targeted
meetings of ethnic Albanians. In Mitrovice, police raided a
peaceful gathering to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the
murder of Hasan Prishtina, an ethnic Albanian hero. Police
broke up the gathering and indiscriminately beat the
participants, including the elderly, children, and women.
Police detained and questioned a founding member of Arkadia, a
gay rights group, about the group's activities.
Police arrested committee members of the Belgrade Islamic
community in April and accused them of collecting money for
arms while compiling data on the Islamic community.
c. Freedom of Religion
There is no state religion, but the Government gives the
Serbian Orthodox Church, to which the majority of Serbs belong,
preferential treatment over other faiths and access to
state-run television for religious events.
Although there are no legal restrictions on the practice of
religion, the regime overtly and covertly promoted religious
intolerance. Police condoned periodic harassment of religious
facilities used by ethnic minorities. After the fire-bombing
of Hungarian and Croatian Catholic churches in the Vojvodina,
police investigations were generally perfunctory and
inconclusive.
Following the mining of a mosque in the municipality of Bar in
October, the fourth such act of vandalism against Muslim
religious sites in Montenegro, there was widespread
condemnation from local authorities.
d. Freedom of Movement Within the Country, Foreign
Travel, Emigration, and Repatriation
The Constitution provides for freedom of movement. Exit visas
are generally not required except for travel to Albania.
Passports are available to most citizens of Serbia/Montenegro,
but many Kosovar Albanians have had their right to travel
restricted.
Following Macedonia's imposition of a passport requirement for
all citizens of the former Yugoslavia, there were increasing
reports that Serbian border guards confiscated the passports of
ethnic Albanians working abroad as they returned to Kosovo.
Police also confiscated some passports during house searches.
Serbian authorities on the Kosovo-Macedonia border delayed
departure of a Kosovar Albanian delegation attending meetings
on educational issues of the International Conference on the
Former Yugoslavia.
The authorities detained two members of the Kosovo Helsinki
Committee as they crossed into Kosovo from Macedonia following
their attendance at a meeting in Tirana. Serbian police seized
the passport of a well-known ethnic Albanian journalist and
political activist on the grounds that he had visited Albania
without obtaining a Serbian exit visa. Despite such cases,
Serbian authorities have generally allowed ethnic Albanian
leaders, including LDK leader Ibrahim Rugova, to leave the
country and return, even though they consider his party and
other ethnic Albanian parties illegal.
On May 1, Serbia tightened its refugee requirements, drawing up
a list of "safe municipalities" and contending that those
arriving from nationalist Serb-controlled regions of Bosnia and
Croatia were no longer eligible for refugee status. Only
Montenegro continued to offer unconditional protection to
refugees from Bosnia and Croatia. There are approximately
60,000 refugees in Montenegro, 10 percent of its population.
As in Serbia, nearly 95 percent live with host families.
Informed observers reported that Serbian police at times
prevented Muslim refugees from entering Serbia by bus from
Montenegro, while allowing Serb refugees on the same busses to
enter.
Numerous reliable reports indicate that local minorities,
especially in Vojvodina, have been forcibly displaced and Serb
refugees moved into their homes.
Section 3 Respect for Political Rights: The Right of Citizens
to Change Their Government
The Constitution allows citizens to change their government,
but their ability to do so is circumscribed by the Milosevic
government's control of mass media and the electoral process.
This is the case particularly in Serbia. In the December 1992
elections, opposition parties were denied equal access to the
state-run media, voter registration lists omitted many eligible
voters, international observers noted numerous voting
irregularities, and serious questions were raised as to the
accuracy of the vote count. The CSCE report concluded that
this election could not be deemed to be fair and democratic.
The CSCE found conditions in Montenegro much better. In the
December 1993 Serbian parliamentary elections, similar doubts
were raised as to the fairness of voting procedures.
Parliamentary elections are held every 4 years. In principle
the ballot is secret, but in practice voting booths are often
not available, and voters mark their ballots on open tables or
behind small cardboard shields. Voters, nonetheless, can
obtain a degree of privacy.
Slobodan Milosevic dominates the political system in
Serbia/Montenegro. Although formally President of Serbia, one
of the two constituent republics in the so-called Yugoslav
Federal Republic, Milosevic, through his control of the Serbian
police, the army, and the state administration, first weakened
the authority of the Federal Government and then placed his
followers in key positions, including Federal President and
Federal Prime Minister.
In May the Serbian Socialist Party combined with the Serbian
Radical Party to remove Federal President Dobrica Cosic, who
had shown some degree of independence from Milosevic. In a
striking display of political ruthlessness, Cosic was summarily
ousted following a single day's unscheduled debate in the
Federal Parliament with no opportunity to defend himself.
