generalspeaking

Sunday, September 03, 2017

Canadian Citizenship

"As such, he was legally responsible for the RS MUP police [of the Bosnian Serb Republic in the early 1990s] and their acts."
"[Cedo Kljajic was] a staunch supporter [of the ethnic Serb police force, took part in its creation, was responsible for oversight and direction of police work until 1992]."
"[Early in the conflict, Kljajic] had full knowledge [of crimes committed by his subordinates in the Serb police force]."
Government of Canada statement of claim

Stacks of unidentified corpses line the walls of an underground shelter at a Bosnian morgue in Tuzla March 28, 1997 (Image: Reuters)

Appointed undersecretary of public security for the Bosnian Serb Republic, Cedo Kljajic is finding his past catching up to him at the present, as a citizen of Quebec. When tensions arose in late 1991 between Serb, Croat and Muslim party leaders, according to the federal statement presented in the Federal Court of Canada, it heralded the breaking away of Bosnia and Herzegovina from Yugoslavia, fostering the emergence of Bosnian Serb political, administrative and police institutions.

War broke out just as Bosnia and Herzegovina declared their independence, resulting in the focus of the Bosnian Serb leadership to engineer an ethnically homogeneous enclave through the elimination of Bosnian Muslims and Croats from the regions the Serbs claimed as their own. Active and reserve members of the RS MUP police in their thousands participated in a brutal attack campaign, including:

Arbitrary and illegal arrest and detention of a significant proportion of the non-Serbian population comprised mostly of men, under often inhumane conditions;
Mistreatment, mental and physical torture, sexual assaults and the slaughter of many detainees;
Forced displacement of non-Serb civilians, along with looting and destruction of property.

Mr. Kljajic, now living as a Canadian citizen in Quebec, is facing claims he produced false statements relative to his past when he made application to obtain permanent residency status in Canada in 1995, and following that, citizenship in 1999. The Government of Canada has initiated a move to strip citizenship from this man because of his background in committing war crimes in the former Yugoslavia.

31 March 1993: Bosnian Muslim refugees are transported on a UN truck in a convoy as they flee the Serb-besieged enclave of Srebrenica for Tuzla Pascal Guyot/AFP

His false statements render him, under Canadian immigration law, inadmissible to Canada; the penalty for making false claims resulting in the revocation of citizenship. The senior position he was named to in April 1992 giving him responsibility for the RS MUP police whose systematic, widespread attacks against non-Serb civilians render him inadmissible for entry to Canada, much less landed immigrant status leading to citizenship.

Canada had designated the Bosnian Serb government, back in 1993, as a regime whose commission of gross human rights violations and crimes against humanity ensures that any senior official of that government would be inadmissible to Canada. Mr. Kljajic's application for permanent resident status in the refugee class registered in 1995 made no mention of his senior role in the Bosnian Serb regime. Instead, he had claimed himself to have been a lawyer in Sarajevo.

As well, this man denied having ever been involved in any crimes against humanity. All of which belie reality. All of which ensure that as a violator of human rights and an active participant in a cruel and bitter conflict render him inadmissible for residence in Canada.