Bosnian security official wants terrorist recruiting defined as crime
BBC Worldwide Monitoring - October 4, 2004, Monday

Excerpt from report by M. Cubro: "Recruiting for terrorist organizations is not a criminal act", published by Bosnian Serb newspaper Nezavisne novine on 1 October

Sarajevo: Terrorist organizations may recruit people in Bosnia-Hercegovina without fear of criminal prosecution. The B-H Criminal Code does not recognize recruiting for terrorist organizations as a criminal offence.

"The report on the fight against terrorism that we sent to the United Nations says that our Criminal Code does not envisage criminal prosecution for recruiting for terrorist organizations. I think that the UN antiterrorist committee will send us a strong warning about this and that we will be forced to amend the B-H Criminal Code in order to incorporate this provision," Dragan Mektic, deputy B-H security minister, said yesterday.

Mektic said that the United Nations' interest in the legal dimension of the problem of recruiting for terrorist organizations did not mean that the United Nations had information that Bosnia-Hercegovina was a recruiting centre for these organizations. Passage omitted

Chief State Prosecutor Marinko Jurcevic said that the B-H Prosecutor's Office had never prosecuted anyone for recruiting for terrorist organizations.

"We have never had such a case. I must admit that this is very difficult to prove, because all of us have passports and may travel wherever we please. How then can we prove that someone has been recruiting for terrorist organizations?" Jurcevic said.

SOURCE: Nezavisne novine, Banja Luka, in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian 1 Oct 04 p 2

Copyright 2004 British Broadcasting Corporation
BBC Monitoring Europe - Political
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