Balkan Legal News – 29 October 2025

The following media round-up on international, legal and foreign policy issues from around the Balkans for the period from 22 October to 28 October 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

Bosnia & Hercegovina – 28 October 2025

The Mothers of Srebrenica and Zepa Enclaves is proposing that nishans – Muslim gravestones – be installed outside the cemetery at the Srebrenica Memorial Centre to commemorate all those whose bodies have not yet been found or identified from the July 1995 massacres. Munira Subasic, head of the Mothers of Srebrenica, which seeks justice for the victims of the 1995 massacre, told the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (“BIRN”) that they had decided to launch this initiative based on a decision by the High Representative, Bosnia’s peace overseer. This stipulated that, 30 years after the genocide, families have the right to build monuments for victims who have not been found. The full article is available here.

Bulgaria – 28 October 2025

Bulgaria and Germany’s Rheinmetall have agreed to build a new arms factory in Sopot, Bulgaria, worth €511.3 million. The plant, expected to open in 2027, will produce gunpowder and 155-mm NATO-standard artillery shells. Rheinmetall will own 51% of the joint venture, which is projected to create over 1,000 jobs. The full article can be found here.

Montenegro – 27 October 2025

Montenegrin Prime Minister Milojko Spajic announced on Sunday 28 October 2025 that his country intends to halt its visa-free regime for Turkish citizens, which allows them to stay for 90 days without a visa. “Under an urgent procedure, we will make a decision on the temporary suspension of the visa-free regime for Turkish nationals” Spajic wrote on X on Sunday. The decision follows an incident in a nightclub in Zabjelo, which resulted in the detention of 45 people. Two of them, a Turkish citizen and an Azerbajiani citizen, were later arrested for behaviour that resulted in several people being injured. The full article can be found here.

Kosovo – 24 October 2025

A Peje/Pec police station internal report, seen by BIRN, has revealed that over around one decade, from 2012 to 2023, police officers and management at the station had not processed over 380 potential criminal and civil violations as well as internal disciplinary cases. The ongoing prosecution investigation has revealed that police officers and management systematically failed to forward cases to the Peje/Pec prosecutor’s office, effectively bypassing their legal obligations by keeping the files in station drawers instead. The statute of limitations for many of these cases expired as a result, preventing further prosecution and leaving alleged offenders free. The full article can be found here.

Bosnia & Hercegovina – 23 October 2025

BIRN Bosnia and Hercegovina launched a database of children missing from the 1992-95 war in the country and staged a premiere of the new documentary Rodjeni ali ne postoje (The Unlived Lives) on Thursday in the capital, Sarajevo. The database was presented at an event, “Children Missing in War – 30 Years Later, What Next?”. It contains the cases of 35 children who went missing during the 1992-95 war, as well as testimonials from parents and family members who are still looking for them. The full article can be found here.

Greece – 23 October 2025

Greek Police on Thursday gave details about the arrests of 37 people allegedly involved in the so-called OPEKEPE scandal, in which an organised crime fraudulently obtained EU farming subsidies by making fake land ownership declarations. In an investigation led by the European Public Prosecutor’s Office, EPPO, police said they carried out an operation on Wednesday in areas across the country from Thessaloniki in northern Greece to the islands of Santorini and Crete. The full article can be found here.

Greece – 22 October 2025

Greece on Wednesday passed a bill assigning protection and management of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier to the Ministry of Defence. After two days of intense debate, the bill was approved with 159 votes in favour and 134 against, out of a total of 293 members of parliament. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on October 12 announced the upcoming regulation following Panos Ruci’s hunger strike in front of the tomb for 23 days. Ruci, father of one of the victims of the 2023 Tempi train crash, which claimed 57 lives, was demanding the exhumation of his son’s body. The full article can be found here.

Serbia – 22 October 2025

One person was shot on Wednesday in front of the Serbian parliament in Belgrade, where a pro-government tent camp has been situated since it was set up in March this year in an attempt to counter mass protests against President Aleksandar Vucic’s administration.  A tent in the controversial tent camp, which is known by the nickname ‘Caciland’, was also set on fire. Officials and prosecutors claimed the shooter was also responsible for this. The full article can be found here.

Turkey – 22 October 2025

Turkish and international media and rights groups, including BIRN, called on the Turkish government in a joint letter on Wednesday to withdraw a draft law restricting and possibly criminalising journalists who cover LGBTQ+ issues. “As press and freedom of expression organisations undersigned below, we call for the removal of the reported anti-LGBTQ+ provision from the 11th Judicial Package, which would restrict and possibly criminalise media reporting on the community”, wrote the 17 Turkish and international groups. The signatories include BIRN, the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom, ECPMF, European Federation of Journalists, EFJ, and the Media and Law Studies Association, MLSA. The full article can be found here.