From the office of the President of Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, the first criminal complaint was filed for defamation, which was recently criminalized in that entity.
Head of Public Relations of the Banja Luka District Public Prosecutor’s Office, Maja Đaković Vidović, confirmed for Klix.ba that they have received one report so far regarding the introduction of defamation into the Criminal Code of the RS.
That report came from the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the RS, that is, from the office of the President of the RS against an unknown person. It can be one or more people, it will be determined later by the investigation.
She pointed out that she could not provide more detailed information about the reasons for filing the report, except that it was a criminal offense of defamation, considering that the case had just been assigned to the prosecutor for work.
The criminalization of defamation, which for the whole of Bosnia and Herzegovina is definitely a democratic step backwards in terms of freedom of speech, recently came into force in the RS, and it will also affect those in the FBiH if a criminal offense has been committed or is suspected of being committed to the detriment of RS residents.
There were numerous warnings from the professional public and the international community that such a law should not be adopted, but the authorities in the RS decided to restrict human freedoms. Partial success has been achieved in terms of the reduction of fines from draconian tens of thousands of BAM to several thousand BAM, depending on the gravity of the crime.
However, the mere existence of such a law is not acceptable in a democratic society, especially a fragile one like BiH, where there is no strong and independent judiciary.
All residents of Bosnia and Herzegovina can find themselves in court because of what they said about a person, regardless of how and where it was said.
Journalists, artists, politicians, as well as ordinary citizens who express their views in public or in a bar, are liable to blame.
