Balkan News

The president of the UN’s war crimes court for the former Yugoslavia, Carmel Agius, said the Hague Tribunal established many crucial facts about the 1990s wars, but its job was never to provide reconciliation.

New research by BIRN and Reporters Without Borders highlights the extent to which the Serbian media space has become dominated by a handful of boadcasters and media companies.

Over the past three years, courts and prosecutions in Bosnia and Herzegovina have processed more cases involving wartime sexual violence than before, but more needs to be done, a new OSCE report says.

Belgrade’s Humanitarian Law Centre filed criminal complaints against three former fighters from the Serbian Red Berets unit, accusing them of committing war crimes in the Bosnian town of Doboj in 1992.

Romania's ruling Social Democrat Party impeached its own government on Wednesday after a week of skirmishes between the party leader and the Prime Minister who refused to resign.

After the opposition Vetevendojse movement invited the LDK to join a coalition, acting PM Isa Mustafa said the LDK’s condition for entering any coalition was holding the PM’s post. 

London-based think tank says Moscow’s bid to establish bloc of four neutral or pro-Moscow Balkan states has experienced major setbacks in Macedonia and Montenegro.

The overnight demolition of an illegally-built mosque has highlighted difficulties the Muslim community faces in Serbian capital.

The United Nations should reconsider its refusal to compensate Kosovo Roma who suffered lead poisoning at UN-run camps after the Kosovo war.

Events in Macedonia have shown that genuine change remains possible in this region – but only if ordinary citizens are prepared to lead the way. 

Parliament is to vote on a Social Democratic Party motion of no confidence in its own government after a week of political turmoil and a nationalist backlash over a failed deal with an ethnic Hungarian party.

A pro-government newspaper in Serbia has been criticised for giving an interview to a convicted criminal - who accused President Aleksandar Vucic's enemies of plotting his downfall and even death.

Following the fire in London's Grenfell Tower, in which dozens died, concerns have risen in Bulgaria over construction materials used in renovation work on apartment blocks.

20 Jun 17 Romania Arrests Target Child-Trafficking Crime Gang Romanian organised crime prosecutors say that more than 70 Roma children from the east of the country were trained to pick pockets and then sent to Paris to steal and beg. Ana Maria Touma BIRN Bucharest Beggar on the Champs-Elysees, Paris. Photo: Guilhem Vallut/Flikr. Romanian prosecutors have uncovered an organised criminal group suspected of training more than 70 Roma children and sending them to France to steal from offices, pick pockets and beg on the streets of Paris. Prosecutors said in a statement that on Monday they searched 25 homes in several Romanian cities and brought in 120 people for questioning […]

Former senior Kosovo Liberation Army members Sylejman Selimi and Sami Lushtaku’s appeal against their conviction for war crimes against civilian prisoners began at the country’s Supreme Court.

The defence lawyer for former security official Franko Simatovic told the Hague Tribunal that a witness’s claim that the Serbian State Security Service was a protagonist in the Croatian war in 1991 was false.

The number of Bosnian citizens wanted by Interpol on terrorism-related charges has risen to 13, but locals and analysts are divided about whether the country itself is in danger of attacks.

After preventing the establishment of a new ethnically-segregated school in their town, pupils in Jajce led protests against ethnic divisions in Bosnian schools in general.

Macedonia may have to pay dearly to fix problems with the ongoing construction of two key stretches of motorway funded by a Chinese loan, after work was temporarily halted due to bad planning.

A new investigation into Real Madrid star Luka Modric, suspected of giving false testimony in a corruption trial in Croatia, demonstrates that people must tell the truth in court, the ex-justice minister said.