Global Overview 2015: People internally displaced by conflict and violence - Protracted displacement in Bosnia and Herzegovina

Redress and reconciliation challenges

Nearly 20 years after the end of a conflict that displaced around a million people, there were still at least 100,400 IDPs in Bosnia and Herzegovina as of the end of 2014.^[202] The true number is likely to be higher, given that the figure only represents those who have obtained legal status as a "displaced person" and their children. Around 580,000 IDPs have returned to their homes.^[203]

The vast majority of those still displaced live in private accommodation, but around 8,500 live in collective centres, the temporary shelter they were allocated some two decades ago. They are being resettled to social housing. Some IDPs and returnees were displaced again in 2014 by the worst floods and landslides on record, reigniting past trauma for some.

Over two decades of displacement, the number of IDPs decreased dramatically twice. The first fall was from 1996 to 1997 and followed the cessation of hostilities and a push by the government and the international community for their return. The second was from 2000 to 2005 as a result of housing reconstruction and the property law implementation plan. The plan resolved nearly 94 per cent of more than 200,000 property claims.^[204] Most IDPs returned to areas where they formed part of the ethnic majority.

IDPs who return and repossess their property lose their "displaced person" status, but this cannot be equated with the achievement of durable solutions. The sustainability of returns has not been monitored, and many returnees have left again, including because of the poor living conditions they encountered and the unlawful secondary occupation of their property.

Since 2007, the number of IDPs returning to their pre-war homes has flat-lined. Many who wished to return have already done so, though others are still in need of assistance to rebuild their homes or are entangled in legal battles to reclaim their property. Some are also unwilling to return to areas that witnessed gross human rights abuses and where the perpetrators have either gone unpunished or have been released from prison after serving their sentence.

For IDPs who have returned to areas where they are in the ethnic minority, a lack of acknowledgement of events during the war and the commemoration only of victims from the local ethnic majority hinders their ability to move on from their wartime traumas. On 31 May 2014, parents of children killed or disappeared in the town of Prijedor during the war, many of whom are returnees, gathered to rally against local authorities' refusal to publicly acknowledge the killing of more than 3,100 civilians, 102 of whom were children.^[205] Such protests are typical across the country.

The number of attacks on returnees has declined over the years, but they still take place, and displaced and returnee children continue to be educated separately from their counterparts in the local population according to their ethnicity. All of which shows that ethnic reconciliation is still a work in progress and tensions remain.

Justice for the grave violations of international humanitarian law that IDPs and others suffered during the war is essential to the achievement of durable solutions. Violations include mass killings, torture, systematic rape, forced labour and confinement to camps. Remedies to address them have been put in place, including social protection and benefits for the civilian victims of war. Truth commissions have been established in Bijelina, Sarajevo and Srebrenica, commemorations take place and the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and domestic courts have prosecuted some perpetrators. ICTY's mandate came to an end in 2014 after making 69 convictions.^[206] Many IDPs, however, are still waiting for justice.

In 2009, the council of ministers mandated the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Human Rights and Refugees to develop a national transitional justice strategy with UNDP's support.^[207] The strategy is a comprehensive framework for dealing with the legacy of human rights violations and war crimes, and includes provisions on fact finding, truth telling, reparations, memorials and institutional reforms. It was drafted through a consultative process with national and international NGOs and civil society.

The strategy document and its accompanying action plan are still awaiting endorsement by the council of ministers. The failure to adopt them so far has benefitted those who profit from the status quo and often inflame ethnic tensions for political gain, as was seen during the 2014 elections.^[208] Protracted displacement will continue until ethnic divisions have been overcome and IDPs and returnees have received redress for the injustices they suffered.

202. IDMC e-mail correspondence with the Ministry of Human Rights and Refugees, 30 June 2014

203. UNDP, Progress Towards the Realisation of Millennium Development Goals: Bosnia and Herzergovina 2013, 2013, available at: http://goo.gl/tuOnDB

204. OSCE, Property and Return, no date, http://www.oscebih.org/Default.aspx?id=54&lang=EN

205. BalkansInsight, Parents Demand Children's Memorial in Bosnia's Prijedor, 30 May 2014, available at: http://goo.gl/DoAG15

206. Human Rights Watch, ICTY: A Tribunal's Legal Stumble, 3 July 2013, available at: http://goo.gl/jRo3Rt

207. Ministry of Human Rights and Refugees and Ministry of Justice, Transitional Justice Strategy for Bosnia and Herzegovina 2012-2016, March 2013, available at: http://goo.gl/jy0WaJ

208. OSCE, Elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina held in competitive environment, but inter-ethnic divide and mistrust remain key factors, international observers say, 13 October 2014, available at: http://goo.gl/WB8YdC