Democratic opposition deputies, who protested the unprecedented
haste with which the Head of State was dismissed, were jeered
and threatened by SRS deputies, one of whom subsequently
attacked an opposition delegate in the lobby of Parliament,
knocking him unconscious. This sparked the June 1
demonstrations (see Section 1.c.).
A new law on the declaration of a state of siege carries the
threat that martial law could be imposed over the objections of
the Montenegrin republic. Throughout 1993, party and political
institutions in Montenegro functioned in fits and starts with
some degree of adherence to democratic principles and the rule
of law, as well as tolerance for opposition and ethnic minority
views, at least in comparison with the situation in Serbia.
Nevertheless, the Montenegrin government's sphere for
independent action is greatly circumscribed by Milosevic's
refusal to tolerate significant divergence from the Serbian
party line.
Section 4 Governmental Attitude Regarding International and
Nongovernmental Investigation of Alleged Violations
of Human Rights
Local human rights monitors, Serbs as well as members of
minorities, worked courageously under difficult circumstances
and despite public insinuations by ultranationalist leaders and
sometimes government officials that they were traitors. Police
routinely searched human rights offices in Kosovo, confiscated
documents, and harassed their employees.
A number of independent human rights organizations exist in
Serbia/Montenegro, researching and gathering information on
abuses and publicizing such cases. Several operate out of
Kosovo, including the Council for the Defense of Human Rights
and Freedoms and the Kosovo Helsinki Committee. In the Sandzak
region, a separate Council for the Defense of Human Rights and
Freedoms monitors abuses against the local Muslim population.
The Belgrade-based Humanitarian Law Fund and the Center for
Antiwar Action (CAA) have a broader scope of activities,
researching human rights abuses throughout the "FRY" and on
occasion, elsewhere in the former Yugoslavia. In addition to
monitoring human rights abuses, the CAA sponsors symposiums and
lectures and runs a small publishing house. The activities of
independent human rights agencies are carefully monitored by
Serbian authorities but they are not generally subject to overt
harassment. Last July, however, local authorities seized files
and computer disks belonging to the Council for the Defense of
Human Rights and Freedoms in Pristina. The materials have not
been returned. In August the CAA and two opposition groups had
their offices robbed and documents stolen, pointing to
political rather than criminal motives for the break-ins.
The governments of Serbia and Montenegro formally maintain that
they have no objection to international organizations
conducting human rights investigations on their territories.
However, they regularly attacked the findings of human rights
groups. The Federal Minister for Human Rights and National
Minorities repeatedly charged the international community with
selective application of international law, criticized the work
of the CSCE monitors even as local Serbian officials praised
that work, and denied human rights violations against minority
groups.
On June 29, the "FRY" mission to the United Nations in Geneva
rejected a proposal to allow envoys of U.N. Human Rights
Rapporteur Tadeusz Mazowiecki entry to Serbia/Montenegro. The
refusal was based on the assertion that in previous visits,
Mazowiecki had indulged in "malicious" misrepresentations and
had applied double standards unfair to Serbia.
The CSCE missions established in September 1992 and terminated
by Milosevic in July 1993 experienced varying degrees of
cooperation. During a planned visit to villages bordering
Bosnia in the Montenegrin part of Sandzak, the mission was not
able to reach the villages because local officials failed to
provide security guarantees. However, relations with local
officials were generally good. Belgrade refused to extend the
mission's mandate in July after insisting on linking its
presence to Serbia/Montenegro's suspended status in the CSCE,
and several Serbian and federal officials publicly accused the
CSCE mission of inciting local populations.
Violent acts against ethnic minorities in the regions formerly
monitored by the CSCE missions subsequently increased,
particularly in Kosovo, including acts against former employees
and associates of the missions. Prizren police detained and
questioned a Helsinki Watch representative and a British
journalist while they were covering the aftermath of a trial of
five Albanians accused of "endangering the territorial
integrity of Yugoslavia." They were released after 4 hours of
questioning.
Many foreign delegations visited all parts of Serbia and
Montenegro without difficulty, but a Swedish delegation due to
visit Kosovo on a refugee-related mission was denied visas.
Section 5 Discrimination Based on Race, Sex, Religion,
Disability, Language, or Social Status
Federal and republic laws guarantee equal rights to all
citizens, regardless of ethnic group, religion, language, or
social status.
Women
Women have suffered numerous human rights abuses in the hostile
atmosphere of oppressive nationalism fostered by the regime
during the conflict and warfare over the breakup of
Yugoslavia. Women's rights activists have little access to the
mass media and are therefore virtually unknown outside of
Belgrade and Novi Sad. Serbian women face rising levels of
domestic violence and sexual harassment in the workplace. Few
women are represented in high-level political positions.
