The Youth Initiative for Human Rights (YIHR Serbia) condemns the statements and actions of President Aleksandar Vučić, Prime Minister Macut and Minister of Justice Vujić, who exploited the poor health condition of Nebojša Pavković, a convicted war criminal, to celebrate him as a hero. It is unacceptable to use the application of basic human rights principles — which allow convicts to stay with their families and receive medical treatment in their home country due to serious health conditions — as a means to glorify and deny the massive human rights violations for which Pavković was convicted with final verdict. Such actions are in direct opposition to the principles of peace and stability. Instead of, as Minister Vujić said, “the state must stand behind Pavković, Karadžić and Mladić,” the Republic of Serbia must abide by the law, international obligations, and not war criminals.

Considering the ongoing attempts to heroize Pavković — the most recent being an attempt by the Cultural Institution of Ćuprija to paint a large mural in the town center, which was prevented by a decision of the Commissioner for Protection Equality based on a complaint by the YIHR Serbia — we express concern that Pavković’s stay in Serbia will be used by Serbian officials as an additional reason to continue the practice of denying war crimes, which we have documented in the reports titled “The State of Denial.”

On Friday, September 26, President Vučić, contrary to his constitutional powers, announced in New York that Nebojša Pavković would be released early by the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals in The Hague (IRMCT) due to his extremely poor health condition. Making such an announcement before the decision was officially published by the IRMCT clearly demonstrates an intention for political exploitation and undermining of good neighborly relations in the region. For security reasons, the IRMCT publishes such decisions only after the convict has been transferred to their country, based on Article 26 of the ICTY Statute and Rules 150 and 151 of the IRMCT’s Rules of Procedure and Evidence.

On Friday, Vučić stated that Pavković “fought heroically in 1999”, which is an insult to the thousands of Albanian civilian victims, for whose suffering Pavković — as commander of the Third Army of the Yugoslav Army — was convicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in 2014. The verdict confirmed that Pavković was responsible for deportations, other inhumane acts (forcible transfer), murder, and persecution as crimes against humanity, and for murder as a violation of the laws and customs of war. Pavković arrived in Belgrade from Finland — where he had been serving a 22-year prison sentence — on Sunday, September 28, on a plane provided by the Government of Serbia.

We believe that Serbia should be a country committed to peace — a country that has learned important lessons from its own past and whose representatives, wherever they speak on its behalf, respect their mandates and demonstrate a commitment to the principles of accountability, empathy, and reconciliation. Unfortunately, once again, what has been brought to the forefront is the disregard for judicially established facts and for the victims of the 1990s wars who were not of Serbian nationality — as well as for the victims of the war in Gaza. The President of Serbia confirmed this stance through a meeting held in New York on Thursday, September 25, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, for whom the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant in November 2024 for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed against Palestinian civilians.