Bosnia Charges Catholic Cleric with Glorifying War Criminal

Monument to Slobodan Praljak in Capljina. Photo: Hercegovina.info The Bosnian state court on Thursday confirmed an indictment alleging that Father Petar Barbaric, a Catholic priest, gave a speech glorifying Slobodan Praljak after the unveiling of a monument to the deceased war criminal at a cemetery in the city of Capljina in November 2025. “The speech was broadcast by various electronic media outlets and internet portals, garnering a large number of views, as well as reactions from the public and citizens,” the state prosecutor’s office said in a statement. The indictment charges Barbaric with glorifying an individual who had been convicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, under a final verdict, of crimes against humanity and war crimes, thereby committing the criminal offence of “provoking ethnic, racial and religious hatred, conflicts and intolerance”. The investigation was opened in November last year after a photograph began circulating of the unveiling in Capljina of the monument to Praljak, wartime commander of the Main Headquarters of the Croatian Defence Council, the Bosnian Croat wartime military force. The monument features Praljak’s likeness carved into stone, with the inscription: “Praljak, Croatian General,” his place and year of birth – “Capljina, 1945” – and the year and place of his death: “The Hague, 2017.” In November 2017, the Hague Tribunal convicted Praljak, along with five other high-ranking officials of the unrecognised Croat-led wartime statelet of Herzeg-Bosnia, sentencing him to 20 years in prison for crimes against Bosniaks. During the reading of the verdict, Praljak took poison and died the same day. Under amendments to the Bosnian Criminal Code imposed in July 2021 by the High Representative, the international overseer of the continuing implemetation of the Dayton Peace Agreement, denying genocide and other war crimes was outlawed. It also became a punishable offense to bestow honours or awards, or erect monuments or any other form of memorial, to a person convicted under a final verdict of genocide, crimes against humanity or war crimes. When news of the installation of a monument to Praljak first emerged, Emir Hajdarevic, president of the Mostar Association of Camp Inmates, said it showed that some still see war criminals as heroes. “This is yet another crime against the victims of Herzegovina committed in Capljina, which is known for the crimes at Gabela and Silos [wartime detention camps in the Herzegovina area],” Hajdarevic said.