OSCE Mission to Montenegro supports seminar on presumption of innocence

The OSCE Mission to Montenegro supported a seminar in Podgorica on 23 February 2015 on the right to the presumption of innocence as articulated by the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), with a particular focus on the role of the media and public officials.

Some 45 judges, prosecutors, representatives of the media, NGOs and the diplomatic community exchanged opinions, experiences and best practices related to the right to presumption of innocence as elaborated in Article 6 of the ECHR, and the relationship between freedom of expression in Article 10.

The President of the Supreme Court Vesna Medenica said that violations of the principle of presumption of innocence must be reduced in Montenegro. “On a daily basis, we see that public officials and politicians often violate the presumption of innocence by directly implicating the guilt of persons suspected or accused of various criminal offences, and sometimes even of those who are not even generally suspected or accused.”

Rob Force, Programme Manager of the Rule of Law and Human Rights Programme at the OSCE Mission, said: “In a democratic society, the presumption of innocence is a fundamental human right and a prerequisite to a fair trial for an individual charged with a criminal offence.  Protection of this right lies primarily with the judiciary, but other state officials as well as the media also play an important role in the protection of this human right.”

This seminar was held in co-operation with the British Embassy, German Embassy, Konrad Adenaur Stiftung, the Advice on Individual Rights in Europe (AIRE) Centre, the Centre for Democracy and Human Rights NGO and the Judicial Training Centre.

It is the latest seminar to be organized by the OSCE Rule of Law and Human Rights Programme in recent years to highlight and discuss the different articles of the ECHR Convention.