Criminal law

EU Minister Volkan Bozk?r has expressed unease over remarks by Prime Ministerial adviser Etyen Mahçupyan that it was impossible to say that Armenians were not subjected to a genocide in 1915.

Mahçupyan?s description ?was not appropriate for his title of adviser,? Bozk?r said on April 16 during a televised interview.

Etyen Mahçupyan, who became the ever first Armenian-origin chief advisor to a Turkish prime minister when Ahmet Davuto?lu appointed him to the post on Aug. 27, 2014, has described the killings of Armenians in 1915 at the hands of the Ottoman Empire as a ?genocide.?

Turkey has no reason to react against any motion to recognize the mass killing of Ottoman Armenians in World War I as ?genocide,? as it will never accept ?a crime and sin? like genocide, President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an has said, as the European Parliament is set to vote on a motion on the issue on April 15.

Bulgaria's prosecuting authority has announced that judge Rumyana Chenalova, who has been sought nationwide since Tuesday noon, is now in custody.

Chenalova is now facing pre-trial proceedings for professional misconduct and a document-related offence.

Bulgarian authorities are searching nationwide for Judge Rumyana Chenalova, who has been temporarily removed from office due to ongoing disciplinary proceedings against her.

Chenalova was not found at any of the addresses she listed in documents submitted to the court authorities, according to the prosecuting authority, as cited by dnevnik.bg.

The High Court of Cassation and Justice (ICCJ) on Tuesday is to check on the legality of preventive measures in the ANRP (National Authority for Property Restitution) case with the former chief of the National Integrity Agency (ANI) Horia Georgescu and MPs Catalin Theodor Nicolescu and Marko Attila-Gabor involved.

Photo credit: (c) Cristian NISTOR / AGERPRES ARCHIVE

Croatia's Constitutional Court on Thursday released Mayor Milan Bandic from custody, acting on an appeal from his lawyers, who said his fundamental rights had been breached in March when the Zagreb County Court put him behind bars.

The government on Thursday submitted to Parliament an amendment to be tagged onto the bill foreseeing the scrapping of maximum-security prisons that would allow inmates? partners or relatives who are deemed to be suspects to be held under house arrest rather than in custody.

Turkey's Supreme Court of Appeals has sentenced a prosecutor charged over delaying an investigation into the "Operation Return to Life" in 2000, in which scores of inmates died after security forces raided 20 prisons across Turkey.

Bosniak war victims welcomed the life sentence for genocide in Srebrenica given to former general Zdravko Tolimir, but Serb lawyers said it was an unjust, politicised verdict.