29 December 2020, Prishtina – The Ombudsperson Institution organized on Tuesday a press conference and published the preliminary data on the work of the Institution during 2020.

The Ombudsperson, Mr. Naim Qelaj, said that 2020 was a difficult and tragic year for those who lost their lives in the battle with COVID-19 and expressed his sorrow for the families who lost their loved ones.

Mr. Qelaj stressed that the human rights situation in the Republic of Kosovo during 2020 was characterized by two main challenges: changes in the legislative and government and the impact of the pandemic. He stressed that the changes in the government and the legislative have created delays in drafting and approving laws, while he considered the approval of the Istanbul Convention, which has become part of the country’s legislation, a success. The legislative had foreseen in this year’s plan the review and approval of 129 draft laws while it has approved only 14 laws.

The ombudsperson added that the change of government has also affected policy changes that have not shown consistency in addressing the pandemic challenge. The initial measures that were taken were in the absence of the principle of legality, disproportionate and without a plan of balancing the support and damages caused by the complete restriction of movement and paralysis of economic activities. He said that the support packages for recovery did not maintain the social balance, the problem of informality and tolerance is revealed precisely for the poorest sections of the population.

Mr. Qelaj emphasized that he has opened an ex officio case for the analysis of Law no. 07/L-016 on Economic Recovery – COVID -19, where, in the meantime, the OIK has received several individual complaints regarding this issue.

During 2020, the Ombudsperson Institution (OIK) has received a total of 1,349 complaints from citizens, while from this number 686 cases have been opened for investigation. Also, 43 cases were opened ex officio. The responsible authorities to which citizens’ complaints are addressed are: ministries with 390 cases, courts with 360 cases, municipalities with 230 cases, state prosecution offices with 62 cases and Kosovo Police with 62 cases and others.

Of these general complaints, the gender of complainants is men with 72.5 per cent and women with 27.5 per cent of cases reported to the OIK. Whereas, by ethnicity, the complaints that have been opened for investigation are as follows: Albanians 594 cases, Serbs 47 cases, Bosnians 17, Turks 10, Ashkali 5, Roma 3, Egyptians 3, Gorani 2 and others 5 cases.

On the other hand, the OIK for this year has closed 973 cases, of which 460 cases were positively resolved, in accordance with the request of the complainant. Whereas, 156 cases were considered inadmissible because no violations or mismanagement were found, while 144 cases were closed with a report. 108 cases were considered inadmissible because the cases were in use of legal remedies while 48 cases were inadmissible due to non-use of legal remedies. 41 cases were closed due to the complainant’s lack of interest and another 12 cases were inadmissible because they were out of jurisdiction and others.

The OIK has issued 178 recommendations to the responsible authorities from the investigated case reports, letters of recommendation, Amicus Curie, opinions and requests for interim measures.

Of these recommendations, 34 of them have been implemented by the responsible authorities, 12 recommendations are unimplemented and 132 recommendations are pending implementation.