WASHINGTON, Feb 25 (Hina) - The Croatian Government's human rights record remained poor in 1999, read a 6,000-page report on the human rights practices in 194 countries world-wide for the last year, which was released in Washington on
Friday. The report, which also comments on the situation in Croatia on 42 pages, read that "improvement was noted in certain areas," but "serious problems continued in others." Just as in previous reports on this matter, most objections referred to the authorities' interference in all fields of society and economy, restrictions of the media freedom, flaws in the cooperation with the Hague-based International War Crimes Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY), as well as to a slow process of the return of Serb refugees. State Department officials said they were expecting that the next report for 2000 would give considerably better assessments. The introduction to the report
WASHINGTON, Feb 25 (Hina) - The Croatian Government's human rights
record remained poor in 1999, read a 6,000-page report on the human
rights practices in 194 countries world-wide for the last year,
which was released in Washington on Friday.
The report, which also comments on the situation in Croatia on 42
pages, read that "improvement was noted in certain areas," but
"serious problems continued in others."
Just as in previous reports on this matter, most objections
referred to the authorities' interference in all fields of society
and economy, restrictions of the media freedom, flaws in the
cooperation with the Hague-based International War Crimes Tribunal
for former Yugoslavia (ICTY), as well as to a slow process of the
return of Serb refugees.
State Department officials said they were expecting that the next
report for 2000 would give considerably better assessments.
The introduction to the report included a sentence saying that in
January Croatia held parliamentary elections, which were free and
"generally well-conducted", and the then ruling Croatian
Democratic Union (HDZ) lost them to an opposition coalition.
The 1999 report, however, warned that the electoral legislation
"seriously limited citizens' right to change their government
peacefully". In the run-up to the elections the media were under
direct impact of the HDZ party, journalists were prone to self-
censorship and there were also cases of "the overt censorship of the
electronic media."
"The Government restricted press freedom, using the courts and
administrative bodies selectively to shut down or restrain
newspapers, radio, and television stations critical of the
Government or simply outside of its control," it read.
It cited the data that "some 900 criminal and civil cases against
journalists were ongoing".
"The Government's record of cooperation with international human
rights and monitoring organisations was mixed," the report read.
As it was expected, the cooperation between Zagreb and the Hague-
based ICTY was marked negatively.
"It cooperated with some requests from the International Criminal
Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) but refused to comply
with others, including the ICTY's search for evidence on alleged
crimes committed during the Croatian military operations "Flash"
and "Storm" in 1995," the report added.
The report reiterated some objections regarding the return of
refugees. "The implementation of government programs promulgated
in 1998 for the return to the country of refugee citizens (mostly
ethnic Serbs) and the restitution of their homes proceeded very
slowly in many areas because of local government intransigence,
unhelpful influence at the national level, and bureaucratic and
legal confusion," it read.
(hina) ms