STATEMENT FOR PUBLIC

International Human Rights Day
BH is still far from world standards

10 December, International Human Rights Day is one occasion to turn the attention of the domestic public and future governmental authorities to the fact that BH is one of the European countries with the most numerous violations of human rights. The Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in BH stresses that in our country there is still no respect for the General Declaration of Human Rights, the 52. anniversary of which we are observing now. Human rights of returnees are being massively violated and there is discrimination on ethnic, religios and gender basis.
We are particularly concerned about the fact that the rule of law has yet been established and that all the BH citizens do not enjoy the same rights and that laws are not equally applied to all.
We wish once again to point at the extremely difficult and painful issue of missing persons. About 20,000 are still registered as missing persons although five years passed since the establishment of peace. It is inadmissible that the authorities have not made sufficient effort in order to throw light on their fate and to stop the agony of the members of their families.
Therefore, we urge all those with political responsibility in Bosnia and Herzegovina to make efforts in order to improve the state of human rights and to respect for the international standards in this field. We urge all those who can help in solving solve the issue of missing persons, to show their good will and to do all in their power finally to find the truth on missing persons.

Sarajevo 9 December 2000
No: 09A-12/2000

Srdjan Dizdarevic
President of the Helsinki Committee
for Human Rights in BH

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