Bosniak brutally beaten by Serbs near Zvornik

Billiard club in Kiseljak set on fire

Drugs and weapons seized in Tuzla

Police turning blind eye to brutal and bloodthirsty dog fighting in Mostar

Attackers on Budimir and Asić identified

Cantonal Court in Sarajevo confirms indictment against Dragan Čović

Dodik: Croats must be elected by Croats

Remarks on BiH’s judicial system to be sent to Brussels

 

Dnevni Avaz, pg 8 – Five Serbs from the village of Branjevo attacked Nesud Halilović several days ago while he was fishing on the Drina river bank, causing him severe bodily injuries. They also knocked out his front teeth and broke his jaw. After the attack, some 30 residents of the Bosniak village of Gornji Šepak spent the weekend nights guarding the village. Avaz says the attack happened after the Serbs were provoking the Bosniaks for days and in various ways.

“I am embittered by this attack, especially because neither Halilović nor anybody else from Gornji Šepak had provoked the attack,” said Fadil Banjanović, a delegate in the RSNA Council of Peoples, expressing hope that similar attacks will not happen in the future.

The attack was reported to the police in Zvornik.

Dnevni Avaz, pg 16 – ‘Pink Panther’ billiard club in Lepenica near Kiseljak was set on fire late Saturday night and its owner Ivan Katava claims that perpetrators are the persons who had beaten him a few days before the arson attack. Katava, who informed the police about the incidents, believes somebody is trying to hush up the whole case because the persons whom he has reported to the police are still free.

 

Oslobođenje, pg 8 – A 31-year-old man from Tuzla has been arrested on suspicion of illegal possession of drugs and weapons, Tuzla Canton MoI said yesterday.

Executing the Municipal Court order, police searched the suspect’s home and car, seizing a considerable quantity of heroin, some amphetamine-based drugs and marijuana, as well as a gun with eight bullets and other items. After police questioning, the suspect was handed over to the Cantonal Prosecutor’s Office for further proceedings. 

 

Dnevni List, front page and pgs 14-15 – Following constant complaints by Mostar’s citizens, the paper investigated the allegations that brutal dog fights happen in the city centre every day. The paper took the picture of the devastated premises of the former heating plant near the city market that have become an illegal dog slaughterhouse, where 15- and 16-year-olds keep three grown pit bulls and six puppies. It further emphasises that, regardless of numerous complaints by the citizens living there, “the scenes from horror movies are constantly taking place in front of their doors.” A 50-year-old man told the daily that those teenagers use their pit bulls to attack and kill stray dogs, which they often film with their mobile phones.  The citizens claim that police only warned the hooligans that their dogs must wear a muzzle, but have never tried to check what is going on behind the red and white door with the image of a bloodthirsty pit bull painted on it. The paper points out that “the citizens are living in fear from the brutal teenagers who don’t shy away from anything in dealing with those who stand in their way”.   

Dnevni Avaz, front page and pg 6 - Herzegovina-Neretva Canton MoI will submit criminal reports against Stanko Galić and Vjekoslav Galić from Široki Brijeg. The two are suspected of having verbally and physically attacked FBiH President Živko Budimir and a member of the FBiH Parliament, Željko Asić, during a wedding party in the settlement of Kruševo near Mostar several days ago. CID Chief of HNC MoI Srećko Bošnjak explained that Vjekoslav Galić was present at the wedding as the guest of honour, while Stanko Galić was the bridegroom and his wife is the daughter of Asić’s sister. The reports will be submitted to the Cantonal Prosecutor’s Office in Mostar.

Oslobođenje, pg 7 – The Cantonal Court in Sarajevo has confirmed the Cantonal Prosecutor’s Office indictment against HDZ leader Dragan Čović, accusing him of abuse of office or official authority in the case publicly known as “Lijanovići”.

According to the indictment, Čović is responsible for issuing an unlawful Act on Customs Tariffs for products which required a special import tax while acting as finance minister in the FBiH Government in 2000, enabling the meat industry company Lijanovići to evade levies on meat and skin chicken and turkey products, which caused 1.9 million KM damage to the FBiH budget.

