Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)

Serbian campaigners have now, 1/11/14, written to Mr Michael Davenport, the EU Ambassador to Serbia, regarding the situation of how Nani was originally taken from the family Mitic.

A full copy of the letter is provided below.  In many ways this shows that Serbian police and politicians are NOT enforcing the correct laws of the country.  Do they even know the laws that they are supposed to be enforcing ?

As Mr. Davenport is the EU Ambassador to Serbia is in very regular contact with the President of Serbia, Mr. Tomislav Nikolic, as well as we understand, witnessing the overseeing of the implementation of Serbian law; the results (or non results) of which can be reported back to the EU Enlargement Commission (who we have previously contacted). We now request that Mr. Davenport carefully analyses the information provided in the report and that he intervenes directly in cooperation with the Serbian authorities to get Nani  and the other animals being held by the hunters released back to the Mitic family immediately.

Below is the letter provided to Mr. Davenport; the EU Ambassador to Serbia.

As the letter finishes – “We believe you will help us, for Nani the fawn, and that the fawn will be with her family early as next week, at her home where she is eagerly waited for, so eagerly that it is painful to describe”.

We also hope that Mr. Davenport will act in support of Serbian law, his EU position, and also in favor of our lawful and correct attempts to have Nani and other animals taken from the hunters and returned to the family Mitic.

Prevod / Translation

EU Delegation in Republic of Serbia
Avenija19a, Vladimira Popovica 40/V,
Novi Beograd, Republic of Serbia

To the EU Ambassador in Serbia, Mr. Michael Davenport

31.10.2014

Dear Mr. Michael Davenport

We wanted to contact you about the problems we have. We want you to get to know us through our work, and point out the following facts: our non-governmental organization exists since 2003. It is dedicated to the protection of nature, environment, animal and human rights and for many years we operate in Serbia and cooperate with friends from the EU, especially with Mr. Mark Johnson from the UK, who has helped us a lot over the years in many ways and through advices on how to improve our work, and for that purposes he founded the website http://serbiananimalsvoice.com  which eventually became a place for all the problems we are dealing with as a NGO and he attracted with its content many activists from the Western Balkan countries, the whole Europe, and from the world.
Please visit http://serbiananimalsvoice.com  and get familiar with our work.

We wish to point out that we are ashamed of the reasons why we now turn to you because we have already addressed to all relevant and competent institutions in Serbia (since 08.08.2014), including the President of Serbia, Mr. Tomislav Nikolic, who was the only one who replied that he has no competence in this particular case, but that he will forward it to the relevant Ministry with a request to legally solve this problem. The Ministry is not responding even on the request of the President of the country!

We appealed to the Prime Minister, Mr. Aleksandar Vucic, to the Minister of Agriculture and Environmental Protection, to the Minister of Police, to the Minister of State Administration and Local Government, to all vice presidents of the Serbian government and all competent national inspection service – from 08.08.2014 until now they all failed to act in accordance with the applicable laws of the Republic of Serbia and to all our addressing there was no answer!

This is not an acceptable behavior for the state authorities of a country that wants to enter EU!

Our state authorities ignore addressing, submissions and requests of the citizens and civil society organizations. Minister of Agriculture and Environmental Protection, Mrs. Dr. Snezana Bogosavljević Boskovic, in whose direct responsibility is the mentioned problem, Prime Minister Mr. Aleksandar Vucic, Deputy Prime Minister Mr. Kori Udovicki, Police Minister Mr. Nebojsa Stefanovic because the police participated unlawfully in this case, as well as the inspection services and the local police, all because of the silence from the top of government, they continue to work illegally as it is tolerated by their superiors who we have enumerated.

It is a gross violation of human rights to abduct a property of another with the assistance of a local police, the police station Cicevac that belongs to the Police Department in Krusevac, of Rasina district.

