Serbian Commissioner Backs BIRN in Info Requests on War Crimes Fugitive

Serbia's information commissioner has ordered the country's interior ministry to provide the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network with information BIRN requested concerning war crimes fugitive Rajko Kozlina, sentenced in late 2019 by a Serbian court to 15 years in prison but who remains at large.

Acting on BIRN complaints, the office of Serbia's Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Personal Data Protection, Milan Marinovic, annulled the ministry's rejections of BIRN's requests and ordered it to inform BIRN whether it has the information requested and, if so, to hand it over "without delay".

The ministry has twice rejected Freedom of Information requests submitted by BIRN and asking whether Kozlina, a former soldier, used an official border crossing when he fled the country despite an order to report to prison. The First Basic Court in Belgrade issued a warrant for his arrest in June this year.

BIRN also asked whether the ministry has issued an international arrest warrant for Kozlina.

In both cases, the ministry argued that giving out the information would "violate the right to privacy of the person", saying there was no public interest in the information being provided.

In a December 21 decision, however, the information commissioner said the ministry had "erred" in arguing that Kozlina's right to privacy trumps the public interest as "the requested information relates to a person sentenced to 15 years in prison for committing war crimes, who at the time of the verdict was employed in the Serbian army."

"Besides," the commissioner added, "the media have already informed the public [about Kozlina's case]."

"In this particular case, the interest of the public to know the requested information...