State sued over alleged police torture

Belgrade, September 12 (Source: B92) - The Humanitarian Law Center has sued the state on behalf of Šefko Bibić for police torture he says he suffered in 1993. The HLC wants Bibić from Sjenica to receive compensation for pain suffered during a beating he received from officers in a police station in the village of Karajukića Bunari in December 1993, when he claims he was physically abused and subjected to insults related to his ethnicity.

The HLC alleges that Bibić, who is Muslim, was summoned for questioning at the police station at the beginning of December 1993. “The policemen asked Bibić to bring his weapons along to the station. When Bibić told inspector Mile N. that he wasn’t carrying any weapons with him, the inspector proceeded to hit him several times, all the while racially insulting him,” the HLC statement says.

Bibić lost consciousness as a result of the beating, and when he came round, the same inspector continued to hit him, before sending him home. Mile N. then allegedly ordered Bibić to appear at the police station the following day and bring his weapons, and told him to "buy a gun if he did not already have one." The Humanitarian Law Center accuses members of the police (MUP) of searching the homes of Bosniaks living in Sandžak during the 1990s war in Bosnia, in a bid to find weapons, "and then arresting and abusing them for no apparent reason."

“Even though these cases were reported to the competent bodies, there have been neither serious investigations nor disciplinary procedures in most of them,” the HLC alleges. Most of the police officers who took part in the alleged abuse are, according to HLC data, still employed with MUP.

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