Federal and republic laws prohibit discrimination against
women, but the laws are not enforced. In comparison to men,
women have limited access to senior positions in political and
economic life but are well represented in the professions,
particularly as doctors and teachers. According to women's
rights monitors, as a result of the deteriorating economic
situation, women were often the first to be let go. The Police
Academy no longer accepts female students. Those women who had
attended the school were hired in purely administrative
positions, and there are no female police officers in uniform
on the street. Although women constitute 70 percent of the
students enrolled at the Law Faculty of Belgrade University, in
the workplace women comprise only 10 percent of public
prosecutors and only 10 percent of judges at the Supreme Court
level.
Women are entitled to equal pay for equal work. Maternity
leave for employed women usually is granted for 1 year, and
even longer in some cases, although the collapse of the economy
has restricted such benefits in practice. Legal penalties for
spousal abuse are the same as those for abuse of other persons,
but a complaint must be filed. This is seldom done, according
to women's rights groups, due to traditional attitudes.
According to women's rights monitors in Belgrade, these same
traditional attitudes cause women's rights groups to be largely
ignored. One group reported a burglary at its offices, during
which nothing was taken, and after which the group was evicted
from those premises. The reasons for the eviction are not
clear.
Women's rights groups established an SOS hotline and opened a
rape crisis center in Belgrade in September with the aim of
assisting women raped in the war in Bosnia. Some 5,000 calls
have been received since the hotline was established in 1992.
Most of the women who call are aged between 40 and 60, poorly
educated, and unemployed. Representatives claim that domestic
violence against women and children has taken an upward turn as
husbands, returning traumatized and armed from the war in
Bosnia, are unable to find jobs and take their frustration out
on their families. The hotline reports that sexual harassment
of women has increased and is tolerated by women from all
levels of society who are fearful of losing their jobs.
The Serbian Orthodox Church accused Serbian women of failing to
give birth to enough children and demanded a ban on abortions
earlier in the year. The Church had insufficient political
support and failed to achieve the ban.
Children
The minimum age for employment is 16 years, although in
villages and farm communities, younger children often assist
with family agricultural obligations.
National/Racial/Ethnic Minorities
The ethnic minorities of Serbia/Montenegro continued to suffer
discrimination in all respects, in addition to the abuses
described elsewhere in this report. There were credible
reports that qualified Muslims or ethnic Albanians were fired
from their jobs on the basis of religion or ethnicity.
Members of ethnic minorities were badly treated in the armed
forces where they were viewed with suspicion and often outright
hostility. In early 1993, there appeared to be an increase in
the number of Muslims being called to military service which
may have reflected an effort to encourage Sandzak Muslims to
leave the area. A recently enacted law for the army contains a
provision whereby recruits may serve in a civilian capacity for
religious or other reasons of conscience; it remains to be seen
whether it will be applied to minorities.
There is a traditional prejudice against the substantial Gypsy
(Roma) population. The Yugoslav Democratic Party of Gypsies is
not well organized and does not play a role in the political
life of the country commensurate with its numbers. The Gypsy
population has the right to vote, and there is no legal
discrimination, although traditional societal discrimination is
widespread, and local authorities apparently condone and even
participate in harassment and intimidation of Gypsies.
Religious Minorities
After the December 1992 election victory of Milosevic's
Socialists and Seselj's Radicals, the regime moved to fire
uncooperative employees and place its own handpicked candidates
in senior positions at Serbian Radio and Television and other
institutions. Seselj mounted a campaign of treason accusations
against dissidents and non-Serbs. Increasing authoritarianism
and intolerance created a fearful climate for members of all of
Serbia's ethnic and religious minorities.
The Humanitarian Law Fund stated that since August 1992 violent
incidents against Muslims have been increasing. The Fund
accused military and paramilitary Serbian groups from Bosnia,
reservists of the "FRY" army, and local police. The government
has not taken any effective action to protect the Muslim
population in Sandzak from continuing violence.
Sandzak Muslim soccer fans and supporters of Zeljko "Arkan"
Raznjatovic's All-Serbian Pristina Club clashed at Novi Pazar
stadium during a soccer game. Police arrested 50 Muslim
spectators on a variety of charges, but none of Arkan's
supporters were arrested.
In Sandzak there continued to be reports of destruction of
mosques and Muslim-owned businesses. In Sjenica 17 Muslims in
senior positions were fired and replaced by Serbs.
People with Disabilities
There is no formal legislation to guarantee equal rights for
the disabled. Attempts to introduce legislation have failed.
An opposition party is lobbying to broaden existing legislation
to provide equal rights for the disabled. Public buildings are
required to provide access for the disabled, but it is only
recommended that private buildings provide such access.
