The law on non-application of the Decision of the High Representative on the prohibition of denying genocide and other war crimes and glorifying war criminals, which was adopted by the National Assembly of Republika Srpska (NARS) in July 2021, is unconstitutional, the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) decided.
By the decision of the National Assembly, the changes to the Criminal Code imposed by the former high representative in BiH, Valentin Inzko, were invalidated.
The decision was announced on Friday at a press conference in Brcko, where the Constitutional Court held session on Thursday.
The Deputy President of the Constitutional Court of BiH, Mirsad Ceman, said that the Constitutional Court resolved the case initiated by the request of seven delegates of the People’s Council of RS for the review of the constitutionality of the Law on Non-Application of the Decision of the High Representative.
”The Constitutional Court found that the law in question is not in accordance with the Constitution, which defines BiH as a democratic state that functions on the basis of the law and also the standard that the system of free democratic elections is applied in BiH. The court found that this law is not in accordance with the Constitution,” said Ceman and added that this law foresaw that the prohibitions imposed by the former high representative will cease to apply in RS.
”Given that this law was adopted and promulgated by the High Representative, the question of admissibility arose. Briefly explained and stated, the Constitutional Court was guided by its earlier practice in some similar cases because the high representative acted as a legislative institution replacing the competent authority, which in this particular case is the Parliamentary Assembly of BiH (PABiH), and it is a state law. The Constitutional Court established that the controversial law in RS ceases to be valid when our decision is published in the Official Gazette of BiH,” Ceman explained.
The Constitutional Court of BiH currently has 11 unexecuted decisions of the institutions of BiH, which, as said by the President of the Court, Mato Tadic, is absurd, “because in no country that has the rule of law does it happen that final decisions of the court are not executed.”
”Four such decisions refer to the PABiH, four decisions refer to the Parliament of the Federation, two decisions were not implemented by the NARS, one decision was partially implemented and it refers to the case known as ‘Baralija v. BiH’. Unfortunately, we also have a number of unexecuted decisions when it comes to the individual rights of citizens,” Tadic explained, Detektor writes.
E.Dz.