On 01.08.2014 from the home and the property of the tripartite adult family, from the hands of Mrs. Dragana Mitic, her husband and son (street Luja Pastera br.6, Cicevac), a group of hunters has kidnapped, with the assistance of the police, a tame fawn just two months old, who was saved from a certain death by Mrs. Dragana Mitic when it was in coma, weighting only 450 grams due to which this fawn sees her as her own mother, and they all consider this fawn as a member of the family. This fawn was in a comatose state, abandoned, without mother and on the verge of death when it was found in the last days of May, 2014 by their neighbor Dejan Ignjatovic who was picking mushrooms and out of compassion brought the fawn with him with one humane intention: to save him! That is how the fawn arrived at Mrs. Dragana Mitic. When the fawn recovered and grew up, she became tame, since there was no other way to help her. She grew up with people who love her immensely. A group of hunters of the local hunting association came on the gate of the family and asked them to surrender to fawn, but they refused.

Nani, the fawn is the fifth this year that was taken this way by hunters. We have evidence for three of them, yet all 4 went missing because they were slaughtered after the hunters seized them, and that is prohibited by our laws.

As this family refused to surrender the fawn even after a bitter fight and argument with hunters, there appeared a police inspector Miroslav Vidakovic in his official car with two uniformed policemen from the police station Cicevac, who told the family: “I give you one hour to “make a deal” with hunters, and if you don’t surrender the fawn, I will come back with a court order to search your house and will file the criminal charges of 150-200 thousand RSD” – that has no basis in any law of Republic of Serbia.

He added to hunters while leaving: “keep an eye on them”. Such behavior does not fall within the lawful police work, that in this particular case had no business or jurisdiction, but the inspector Miroslav Vidakovic acted on his own initiative, protecting the interests of the Hunting Association where he was a longtime vice president, and doing damage to a weak fawn and violating the human rights of the family in whose possession the fawn was.

On complaints filed about his work, the response of Police Department Krusevac was that our complaints were unjustified, which is not in accordance with the Police Act. We have filed a charge to the Minister of Police on 28.09.2014 and to date there is no response. (Police Act)

Legit way for him was to show the family who kept the weak fawn and to hunters what and how they should do and exclude himself from the jurisdiction. Legit way for him was to call the competent Republican veterinary inspection or send them all (family and hunters) to veterinary inspection as a competent state service. (Animal Welfare Act).

Thus, under threats and pressure from police inspector Vidakovic, all three adults whose rights have been grossly violated, weeping and under a lot of stress, on 01.08.2014 they surrendered their gentle, weak fawn to hunters, and that is when the suffering begins to all of them and us as a NGO that helps the family to exercise their rights.

Republican veterinary inspection (hereinafter RVI) acted on our urgent charge from 08.08.2014 only on 26.08.2014 and ignored the Article 79 of the Animal Welfare Act (which mandates the return of the fawn to Mrs. Dragana Mitic’s family). RVI even ignored that Mrs. Dragana Mitic has the right to withhold the fawn and that she even began the adoption procedure on 10.8.2014, after we have (instead of state authorities) explained to her the lawful way and what she should do. No one told her that. The goal was just to take Nani the fawn away, at any cost, which they also had the intention to slaughter and failed to do so because we immediately upon learning of this case, filed the appropriate charges and we still keep a strong pressure on the state authorities, with daily control of the fawn’s state. All this is updated daily on the site http://serbiananimalsvoice.com

Article 58 of the Animal Welfare Act entitles the family of Mrs. Dragana Mitic to file a Request to the Minister of Agriculture who has the right and responsibility within 30 days to issue a consent that they can keep their tame fawn, as tame could never become a hunting game and can never go back to the hunting grounds, neither Serbia has a registered shelter for such tame specimens of wild animal species, in which the hunting is prohibited; and even if there was a registered shelter, this fawn already has his own human family, to which it is deeply attached by special mutual love, and that is impossible to ignore despite the ideal solution. Choosing the worse place and continuing to distort the welfare of Nani the fawn, especially because Mrs. Dragana Mitic’s family has all the necessary conditions for the life of this tame specimen. The Animal Welfare Act in its principles primarily deals with the protection of the welfare of all animals that are under the authority of this Act.