In 2006, Čović was found guilty in the Lijanovići case and sentenced to five years in prison, but one year later the court dismissed the verdict, declining its jurisdiction over the case and returning the process to the beginning.

A new indictment against Čović in this case was handed from the state court to the cantonal court in Sarajevo in March 2009.

 

According to the verdict, former Interior Minister Dragan Mandić has been sentenced to one year imprisonment because he had exceeded the limits of his official authority and signed 12 decisions on donation of the vehicles of the HNK Ministry of Interior to the third persons.  Therefore he damaged the budget of HNK in the amount of KM 99,329.70, and thereby acquired the material gain to the third persons in the period from 23 November 1998 to 2001.

Goran Bilić and Tomislav Martinović, also former ministers of interior, two former police commissioners Dragan Brkić and Srećko Glibić, former CID Chief Sead Šehić, and former cantonal prime ministers Miroslav Ćorić and Josip Merdžo were acquitted of all charges due to lack of evidence.

According to Avaz, considering that the indictment was mostly based on reports provided by the FBiH Financial Police, which is managed by Director Zufer Dervišević, it can be concluded that this was another failed setup arranged by this institution’s illegal chief. 

 

 

Dnevni List, pg 5, Oslobođenje, front page and pg 6 – RS President Milorad Dodik has said that despite objections by “some of the world’s leading countries, the idea of forming the federal unit in BiH, where Croats would organise themselves, must not be abandoned”.

Dodik told Extra Magazine that “if BiH wants to survive as any kind of community in the future, Croat representatives must be elected by Croats and the Election Law should be amended in this regard to enable the forming of two electoral units in the FBiH, where one unit would be dominantly Croat and the other dominantly Bosniak”. 

Speaking of the structured dialogue on judicial reform in BiH, RS President stressed that “agreement should be given a chance, and if it is eventually not reached, the RS has mechanisms in place which it will not hesitate to use”. Dodik excluded any possibility of a new conflict in BiH.

“I believe that’s only a threat that most frequently comes from the Bosniak side as their political argument, according to which those who fail to disobey Bosniaks and their political ideologies will be responsible for a possible conflict,” said Dodik. According to him, the aim of the Bosniak political leaders is “to create a society based on the principle of outvoting and to ensure that decisions in BiH are taken by the dominant Bosniak voting majority”.

“All Bosniak political parties’ alliances with the Croat parties in the Federation were fake and it was only a matter of time when they will definitely settle the score with the Croat political body in BiH and impose the Bosniak ideology that is being presented by the current and former leaders of the Bosniak parties and Reis Mustafa Cerić as their religious leader,” said Dodik.

RS President has accused Reis Cerić of abusing Islam for political purposes “by sending his message to Serbs and Croats that BiH is the country of Bosniaks and if Serbs and Croats can’t accept that, they will have to leave”. 

 

Glas Srpske, pg 5, Nezavisne Novine, front page and pgs 2-3 – A document containing answers to the EC’s request for getting technical information relevant to the structured dialogue on judicial reform in BiH is ready to be sent to Brussels.

“The document has been translated and will be sent to Brussels by 31 August,” said the BiH Directorate for European Integration.

“What matters most is that all comments that the RS had about the BiH judiciary, especially those concerning the BiH Court and Prosecutor’s Office, have been accepted,” said RS Assistant Minister of Justice Nikola Kovačević.

“Brussels will get our comments and will sit down with us to negotiate. We have to be ready and prepared to provide solid arguments for what we want to achieve,” he said, adding that this especially refers to the BiH Court and Prosecutor’s Office, “which are not the constitutional categories and have been imposed by the High Representative”.

 

Dnevni Avaz – Reis Cerić: We should separate good from evil, justice from injustice  

Oslobođenje – Zagreb Mufti Omerbašić: Time when we were called different names is over

Nezavisne Novine – Remarks on BiH’s judicial system to be sent to Brussels

Glas Srpske – Monthly cost of student life amounts to 700 KM

Press RS – Professor at Economy Department of Banja Luka University asks for sex in exchange for a passing grade  

Dnevni List – Bugojno’s Croats were burned at stake, their identity cannot be determined