24 March – International Day for the Right to the Truth

On the occasion of 24 March – International Day for the Right to the Truth, the regional network of Youth Initiative for Human Rights in Kosovo, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Croatia remind political elites in the region about their duty to fulfill the right to the truth and their obligation to combat impunity.

Wars and other events that have occurred in the territory of former Yugoslavia had resulted in serious and massive violations of human rights that in large part remained denied, untried and un-repaired. Today, according to the data of International Committee of the Red Cross, the number of missing persons in the territory of former Yugoslavia is around 15000 and the right of families to know truth about the destiny of their loved ones remains unrealized.

The right to know the truth is an inevitable right for the families of victims as well as society’s right to know the full truth about what happened in the past. Therefore we call on our decision-makers to commit themselves fully to resolving the fate of all victims, punishing those responsible of crimes and to support the initiative to establish a regional commission to establish facts about all victims of war crimes and other serious human rights violations in the former Yugoslavia – RECOM (www.zarekom.org,www.perkomra.org).