CCPR/C/115/D/2048/2011 3.10 Dino Kadirić submits that he was 5 years old when the events took place. He was forced to grow up without his father and the impossibility of adequately mourning him. Being in an especially vulnerable situation, he witnessed his father’s apprehension, illtreatment and arbitrary execution. Despite their obligation to adopt special measures of protection, the State party’s authorities left him in a painful situation of uncertainty concerning the whereabouts of his father’s body. He therefore submits that the State party has violated his rights under article 24 (1), read in conjunction with articles 2 (3) and 7, of the Covenant, as he was a minor in need of special protection until he reached the age of majority on 2 September 2005. 3.11 The authors request the Committee to recommend the State party to: (a) order an independent investigation as a matter of urgency to locate, exhume, identify and respect Ermin Kadirić’s mortal remains and return them to the family; (b) bring the perpetrators before the competent authorities for prosecution, judgement and sanction, and disseminate publicly the results of this measure; (c) ensure that the relatives of Ermin Kadirić obtain integral reparation and prompt, fair and adequate compensation; and (d) ensure that the measures of reparation cover material and moral damage and measures of restitution, rehabilitation, satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition. The State party should also provide the authors with, inter alia, medical and psychological care immediately and free of charge through its specialized institutions, in order to reduce the psychological and mental suffering that these events have caused them. The State party should also ensure that the interpretation by the State Attorney’s Office of the Republika Srpska of the Law on Compensation does not discriminate against relatives of civilian victims of war by systematically excluding them from compensation. State party’s observations on admissibility and the merits 4.1 In a note verbale dated 21 June 2011, the State party submitted its observations on admissibility and the merits. It referred to the legal framework that had been established for the prosecution of war crimes in the post-war period since December 1995. It stated that the National Strategy for War Crimes Processing had been adopted in December 2008, with the objective of finalizing the prosecution of the most complex war crimes within seven years, and of “other war crimes” within 15 years of the adoption of the Strategy. The State party further referred to the adoption of the Law on Missing Persons, creating MPI with the aim of improving the process of tracing missing persons and identifying mortal remains, and recalled that, of the nearly 30,000 persons who had gone missing during the war, the remains of 20,000 persons had been found and 18,000 identified. 4.2 In April 2009, MPI had established a regional office in Sanski Most, as well as a field office and organizational units. The State party considered that those initiatives created the conditions necessary for faster and more efficient processes to search for disappeared persons in the territory of Bosnian Krajina, including Prijedor. Their investigators were on site every day to collect information on potential mass graves and to establish contacts with witnesses. Since 1998, 721 graves had been exhumed and 48 other graves re-exhumed in that area, including the municipality of Prijedor. The State party further informed the Committee that one grave with 15 unidentified human corpses had been located in the area of Rizvanovići and that a request for exhumation had been sent to the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina. 4.3 As part of its observations, the State party forwarded to the Committee a letter from the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina, in which it was pointed out that, according to its records, the authors had never applied to the Prosecutor’s Office for an investigation into Ermin Kadirić’s fate and whereabouts, although the events had happened during the armed conflict and involved the possible commission of a war crime. Accordingly, the Prosecutor’s Office held that it was “doubtful whether [the authors] have 9