{"id":179077,"date":"2020-04-15T23:29:44","date_gmt":"2020-04-15T22:29:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev.recom.link\/?p=179077"},"modified":"2020-05-24T22:08:51","modified_gmt":"2020-05-24T21:08:51","slug":"common-priority-facts-about-victims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/","title":{"rendered":"Common Priority: Facts About Victims"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"post-content\">\n<p>27 May 2019<\/p>\n<p>The EU has placed good neighborly relations and reconciliation high in the 2018 enlargement strategy. Its endorsement by the Western Balkans leaders at the Sofia summit (17 May 2018) and their joint declarations on missing persons and on war crimes, in London (10 July 2018), give hope that strong support for reconciliation, through the RECOM Initiative, will be agreed upon at the Poznan Summit (4-5 July 2019) in the framework of the Berlin Process.<\/p>\n<p>The preparatory ministerial meeting (Warsaw 11 May 2019) certainly underlined the \u201cparticipants\u2019 commitment to reconciliation\u201d, as they\u00a0\u00a0\u201cdiscussed a possible approach to dealing with the past by the governments with the involvement of civil society and victim associations through the initiative for RECOM\u201d and \u201cagreed to continue exploring this option\u201d (Chair\u2019s communiqu\u00e9). Pierre Mirel, former Director for the WB at the European Commission, was asked to assist this aim forward.<\/p>\n<p>It is in this context that Pierre Mirel met recently with state institution representatives in Bosnia and Herzegovina, including with Sta\u0161a Ko\u0161arac, deputy of the SNSD Caucus, who issued a press release afterward (16 May 2019). Mr. Ko\u0161arac stated that Republika Srpska\u2019s institutions consider RECOM as an \u201cunacceptable institution for encouraging the process of reconciliation\u201d, because \u201cICTY judgments cannot be the basis for establishing facts and full truth\u201d. How can one deny that beyond the verdicts, even with some mistakes, facts have been established by the trials?<\/p>\n<p>This statement by Mr. Ko\u0161arac represents a clear negation of BiH\u2019s commitment at the London Summit where the Heads of Governments underlined the importance of \u201crecognizing and respecting verdicts, rejecting the use of hate speech and the glorification of war criminals, promoting a culture of respect for and solidarity with all the victims\u201d (Joint Declaration on War Crimes).<\/p>\n<p>This is precisely the goal of the\u00a0\u2018Regional Commission tasked with establishing the facts about all victims of war crimes and other serious rights violations committed on the territory of the former Yugoslavia from 1 January 1991 to 31 December 2001\u2019\u00a0(RECOM).<\/p>\n<p>RECOM is not aimed at duplicating judicial work nor at becoming a parallel tribunal. By focussing on the facts and the victims, it would prove to be an indispensable tool to complement judicial decisions and to bring closer opposing views regarding the same events. RECOM is conceived as a regional inter-state body, where its Commissioners are selected by the authorities and civil society representatives. Its Draft Statute rallied a wide consensus among the Western Balkan leaders in 2014. Political changes in several countries afterwards slowed down the pursuit of the initiative, hence the importance of returning to it as it regathers momentum at the Poznan Summit this July.<\/p>\n<p>So far, Serbia, Kosovo, North Macedonia, and Montenegro have agreed to support it. Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia have not yet taken an official position. It is hoped that they too will participate in a RECOM Declaration, in the name of the victims and in accordance with their commitment \u201cto overcome the legacy of the past, through promoting reconciliation and good neighborly relations\u201d (Joint Declaration, London, 10 July 2018).<\/p>\n<p>All WB leaders should indeed be striving for reconciliation by all possible means (in the fields of trials, victims-centered approaches, joint commemorations, school books and other activities), in line with the numerous declarations, they have signed over the past years, as well as in the context of the 2015 EU Council conclusions to support Transitional Justice. Establishing the facts about the victims should be a priority, in order to restore their dignity and to avoid allowing the past to permanently disturb the present and handicap the future.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"27 May 2019 The EU has placed good neighborly relations and reconciliation high in the 2018 enlargement strategy. Its endorsement&#8230; ","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":181501,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[642],"tags":[1726,1935],"class_list":["post-179077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-institutions-support","tag-berlin-process","tag-eu-2"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Common Priority: Facts About Victims - REKOM ~ KOMRA ~ RECOM<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Common Priority: Facts About Victims - REKOM ~ KOMRA ~ RECOM\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"27 May 2019 The EU has placed good neighborly relations and reconciliation high in the 2018 enlargement strategy. Its endorsement...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"REKOM ~ KOMRA ~ RECOM\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/ZaREKOM.PerKOMRA.ForRECOM\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-04-15T22:29:44+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-05-24T21:08:51+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/institualization.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1024\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"683\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Recom Editor\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@REKOM_KOMRA\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@REKOM_KOMRA\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Recom Editor\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/\",\"name\":\"Common Priority: Facts About Victims - REKOM ~ KOMRA ~ RECOM\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/institualization.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-04-15T22:29:44+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-05-24T21:08:51+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/0b0fce47cdf986c8b4194146b69999a3\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/institualization.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/institualization.png\",\"width\":1024,\"height\":683,\"caption\":\"eu flag\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Common Priority: Facts About Victims\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/\",\"name\":\"REKOM ~ KOMRA ~ RECOM\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/0b0fce47cdf986c8b4194146b69999a3\",\"name\":\"Recom Editor\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/b345ee03975bccfc62280b0fd1ffd916?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/b345ee03975bccfc62280b0fd1ffd916?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Recom Editor\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/author\/jelanag\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Common Priority: Facts About Victims - REKOM ~ KOMRA ~ RECOM","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Common Priority: Facts About Victims - REKOM ~ KOMRA ~ RECOM","og_description":"27 May 2019 The EU has placed good neighborly relations and reconciliation high in the 2018 enlargement strategy. Its endorsement...","og_url":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/","og_site_name":"REKOM ~ KOMRA ~ RECOM","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/ZaREKOM.PerKOMRA.ForRECOM\/","article_published_time":"2020-04-15T22:29:44+00:00","article_modified_time":"2020-05-24T21:08:51+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1024,"height":683,"url":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/institualization.png","type":"image\/png"}],"author":"Recom Editor","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@REKOM_KOMRA","twitter_site":"@REKOM_KOMRA","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Recom Editor","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/","url":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/","name":"Common Priority: Facts About Victims - REKOM ~ KOMRA ~ RECOM","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/institualization.png","datePublished":"2020-04-15T22:29:44+00:00","dateModified":"2020-05-24T21:08:51+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/0b0fce47cdf986c8b4194146b69999a3"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/institualization.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/institualization.png","width":1024,"height":683,"caption":"eu flag"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/common-priority-facts-about-victims\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Common Priority: Facts About Victims"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/","name":"REKOM ~ KOMRA ~ RECOM","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/0b0fce47cdf986c8b4194146b69999a3","name":"Recom Editor","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/b345ee03975bccfc62280b0fd1ffd916?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/b345ee03975bccfc62280b0fd1ffd916?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Recom Editor"},"url":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/author\/jelanag\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179077"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179077"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179077\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":179078,"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179077\/revisions\/179078"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/181501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.recom.link\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}