Today, we mark the International Day of the Disappeared and once again draw attention to this human rights issue still affecting numerous communities, and missing persons’ relatives and friends in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia.
The 1990’s wars in former Yugoslavia resulted in 40 000 missing persons, 70% out of which have already been accounted for with indispensable help of the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP) and the international community. The remaining 30%, or around 11 300 persons, are still regarded as missing as a result of, among else, enforced disappearance and displacement as well as other gross human rights violations such as crimes against humanity, genocide, unlawful persecution, and detention.
One of the main postulates of transitional justice is the right to truth, an “obligation incumbent upon states to disclose, both to victims and to the community, every fact and circumstance about serious violations of human rights”. The right to truth applies to all human rights violations and particularly to enforced disappearances when relatives of victims seek to be informed of their loved ones’ fate and the location of their remains.
A positive step towards realizing this right as well as the states’ recognition of their role and responsibility to do so was made in 2014 when presidents of Croatia, Montenegro, and Serbia and the Chairman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina signed a Declaration on the Role of the State in Addressing the Issue of Persons Missing as a Consequence of Armed Conflict and Human Rights Abuses. Further efforts resulted in state institutions responsible for the search of missing persons in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Montenegro and Serbia signing a Framework Plan describing and formalizing the institutions’ regional cooperation and strategy aimed at accounting for missing persons in the entire region. According to the Plan, the Missing Persons Group (MSG) was formed soon thereafter which comprised the said responsible institutions. This group, with the support and help of the ICMP and the international community, realized multiple successful projects and mechanisms, such as the Database of active missing persons cases from conflicts on the territory of former Yugoslavia, which significantly increased the effectiveness of investigation processes.
Nevertheless, political and financial support as well as regional cooperation between states’ governments is still not sufficient enough while the question of missing persons still remains a politically-charged issue. Investigations, sharing information on missing persons and (mass) burial sites as well as regional cooperation on the issue have been continuously politicized as well as used for political manipulation and bargaining by the political elite in all countries. Instead of prioritizing the search for missing persons and realizing the rights of victims’ families over political issues, political representatives continue to bargain, withhold or deny having information about missing persons belonging to the “other” ethnic group and/or those who disappeared as a result of violations perpetrated by the state’s armed forces.
As more and more time passes since the cessation of conflicts in former Yugoslavia and relatives of missing persons, witnesses and perpetrators involved grow older and older, accounting for missing persons becomes all the more central, time-sensitive issue which requires unreserved support and cooperation from all countries, its governments and state institutions. Therefore, YIHR Bosnia and Herzegovina, YIHR Croatia, YIHR Kosovo, YIHR Montenegro, and YIHR Serbia urge governments in power, states’ institutions, and political representatives to:
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prioritize finding missing persons over political interests as well as to stop bargaining with and exploiting pain and suffering of the missing persons’ relatives for political gain.
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uphold their commitment to resolve “the fate of the missing in a manner that is commensurate with human rights and the rule of law” which they officially affirmed and declared through the 2014 Declaration.
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unreservedly politically and financially support the Missing Persons Group in their and the member institutions’ efforts to account for missing persons as well as to unconditionally cooperate with the ICMP in the process.
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develop strategies and promotion campaigns in order to raise the public’s awareness about the existence of the Database comprising all active missing person cases for which every citizen can anonymously provide information about each case or the location of a mass or individual grave.
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unreservedly support, act on, and advocate for regional cooperation in accounting for all missing persons, regardless of their ethnicity,
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ensure that perpetrators of enforced disappearances are brought to justice, and if convicted, sanctioned in a manner proportional to the gravity of the acts committed.