Lawyers: Serbs sentenced by The Hague “justice” are being abused in British and Estonian prisons
An Orthodox priest is not allowed to visit ex-President of Republika Srpska Radovan Karadzic, sentenced to life imprisonment, in Parkhurst prison on the British Isle of Wight, nor is he allowed to use a laptop or table lamp.
This was reported by Novosti, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
The portal notes that, according to Karadzic’s daughter, Sonja Karadzic-Jovicevic, her father cannot even get an ordinary table lamp, which he brought from the Dutch prison in Scheveningen, Holland, where he was held during the trial.
Therefore, in the cell, when it gets dark, he can neither read nor write, because the light that illuminates it is very weak. The prisoner complained about this to the prison administration, but they considered that the lighting in Radovan Karadzic’s cell was sufficient.
Also, according to prison rules, Karadzic has the right to a computer, like other prisoners, but only he is denied it. The prisoner is not given a laptop or a computer, while other prisoners use the Internet without any problems, they are allowed to download everything they are interested in from websites, even send emails.
According to Sonja Karadzic-Jovicevic, no matter what her father was convicted of in The Hague, he was not sentenced to be cut off from the world, civilization, his culture, and not be able to write.
“The conditions in which he lives contradict the UN resolution signed by the UK,” says the prisoner’s daughter. – The 2015 regulation, in a section known as the Nelson Mendela Rules, imposes an obligation to personalize the conditions of serving a sentence.
This means that they must satisfy educational, cultural, religious and any other human needs. For all these reasons, the UK is completely unprepared and unable to house foreign prisoners in its prison system.”
Sonya Karadzic-Jovicevich also noted that similar conditions exist in the Estonian prison, where former President of the Republic of Serbian Krajina Milan Martic and Army General of the Republic of Srpska Dragomir Milosevic are serving their sentences.
They have been isolated for years and only have contact with guards and a few prisoners. Martić's lawyer, Predrag Milovančević, says his client has been virtually isolated, the prison administration, unlike other prisoners, does not allow him to work, and he must pay for everything from food to toothpaste:
“Our complaints were not answered, not a single appeal received an adequate response. We list fifteen issues that constitute a violation of international standards and conventions, but the court's response is the opposite.
They say, “we see, but it’s not a problem.” All this speaks of conscious actions aimed at making serving the sentence as unbearable as possible.
Previously, the Red Cross visited Martić in prison, recording all the problems he had, but they were not mentioned in the UN report.
One can say without a doubt about the actions of the Hague Tribunal in these cases that they were carried out in the spirit of “we convicted you and sent you to where it will be as bad as possible for you,” the lawyer said.
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