Deportation of Bosnian Muslim refugees in 1992

Prelevic Law Firm has filed 40 claims on behalf of 190 family members of 33 refugees who lost their lives due to illegal arrest and deportation by the Montenegrin police to the army of Bosnian Serbs on the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina and on behalf of 7 survivors who had been deported to the Foca concentration camp. The first claim has been filed on 6 December 2004. A total of 29 first instance judgments has been delivered so far, 27 partially adopting the plaintiffs' claims and 2 rejecting all claims. Not one judgment has become final. The Higher Court in Podgorica has not yet decided on the first appeal filed on 15 July 2006. The President of the Montenegrin Government, the opposite party to the plaintiffs in these law suits, never replied to three letters of the victims' families suggesting settlement negotiations. Since the initiation of the law suit, five parents of the victims have died. The criminal investigation has been going on for two years with no result in spite of numerous written and other evidence of this war crime, probably the best documented one in the region.

- Case summary

- Victims

- Amnesty International Report 2008
State of the World's Human Rights:
"No progress was made in investigations of six former police officers indicted in February 2006 for the enforced disappearance of 83 Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) civilians in 1992. In related civil proceedings, in 25 out of 38 first instance decisions, Montenegro was found responsible for the enforced disappearances or deaths of the Bosniak civilians, and compensation was awarded to survivors, or to family members for the deaths of their relatives. The state appealed each decision. The court rejected claims that the authorities had violated the relatives' rights under M Article 3 of the ECHR in failing to provide information on the fate and whereabouts of the disappeared."

- 15th anniversary update

- Amnesty International : Montenegro - The right to redress and reparation for the families of the "disappeared" 12/21/2006
     - download PDF document
     - read on Amnesty International site

- Letter to the PM Sturanovic 05/29/2007

- Second letter to the PM Sturanovic 02/14/2007

- Letter to the PM Sturanovic 12/13/2006

- Role of the State Prosecutor (1992-2007)

- Latest development 12/05/2006

- 1992 deportation of refugees case: first judgement 06/29/2006

- Amnesty International calls on Montenegrin authorities to ensure justice...

- Human Rights Watch World Report 2006: Serbia and Montenegro:
"... The case concerned the handing over of eighty Bosnian Muslim refugees in Montenegro to Bosnian Serb soldiers in May 1992, resulting in the execution of most of the refugees. Dozens of victims' families sued the state for compensation in 2004, but as of October 2005 only four civil proceedings had begun. Under public pressure, in October, the Montenegrin state prosecutor requested the opening of a criminal investigation into the 1992 case. The prosecutor's motion was seriously flawed by including a dozen victims among the potential witnesses and omitting important documents from the evidence. The motion also failed to include any senior official among the suspects."

- Written evidence presented to the Court and The Defendant State

- Response of the Ministry of Interior to the wife of one of the victims, 18 August 1992

- Request for Information on the Investigation directed to the Supreme State Prosecutor, 7 April 2005

- Destruction of evidence - information released 8 Sept 2005.