FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 19, 2005
CONTACT: Andy Verich
202-463-8643
Honorable Terry Goddard
Attorney General
Office of the Attorney
General
1275 West Washington Street
Phoenix, AZ 85007
Dear Attorney General Goddard:
If has come to our attention that there has recently been a sweep of arrests in Phoenix, Arizona of Serb immigrants. They include men and women ranging in age up to 65 years old, many of them formerly victims of war crimes who spent time in concentration camps during the war in Bosnia & Herzegovina. This wholesale attack follows other similarly-based arrests during the last year.
The people in question have been charged with lying on an affidavit they signed during the immigration process denying that they served in military forces during the war. Coincidentally, the arrests have involved people who refused to participate as witnesses in the ICTY Srebrenica trial and focused on those who are located in Phoenix and other parts of Arizona.
Also coincidentally, these arrests have taken place since Ms. Camille Bibles became the new Assistant US Attorney in Nevada. Ms. Bibles was formerly a lawyer for the Office of the Prosecutor at ICTY involved in the Srebrenica case. One of the arrested parties was originally indicted as a war criminal identified by a Serb (protected) witness who identified him. But when official transcripts showed that the protected witness who fingered him admitted to lying about this man, the war crimes charge was dropped only to be followed by the new charge of lying on the affidavit. Furthermore when informing Ms. Bibles that he would not testify, the indicted was told that he would be sorry.
We are not aware of a similar wholesale attack on the basis of an affidavit on the tens of thousands of Croatian or Muslim immigrants from Bosnia & Herzegovina who also served in various military units during the war.
We are very concerned that:
- this action represents selective prosecution based on membership in an ethnic group;
- there has not been any prosecution of members of any other ethnic groups involved in this or other civil conflicts solely on the basis of membership in a foreign army
Can you please assist in assessing this problem by answering the following questions:
- Has your office conducted identical or similar investigations of other ethnic groups who were involved in the civil war in Bosnia or elsewhere and have been admitted to the US? If so, when, where and how many members of the other ethnic groups have been indicted? Or, is this simply limited to Serb immigrants?
- Have your representatives applied the same due diligence and in proportionally the same number of cases in examining members of other ethnic groups as you did with the Serbian immigrants? If not, why not? Please give us the specifics in this answer.
We are an organization of Americans of Serb background throughout the United States and our membership is very concerned with the discrimination implications in this action.
Best regards,
Nenad Vukicevic
President, Serbian Unity Congress
Cc: Secretary Condoleeza Rice, Department of State
Secretary Michael
Chertoff, Department of Homeland Security
Congressmen Dan Burton, Rahm
Emanuel, co-chairmen, Serbian Congressional Caucus
Senate and House
Committees on the Judiciary
Senate and House Subcommittees on Immigration and
Refugees
http://news.serbianunity.net/bydate/2005/September_20/27.html?w=p
