It is very possible that the Svetozar Pudaric case will end up before the European Court for Human Rights in Strasbourg, President of the fourth chamber of the European Court of Human Rights Faris Vehabovic told N1.
“The main role of Bosnia’s Constitutional Court is to protect the Constitution and the rights it guarantees, and some of those rights are also guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights, as well as other rights stipulated in the Constitution,” Vehabovic told N1. “I can’t comment on the reasons why the court rejected this case, but the case will almost certainly end up before the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.”
Svetozar Pudaric, a Bosnian Serb living in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH) entity filed an appeal to Bosnia’s Constitutional Court to be allowed to apply for candidacy for Bosnia’s Presidency member from among the Serb people.
Bosnia’s Presidency is composed of three members, each representing one of the three ethnic majorities living in the country – a Bosniak, a Serb and a Croat Presidency member.
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The country is also composed of two territorial semi-autonomous entities that emerged from the 1995 Dayton Peace Agreement, which ended the war. One of them is the Federation (FBiH), populated by mostly Bosniaks and Croats, and Republika Srpska (RS), populated mostly by Serbs.
The Bosniak and Croat Presidency members are elected from the FBiH, and the Serb member is elected from the RS.
Pudaric is a Serb who lives in the FBiH.
In the rejection of Pudaric’s case, the CC explained that it had already ruled on a similar case before. That is the case of Ilijaz Pilav, a Bosniak in the RS who wanted to run for the Bosniak Presidency member seat.
Vehabovic also expressed his confidence that there will be many more cases like the Pudaric case in the future.
According to him, Bosnia has a record os systemic human rights violations when it comes to its electoral process.
“It is quite clear that Bosnia is systemically violating human rights when it comes to the field of Bosnia’s electoral process,” he added.
