FREE THE BELGRADE SIX!

All the independent observers unanimously agree that the trial against the Belgrade Six is purely (and irrationally) politically motivated, and that the prosecutors' qualification of the charges as "international terrorism" is grotesque and legally unsustainable. A number of eminent lawyers have presented detailed analyses and arguments supporting this assessment. We will not proceed to repeat their arguments and the results of their expert analyses of the "18-euro intertnational terrorism" indictment, since they are already included in the official statement by the Action Committee of the Campaign Against Political Repression, which has been submitted to the media and published in full.

What has so far been drawing the attention of the independent public, is the legal qualification of the "act" and the utterly disproportionate application of state power against the defendants (i.e. their five-month-long custody), due to the fact that this was the only information on the contents of the indictment so far available to the public, as well as the fact that they are the weakest points of these political charges.

However, since the activists of the Campaign Against Political Repression have published the formal indictment, the public can now easily learn that these are far from being the only weak points of the charges, and that, moreover, this indictment has no strong, serious, sustainable points whatsoever.

It is evident from the indictment itself that there are not even any legal grounds to qualify the "act" as attempt at causing general public danger – given that the mixture in the bottles thrown at the sidewalk in front of the embassy (not "at the embassy" itself) was not flammable, and therefore any attempt at an "attack" with this sort of mixture should consequently be legally qualified as a failed attempt.

The weakest point of the indictment, however, is its complete disability to prove that the six defendants actually participated in throwing those bottles at the sidewalk in front of the Greek embassy. The assumption brought forward in the indictment, that it was the six of them who organized and performed this throwing of two bottles containing inflammable matter, is based primarily on the "confession" of two of the defendants.

We cannot help but remind that the defentant's confession used to be considered sufficient evidence of guilt in legal theory and practice of the Medieval Inquisition. Who exactly is it that is using this kind of a trial in an attempt to push Serbia and its Judicary into the historical darkness of the Inquisition, using for the purpose two broken bottles of inflammable matter on the sidewalk outside the Greek embassy?

For these reasons, having been acquainted with the text of the indictment in its entirety, we demand that the charges be altogether dropped, and that the six defendants be released without further delay.

Campaign Against Political Repression
Action Committee of the Campaign – the Administrators of Campaign's web-site

Filip Šaćirović
Jaćim Milunović
Vladimir Marković
Nenad Glišić
Pavluško Imširović
Milan Stojanović
Ivan Feher
Aleksandra Spasov
Slobodan Stamenčić

Free the Belgrade 6 - info

On September 4th, the investigating attorney of the Belgrade District Court ruled that the six young people arrested on September 3rd 2009 under the charges of "causing general public danger", were to be held in custody for thirty days, whereas, in his request for investigation, the state attorney changed the qualification to "criminal act of international terrorism".

They are being prosecuted for having written a graffiti on the facade of the Greek embassy building in Francuska Street in Belgrade, and then throwing two Molotov cocktalis on the building, on August 25th about 3a.m. On this occasion, a window was cracked, the flame caused minor damage to the facade without spreading to the interior of the building, and the small fire was soon extinguished (with a bottle of water). No one was injured in this 'assault', since the embassy building was empty at the time, and all embassy services started working regularly the following morning.

After two months of investigation, on November 3rd, charges of committing a criminal act of international terrorism were raised against Tadej Kurepa, Sanja Dojkic, Nikola Mitrovic, Ratibor Trivunac, Ivan Savic and Ivan Vulovic. The defendants were denied the right to be granted bail, under the excuse that their offence could possibly be repeated.

The curiousity of these circumstances resides in the unusual moves made by the police and the prosecution, whereby the arrested have been charged with committing a criminal act of international terrorism. According to the Criminal Code of Serbia, this act is treated in the same rank with the crime of genocide, crime against humanity, war crimes against civilians, organizing and incitement to genocide and war crimes, leading aggressive warfare, and the like.

Let us recollect that the only person prosecuted for taking part in the burning of the American embassy in Belgrade on February 21st 2008 was spared such a harsh qualification, and was charged with no more than "serious offenses against the enforcement of general safety", even though the building of a foreign embassy was seriously damaged in the fire, and one person, who was in the company of the defendant, died in the fire.

At the present moment, in which civil rights and freedoms in Serbia are being largely narrowed by the changes introduced to the Criminal Code and the Public Information Law, criminal prosecution of the six arrested clearly indicates the intention of certain political structures to increase the level of repression and use misfeasance in their effort to gradually stifle any political criticism of their actions.

More than two months following the formal indictment, a month after the complaint filed by the defense was dismissed, the six young people are still in detention, awaiting trial. Their trial has not yet been scheduled, even though all legal deadlines have been broken.

We hereby declare our solidarity with the arrested and demand that the absurd indictment against them be withdrawn!

Freedom to the arrested anarchists! (read less)