”High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH)Christian Schmidt reminds members of the Parliament that the dismissal of the current international judges from the Constitutional Court would violate the Constitution and the principle of independent jurisdiction. The High Representative, as the guardian of the Dayton Agreement, cannot accept any legislative initiatives in that direction,” announced the Office of the High Representative (OHR).
The High Representative emphasizes, as further stated, that judges enjoy the security of tenure and that taking into account ethnic criteria in passing judgments violates every international legal standard.
”Judges should render verdicts independently and impartially, based on the law. With such initiatives, BiH is deviating from the European path,” stated the high representative, it was published on the X platform.
Five delegates from the Club of the Bosniak People decided to leave the session of the House of Peoples of the Parliamentary Assembly of BiH yesterday after the consideration of the request of delegate Zelimir Neskovic (Caucus of the Serbian People) was included in the agenda of yesterday‘s session with eight votes “for”, six “against” and no abstentions when it comes to considering the Draft Law on the Constitutional Court of BiHunder the urgent procedure.
Speaker of the BiH House of Peoples, Kemal Ademovic, said that the law is unconstitutional and that he does not intend to put it on the agenda, while Sefik Dzaferovic, the chairman of the Bosniak People’s Caucus, pointed out, among other things, that the proposed law “takes away the right of the Constitutional Court to regulate its way of acting, rather than parliament should do it by law”.
”The Constitutional Court decides by a majority vote of the judges, and here ethnic voting is introduced in the way of making decisions regarding appeals,” said Dzaferovic, Federalna reports.