Slaven Kovacevic, according to whose lawsuit the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg ruled that his active right to vote was threatened, at the protests in front of the Office of the High Representative (OHR) building in Sarajevo, due to dissatisfaction with the decisions of High Representative Christian Schmidt, said that this is the worst High Representative and the only one against which protests were organized several times.
Kovacevic told the gathered citizens that when he sees how many there are, he gets extra strength to fight for his verdict. “Let them shoot, no one can scare me,” he said.
He pointed out that with his appeal “he doesn’t have bad intentions“, adding that there are two visions in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH)…
“Our one and only, civil, where we are all equal in good and bad, and there is also their vision, one of the exhibits of which is this Mr. Schmdit. Together with backward policies, he wants to create a country where there is no place for everyone,” Kovacevic said.
“This Schmidt is the first and only high representative who has done three things”, Kovacevic continued his speech and explained what it was all about.
“He is the only high representative against whom protests were organized a few times. The second thing he has done is that he has shown extreme partiality – he is trying to protect the systems that were created during the genocide and the Joint Criminal Enterprise (JCE) and that is why he wants to go to Strasbourg. The third thing is that he succeeded in tarnishing the reputation of the international community, which will not be recovered as long as he is here,” stated the appellant before the European Court of Human Rights.
During his address, Kovacevic asked the high representative two questions.
“Are you ashamed to sit in your office 500 meters from the Vraca Memorial Park where 11,000 Sarajevo citizens, who were killed in the Second World War for the ideology you worship, lie? Are you ashamed that the 11,000 Sarajevo citizens were killed during the siege in the 1990s because of the ideology you are trying to protect,” he asked.
In the end, Kovacevic said that “he will go to the end, that I will not give up and that he will win”.
Kovacevic vs BiH
Kovacevic complained to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg because his active right to vote is threatened since, as someone who lives in the Federation of BiH (FBiH) entity, he can vote exclusively for Croats and Bosniaks when electing members of the BiH Presidency.
The court ruled that Kovacevic‘s rights were violated and that he was discriminated against.
In the verdict, the Court states that the constituent nations, which according to the Constitution of BiH are Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats, “obviously enjoy a privileged position in the current system”.
High Representative Christian Schmidt decided to testify in the “Slaven Kovacevic” case at the European Court of Human Rights after the BiH Council of Ministers appealed the verdict.
