Historical negationism

The Serbian authorities are using memorialisation of the 1990s wars to manufacture a populist narrative of national pride and victimhood for political advantage, says a new report by the Humanitarian Law Centre which was launched on Tuesday evening in Belgrade.

Mayor of Niksic Marko Kovacevic (right) at a session of parliament. Photo: Parliament of Montenegro.

"After gathering the necessary evidence, the Higher Prosecution in Podgorica filed an indictment, and the High Court in Podgorica will have to confirm it," state prosecutor Lepa Medenica told news website CDM.

Several times a week, the Memorial Centre at Donja Gradina - the place where prisoners in the Ustasa-run Jasenovac-Stara Gradiska concentration camp complex in Croatia were brought every day to be liquidated - publishes posts on Twitter commemorating the lives of the camp's victims.

This is the conclusion of the Independent International Commission for the Study of the Suffering of All Nations in the Srebrenica Region in the period 1992-1995, formed by the Government of Republika Srpska.

Denis Becirovic, the other lawmaker behind the proposal, said that because deputies from the main Bosnian Serb and Croat parties, the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats, SNSD, and the Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, did not back the changes, it is now time for Inzko to step in and impose a solution.

The Serbian National Council, SNV presented its annual report on Tuesday, registering 214 incidents of ethnic intolerance, historical revisionism, denial of historical facts, offences, threats, physical attacks and hate speech targeting Croatian Serbs last year.

MEPs in the European Parliament adopted two separate reports on Thursday evening urging Serbia and Kosovo to be more efficient in investigating the remaining missing persons cases from the 1998-99 Kosovo war.

Journalists in Greece say censorship, intimidation and restrictions on access are getting worse under the ruling conservatives.

High-level Polish officials have jumped on the bandwagon of criticism over US President Donald Trump's social media bans to promote a recent draft law officially aimed at combatting online "censorship", but which digital rights groups warn must be scrutinised carefully.

Croatia will take over the presidency of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, IHRA, in 2023 after its nomination was unanimously endorsed at IHRA's plenary session, the Croatian Foreign Ministry announced on Friday.