Lawyers’ Committee for Human Rights – YUCOM, with all due respect for the Ministry of Interior’s call for citizens of the Republic of Serbia to decommission of weapons, expresses concerns about the way in which this Ministry has organized the action.
We want to remind that based on the newly adopted Law on Weapons and Ammunition the Ministry of Interior have called upon citizens to decommission all weapons and ammunition to the nearest police departments within the territory of Serbia in the next three months starting from March 4, 2015. Regarding the fact that the weapons and ammunition, including the explosive devices, are being decommissioned by the persons who haven’t been trained to use it, nor have the license for possessing, they are endangering the lives and physical integrity of both citizens and police officers by carrying them to the police station.
We call upon the authorities to avoid this risk and develop the way of conducting the aforementioned actions in a manner that does not endanger the physical integrity of the citizens. This can be done by adopting clear policies and procedures for safer transfer of these weapons and ammunition (for example, the citizens could call the trained police officers to seize weapons, instead of inviting people to bring their own weapons and ammunition, disregarding the lack of training).
We note that this announcement has been the result of several complains of conscientious employees of the Ministry of Internal who have addressed to YUCOM and expressed their concerns about the safety of citizens.
