Non-governmental organizations and civic activists strongly condemn the chanting of the name of convicted war criminal Ratko Mladić during a basketball game played on Wednesday evening in Zeta between the home team KK Vukovi Zeta and the visiting team KK Ibar Rožaje.
According to video footage and eyewitness accounts from the scene, a group of fans of KK Vukovi Zeta chanted the name of Ratko Mladić, a convicted war criminal who was found guilty, among other crimes, of genocide against the Bosniak population in Srebrenica. The team targeted by the chanting comes from a town in northern Montenegro whose population is predominantly Muslim, mainly Bosniak.
Glorifying convicted war criminals constitutes the criminal offence of inciting hatred and intolerance, punishable by imprisonment from six months to five years. We expect the competent state prosecutor to review the footage, identify all perpetrators of this criminal act, and prosecute all those who may bear criminal responsibility.
Reports from the scene indicating that some of the perpetrators of this criminal act were children are a serious cause for concern for our society. Such attitudes among children do not arise spontaneously but are shaped through messages and patterns of behaviour transmitted by adults in the environment in which they grow up. Therefore, responsibility lies not only with individuals in the stands, but also with parents, schools, and the wider community that has for years tolerated the relativization of war crimes and has failed to support the teaching of historical facts about the wars of the 1990s.
We expect the Higher State Prosecutor’s Office to act more decisively against hate speech.
In addition to the Criminal Code of Montenegro, which sanctions the incitement of national, racial and religious hatred and intolerance, hate speech is also prohibited by the Law on Prohibition of Discrimination, the Law on Public Order and Peace, as well as the Law on the Prevention of Violence and Misconduct at Sports Events.
We demand that the police and the State Prosecutor’s Office investigate this case without delay and identify those responsible. Lawful action by institutions in combating hate speech is necessary to prevent the recurrence of such incidents and to send an unequivocal warning to both parents and children that in Montenegro the glorification of war criminals and the spread of hatred will not be tolerated.
- Human Rights Action
- Antifascists of Cetinje
- Association SPECTRA
- Centre for Democratic Transition (CDT)
- Centre for Civic Education (CCE)
- Centre for Investigative Journalism of Montenegro (CIN-CG)
- Centre for Monitoring and Research (CeMI)
- Centre for Development of Non-Governmental Organizations (CRNVO)
- ANIMA – Centre for Women’s and Peace Education
- Centre for Democracy and Human Rights (CEDEM)
- Montenegrin Committee of Lawyers for the Protection of Human Rights and Freedoms
- Montenegrin PEN Centre
- Montenegrin Philological Society
- Queer Montenegro – Montenegrin LGBTIQ Association
- ERA – LGBTI Equal Rights Association for the Western Balkans and Turkey
- Forum MNE – Youth and Informal Education Forum
- Ipso Facto
- Juventas
- Prima
- Safe Women’s House
- Media Institute of Montenegro
- Association of History Teachers of Montenegro – HIPMONT
- Dina Bajramspahić, civic activist
- Paula Petričević, civic activist
Milena Bešić, civic activist