10 Jun What Is Missing from the Ministry of Interior’s Internal Control Sector Annual Report?
The 2025 Annual Report of the Internal Control Sector (SUK) of the Ministry of Interior does not provide a breakdown of the criminal complaints initiated against police officers and other Ministry employees.
The report states that, out of 358 resolved criminal complaints, 170 concerned corruption-related offenses, while 188 concerned other criminal offenses. However, unlike in 2024, the report does not specify what falls under the category of “other criminal offenses.” In the 2024 report, the structure of these offenses was clearly explained and included offenses such as ill-treatment and torture committed by police officers. This raises the question: why were these data omitted from the 2025 report?
Last year saw numerous cases in which police used excessive force against citizens, particularly during August and September.
Disturbing footage emerged from Valjevo on August 14, showing police brutally beating citizens who were lying on the ground and offering no resistance. The videos showed numerous police officers kicking and striking citizens with batons while they lay on the ground. In one case, an officer deliberately struck a man in the groin area. In another video, an officer can be heard asking the man he was beating, “Are you an opposition supporter?” Forensic examinations of 25 individuals revealed the extent of the violence committed against the residents of Valjevo that night. Yet despite the evidence, no one has been held accountable.
In central Belgrade, members of the Unit for the Protection of Certain Persons and Facilities detained several citizens, including students, and took them to the garage of the Government of Serbia. According to one of the detained students, the then commander of the unit beat her and threatened her with rape. A student who was detained that same evening without any apparent reason also testified about violent treatment by members of the unit. He described being beaten in the government garage and threatened by a police officer who told him that he would “shoot him.”
The public was also shocked by footage from Novi Sad showing 15 young men detained during a protest, kneeling with their hands restrained and their heads against a wall while members of the Intervention Police Unit stood behind them. Among those detained were high school students. Police repeatedly used force against citizens in Novi Sad, including tear gas and stun grenades. In one intervention, an elderly man was injured after a police officer pushed him from behind, causing him to fall and hit his head on a curb.
The list of cases involving police brutality is long:
- A police officer repeatedly striking a student from Niš in the head
- A police officer hitting a woman with a baton during a protest in Belgrade
- The violent beating of demonstrators lying on the ground in Belgrade
- Citizens in Novi Sad being forced to lie on the ground for an hour during a September protest, causing some of them to become physically unwell
- Police beating an 18-year-old man from Novi Pazar after detaining him without any apparent reason
- A student with a bloodied face following a police intervention during a protest in Belgrade.
The only thing we have not seen is anyone being held accountable for this violence and brutality.
It should be recalled that Article 137 of the Criminal Code stipulates: “The criminal offense of ill-treatment and torture is punishable by imprisonment of up to one year. If, through the use of force, threats, or any other unlawful means, a person inflicts severe pain or suffering on another person in order to obtain a confession, statement, or other information from that person or a third party, or to intimidate, unlawfully punish, or discriminate against that person or a third party, the prescribed penalty is imprisonment of up to five years. If either of these offenses is committed by a public official in the performance of official duties, the offender shall be punished by imprisonment of up to three years, or up to ten years, respectively.”
We therefore ask the Internal Control Sector why it is concealing data on proceedings initiated for ill-treatment, torture, and the infliction of serious bodily harm. Whether such proceedings were initiated at all remains unclear. The Internal Control Sector has an obligation to provide answers to the public and to all victims of police brutality directed against citizens during the 2025 protests.
Despite years of warnings from civil society organizations and international bodies regarding cases of torture, inhuman and degrading treatment, abuse of police powers, and unlawful use of force, as well as numerous publicly available pieces of evidence and documented cases, the Internal Control Sector has demonstrated neither the capacity nor the willingness to ensure effective accountability of police officers.
For this reason, the new Draft Law on Internal Affairs represented an opportunity to address the long-standing weaknesses of the police oversight system. However, that opportunity has been missed. The draft law neither ensures the genuine institutional and operational independence of the Internal Control Sector nor establishes mechanisms that would guarantee its autonomy and effectiveness in investigating allegations of unlawful conduct by police officers. Instead of strengthening accountability and independent oversight, the proposed solutions leave the existing structural deficiencies untouched.