Minister of Agriculture to whom the request-plea was filed on 10.08.2014 and which we as a NGO supported, while everything being grounded in the Animal Welfare Act, is silent and is not responding for more than 90 days, what continues to affect the illegal operation of RVI; further undermines the well-being of the fawn and sends a clear message to the citizens that in Serbia nothing is changing, because the local power holders are still stronger than the law.

The Minister of Police is not punishing and he tolerates his personnel who use fraudulent threats in the interests of the hunting association whose member and a former vice president is a police inspector Mirosav Vidakovic, and the President of the Hunting Association, Mrs. Milija Djordjevic is a former Chief of Staff or Commander of Police Station Cicevac. Commission for the complaints on police work of Police Department Krusevac rejected our complaint as unfounded, although Mr. Miroslav Vidaković himself admitted it all in his official report. The second instance authority – Minister of Police is still silent, no response from him.

All state bodies that have mechanisms, the right and duty to act lawfully:
. either tread the laws and the Constitution and human rights,
. or remain silent, wait for us to get tired, give up and forget all illegal acts that they committed.

We filed a complaint about the work and disciplinary charges against
. inspector of RVI Krusevac, Ms. Slavica Jovanovic, because she acted belatedly and illegally
. hunting inspector who acted for a specific fawn, although wasn’t competent, and the content of the record is unlawful. Game and Hunting Law exempts these tame specimens of wild species and places them under the jurisdiction of other laws.

We filed a large number of charges to the Ministry of Agriculture and Environmental Protection regarding abduction, abuse of the fawn, locking the fawn in a dirty little space, starvation, closing the fawn with an African goat during his estrus when he could unknowingly hurt the little, weak fawn, which is female – after which the hunters slaughtered the goat out of sheer spite, only the baby goat remained by herself.

They even slaughtered tame fawn Susan for whose existence we unfortunately found out too late, but we received photos of her. She was also on the pheasant farm of the Hunting Association Cicevac. These are all illegal, arrogant actions that we were reporting without any effect, although all state agencies are aware of this case, and they all trample human rights of this family of three from Cicevac and NGO EPAR, and they all participate and enable with their own illegal actions further abuse of Nani the fawn, who is protected by all legal provisions exactly from this kind of people’s behavior which disrupts her well-being.

Please find attached the latest in a series, a charge from 27.10.2014 that we have filed to the Ministry of Agriculture, translated into English.

SAV comment – please click on the following to read a copy of the full Criminal Charge made  on 27/10/14 and issued by SAV on 28/10/14:

https://serbiananimalsvoice.com/2014/10/28/281014-serbia-and-england-a-manic-day-but-one-which-we-hope-witnesses-a-very-major-turn-for-the-benefit-of-all-animals-within-serbia/

We filed criminal charges against the above mentioned inspectors who have worked and continue to work illegally, as well as against the Minister of Agriculture – but our judiciary and prosecution services are not exempted from corruption, idleness, irresponsible work and malpractice, so we don’t have clear hope that they will solve it. In addition, they work very slow and tame fawn Nani doesn’t have much time.

Please, Dear Mr. Davenport, help us and if you can personally call and consult Mr. Aleksandar Vucic about this case (maybe he doesn’t know all this, maybe someone deliberately did not show or hide from him our charges because he didn’t respond and it doesn’t suit his behavior and attitudes).

We know that you are a great friend of Serbia and that you help us a lot in every way, and our Prime Minister, in who we believe and have a clear hope that he is determined and honest in his efforts to improve the credibility of Serbia for the benefit of all citizens.

In this regard, we turn to you, believing that this whole thing can be resolved very quickly and conveniently for the fawn herself and her family.

We believe you will help us, for Nani the fawn, and that the fawn will be with her family early as next week, at her home where she is eagerly waited for, so eagerly that it is painful to describe.

Best regards from us and we ask you to continue your mission in Serbia the same as you do now.

Sincerely,

EPAR – SERBIA OIPA / Alliance for the protection of nature, animal and human rights

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