Balkan Legal News – 05 November 2025

The following media round-up on international, legal and foreign policy issues from around the Balkans for the period from 29 October to 04 November 2025.

Guernica 37 will provide weekly media updates with a focus on Bosnia and Hercegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia. Should you wish to contribute or submit a media summary, opinion piece or blog, please send to Ned Vucijak at nenadv@guernica37.com for consideration.

Guernica 37 Balkan Legal News

  Serbia – 4 November 2025

The Serbian parliament on Tuesday began a debate that could lead to the adoption of a so-called lex specialis, a special law on revitalising the former Yugoslav Army General Headquarters in Belgrade destroyed by the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999. The law aims to declare the revitalisation project – which is already linked to the investment firm of Jared Kushner, US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law – a “project of importance for the Republic of Serbia”. The full article is available here.

Bosnia & Hercegovina – 4 November 2025

The Bosnian state prosecution has begun investigating after the unveiling of a monument in Capljina commemorating Slobodan Praljak, a deceased former officer of the Croatian Defence Council, the Bosnian Croat wartime military force, the prosecutor’s office told BIRN. Praljak swallowed a vial of poison in the Hague Tribunal courtroom when the verdict convicting him of wartime crimes was delivered in November 2017. He died the same day. The full article can be found here.

Romania – 3 November 2025

Romanian Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan announced on Monday that Rheinmetall plans to invest around 535 million euros in a facility producing ignition powders and modular charges in the town of Victoria, central Romania. The government will contribute with a 120-million-euro loan under the EU’s SAFE mechanism (Security Action for Europe), aimed at boosting defence industrial capacity across the bloc. The full article can be found here.

Serbia – 3 November 2025

Serbian police arrested 37 people in Belgrade on Sunday night following clashes between supporters of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party, SNS, and their opponents in front of parliament, where SNS supporters have erected a tent camp. On Monday, the Interior Ministry said police had arrested people who were “disturbing public order and causing incidents during an unregistered public gathering” in front of parliament. The phrase “unregistered public gathering” is an expression used by officials in Serbia for all the anti-government protests that have been held since the Novi Sad railway station disaster last November, which caused the deaths of 16 people. The full article can be found here.

North Macedonia – 3 November 2025

After Sunday’s local election runoffs, the ruling VMRO DPMNE party celebrated victory in 21 out of the 33 municipalities where second rounds were held, confirming its overall dominance at the local elections. In total, after the two election rounds, the party is set to govern 54 of the country’s 81 municipalities. This is 12 more than in the previous 2021 local polls, when it won in 42. The full article can be found here.

Serbia – 1 November 2025

A sea of people flowed along the roads leading up to Novi Sad railway station. They came in their tens of thousands to remember the 16 people who died there this time last year. The victims were standing or sitting underneath a concrete canopy at the recently-renovated facility, when it collapsed. The two youngest were just six years old, the oldest, 77. Regular protests have rocked Serbia in the 12 months that have followed. But on Saturday morning, the huge crowd participated in an event that put the emphasis on quiet commemoration. The full article can be found here.

Albania – 31 October 2025

Former Albanian Prime Minister Fatos Nano, the reformist leader who transformed the country’s Communist Party into a modern European-style Socialist Party and who steered Albania through several of its most turbulent post-communist years, has died at the age of 73. Nano, a figure at once admired, contested and indispensable to the narrative of Albania’s democratic transition, leaves behind a political legacy that remains central to the story of the country’s modern left. Nano served three times as prime minister and, in a career marked by dramatic returns and voluntary resignations, became a symbol of both sacrifice and contradiction.  The full article can be found here.

Croatia – 30 October 2025

The Serbian National Council, which represents ethnic Serbs in Croatia, on Thursday said it would file a criminal complaint against Igor Vukic and other participants in a debate staged by far-right parties in the Croatian parliament, accusing them of downplaying the crimes committed in the World War II Jasenovac concentration camp. The full article can be found here.

Bosnia & Hercegovina – 29 October 2025

In a sudden change of approach, the United States’ Office of Foreign Assets Control, OFAC on Wednesday lifted sanctions that had been imposed on the former president of Bosnia’s Serb-led Republika Srpska entity, Milorad Dodik, and on 47 individuals and companies connected to him.  Sanctions were also lifted from Zeljka Cvijanovic, the Serb member of Bosnia’s tripartite presidency and one of Dodik’s closest associates, Republika Srpska assembly speaker Nenad Stevandic, Dodik’s adult children, Igor and Gorica, and more than a dozen companies connected to them. The full article can be found here.

Bosnia & Hercegovina – 29 October 2025

The police in Tuzla Canton, one of ten cantons in Bosnia’s Federation entity, arrested seven individuals on Wednesday suspected of human trafficking and forcing minors into prostitution. Four of those arrested are police officers – Kalesija Police Department Inspector Besim Klopic, head of the Crime Division of Zivinice Police Miralem Halilovic, and two officers from the Zivinice Police – Jasmin Modric and Dzevad Pozegic. Zijad Jagodic, a former member of the state-level parliament and currently a professor at the European University in Brcko was also arrested. The full article can be found here.