Section 6 Worker Rights
a. The Right of Association
All workers (except military personnel) are legally entitled to
form or join unions of their own choosing. This right is
formally respected. Workers are no longer obligated to join
and pay dues to the official unions.
The older semiofficial union umbrella organizations (the
Council of Independent Trade Unions of Serbia--CITUS, the
Council of Independent Trade Unions of Montenegro--CITUM, and
their federal counterpart, the Council of Independent Trade
Unions of Yugoslavia--CITUY) had offered material benefits to
members, such as preferential access to lower cost commodities
from government reserves, that the fledgling independent unions
were unable to match. These commodity reserves have dwindled,
however, leaving union members facing much the same shortages
as nonunion members. Although statistics on the size of the
organized work force are unreliable, the large bulk of Serbian
and Montenegrin workers are probably members of the
semiofficial CITUS and CITUM. CITUS claims current membership
of 1.8 million workers, while the more loosely affiliated
Serbian independent trade union organization (Nezavisnost) has
between 80,000 and 200,000 members.
There are reportedly no unions independent of CITUM in
Montenegro. Since mid-1991, union activity has generally been
at a reduced level, either out of support for the Government or
due to fears of being perceived as disloyal.
The right to strike is recognized and was exercised by both the
independent and progovernment trade union organizations
throughout 1993. A 30-day notification of the intent to strike
is required. More than two dozen strikes were recorded,
protesting lack of job security and the failure of wages to
keep pace with hyperinflation. Some unions called for the
resignation of the Federal Government. Additionally, there
were two general strikes, one organized by the independent
labor union on May 19 and the other organized by progovernment
unions on August 5. Both were poorly organized and failed to
achieve the widespread work stoppages initially planned.
During the course of the year, the Government successfully
defused worker discontent by either partially or fully meeting
union demands for wage increases. Hyperinflation, however,
eroded purchasing power so quickly that any wage increases
rapidly disappeared in real economic terms.
The Serbian Interior Ministry has instructed Belgrade's public
prosecutor to investigate leaders of a strike organized by the
Kolubara Coal Miner's Union in December. There have been
reports of union activists being harassed and briefly detained
by the police.
In June 160 civil air controllers working for the Ministry of
Traffic and Communications went on a hunger strike to protest
low wages and hazardous working conditions. The strike, which
was bitterly fought, proved to be a negative turning point in
government-labor relations but, more significantly, provided
the Government with the impetus to pass a major new law that
bans all public service workers from participating in strikes.
The Independent Trade Unions of Kosovo (ITUK), formally
recognized by the Federal Government, continued to face huge
obstacles at the local level in representing a work force that
suffered from official repression, repeated mass dismissals on
ethnic grounds, and consequent massive unemployment. CITUS is
well represented in Kosovo and has taken over the offices
occupied by the Communist-era trade union. According to ITUK,
worker union fees deducted from paychecks are deposited with
CITUS, and benefits are distributed only to Serbian workers.
All ethnic Albanian workers pay union fees voluntarily.
b. The Right to Organize and Bargain Collectively
This right is guaranteed by law, but Western-style collective
bargaining is unknown. Under U.N. sanctions, which have led
the Government to freeze previously planned economic reforms,
real collective bargaining is unlikely. Plant management is
not independent of the Government nor an effective bargaining
partner for the unions. Republic wage controls effectively
usurped the role of enterprises and the semiofficial chambers
of economy. The republic governments have promised that no
workers would be discharged as a result of the sanctions and
guaranteed that idled workers would receive an income equal to
50 percent of their former wages.
Privatization of social property (state enterprises) is another
problem in which the rights and interests of workers are not
well defined or understood.
c. Prohibition of Forced or Compulsory Labor
Forced labor is prohibited by law and is not known to occur.
d. Minimum Age for Employment of Children
The minimum age for employment is 16, although in villages and
farm communities younger children often assist with family
agricultural obligations.
e. Acceptable Conditions of Work
The republic governments guaranteed minimum wages, but delays
and partial payments were pandemic. The governments of Serbia
and Montenegro continued strict wage controls in 1993.
Unemployment and underemployment due to sanctions and other
economic problems also reduced the number of families with two
wage earners. The minimum wage is insufficient to provide a
worker and family a decent living standard. By October the net
minimum monthly wage in Serbia was only sufficient to feed a
family of four for 2 or 3 days.
The official workweek was listed as 40 hours, but many
enterprises and workers worked fewer hours for lack of raw
materials. In general, sick leave and other benefits are
generous. Federal and republic laws and regulations on
occupational health and safety were adequate, although
enforcement was lax.
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